Queen of Sheba
The Queen of Shebah (Hebrew: מלכת שבא, Malkat Shva; Ge'ez: ንግሥተ ሳባ, Nigiste Saba (Nəgəstä Saba); Arabic: ملكة سبأ, Malikat Sabaʾ) was a monarch of the ancient kingdom of Sheba and is referred to in Habeshan history, the Hebrew Bible, the New Testament, and the Qur'an. There is no evidence of her existence outside the texts of these four sources.[1] She is widely assumed to have been a queen regnant, although there is no historical proof of this; in fact, she may have been a queen consort.[1] The location of her historical kingdom is believed to be in Yemen or Ethiopia.[2]
Diverse referencesKnown to the Ethiopian people as Makeda or Maqueda (ማክዳ mākidā),[3] this queen has been called a variety of names by different peoples in different times. To King Solomon of Israel she was the Queen of Sheba. In Islamic tradition she was calledBalqis or Balkis by the Arabians, who say she came from the city of Sheba, also called Mareb, in Yemen or Arabia Felix. The Roman historian Josephus calls her Nicaule. She is thought to have been born on January 5, sometime in the 10th century BC.
In the Hebrew Bible, a tradition of the history of nations is preserved in Genesis 10. In Genesis 10:7 there is a reference to Sheba, the son of Raamah, the son of Cush, the son of Ham, son of Noah. In Genesis 10:26-29 there is a reference to another person named Sheba, listed along with Almodad, Sheleph, Hazarmaveth, Jerah, Hadoram, Uzal, Diklah, Obal, Abimael, Ophir, Havilah, and Jobab as the descendants of Joktan, the son of Eber, the son of Shelah, the son of Arphaxad, the descendant of Shem, another son of Noah.
Aharoni, Avi-Yonah, Rainey, and Safrai placed the Semitic Sheba in Southern Arabia in geographic proximity to the location of the tribes descended from their ancestor, Joktan. In addition to Sheba, Hazarmaveth and Ophir were identified. Semitic Havilah was located in Eastern Africa, modern day Ethiopia. Semitic Havilah (Beresh't 10:29) is to be distinguished from Cushite Havilah (Beresh't 10:7), the descendant of Cush, descendant of Ham; both locations for Havilah are thought by these scholars to have been located in present day Ethiopia.[4]
Hebrew biblical account
According to the Hebrew Bible, the unnamed queen of the land of Sheba heard of the great wisdom of King Solomon of Israel and journeyed there with gifts of spices, gold, precious stones, and beautiful wood and to test him with questions, as recorded in First Kings 10:1-13 (largely copied in 2 Chronicles 9:1–12).
It is related further that the queen was awed by Solomon's great wisdom and wealth, and pronounced a blessing on Solomon's God. Solomon reciprocated with gifts and "everything she desired." Solomon offered to give her everything his kingdom had to offer except the "royal bounty." Therefore, according to the Bible, "she turned and went to her country, she and her servants." The queen apparently was quite rich, however, as she brought four and a half tons of gold with her to give to Solomon (1 Kings 10:10).
In the biblical passages which refer explicitly to the Queen of Sheba there is no hint of love or sexual attraction between Solomon and the Queen of Sheba. The two are depicted merely as fellow monarchs engaged in the affairs of state.
The biblical text, Song of Solomon (Song of Songs), contains some references, which at various times, have been interpreted as referring to love between Solomon and the Queen of Sheba. The young woman of the Song of Songs, however, continues to deny the romantic advances of her suitor, whom many commentators identify as King Solomon. In any case, there is little to identify this speaker in the text with the rich and powerful foreign queen depicted in the Book of Kings. The woman of the text of the song clearly does regard "The Daughters of Jerusalem" as her peer group [citation needed]Qur'anic AccountThe Qur'an, the central religious text of Islam, mentions the Queen by name in the 34th Chapter of the Holy Book. Arab sources name herBalqis or Bilqis. The Qur'anic narrative, from sura 27 (An-Naml),[5] has Solomon getting reports from the Hoopoe bird about the kingdom of Saba (Sheba), ruled by a queen whose people worship the sun instead of God. Solomon sends a letter inviting her to visit him and submit fully to the One God, Allah, Lord of the Worlds according to the Islamic text. The Queen of Sheba is unsure whether to accept his invitation and does not wish to behave as a king would: 'entering a country, despoiling it and making the most honorable of its people its lowest'. So she decides to send Solomon gifts and await his response. He then sends back a response warning her and her people about the power he has. Queen Sheba sends him back gifts. Solomon is unimpressed by the Queen's gifts, stating that the gifts he has received from God are far greater in value.
Upon discovering that the Queen is coming to meet him, Solomon asked his people if anyone can bring the throne of the Queen before she arrives. A jinn under the control of Solomon proposed that he will bring it before Solomon rises from his seat. One who had knowledge of the "Book" proposed to bring him the throne of Bilqis 'in the twinkling of an eye' and accomplished that immediately.[6] The queen arrives at his court, is shown her throne and asked: does your throne look like this? She replied: (It is) as though it were it. When she enters his crystal palace she accepts Abrahamic monotheism and the worship of God alone.
Ethiopian account
The imperial family of Ethiopia claims its origin directly from the offspring of the Queen of Sheba by King Solomon.[7] The Queen of Sheba (ንግሥተ ሣብአ nigiśta Śab'a), is named Makeda (ማክዳ) in the Ethiopian account.
The etymology of her name is uncertain, but there are two principal opinions about its Ethiopian source. One group, which includes the British scholar Edward Ullendorff, holds that it is a corruption of "Candace", the Ethiopian queen mentioned in the New Testament Acts; the other group connects the name withMacedonia, and relates this story to the later Ethiopian legends about Alexander the Great and the era of 330 BCE.
The Italian scholar Carlo Conti Rossini, however, was unconvinced by either of these theories and, in 1954 stated that he believed the matter unresolved.[8]
An ancient compilation of Ethiopian legends, Kebra Negast ('the Glory of Kings'), is dated to seven hundred years ago and relates a history of Makeda and her descendants. In this account King Solomon is said to have seduced the Queen of Sheba and sired her son, Menelik I, who would become the first Emperor of Ethiopia.
The narrative given in the Kebra Negast - which has no parallel in the Hebrew Biblical story - is that King Solomon invited the Queen of Sheba to a banquet, serving spicy food to induce her thirst, and inviting her to stay in his palace overnight. The Queen asked him to swear that he would not take her by force. He accepted upon the condition that she, in turn, would not take anything from his house by force. The Queen assured that she would not, slightly offended by the implication that she, a rich and powerful monarch, would engage in stealing. However, as she woke up in the middle of the night, she was very thirsty. Just as she reached for a jar of water placed close to her bed, King Solomon appeared, warning her that she was breaking her oath, water being the most valuable of all material possessions. Thus, while quenching her thirst, she set the king free from his promise and they spent the night together.
Other Ethiopian accounts make her the daughter of a king named Agabo or Agabos, in some legends said to have become king after slaying the mythological serpent Arwe; in others, to have been the 28th ruler of the Agazyan tribe. In either event, he is said to have extended his Empire to both sides of the Red Sea.[citation needed]
The tradition that the Biblical Queen of Sheba was a ruler of Ethiopia who visited King Solomon in Jerusalem, in ancient Israel, is supported by the first century CE. Roman (of Jewish origin) historian Flavius Josephus, who identified Solomon’s visitor as a "Queen of Egypt and Ethiopia".[9]
While there are no known traditions of matriarchal rule in Yemen during the early first millennium BC, the earliest inscriptions of the rulers of Dʿmt in northern Ethiopia and Eritrea mention queens of very high status, possibly equal to their kings.[10]
Possible Egyptian derivation
Josephus says in his Antiquity of the Jews, book 8 chapter 6, that it was the "queen of Egypt and Ethiopia" who visited King Solomon. Queen of the South (biblical reference) is made by Jesus in Matthew 12:42 and Luke 11:31. Daniel 11:5 and 8 identify the South as Egypt. There also have been claims that the ancient Egyptian name Hatshepsut translates as "Queen of Sheba".[11]Hatshepsut was a pharaoh of Egypt, born c. 1508 and died 1458 BC, who revived active trade with neighboring kingdoms and created a flourishing and prosperous economy for her eighteenth dynasty kingdom. Solar deities are most closely associated with her dynasty, the one founded by her grandfather and credited to the patron deity of Thebes, Amun. She is recorded as going on a famous journey to the land of Punt, though no one knows for sure where Punt is.
Sheba may be derived from the ancient Egyptian word for star. The Kingdom of Kush was also located in southern Egypt. According to the eleventh century geographer Yaqut al-Hamawi, the star-worshippers of Harran in Turkey and those from Yemen, went on special pilgrimages to the pyramids of Giza. The "Queen of Sheba" may have referred to the title of the Kandake when acting as the chief astronomer or high priestess of a star-venerating religion that was centered in Africa, with satellite centers in Arabia, Asia, and Europe.
The "star-worshippers" also studied or venerated the sun and moon. The roots of star veneration or star study date back to well before 5000 B.C. Evidence for a level of sophistication and knowledge of astronomy has been found at several archaeological sites in Africa, including the complex at Nabta Playa in southern Egypt. The structure at Nabta is almost 7,000 years old, and is the oldest astronomical complex in the world.
Other astronomical sites in Africa include: Namoratunga II, near Lake Turkana, in Kenya, which was in use around 300 BC; theSenegambian stone circles; and the Bouar megaliths in what is now the Central African Republic.
Nubia - another possible location
The tradition of the Candaces is well documented in Nubia, where the rule of its many queens recedes into prehistoric times and there the title Kentakes is a term used to describe the long tradition of leadership in Nubia by warrior queens.[citation needed] Nubia was south of Ancient Egypt, also divided by the Nile River and bordered by the Red Sea and, it is another candidate for the location of Sheba and the famous queen. The history of Nubia provides examples of a tradition and a wealthy kingdom that could be the original kingdom of the Queen of Sheba. The economics of the culture was based upon trade. David Jones, in Women Warriors: a History, relates that in 332 BC Alexander the Great attempted to lead his army into Nubia. At its border, he was confronted by the brilliant military formations devised by their warrior queen, Candace of Meroë. She led her army on the opposite side of the border from atop an elephant. Alexander withdrew and redirected his forces to enter Egypt instead.[12] It should be noted that this story is thought by scholars to be legendary, and Alexander appears never to have attacked Nubia.[13][14] That was the beginning of the Greek rule of Egypt that would last for three hundred years until the Roman occupation in 30 BC.
Strabo also describes a similar clash with the Romans, in which the Roman army was defeated by Nubian archers under the leadership of another queen of Nubia. This queen was described as "one-eyed", being blind in one eye or represented only in profile.[15] The strategic formations used by this second queen are well documented in Strabo's description of her victory.
Old Kingdom Egyptian accounts of trade missions first mentioned Nubia in 2300 BC. Egyptians imported gold, incense, ebony,ivory, and exotic animals from tropical Africa through Nubia. Aswan, right above the First Cataract, marked the southern limit of Egyptian control. As trade between Egypt and Nubia increased, so did wealth and stability.[citation needed]
By the sixth dynasty of Egypt, Nubia was divided into a series of small kingdoms. Scholars debate whether these peoples, who flourished from c. 2240 BC to c. 2150 BC, were the result of another internal evolution, wars, or invaders. The Sahara Desert was becoming too arid to support human beings. During the Egyptian Middle Kingdom (c. 2040–1640 BC), Egypt began expanding into Nubia to gain more control over the trade routes in Northern Nubia and direct access to trade with southern Nubia. They erected a chain of forts down the Nile below the Second Cataract in the river. These garrisons seemed to have had peaceful relations with the local Nubian people, but little interaction during the period.[citation needed]
A contemporaneous, but distinct, culture was the Pan Grave culture, so called because of their shallow graves. Shallow graves produced mummies naturally. The Pan Graves are associated with the eastern bank of the Nile, but the Pan Graves and western groups definitely interacted. The Kingdom of Kerma arose as the first kingdom to unify much of the region. It was named for its presumed capital at Kerma, one of the earliest urban centers in tropical Africa. By 1750 BC, the rulers of Kerma were powerful enough to organize the labor for monumental walls and structures of mud brick. They created rich tombs with possessions for the afterlife and large human sacrifices. The craftsmen were skilled in metalworking and the quality of their pottery surpassed that of Egypt. Excavated sites at Kerma yielded large tombs and a palace-like structure ('Deffufa'), alluding to the early stability in the region.[citation needed]
The early tradition of astronomical observations in Nubia is reflected by the presence of megaliths discovered at Nabta Playa that are examples of what may be the world's first Archaeoastronomy devices, predating Stonehenge by at least 1000 years.[16]According to one authority, the complexity observed at Nabta Playa, likely formed the basis for the structure of both the Neolithicsociety at Nabta and the Old Kingdom of Egypt.[17] Hence the long tradition of studying the stars and the sun such as the references in the Old Testament, and the knowledge of new phenomena provoking the travel of the Magi.
Christian interpretations
The Queen of Sheba is believed to be the Queen of the South referenced in Matthew 12:42 and Luke 11:31 in the New Testament, where Jesus indicates that she and the Ninevites will judge the generation of Jesus' contemporaries who rejected him.
Christian interpretations of the scriptures mentioning the Queen of Sheba in the Hebrew Bible, the Old Testament, typically have emphasized both the historical and metaphorical values in the story. The account of the Queen of Sheba is thereby interpreted by Christians as being both a metaphor and an analogy: the Queen's visit to Solomon has been compared to the metaphorical marriage of the Church to Christ where Solomon is the anointed one or the messiah and Sheba represents a Gentile population submitting to the messiah; the Queen of Sheba's chastity has also been depicted as a foreshadowing of the Virgin Mary; and the three gifts that she brought (gold, spices, and stones) have been seen as analogous to the gifts of the Magi (gold, frankincense, and myrrh). The latter is emphasized as being consistent with a passage from Isaiah 60:6; And they from Sheba shall come: they shall bring forth gold and incense; and they shall show forth the praises of the Lord.[18] This last connection is interpreted[who?] as relating to the Magi, the learned astronomers of Sheba who saw a new star and set off on a journey to find a new ruler connected to the new star, that led them to Bethlehem.
Medieval depictions
Art in the Middle Ages depicting the visit of the Queen of Sheba includes the Portal of the Mother of God at the 13th centuryAmiens Cathedral, which is included as an analogy as part of a larger depiction of the gifts of the Magi.[19] The 12th century cathedrals at Strasbourg, Chartres, Rochester and Canterbury include artistic renditions in such elements as stained glass windows and door jamb decorations.[18]Renaissance depictionsBoccaccio's On Famous Women (Latin: De Mulieribus Claris) follows Josephus in calling the Queen of Sheba, Nicaula. Boccaccio goes on to explain that not only was she the Queen of Ethiopia and Egypt, but also the queen of Arabia. She also is related to have had a grand palace on "a very large island" called Meroe, located someplace near the Nile river, "practically on the other side of the world." From there Nicaula crossed the deserts of Arabia, through Ethiopia and Egypt, and up the coast of the Red Sea, to come to Jerusalem to see "the great King Solomon".[20]
Christine de Pizan's The Book of the City of Ladies continues the convention of calling the Queen of Sheba, Nicaula. Piero della Francesca's frescoes in Arezzo (ca 1466) on the Legend of the True Cross, contain two panels on the visit of the Queen of Sheba to Solomon. The legend links the beams of Solomon's palace (adored by Queen of Sheba) to the wood of the crucifixion. The Renaissance continuation of the metaphorical view of the Queen of Sheba as an analogy to the gifts of the Magi also is clearly evident in theTriptych of the Adoration of the Magi (c. 1510), by Hieronymus Bosch. Bosch chooses to depict a scene of the Queen of Sheba and Solomon in an ornately decorated collarworn by one of the Magi.[21]
Christopher Marlowe's Doctor Faustus refers to the Queen of Sheba as Saba, when Mephistopheles is trying to persuade Faustusof the wisdom of the women with whom he supposedly shall be presented every morning.[22]
Modern Arab academic view
Some modern Arab academics have placed the Queen of Sheba as a ruler of a trading colony in Northwest Arabia, established bySouth Arabian kingdoms[citation needed]. Modern archaeological finds do confirm the fact that such colonies existed with South Arabian script and artifacts, although nothing specific to Balqis or Bilqis, the Queen of Sheba, has been uncovered.
Recent archaeological discoveries
The Bar'an temple in Ma'rib - built in the eighth century BC and functioning for nearly 1000 yearsRecent archaeological discoveries in Mareb, Yemen support the view that the Queen of Sheba ruled over southern Arabia, with evidence suggesting that the area was the capital of the Kingdom of Sheba.
A team of researchers funded by the American Foundation for the Study of Man (AFSM) and led by University of Calgary archaeology professor, Dr. Bill Glanzman, has been working to "unlock the secrets of a 3,000-year-old temple in Yemen." "We have an enormous job ahead of us," said Glanzman in 2007. "Our first task is to wrest the sanctuary from the desert sands, documenting our findings as we go. We're trying to determine how the temple was associated with the Queen of Sheba, how the sanctuary was used throughout history, and how it came to play such an important role in Arab folklore."[23]
Footnotes
font.:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queen_of_Sheba
Diverse referencesKnown to the Ethiopian people as Makeda or Maqueda (ማክዳ mākidā),[3] this queen has been called a variety of names by different peoples in different times. To King Solomon of Israel she was the Queen of Sheba. In Islamic tradition she was calledBalqis or Balkis by the Arabians, who say she came from the city of Sheba, also called Mareb, in Yemen or Arabia Felix. The Roman historian Josephus calls her Nicaule. She is thought to have been born on January 5, sometime in the 10th century BC.
In the Hebrew Bible, a tradition of the history of nations is preserved in Genesis 10. In Genesis 10:7 there is a reference to Sheba, the son of Raamah, the son of Cush, the son of Ham, son of Noah. In Genesis 10:26-29 there is a reference to another person named Sheba, listed along with Almodad, Sheleph, Hazarmaveth, Jerah, Hadoram, Uzal, Diklah, Obal, Abimael, Ophir, Havilah, and Jobab as the descendants of Joktan, the son of Eber, the son of Shelah, the son of Arphaxad, the descendant of Shem, another son of Noah.
Aharoni, Avi-Yonah, Rainey, and Safrai placed the Semitic Sheba in Southern Arabia in geographic proximity to the location of the tribes descended from their ancestor, Joktan. In addition to Sheba, Hazarmaveth and Ophir were identified. Semitic Havilah was located in Eastern Africa, modern day Ethiopia. Semitic Havilah (Beresh't 10:29) is to be distinguished from Cushite Havilah (Beresh't 10:7), the descendant of Cush, descendant of Ham; both locations for Havilah are thought by these scholars to have been located in present day Ethiopia.[4]
Hebrew biblical account
According to the Hebrew Bible, the unnamed queen of the land of Sheba heard of the great wisdom of King Solomon of Israel and journeyed there with gifts of spices, gold, precious stones, and beautiful wood and to test him with questions, as recorded in First Kings 10:1-13 (largely copied in 2 Chronicles 9:1–12).
It is related further that the queen was awed by Solomon's great wisdom and wealth, and pronounced a blessing on Solomon's God. Solomon reciprocated with gifts and "everything she desired." Solomon offered to give her everything his kingdom had to offer except the "royal bounty." Therefore, according to the Bible, "she turned and went to her country, she and her servants." The queen apparently was quite rich, however, as she brought four and a half tons of gold with her to give to Solomon (1 Kings 10:10).
In the biblical passages which refer explicitly to the Queen of Sheba there is no hint of love or sexual attraction between Solomon and the Queen of Sheba. The two are depicted merely as fellow monarchs engaged in the affairs of state.
The biblical text, Song of Solomon (Song of Songs), contains some references, which at various times, have been interpreted as referring to love between Solomon and the Queen of Sheba. The young woman of the Song of Songs, however, continues to deny the romantic advances of her suitor, whom many commentators identify as King Solomon. In any case, there is little to identify this speaker in the text with the rich and powerful foreign queen depicted in the Book of Kings. The woman of the text of the song clearly does regard "The Daughters of Jerusalem" as her peer group [citation needed]Qur'anic AccountThe Qur'an, the central religious text of Islam, mentions the Queen by name in the 34th Chapter of the Holy Book. Arab sources name herBalqis or Bilqis. The Qur'anic narrative, from sura 27 (An-Naml),[5] has Solomon getting reports from the Hoopoe bird about the kingdom of Saba (Sheba), ruled by a queen whose people worship the sun instead of God. Solomon sends a letter inviting her to visit him and submit fully to the One God, Allah, Lord of the Worlds according to the Islamic text. The Queen of Sheba is unsure whether to accept his invitation and does not wish to behave as a king would: 'entering a country, despoiling it and making the most honorable of its people its lowest'. So she decides to send Solomon gifts and await his response. He then sends back a response warning her and her people about the power he has. Queen Sheba sends him back gifts. Solomon is unimpressed by the Queen's gifts, stating that the gifts he has received from God are far greater in value.
Upon discovering that the Queen is coming to meet him, Solomon asked his people if anyone can bring the throne of the Queen before she arrives. A jinn under the control of Solomon proposed that he will bring it before Solomon rises from his seat. One who had knowledge of the "Book" proposed to bring him the throne of Bilqis 'in the twinkling of an eye' and accomplished that immediately.[6] The queen arrives at his court, is shown her throne and asked: does your throne look like this? She replied: (It is) as though it were it. When she enters his crystal palace she accepts Abrahamic monotheism and the worship of God alone.
Ethiopian account
The imperial family of Ethiopia claims its origin directly from the offspring of the Queen of Sheba by King Solomon.[7] The Queen of Sheba (ንግሥተ ሣብአ nigiśta Śab'a), is named Makeda (ማክዳ) in the Ethiopian account.
The etymology of her name is uncertain, but there are two principal opinions about its Ethiopian source. One group, which includes the British scholar Edward Ullendorff, holds that it is a corruption of "Candace", the Ethiopian queen mentioned in the New Testament Acts; the other group connects the name withMacedonia, and relates this story to the later Ethiopian legends about Alexander the Great and the era of 330 BCE.
The Italian scholar Carlo Conti Rossini, however, was unconvinced by either of these theories and, in 1954 stated that he believed the matter unresolved.[8]
An ancient compilation of Ethiopian legends, Kebra Negast ('the Glory of Kings'), is dated to seven hundred years ago and relates a history of Makeda and her descendants. In this account King Solomon is said to have seduced the Queen of Sheba and sired her son, Menelik I, who would become the first Emperor of Ethiopia.
The narrative given in the Kebra Negast - which has no parallel in the Hebrew Biblical story - is that King Solomon invited the Queen of Sheba to a banquet, serving spicy food to induce her thirst, and inviting her to stay in his palace overnight. The Queen asked him to swear that he would not take her by force. He accepted upon the condition that she, in turn, would not take anything from his house by force. The Queen assured that she would not, slightly offended by the implication that she, a rich and powerful monarch, would engage in stealing. However, as she woke up in the middle of the night, she was very thirsty. Just as she reached for a jar of water placed close to her bed, King Solomon appeared, warning her that she was breaking her oath, water being the most valuable of all material possessions. Thus, while quenching her thirst, she set the king free from his promise and they spent the night together.
Other Ethiopian accounts make her the daughter of a king named Agabo or Agabos, in some legends said to have become king after slaying the mythological serpent Arwe; in others, to have been the 28th ruler of the Agazyan tribe. In either event, he is said to have extended his Empire to both sides of the Red Sea.[citation needed]
The tradition that the Biblical Queen of Sheba was a ruler of Ethiopia who visited King Solomon in Jerusalem, in ancient Israel, is supported by the first century CE. Roman (of Jewish origin) historian Flavius Josephus, who identified Solomon’s visitor as a "Queen of Egypt and Ethiopia".[9]
While there are no known traditions of matriarchal rule in Yemen during the early first millennium BC, the earliest inscriptions of the rulers of Dʿmt in northern Ethiopia and Eritrea mention queens of very high status, possibly equal to their kings.[10]
Possible Egyptian derivation
Josephus says in his Antiquity of the Jews, book 8 chapter 6, that it was the "queen of Egypt and Ethiopia" who visited King Solomon. Queen of the South (biblical reference) is made by Jesus in Matthew 12:42 and Luke 11:31. Daniel 11:5 and 8 identify the South as Egypt. There also have been claims that the ancient Egyptian name Hatshepsut translates as "Queen of Sheba".[11]Hatshepsut was a pharaoh of Egypt, born c. 1508 and died 1458 BC, who revived active trade with neighboring kingdoms and created a flourishing and prosperous economy for her eighteenth dynasty kingdom. Solar deities are most closely associated with her dynasty, the one founded by her grandfather and credited to the patron deity of Thebes, Amun. She is recorded as going on a famous journey to the land of Punt, though no one knows for sure where Punt is.
Sheba may be derived from the ancient Egyptian word for star. The Kingdom of Kush was also located in southern Egypt. According to the eleventh century geographer Yaqut al-Hamawi, the star-worshippers of Harran in Turkey and those from Yemen, went on special pilgrimages to the pyramids of Giza. The "Queen of Sheba" may have referred to the title of the Kandake when acting as the chief astronomer or high priestess of a star-venerating religion that was centered in Africa, with satellite centers in Arabia, Asia, and Europe.
The "star-worshippers" also studied or venerated the sun and moon. The roots of star veneration or star study date back to well before 5000 B.C. Evidence for a level of sophistication and knowledge of astronomy has been found at several archaeological sites in Africa, including the complex at Nabta Playa in southern Egypt. The structure at Nabta is almost 7,000 years old, and is the oldest astronomical complex in the world.
Other astronomical sites in Africa include: Namoratunga II, near Lake Turkana, in Kenya, which was in use around 300 BC; theSenegambian stone circles; and the Bouar megaliths in what is now the Central African Republic.
Nubia - another possible location
The tradition of the Candaces is well documented in Nubia, where the rule of its many queens recedes into prehistoric times and there the title Kentakes is a term used to describe the long tradition of leadership in Nubia by warrior queens.[citation needed] Nubia was south of Ancient Egypt, also divided by the Nile River and bordered by the Red Sea and, it is another candidate for the location of Sheba and the famous queen. The history of Nubia provides examples of a tradition and a wealthy kingdom that could be the original kingdom of the Queen of Sheba. The economics of the culture was based upon trade. David Jones, in Women Warriors: a History, relates that in 332 BC Alexander the Great attempted to lead his army into Nubia. At its border, he was confronted by the brilliant military formations devised by their warrior queen, Candace of Meroë. She led her army on the opposite side of the border from atop an elephant. Alexander withdrew and redirected his forces to enter Egypt instead.[12] It should be noted that this story is thought by scholars to be legendary, and Alexander appears never to have attacked Nubia.[13][14] That was the beginning of the Greek rule of Egypt that would last for three hundred years until the Roman occupation in 30 BC.
Strabo also describes a similar clash with the Romans, in which the Roman army was defeated by Nubian archers under the leadership of another queen of Nubia. This queen was described as "one-eyed", being blind in one eye or represented only in profile.[15] The strategic formations used by this second queen are well documented in Strabo's description of her victory.
Old Kingdom Egyptian accounts of trade missions first mentioned Nubia in 2300 BC. Egyptians imported gold, incense, ebony,ivory, and exotic animals from tropical Africa through Nubia. Aswan, right above the First Cataract, marked the southern limit of Egyptian control. As trade between Egypt and Nubia increased, so did wealth and stability.[citation needed]
By the sixth dynasty of Egypt, Nubia was divided into a series of small kingdoms. Scholars debate whether these peoples, who flourished from c. 2240 BC to c. 2150 BC, were the result of another internal evolution, wars, or invaders. The Sahara Desert was becoming too arid to support human beings. During the Egyptian Middle Kingdom (c. 2040–1640 BC), Egypt began expanding into Nubia to gain more control over the trade routes in Northern Nubia and direct access to trade with southern Nubia. They erected a chain of forts down the Nile below the Second Cataract in the river. These garrisons seemed to have had peaceful relations with the local Nubian people, but little interaction during the period.[citation needed]
A contemporaneous, but distinct, culture was the Pan Grave culture, so called because of their shallow graves. Shallow graves produced mummies naturally. The Pan Graves are associated with the eastern bank of the Nile, but the Pan Graves and western groups definitely interacted. The Kingdom of Kerma arose as the first kingdom to unify much of the region. It was named for its presumed capital at Kerma, one of the earliest urban centers in tropical Africa. By 1750 BC, the rulers of Kerma were powerful enough to organize the labor for monumental walls and structures of mud brick. They created rich tombs with possessions for the afterlife and large human sacrifices. The craftsmen were skilled in metalworking and the quality of their pottery surpassed that of Egypt. Excavated sites at Kerma yielded large tombs and a palace-like structure ('Deffufa'), alluding to the early stability in the region.[citation needed]
The early tradition of astronomical observations in Nubia is reflected by the presence of megaliths discovered at Nabta Playa that are examples of what may be the world's first Archaeoastronomy devices, predating Stonehenge by at least 1000 years.[16]According to one authority, the complexity observed at Nabta Playa, likely formed the basis for the structure of both the Neolithicsociety at Nabta and the Old Kingdom of Egypt.[17] Hence the long tradition of studying the stars and the sun such as the references in the Old Testament, and the knowledge of new phenomena provoking the travel of the Magi.
Christian interpretations
The Queen of Sheba is believed to be the Queen of the South referenced in Matthew 12:42 and Luke 11:31 in the New Testament, where Jesus indicates that she and the Ninevites will judge the generation of Jesus' contemporaries who rejected him.
Christian interpretations of the scriptures mentioning the Queen of Sheba in the Hebrew Bible, the Old Testament, typically have emphasized both the historical and metaphorical values in the story. The account of the Queen of Sheba is thereby interpreted by Christians as being both a metaphor and an analogy: the Queen's visit to Solomon has been compared to the metaphorical marriage of the Church to Christ where Solomon is the anointed one or the messiah and Sheba represents a Gentile population submitting to the messiah; the Queen of Sheba's chastity has also been depicted as a foreshadowing of the Virgin Mary; and the three gifts that she brought (gold, spices, and stones) have been seen as analogous to the gifts of the Magi (gold, frankincense, and myrrh). The latter is emphasized as being consistent with a passage from Isaiah 60:6; And they from Sheba shall come: they shall bring forth gold and incense; and they shall show forth the praises of the Lord.[18] This last connection is interpreted[who?] as relating to the Magi, the learned astronomers of Sheba who saw a new star and set off on a journey to find a new ruler connected to the new star, that led them to Bethlehem.
Medieval depictions
Art in the Middle Ages depicting the visit of the Queen of Sheba includes the Portal of the Mother of God at the 13th centuryAmiens Cathedral, which is included as an analogy as part of a larger depiction of the gifts of the Magi.[19] The 12th century cathedrals at Strasbourg, Chartres, Rochester and Canterbury include artistic renditions in such elements as stained glass windows and door jamb decorations.[18]Renaissance depictionsBoccaccio's On Famous Women (Latin: De Mulieribus Claris) follows Josephus in calling the Queen of Sheba, Nicaula. Boccaccio goes on to explain that not only was she the Queen of Ethiopia and Egypt, but also the queen of Arabia. She also is related to have had a grand palace on "a very large island" called Meroe, located someplace near the Nile river, "practically on the other side of the world." From there Nicaula crossed the deserts of Arabia, through Ethiopia and Egypt, and up the coast of the Red Sea, to come to Jerusalem to see "the great King Solomon".[20]
Christine de Pizan's The Book of the City of Ladies continues the convention of calling the Queen of Sheba, Nicaula. Piero della Francesca's frescoes in Arezzo (ca 1466) on the Legend of the True Cross, contain two panels on the visit of the Queen of Sheba to Solomon. The legend links the beams of Solomon's palace (adored by Queen of Sheba) to the wood of the crucifixion. The Renaissance continuation of the metaphorical view of the Queen of Sheba as an analogy to the gifts of the Magi also is clearly evident in theTriptych of the Adoration of the Magi (c. 1510), by Hieronymus Bosch. Bosch chooses to depict a scene of the Queen of Sheba and Solomon in an ornately decorated collarworn by one of the Magi.[21]
Christopher Marlowe's Doctor Faustus refers to the Queen of Sheba as Saba, when Mephistopheles is trying to persuade Faustusof the wisdom of the women with whom he supposedly shall be presented every morning.[22]
Modern Arab academic view
Some modern Arab academics have placed the Queen of Sheba as a ruler of a trading colony in Northwest Arabia, established bySouth Arabian kingdoms[citation needed]. Modern archaeological finds do confirm the fact that such colonies existed with South Arabian script and artifacts, although nothing specific to Balqis or Bilqis, the Queen of Sheba, has been uncovered.
Recent archaeological discoveries
The Bar'an temple in Ma'rib - built in the eighth century BC and functioning for nearly 1000 yearsRecent archaeological discoveries in Mareb, Yemen support the view that the Queen of Sheba ruled over southern Arabia, with evidence suggesting that the area was the capital of the Kingdom of Sheba.
A team of researchers funded by the American Foundation for the Study of Man (AFSM) and led by University of Calgary archaeology professor, Dr. Bill Glanzman, has been working to "unlock the secrets of a 3,000-year-old temple in Yemen." "We have an enormous job ahead of us," said Glanzman in 2007. "Our first task is to wrest the sanctuary from the desert sands, documenting our findings as we go. We're trying to determine how the temple was associated with the Queen of Sheba, how the sanctuary was used throughout history, and how it came to play such an important role in Arab folklore."[23]
Footnotes
- ^ a b K.A. Kitchen, "On the Reliability of the Old Testament", (Cambridge, U.K.: Wm. B. Eerdmans Publishing, 2003) p. 117.
- ^ "Canadians uncover 'Queen of Sheba' temple". CBC News. November 10, 2000.
- ^ Hansberry, W.L. and Johnson, E.H. (1965) "Part V: Africa's Golden Past: Queen of Sheba's true identity confounds historical research," Ebony (magazine). p. 136.
- ^ Yohanan Aharoni, Michael Avi-Yonah, Anson F. Rainey, and Ze'ev Safrai, The Macmillan Bible Atlas, (New York: Macmillan Publishing, 1993) 21.
- ^ Qur'an 27:23–44
- ^ Qur'an 27:40
- ^ Comay, Joan; Ronald Brownrigg (1993) (in English). Who's Who in the Bible:The Old Testament and the Apocrypha, The New Testament. New York: Wing Books. pp. Old Testament, 351. ISBN 0-517-32170-X.
- ^ David Allen Hubbard, "The Literary Sources of the Kebra Nagast", doctoral thesis (St. Andrews, 1954), pp. 303f.
- ^ Flavius Josephus, Paul L. Maier Josephus, the Essential Works: A Condensation of "Jewish Antiquities", and "the Jewish War" Kregel Publications,U.S. (31 Mar 1995)ISBN 978-0825432606 p.140"Queen+of+egypt"+Solomon&source=bl&ots=AV2FTguocp&sig=7s67BPymx7pq_IlaSNtBwXMjetY&hl=en&ei=A6O7SsHmNZDbjQemu7HDCw&sa=X&oi=book_result&ct=result&resnum=6#v=onepage&q=&f=false
- ^ Rodolfo Fattovich, "The 'Pre-Aksumite' State in Northern Ethiopia and Eritrea Reconsidered" in Paul Lunde and Alexandra Porter ed., Trade and Travel in the Red Sea Region, in D. Kennet & St J. Simpson ed., Society for Arabian Studies Monographs No. 2. BAR International Series 1269. Archaeopress, Oxford: 2004, p. 73.
- ^ Hatshepsut, the Queen of Sheba, and Immanuel Velikovsky
- ^ Jones, David E., Women Warriors: A History, Brasseys, Inc.; (2000)
- ^ Gutenberg, David M. (2003). The Curse of Ham: Race and Slavery in Early Judaism, Christianity, and Islam. Princeton University Press. pp. 64.
- ^ Morgan, J.R. and Stoneman, Richard (1994). Greek Fiction: The Greek Novel in Context. Routledge. pp. 117–118. ISBN 0415085071.
- ^ Nubian Queens in the Nile Valley and Afro-Asiatic Cultural History - Carolyn Fluehr-Lobban, Professor of Anthropology, Museum of Fine Arts, Boston U.S.A, August 20–26, 1998
- ^ PlanetQuest: The History of Astronomy - Retrieved on 2007-08-29
- ^ Late Neolithic megalithic structures at Nabta Playa - by Fred Wendorf (1998)
- ^ a b Byrd, Vickie, editor; Queen of Sheba: Legend and Reality, (Santa Ana, California: The Bowers Museum of Cultural Art, 2004), p. 17.
- ^ Murray, Stephen, The Portals: Access to Redemption, http://www.mcah.columbia.edu/Mcahweb/facade/body.html, webpage, accessed August 6, 2006.
- ^ Giovanni Boccaccio, Famous Women translated by Virginia Brown 2001, p. 90; Cambridge and London, Harvard University Press;ISBN 0-674-01130-9;
- ^ Web Gallery of Art, http://www.wga.hu/frames-e.html?/html/b/bosch/91adorat/01tripty.html, website accessed August 2, 2006
- ^ Marlowe, Christopher; Doctor Faustus and other plays: Oxford World Classics, p. 155.
- ^ University of Calgary, http://www.ucalgary.ca/UofC/events/unicomm/NewsReleases/queen.htm, website accessed November 18, 2007
font.:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Queen_of_Sheba
Temple at Yeha, possible capital of D'mt. Main article: Dʿmt
There is some confusion over the usage of the word Ethiopia in ancient times and the modern country. For example, many ancient maps of Africa, which appeared approximately at the time of the European Age of Discovery, named the continent of Africa as Aethiopia, also naming what we now call the Atlantic Ocean, as Oceanus Aethopicus. Ancient Greeks historians such as Herodotus and Diodorus Siculus used the word Aethiopia (Αιθιοπία) to refer to the peoples living immediately to the south of ancient Egypt, specifically the area now known as the ancient Kingdom of Kush, now a part of modern Nubia in Egypt and Sudan, as well as all of Sub-Saharan Africa in general.
Sudan_Meroe_Pyramids
It is now known that in ancient times the name Ethiopia was primarily used to refer to the modern day nation of Sudan based in the upper Nile valley south of Egypt, also called Kush, and then secondarily in reference to Sub-Saharan Africa in general. Reference to the Kingdom of Aksum designated as Ethiopia dates only as far back as the first half of 4th century following the 4th century invasion of Kush in Sudan by the Aksumite empire. Earlier inscription of Ezana Habashat (the source for "Abyssinia") in Ge'ez, South Arabian alphabet, was then translated in Greek as "Aethiopia".
There is some confusion over the usage of the word Ethiopia in ancient times and the modern country. For example, many ancient maps of Africa, which appeared approximately at the time of the European Age of Discovery, named the continent of Africa as Aethiopia, also naming what we now call the Atlantic Ocean, as Oceanus Aethopicus. Ancient Greeks historians such as Herodotus and Diodorus Siculus used the word Aethiopia (Αιθιοπία) to refer to the peoples living immediately to the south of ancient Egypt, specifically the area now known as the ancient Kingdom of Kush, now a part of modern Nubia in Egypt and Sudan, as well as all of Sub-Saharan Africa in general.
Sudan_Meroe_Pyramids
It is now known that in ancient times the name Ethiopia was primarily used to refer to the modern day nation of Sudan based in the upper Nile valley south of Egypt, also called Kush, and then secondarily in reference to Sub-Saharan Africa in general. Reference to the Kingdom of Aksum designated as Ethiopia dates only as far back as the first half of 4th century following the 4th century invasion of Kush in Sudan by the Aksumite empire. Earlier inscription of Ezana Habashat (the source for "Abyssinia") in Ge'ez, South Arabian alphabet, was then translated in Greek as "Aethiopia".
The state of Sheba mentioned in the Old Testament is sometimes believed to have been in Ethiopia, but more often is placed in Yemen. According to the Ethiopian legend, best represented in the Kebra Negest, the Queen of Sheba was tricked by King Solomon into sleeping with him, resulting in a child, named Ebn Melek (later Emperor Menelik I). When he was of age, Menelik returned to Israel to see his father, who sent with him the son of Zadok to accompany him with a replica of the Ark of the Covenant (Ethiosemitic: tabot). On his return with some of the Israelite priests, however, he found that Zadok's son had stolen the real Ark of the Covenant. Some believe the Ark is still being preserved today at the Church of Our Lady Mary of Zion in Axum, Ethiopia. The tradition that the biblical Queen of Sheba was a ruler of Ethiopia who visited King Solomon in Jerusalem in ancient Israel is supported by the 1st century AD Jewish historian Flavius Josephus, who identified Solomon’s visitor as a queen of Egypt and Ethiopia.
Ethiopia is frequently mentioned in the Bible in English translation based on the Greek translation of "Kush" as "Ethiopia," however as the Hebrew original references "Kush" such references are in fact to Nubia in the modern day nations of Egypt and Sudan and not the modern-day nation of Ethiopia. An example of this conflation of the nations of Ethiopia and Sudan is in the oft-cited story of the Ethiopian eunuch as written in Acts, Chapter 8, verse 27: "Then the angel of the Lord said to Philip, Start out and go south to the road that leads down from Jerusalem to Gaza. So he set out and was on his way when he caught sight of an Ethiopian. This man was a eunuch, a high official of the Kandake (Candace) Queen of Ethiopia in charge of all her treasure." The passage continues by describing how Philip helped the Ethiopian understand one passage of Isaiah that the Ethiopian was reading. After the Ethiopian received an explanation of the passage and came to believe in Jesus as the "Son of God", he requested that Philip baptize him, which Philip obliged. Queen Gersamot Hendeke VII (very similar to Kandake) was the Queen of Ethiopia from the year 42 to 52.
However, as the Ethiopian Orthodox Church was founded in the 4th century by Syrian monks, this reference has been shown to be ahistorical. This is because as the original Hebrew uses the word "Kush," this passage has been more properly identified as referencing the ancient Kingdom of Kush, in Sudan and not Ethiopia, and which in fact was Christianized much earlier than the modern-day nation of Ethiopia. identified in antiquity with Arabia Felix and parts of Sub-Saharan Africa, particularly Nubia in modern-day Sudan. Due to secondary English translations of the Bible from Greek instead of Hebrew, which often substitute the word "Cush" (which in Hebrew sometimes means 'dark') for "Ethiopia," (Greek for 'burnt skin') there has been some confusion in identifying "Cush" primarily with modern-day Ethiopia, although that is certainly ahistorical.
Ethiopia is frequently mentioned in the Bible in English translation based on the Greek translation of "Kush" as "Ethiopia," however as the Hebrew original references "Kush" such references are in fact to Nubia in the modern day nations of Egypt and Sudan and not the modern-day nation of Ethiopia. An example of this conflation of the nations of Ethiopia and Sudan is in the oft-cited story of the Ethiopian eunuch as written in Acts, Chapter 8, verse 27: "Then the angel of the Lord said to Philip, Start out and go south to the road that leads down from Jerusalem to Gaza. So he set out and was on his way when he caught sight of an Ethiopian. This man was a eunuch, a high official of the Kandake (Candace) Queen of Ethiopia in charge of all her treasure." The passage continues by describing how Philip helped the Ethiopian understand one passage of Isaiah that the Ethiopian was reading. After the Ethiopian received an explanation of the passage and came to believe in Jesus as the "Son of God", he requested that Philip baptize him, which Philip obliged. Queen Gersamot Hendeke VII (very similar to Kandake) was the Queen of Ethiopia from the year 42 to 52.
However, as the Ethiopian Orthodox Church was founded in the 4th century by Syrian monks, this reference has been shown to be ahistorical. This is because as the original Hebrew uses the word "Kush," this passage has been more properly identified as referencing the ancient Kingdom of Kush, in Sudan and not Ethiopia, and which in fact was Christianized much earlier than the modern-day nation of Ethiopia. identified in antiquity with Arabia Felix and parts of Sub-Saharan Africa, particularly Nubia in modern-day Sudan. Due to secondary English translations of the Bible from Greek instead of Hebrew, which often substitute the word "Cush" (which in Hebrew sometimes means 'dark') for "Ethiopia," (Greek for 'burnt skin') there has been some confusion in identifying "Cush" primarily with modern-day Ethiopia, although that is certainly ahistorical.
The Queen of Sheba (Hebrew: מלכת שבא, Malkaṯ Šəḇâ in Biblical Hebrew; Malkat Sh'va in Modern Hebrew; Ge'ez: ንግሥተ ሳባ, Nigiste Saba (Nəgəstä Saba); Arabic: ملكة سبأ, Malikat Sabaʾ) was a monarch of the ancient kingdom of Sheba and is referred to in Yemeni and Ethiopian history, the Bible, the Qur'an, Yoruba customary tradition, and Josephus. She is widely assumed to have been a queen regnant, she may have been a queen consort. The location of her kingdom is believed to have been in Ethiopia[citation needed] and Yemen.
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The queen of Sheba has been called a variety of names by different peoples in different times. To King Solomon of Israel she was the Queen of Sheba. In Islamic tradition she was called Bilqis or Balqis by the Arabs, who say she came from the city of Sheba, also called Mareb, in Yemen or Arabia Felix. The Roman historian Josephus calls her Nicaule. The Luhya of Kenya call her Nakuti while the Ethiopian people claim her as Makeda or Maqueda. She is said to have been born some time in the 10th century BC. Traditionally her lineage was part of the Ethiopian dynasty established in 1370 BC by Za Besi Angabo, which lasted 350 years; her grandfather and father were the last two rulers of this dynasty.[citation needed] According to the Kebra Negast her mother was known as Queen Ismeni and in 1005 BC, Makeda's father appointed her as his successor from his deathbed.
The gold mine of the Queen of Sheba has been discovered in Ethiopia, the Guardian reports. A local prospector led British archaeologist Dr. Louise Schofield to a mysterious mine in Ethiopia's northern Tigray region. In Ethiopia it was considered quite natural that a woman should have held supreme power. One thousand years BC. My name is Makeda, Queen of Sheba, daughter of the mothers. The long line of female monarchs came with my empire to an end. My son took the reign of me over and over with him started the long Royals of the Ethiopian Kings. How I know? Because I don't speak as a living person, but if soul from the other side of the veil. Apocrypha of the Old Testament Greek: ἀπόκρυφος, apokruphos: secret, hidden) the Ethiopian Christianity is the place where the oldest testament religious experience takes place. Two thousand years later, probably in the 10th century AD another legendary queen took the stage in Ethiopia. Although something of the Aksumite Empire she overthrew is known, from the inscriptions and monuments left behind, and from observations of foreign traders, there little more authentic information about her than about Makeda. There is evidence only that a rebellious queen led the forces which destroyed the old Christian order. Variously referred to as Gudit, Gwedit, Yodit, Judith, and as "Isat" - Amharic for fire - she was believed to be the founder of the Zagwe dynasty which ruled for several hundred years. trust me, the mushrooms revealed it, Jahnoy is the Father of Creation and the Earth's Rightful Ruler, who causes the Bright and Morning Star to rise each and every day above the hearts and eyes of the wicked and the just alike. Whether you acknowledge gravity or not, it remains existing, and such also is Janhoy HIM Haile Selassie, King of Kings, Lord of Lords, Conquering Lion of the Tribe of Judah, Elect of God, King of Zion, Defender of the Faith,Light of This World. |
More than any other Christian community, consider the Ethiopian Christians themselves as heirs of the old Israel. Ethiopians and Jews are distant relatives of each other. Around the year 1000 BC stakes Semitic peoples from the South of the Red Sea, and settled in the northern Ethiopia insisted within mountain country. From the mixing with the local population came the Kingdom of Axum, whose centre was situated in the Highlands of Tigré and Eritrea.
THE MYSTICAL FIGURE known as the Queen of Sheba is recorded in the First Book of Kings in the Old Testament. It states that around the tenth century BC a queen of the rich trading nation known as Sheba decided to meet the great King Solomon in person. She did not believe the stories she had been told of Solomon’s wisdom, and brought many hard questions to test him. When his replies met with her approval she gave him plentiful gifts of gold,spices and precious stones. In return,Solomon gave the queen ‘all her desire’, and after their meeting she returned to her own country. The story is repeated in the second Book of Chronicles, and even Christ himself spoke of a queen of the south who came to hear the wisdom of Solomon. Other than this, precious few pieces of historical evidence have survived, but that has not stopped the growth of countless myths and stories. So who was the real Queen of Sheba?
Perhaps the most famous and important extension of her story is that connected with Ethiopia. In 1320 an Ethiopian monk named Yetshak wrote a compendium of legends called Kebra Negast or ‘Glory of the Kings’.
In it, he said that when the Queen of Sheba, referred to in Ethiopian as Makeda, visited Solomon, she was seduced by the great king. Solomon had said that the queen was welcome to his hospitality, but must not take anything without asking. During the night, the Queen suffered a terrible thirst caused by a spicy meal Solomon fed her and she drank the water placed by her bed. The king said she had broken the rules, and must sleep with him as repayment. Nine months later she gave birth to a boy called Menelik. Ethiopians believe that the Queen and her son both accepted the Jewish faith, and that Menelik founded the Solomon Jewish, and then Christian, dynasty in Aksum, Ethiopia.
At around the same time as Yetshak was compiling his tome, other legends were forming in Europe. A thirteenth century story told in the Legenda Aurea stated that the queen was a prophetess connected to the crucifixion of Christ. Over time, she also became an integral part of religious decorations and art. She was often seen as a sorceress, and then a seductress. Strangely, she is also featured as having a secret deformity – French Gothic sculpture often shows her having a webbed foot. In the same way, the Temptation of Saint Anthony by French novelist Gustave Flaubert depicts the queen as a lustful temptress with a withered limb.
THE MYSTICAL FIGURE known as the Queen of Sheba is recorded in the First Book of Kings in the Old Testament. It states that around the tenth century BC a queen of the rich trading nation known as Sheba decided to meet the great King Solomon in person. She did not believe the stories she had been told of Solomon’s wisdom, and brought many hard questions to test him. When his replies met with her approval she gave him plentiful gifts of gold,spices and precious stones. In return,Solomon gave the queen ‘all her desire’, and after their meeting she returned to her own country. The story is repeated in the second Book of Chronicles, and even Christ himself spoke of a queen of the south who came to hear the wisdom of Solomon. Other than this, precious few pieces of historical evidence have survived, but that has not stopped the growth of countless myths and stories. So who was the real Queen of Sheba?
Perhaps the most famous and important extension of her story is that connected with Ethiopia. In 1320 an Ethiopian monk named Yetshak wrote a compendium of legends called Kebra Negast or ‘Glory of the Kings’.
In it, he said that when the Queen of Sheba, referred to in Ethiopian as Makeda, visited Solomon, she was seduced by the great king. Solomon had said that the queen was welcome to his hospitality, but must not take anything without asking. During the night, the Queen suffered a terrible thirst caused by a spicy meal Solomon fed her and she drank the water placed by her bed. The king said she had broken the rules, and must sleep with him as repayment. Nine months later she gave birth to a boy called Menelik. Ethiopians believe that the Queen and her son both accepted the Jewish faith, and that Menelik founded the Solomon Jewish, and then Christian, dynasty in Aksum, Ethiopia.
At around the same time as Yetshak was compiling his tome, other legends were forming in Europe. A thirteenth century story told in the Legenda Aurea stated that the queen was a prophetess connected to the crucifixion of Christ. Over time, she also became an integral part of religious decorations and art. She was often seen as a sorceress, and then a seductress. Strangely, she is also featured as having a secret deformity – French Gothic sculpture often shows her having a webbed foot. In the same way, the Temptation of Saint Anthony by French novelist Gustave Flaubert depicts the queen as a lustful temptress with a withered limb.
This imperfection perhaps arises from earlier Jewish and Islamic references to her. In both the Koran and the Jewish Book called the Targum Sheni, the queen meets Solomon and reveals that she has hairy feet. The Jewish tradition later features her as a demon or seductress, whereas Islamic legend states that Solomon used his magicians’ power to remove her excess hair and married her. Muslims call the Queen of Sheba Balkis, and believe her great nation was based in the Yemen. The Koran describes Sheba as being two gardens, irrigated by a great dam. An advanced level of farming, and good access to Red Sea shipping channels and Arabian camel trains, meant the nation prospered.
Archaeological proof of this occurring in Southern Arabia has been uncovered. The remains of a great dam can be viewed in the Mareb region of the Yemen, now considered to be the capital of the ancient Sheba nation. This dam collapsed in AD 543, but scientists have been able to deduce that it would have been used to irrigate over 500 acres of farm land. In recent years, archaeologists have finished restoring an ancient temple known as the ‘Throne of Balkis’ in the Mareb region. The structure dates from the tenth century BC, so is from the right era to link with what we do know about the queen. Two miles to the east of the Marab region, another ancient building, known as the ‘Temple of the Moon God’, is also being studied. Scientists using radar equipment believe this is an extremely large and elaborate structure, and could yield the answers to many Sheba mysteries. Unfortunately such investigations have been plagued over the years by political indifference and, until these areas become more secure for researchers to study, the true history of Sheba may continue to be obscured by myth and legend.
Sheba, in the Ethiopian tradition, however, she is called Makeda. The imperial dynasty of Ethiopia is traced to a child from her and Solomon: Menelik. According to Ethiopian legends would Solomon asked her, after a richly spiced meal, in his palace to stay overnight. She agrees, on the condition that he would not stalking her. Solomon agrees, on the condition that they will take nothing that was not of her. If they overnight, thirsty by the spiced food, drink some water, is there as the chickens at her out to Solomon the wise that they kept her promise, and not so …
Archaeological proof of this occurring in Southern Arabia has been uncovered. The remains of a great dam can be viewed in the Mareb region of the Yemen, now considered to be the capital of the ancient Sheba nation. This dam collapsed in AD 543, but scientists have been able to deduce that it would have been used to irrigate over 500 acres of farm land. In recent years, archaeologists have finished restoring an ancient temple known as the ‘Throne of Balkis’ in the Mareb region. The structure dates from the tenth century BC, so is from the right era to link with what we do know about the queen. Two miles to the east of the Marab region, another ancient building, known as the ‘Temple of the Moon God’, is also being studied. Scientists using radar equipment believe this is an extremely large and elaborate structure, and could yield the answers to many Sheba mysteries. Unfortunately such investigations have been plagued over the years by political indifference and, until these areas become more secure for researchers to study, the true history of Sheba may continue to be obscured by myth and legend.
Sheba, in the Ethiopian tradition, however, she is called Makeda. The imperial dynasty of Ethiopia is traced to a child from her and Solomon: Menelik. According to Ethiopian legends would Solomon asked her, after a richly spiced meal, in his palace to stay overnight. She agrees, on the condition that he would not stalking her. Solomon agrees, on the condition that they will take nothing that was not of her. If they overnight, thirsty by the spiced food, drink some water, is there as the chickens at her out to Solomon the wise that they kept her promise, and not so …
In the Islamic tradition they call her Bilqis.
Here a Persian drawing of Sheba, from around 1600
Here a Persian drawing of Sheba, from around 1600
The story In the Bible in 1 Kings 10 and 2 Chronicles 9. There she is with unimaginable riches (gold, gemstones, incense) to Solomon traveled to ensure than already legendary wisdom. She becomes impressed by the wealth and civilization of his court, and also of the God who gave him this. Solomon also gives her many gifts.
Where Seba or Sheba, Saba lag is still not sure.
It would be in South-Arabia may be, of in Eritrea and Ethiopia.
The Jewish historian Flavius Josephus (1st century) called her Queen of Egypt and Ethiopia.
Where Seba or Sheba, Saba lag is still not sure.
It would be in South-Arabia may be, of in Eritrea and Ethiopia.
The Jewish historian Flavius Josephus (1st century) called her Queen of Egypt and Ethiopia.
Menelik I
the son of King Solomon of ancient Israel and Makeda, Queen of Sheba
first Jewish Emperor of Ethiopia
Menelik I (originally named Ebna la-Hakim, Arabic: Ibn Al-Hakim, "Son of the Wise"), first Jewish Emperor of Ethiopia, is traditionally believed to be the son of King Solomon of ancient Israel and Makeda, Queen of Sheba.[1] He ruled around 950 BC, according to traditional sources.[2][3] Tradition credits him with bringing the Ark of the Covenant to Ethiopia, following a visit to Jerusalem to meet his father upon reaching adulthood. According to the Kebra Nagast, King Solomon had intended on sending one son of each of his nobles and one son each of each temple priest with Menelik upon his return to his mother's kingdom. He is supposed to have had a replica made of the Ark for them to take with them. Upon the death of Queen Makeda, Menelik assumed the throne with the new title of Emperor and King of Kings of Ethiopia.
According to legend, he founded the Solomonic dynasty of Ethiopia that ruled Ethiopia with few interruptions for close to three thousand years (and 225 generations later ended with the fall of Emperor Haile Selassie in 1974). However, the medieval incarnation of the Solomonic dynasty didn't come into power until 1270, claiming descent from the Kings of Aksûm, while their predecessors, the Zagwe dynasty, were said to not be of "the house of Israel" (i.e. of Solomon and Menelik). The claims of descent of the Aksûmite Kings preceding the Zagwe dynasty are uncertain, though early pagan inscription denote the King as "son of the unconquerable [god] Mahrem" (translated in Greek as Ares), while medieval Ethiopian sources ascribe them a similar claim of descent. This is consistent with the earliest records that testify that one half of Ethiopians followed the laws of Moses, while the other half worshipped pagan gods.
According to legend, he founded the Solomonic dynasty of Ethiopia that ruled Ethiopia with few interruptions for close to three thousand years (and 225 generations later ended with the fall of Emperor Haile Selassie in 1974). However, the medieval incarnation of the Solomonic dynasty didn't come into power until 1270, claiming descent from the Kings of Aksûm, while their predecessors, the Zagwe dynasty, were said to not be of "the house of Israel" (i.e. of Solomon and Menelik). The claims of descent of the Aksûmite Kings preceding the Zagwe dynasty are uncertain, though early pagan inscription denote the King as "son of the unconquerable [god] Mahrem" (translated in Greek as Ares), while medieval Ethiopian sources ascribe them a similar claim of descent. This is consistent with the earliest records that testify that one half of Ethiopians followed the laws of Moses, while the other half worshipped pagan gods.