Adwa (also spelled Adowa, Aduwa, or Adua) is a market town in northern Ethiopia, and best known as the community closest to the decisive Battle of Adowa fought in 1896 with Italian troops. Amazingly, Ethiopian soldiers won the battle. Located in the Mehakelegnaw Zone of the Tigray Region, Adwa has a longitude and latitude of , and an elevation of 1907 meters.

Based on figures from the Central Statistical Agency in 2005, Adwa has an estimated total population of 42,672, of whom 20,774 were males and were 21,898 females. The 1994 census reported it had a total population of 24,519 of whom 11,062 were males and 13,457 were females. It is the largest town in Adwa woreda.

Adwa is home to several notable churches: Adwa Awraja Fird Bet, Adwa Gebri'el Bet (built by Dejazmach Wolde Gebriel), Adwa Maryam Bet (built by Ras Anda Haymanot), Adwa Medhane `Alem Bete (built by Ras Sabagadis), Adwa Nigiste Saba Huletenya Dereja Timhirt Bet, and Adwa Selasse Bet. Near Adwa is Abba Garima Monastery, founded in the sixth century by one of the Nine Saints and known for its tenth century gospels. Also nearby is the village of Fremona, which had been the base of the 16th century Jesuits sent to convert Ethiopia to Catholicism.

History

According to Richard Pankhurst, Adwa derives its name from Adi Awa (or Wa), "Village of the Awa"; the Awa are an ethnic group mentioned in the anonymous Monumentum Adulitanum that once stood at Adulis. Francisco Alvares records tha the Portuguese diplomatic mission passed Adwa, which he called "Houses of St. Michael," in August 1520.

Despite this claim of antiquity, Adwa only acquired major importance following the establishment of a permanent capital at Gondar. As the traveller James Bruce noted, Adwa was situated on a piece of "flat ground through which every body must go in their way from Gondar to the Red Sea"; the person who controlled this plain could levy profitable tolls on the caravans which passed through. By 1700, it had become the residence for the governor of Tigray province, and grew to overshadow Debarwa, the traditional seat of the Bahr negus, as the most important town in northern Ethiopia. Its market was important enough to need a nagadras; the earliest known person to hold this office was the Greek emigre Janni of Adwa, a brother of Petros, chamberlain to Emperor Iyoas I. Adwa was home for a small colony of Greek merchants into the 1800s.

Because of its local on this major trade route, it is mentioned in the memoirs of numerous 19th-century Europeans visiting Ethiopia. These include Henry Salt, Samuel Gobat, Mansfield Parkyns, Arnaud and Antoine d'Abbadie, and Théophile Lefebvre. After the defeat and death of Ras Sabagadis in the Battle of Debre Abbay, its inhabitants fled Adwa for safety. The town was briefly held by Emperor Tewodros II in January 1860, who had marched from the south in response to the rebellion of Agew Neguse, who had burned then fled the town.

Giacomo Naretti passed through Adwa in March 1879, after it had been devastated by a typhus epidemic. It had been reduced to a shadow of itself, having about 200 inhabitants.

Its geographical importance has also led to Adwa's greatest importance, being the site of the final battle of the First Italo–Ethiopian War, where Emperor Menelik II fought to defend Ethiopia's independence against Italy in 1896. Menelik led the Ethiopian Army to a decisive victory against the Italians, which ensured an independent Ethiopia until the Italians invaded again on the eve of the Second World War. A large tree at the edge of town was pointed out to visitors in the following years as where Emperor Menelik passed judgement on the Eritreans captured in the battle.

The Asmara-Addis Ababa telegraph line, constructed by the Italians in 1902-1904, passed through Adwa and had an office there. By 1905 it was considered the third-largest town in Tigray. Telephone service reached Adwa by 1935, but no phone numbers are listed for the town in 1954.

On 6 October 1935 Italian forces entered Adwa, after two days of bombardment had shocked Ras Seyoum Mengesha into a hasty retreat, abandoning large stocks of food and other supplies. The Italian Gavinana Division brought with them a stone monument in honor of the Italian soldiers ahd who fallen in 1896. This monument was erected immediately after their arrival, and inaugurated on 15 October in the presence of General Emilio De Bono. The town passed from Italian hands by 12 June 1941, when the newly arrived 34th Indian State Force Brigade set up a post office there.

During the Woyane rebellion, 6000 of the territorial troops retreated to Adwa on 22 September 1943. By 1958 Adwa was one of 27 places in Ethiopia ranked as First Class Township. During the 1960s the town was not only an educational center but also an early focus for nationalist dissent, indicated by the fact that all three of the leaders of the Tigrayan People's Liberation Front (TPLF) over the 22-year period from 1975 to 1997, Aregowie Berhe, Sebhat Nega, and Meles Zenawi, all came from Adwa and attended the town's government school.

Adwa was frequent target of attacks by the TPLF during the Ethiopian Civil War: in 1978 the TPLF attacked Adwa; in 1979 it unsuccessfully tried to rob the bank. The town permanently passed into TPLF control in March 1988. Adwa and its environs are the native district of many of the core leaders of the TPLF which lead Ethiopia today, and the district is represented in Parliament by Prime Minister Meles Zenawi himself.

Films

• Adwa (1999). Directed by Haile Gerima.

See also

• Battle of Adowa

Notes