Dejazmach Kassa later reconciled himself to Ras Ali in 1849, and Kassa remained loyal to Ali for the next three years.

After three months, in return for making Kassa dejazmach over Dembiya, north of Lake Tana, the Empress and her powerless husband were released. Kassa defeated the army of Empress Menen the following year on 18 June at Iloha, and took both Menen and her husband the former Emperor Yohannes III captive, forcing Ras Ali to negotiate their release. įuture events were foreshadowed in October, 1846, when Kassa Hailu defeated detachments of Empress Menen's army at two separate battles in Dembiya at the time, Ras Ali was away in Gojjam attempting to subdue the province's warlord, Birru Goshu, and unable to assist his mother. Shiferaw Bekele asserts that 'it is to his credit' that there were only two major wars while he was Ras Bewodded: the Battle of Debre Tabor in 1842, and Kassa Hailu's successful offensive in 1852/1853. They had no surviving issue.Īlthough his reign was punctuated by recurrent rebellions, Ali managed to keep all of the major lords subject to his rule until the final years. Their only daughter Tewabech was married 1848 to Kassa Hailu of Qwara, who in 1854 proclaimed himself a Negus. Ras Ali married Hirut, the daughter of Dejazmach Wube Haile Maryam, lord of Semien and of Tigray when he placed her in the church of Mahdere Maryam for her safety before the Battle of Debre Tabor (6 February 1842), his opponents violated the refuge of the church and kidnapped her. However, Gebre Krestos died after three months, and Sahle Dengel met with Ras Ali in the village of Tsagur where he convinced Ras Ali to restore him to the throne once again (October, 1832). Sahle Dengel was sent to Zengaj, and Ras Ali recalled Gebre Krestos from the island of Mitraha in Lake Tana, and restored him as Emperor. Ras Ali made Sahle Dengel Emperor in 1832, but the clergy of Azazo disapproved of the new Emperor's religious beliefs, and convinced Ras Ali to remove him. In one of these continual campaigns, Ras Ali II plundered the imperial capital, Gondar, in 1838. In any case, the morale of the Ethiopian Church reached its lowest point in the 1840s and 1850s.įor much his reign Ras Ali was constantly at war, either putting down rebellions in his core territories, or defending his territory from rival lords. Some modern scholars consider him as indifferent to religion as he was to the problems of ruling his portion of Ethiopia, although Trimingham observes that he attempted to revive the cult of Ahmad Gragn by requiring pilgrimages to his tomb. Ras Ali was officially a Christian but some of his contemporaries doubted the sincerity of his faith and suspected that he was a secret Muslim. However, his mother, Menen Liben Amede, soon came to control this council and exerted much influence over political decisions for the next decade. As Ali was a minor, a council of regents was appointed from these nobles. In July 1831, after the death of his cousin, Ras Dori, Ali was appointed Ruler of Begemder and Imperial Regent at the age of 12 in a meeting of the chief nobles of the Yejju Oromo at the dynastic capital of Debre Tabor. Yejju, which ruled much of the Ethiopian Empire during the Zemene Mesafint. He was a member of a powerful Oromo dynasty known as the 1866) was Ras of Begemder and the de facto ruler of the Ethiopian Empire.

General ras alula