3,000-year-old settlement unearthed in Ethiopia

A lion’s skull, remains of a bronze plaque with an Ethiopian-Sabian inscription and gold objects ready to be melted down are just a few exciting snapshots from a 12x12m deep trench that a team from the DAI’s Sanaa branch office has just made in Yeha. Through the excavation, the researchers hope to learn more about the eventful history of the site and to fill gaps in the finds.

View into the deep trench [Credit: J. Kramer/DAI Orient-Abteilung]

Yeha in the highlands of Ethiopia is one of the country’s most important historical sites and is known for its monumental buildings from the first half of the 1st millennium BC.  They are the result of a migration and fusion process between the local population and immigrants from the southern Arabian peninsula.
In the early 1st century BC they founded the Ethiopian-Sabaean community Di’amat with its political and religious centre in Yeha. But the beginnings of Yeha go back even further.

Fragmented bronze plaque with an Ethiopian-Sabian inscription
[Credit: I. Wagner/DAI Orient-Abteilung]

Based on ceramic finds and some remains of a wall on the natural bedrock of the nearly nine metre deep section, the DAI team was able to document the first settlement more than 3,000 years old.
The finds clearly indicate an indigenous, and at least partially settled, population. Only in later layers does the ceramic inventory change fundamentally and show that South Arabian groups have immigrated to Yeha.

Bone and ceramic fragments in the Ethiopian-Sabian culture layer
[Credit: S. Japp/DAI Orient-Abteilung]

The lion’s skull, which lay in one layer together with cattle bones and various clay vessels, dates from this period. Without it one would assume a simple waste pit here. However, the lion was probably certainly not on the menu, rather it points to cultic activities and the religious significance of the city at that time.
The bronze plaque also underlines the central position of Yeha in the Ethiopian-Sabaean period. According to the inscription, Başama was the consort of a ruler of Di´amat in the 7th century BC. The panel fragment was found in a conglomerate of partly preserved, partly already melted down gold and bronze objects, which were probably deposited there in the 3rd/4th century AD. The material from earlier times was presumably to be melted down in a nearby melting furnace and reused.

View over the roofed excavation area on the right of the monastery complex with the
Great Temple of Yeha on the right and the church on the left in the background
[Credit: I. Wagner/DAI Orient-Abteilung]

Yeha remains an important place of worship in the Aksumite period and beyond. Even today the place is dominated by an orthodox monastery. The team, however, discovered the corner of a monumental building in the strata from the 3rd/4th century AD, which probably extended into the area of today’s church grounds. What the building looked like and what function it had is still unclear.

The Yeha site is being researched in an Ethiopian-German cooperation project by the Sanaa branch office of the Orient Department of the DAI and the Friedrich Schiller University Jena, Chair of Semitic Philology and Islamic Studies (Prof. Dr. Norbert Nebes). The research project has been funded by the German Research Foundation since autumn 2016 as part of a long-term initiative.

Source: Deutsches Archäologisches Institut [March 07, 2019]

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