eing de­sirous to make known to our friends the Pow­ers (Sov­er­eigns) of Eu­rope the bound­aries of Ethiopia, we have ad­dressed also to you (your Majesty) the pre­sent let­ter.

10th April, 1891

These are the bound­aries of Ethiopia:-

Start­ing from the Ital­ian bound­ary of Arafale, which is sit­u­ated on the sea, the line goes west­ward over the plain (Meda) of Gegra to­wards Mahio, Ha­lai, Digsa, and Gura up to Adibaro. From Adibaro to the junc­tion of the Rivers Mareb and Arated.

From this point the line runs south­ward to the junc­tion of the At­bara and Setit Rivers, where is sit­u­ated the town known as Tomat.

From Tomat the fron­tier em­braces the Province of Ged­eref up to Karkoj on the Blue Nile. From Karkoj the line passes to the junc­tion of the So­bat River with the White Nile. From thence the fron­tier fol­lows the River So­bat in­clud­ing the coun­try of Ar­bore, Gal­las and reaches Sam­buru.

To­wards the east are in­cluded within the fron­tier the coun­try of the Bo­rana Gal­las and Arussi coun­try up to the lim­its of the So­ma­lis, in­clud­ing also the Province of Ogaden .

To the north­ward the line of the fron­tier in­cludes the Habar Awal, the Gad­abursi, and Essa So­ma­lis , and reaches Am­bos.

Leav­ing Am­bos the line in­cludes Lake As­sal, the province of our an­cient vas­sal Mo­hamed An­fari, skirts the coast of the sea, and re­joins Arafale.

While trac­ing to­day the ac­tual bound­aries of my Em­pire, I shall en­deav­our, if God gives me life and strength, to re-es­tab­lish the an­cient fron­tiers (trib­u­taries) of Ethiopia up to Khar­toum, and as Lake Nyanza with all the Gal­las.

Ethiopia has been for four­teen cen­turies a Chris­t­ian is­land in a sea of pa­gans. If pow­ers at a dis­tance come for­ward to par­ti­tion Africa be­tween them, I do not in­tend to be an in­dif­fer­ent spec­ta­tor.

As the Almighty has pro­tected Ethiopia up to this day, I have con­fi­dence He will con­tinue to pro­tect her, and in­crease her bor­ders in the fu­ture . I am cer­tain He will not suf­fer her to be di­vided among other Pow­ers.

For­merly the bound­ary of Ethiopia was the sea. Hav­ing lacked strength suf­fi­cient, and hav­ing re­ceived no help from Chris­t­ian Pow­ers, our fron­tier on the sea coast fell into the power of the Mus­lim-man.

At pre­sent we do not in­tend to re­gain our sea fron­tier by force, but we trust that the Chris­t­ian Power, guided by our Sav­iour, will re­store to us our sea-coast line, at any rate, cer­tain points on the coast .

Writ­ten at Ad­dis Ababa, the 14 th Mazir, 1883 (10 th April, 1891).

(Trans­lated di­rect from the Amharic.)

Adis Ababa, 4 th May, 1897.

This let­ter was ad­dressed to Britain, France, Ger­many, Italy and Rus­sia

Pub­lic Records Of­fice (Lon­don), For­eign Of­fice 1/​32 Rodd to Sal­lis­bury, No. 15, 4 th May. Also see The So­mali Penin­sula, p. 86

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