Straight

Gerad (also Garad ) was the title for the Islamic rulers and tribal leaders in imperial Ethiopia in the Middle Ages . They ruled the Islamized areas in the southeastern border area of the empire . In the history of Ethiopia, the Gerads were often vassals of the Ethiopian emperors , but sometimes also entered into anti-Ethiopian alliances with the Islamic sultanates Ifat and Adal . The emperors tried more or less successfully to tie the Gerad to the Ethiopian Empire through military pressure or marriage policy. After Emperor Zara Yaqob (1434–1468) failed with his plan to tie the Gerad of Bali more closely to Ethiopia by marrying his sister, he unceremoniously had the territories of all Gerad military occupied. He abolished the title Straight and replaced it with the Hegeno , an imperial administrator. But already his successor, Emperor Beyde Maryam I (1468–1478), reintroduced the title of Gerad .

literature

Andrzej Bartnicki, Joanna Mantel-Niecko: History of Ethiopia. From the beginning to the present . Edited by Renate Richter. 2 parts. Akademie-Verlag, Berlin 1978.