Original Painting of Menelik I and the arrival of the Ark to Axum, St. Mary of Zion

The Ark of the Covenant, the holiest of artifacts known to house the Ten Commandments, was last mentioned to exist over 2,400 years ago.

It is thought that it was taken away and destroyed by Nebuchadnezzar when the Babylonians sacked Jerusalem and plundered King Solomon’s Temple in 586 BC.  However, rumors continue to exist that the Ark of the Covenant was saved and still exists today.

One of the most credible theories of the Ark of the Covenant’s location is in Ethiopia.

It all begins with Menelik I, son of King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba.  Menelik I was educated in Jerusalem until he was 19 years of age.  When Menelik was to return to Abyssinia (Ethiopia) with a group of Jews, King Solomon wanted Menelik I to take a copy of the Ark for prayer since Ethiopia was so far away from the Temple in Jerusalem.

However, Prince Menelik I was concerned about the sanctity of the Ark, since Solomon had allowed idols to be placed in the Temple along with the Ark to please his pagan wives.  Menelik and his followers formulated a plan and swapped the Arks after they ensured the attending priests were drunk from wine during his departure festivities.

The real Ark of the Covenant arrived with Menelik I in Ethiopia and resided at the Lake Tana Cherkos monastery for the next 800 years.  It eventually found its resting place at the Church of Saint Mary of Zion in Axum, Ethiopia.  From that point to the present, the church is staffed by just one Monk known as the “Guardian of the Ark”, who is appointed to this sacred position for life.  The monk is quick to inform all curious visitors that he, along with the rest of Axum, would give their lives to protect the Ark.  Only the Guardian is allowed to view the Ark and all others, regardless of position or wealth, are turned away.

Italian policy of the 20th century considered Ethiopia to be in its sphere of influence. It was one of the few remaining African countries which still preserved its independence, free from European domination. Ethiopia had also skirmished with Italy in the past and won the engagement decisively. This occurred in 1896 when 14,500 Italian soldiers suffered a humiliating defeat at the hands of 80,000 Ethiopians in Adwa.

Field Marshal Rodolfo Graziani: Viceroy of Ethiopia

Fueled by the need for revenge and expansion by colonization, Mussolini sent his newly mechanized legions under the command of Field Marshal Rodolfo Graziani across the Abyssinian border from Italian Somaliland and Eritrea on October 3, 1935.

Abyssinia was quickly overran.  Protests were issued by the League of Nations.  It seemed that only the Vatican kept quiet.

Some may speculate that the Vatican blessed the Italian invasion of Abyssinia for its own selfish reasons.  The Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church had every right to call itself the original Christian faith just as much as the Roman Catholics at the Vatican.  And it certainly didn’t sit well when the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church refused to accept the Pope as the supreme leader of the Christian faith.

Pope Pius XI was careful to not personally endorse the Italian invasion on Abyssinia.  The potential backlash from Catholics worldwide would be enough reason to not support this war publicly.  But it is rumored that Mussolini obtained Vatican support for the invasion because it would allow the Vatican to submit the Ethiopian Orthodox Church to its will.

Although Pope Pius XI was fairly quiet during Italy’s occupation of Abyssinia, other members of the Vatican were much more vocal.  Archbishop of Torano was quoted as saying:

“The war against Ethiopia should be considered as a holy war, a crusade (as
Italian victory would)  open Ethiopia, a country of infidels and schismatics, to the expansion of the Catholic Faith.”

Ethiopia, with its long, rich history of Judaism and Christianity, claimed to possess the one artifact most desired by all the major religions; the Ark of the Covenant.  The Vatican was certainly aware of this claim.  And it would be extremely difficult for the Vatican to justify itself as the representative of Christianity if the world’s Holiest artifact still remained in the possession of the Ethiopian Orthodox Church.

Removal of the Stele of Axum by the Italian military

Did Fascist Italy, with the blessing of the Vatican, attempt to locate and remove the Ark from St. Mary’s church in Axum, Ethiopia?  There are no official records that confirm this.  But Italian forces did seek Ethiopian national treasures and Italian soldiers did occupy Axum.  In fact, the great Stele (or Obelisk) of Axum was removed and reassembled in the heart of Rome.  This feat alone shows that money was not an option, since the transportation of this large object was an engineering feat unheard of at the time.

The Ethiopian Orthodox Church has a long history of moving the Ark for safe keeping.  After residing in the Lake Tana Islands for more than 800 years, it was eventually moved to Axum in 333.  On multiple occasions when the Ark was threatened, it was returned to Lake Tana. In some instances, it was placed in other areas such as in Gonder, the caves of the Semien mountain, in Shewa, the Zeway Islands and elsewhere.  And as expected, Ethiopian religious officials claim the Ark was moved from Axum during the Italian occupation.  To make matters even more confusing, the Amhara tradition also states that an exact copy of the Ark is in St. Mary of Zion church and the original Ark of the Covenant is the Ambesà (the Lion) mine

Regardless of the confusion, the Italian forces in Ethiopia during 1935-41, left no stone unturned.  Some estimates state over 1 million Ethiopians were killed; over 300 monks, nuns, and clergy were murdered, 2,000 churches were destroyed along with 525,000 homes and 14 million livestock. Were the churches burned down to subdue the Orthodox Church or to search for the Ark?  Official records do not address this.

But it was in Axum that the mystery of the Ark was solved, at least for the Italians.  There was not just one Ark, but over one hundred of them scattered throughout the country.  To the Italians, this was a typical Ethiopian trick to hide the real Ark (if it truly existed) by having copies located in almost every church.  To the Ethiopians, this was another victory in keeping their most holy possession in Ethiopian hands.

The rebuilt Church of St. Mary of Zion

The Ark is only one of many biblical ties Ethiopia has with Israel.  It is interesting to note that many prominent Italian officials traveled to areas in Abyssinia either known for their historic relationship to the Ark’s location or because of their religious significance.  Alessandro Pavolini, a Leiutenant in 1936 and appointed to Minister of Popular Culture in 1939, was documented as traveling to Lake Tana.  Lake Tana, as mentioned earlier, was the original location where the Ark was kept in Ethiopia.  The lake is also supposedly where the Ark was kept for safekeeping in times of turmoil.  In 1936, just after the Italian invasion of Abyssinia, Pavolini traveled to Lake Tana via some water landing crafts long before Italian forces could arrive and secure the area.  One can only speculate why he took the risk of getting there as soon as possible prior to Italian forces securing the area.   Did he suspect the Ark had been moved there?  Original letters of Pavolini’s trip to Lake Tana was documented by Giordao Bruno Guerri in Storia Illustrata.

Galeazzo Ciano, the Italian Foreign Minister, traveled that same year to Gondar.  After Axum, Gondar is the second most holy city in Ethiopia.  Gondar is also famous for it’s monks, who profess the legend of Lilith and Cain of Hebrew Jewish texts.  For those who may be unfamiliar with this story, Lilith was the first woman created for Adam and Cain was the first born of Adam and Eve.  Cain was condemned to the Land of the Wandering and met Lilith east of Eden by the Red Sea.

The intentions of Pavolini and Ciano can’t be confirmed.  Officially, their travel was business related, other say it was of a personal nature.  But another surprising motive recently coming to light was their quest for another biblical subject; the search for the legendary King Solomon’s mines.

King Solomon’s mines have long been thought to be located in East Africa by archaeologists and biblical scholars.  In the new book “Il Mistero di San Pietro in Ciel d’oro“, scheduled to be released in the summer 2010, Enrico Cernuschi points out that the search for King Solomon’s mines was a top priority for the invading Italians.

According to Cernuschi, the Italian search for King Solomon’s mines started in 1930 during an air photographic mission conducted by Italian and British personnel mapping the border region between British and Italian Somaliland.  This area was of interest to the Italian’s because it was speculated the mines would be there.  The British sent the negatives to a geologist at the University of Leeds and the Italians forwarded the maps to the Military Geographic Institute in Florence.

Sir Henry Rider Haggard (22 June 1856 – 14 May 1925), was the English writer of adventure novels, who first wrote the novel “King Solomon’s Mines” in 1885 during his travels in Africa.  Haggard became aware of this legend while marching with Lord Napier’s army against Negus Theodore II in 1866 in the Haud region.

After the Italian invasion, an expedition privately funded, but backed by the Italian fascist party was conducted in 1937 and 1938 in an attempt to locate the fabled King Solomon’s mines.  In 1940, the expedition eventually stumbled across rich mineral deposits in the very same Haud region.

The Italian Cogne Minery Company began mining this region for its large quantities of Platinum.  Up until 1941, the precious metal was transported by plane to Italy for the production of Fivre valves used in the Italian EC3/ter radar systems.  But in January 1941, the Cogne miners were slaughtered by bandits and Commonwealth forces during the liberation of Abyssinia and the secret location of this mine died with them.

However, Abyssinian tradition states that the oldest of the Axum obelisks contained the cryptic map location of King Solomon’s mines and many believed the obelisk most likely to hold this secret was the very same one wisked away to Rome.

The University of Leeds, which never stopped searching for these mines since 1930, also felt that the Obelisk in Italy held the key to King Solomon’s mines.  The British had lobbied hard for over 65 years to sway the Italian government to return the stele to Ethiopia, and furthermore, volunteered to fund its restoration in Axum.

Axum's Stele in Rome

Cernuschi states that the Italian government was aware of this cryptic cipher in the obelisk.  For 65 years this code had never been broken.  And as fate would have it, a portion of the map was damaged in a lightning storm two weeks after the obelisk was dismantled in Rome, rendering the Obelisk useless for the lobbying Brits.

According to “Il Mistero di San Pietro in Ciel d’oro“, the British were only funding the restoration of the stele just so they could finally decipher the crypted location of King Solomon’s mines.  Once the map was damaged, the British decided to no longer fund the restoration project.

Is this just a wild story made up by Haggard and others?  It is not known.  But the stele, divided into three pieces, remained in Djibouti for 3 years due to this loss in funding.  It wasn’t until Italy finally decided to allocate the additional money to restore it in its original location in Axum that the Obelisk finally came back home.

For the Italians occupiers, the opportunity to search the many myths and legends of the ancient land of Abyssinia was not taken for granted.  In an unrelated, yet interesting attempt by Italians to explore mystical Abyssinia,  were at least 2 private Italian expeditions to Gimma in search of the legendary Cemetery of Elephants, long considered a mystery to the people of East Africa.  Nowadays, more is known about these strange and rare cemeteries where the bones of elephants lay scattered on the ground.  Once considered a myth, studies now show that when elephants prepare to die, they seek a flat location near food and water.  These locations in East Africa are usually hard to come by so the elephants tend to congregate to the same location and die with the others.

With the research of Cernuschi and others slowly providing details of this often overlooked chapter of Italian imperialism, some interesting details are beginning to emerge.  Indiana Jones and the Raiders of the Lost Ark may be a fictional movie, but the Italian exploits in Abyssinia is a historical event .  The measures taken to obtain the biblical secrets of Abyssinia is a part of that history that needs to be explored further.

References: Email correspondence with Enrico Cernuschi, author of  “Il Mistero di San Pietro in Ciel d’oro”, The Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church Faith and Order, Global Alliance for Ethiopia, Ethiopian Review, La Stele di Axum, Nile Trip, Comando Supremo: Italy at War, Keepers of the Lost Ark?, Haile Sellasie’s War, by Anthony Mockler