![[ History of
the Battle of Adwa ]](ad-h-pr1_files/ad-h-hi2.gif)
By Tsegaye Tegenu
(Part One of Three)
[Part Two]
[Part Three]
Introduction
The battle of Adwa had a significant national and international
consequences and it
occupied a unique place in the Ethiopian and African
historiography. The background and
the events leading to the battle have been explained mainly from
the perspective of
diplomatic and political history . This perspective emphasises
the military doctrines of
Ethiopia (national ideology and military missions), skilful
diplomacy of the emperors in
the acquisition of war materials and the making of allies, the
capacity and readiness of
the Ethiopian army to undergo the hardships of the war, its
morale, etc. These factors
have been overemphasized so much so that in some circle they are
being ascribed as
determining factors for the outcome and aftermath of the
battle.The present paper,
however, attempts to explain the background and aftermath of the
battle of Adwa from the
perspective and analysis of the resource system of the Ethiopian
state and its military
strategic culture. Basically the paper deals with the manner of
the acquisition and use of
resources to accomplish concretely defined strategic tasks of
the armed force. Within such
framework of approach and analysis, the paper attempts to
address two central issues: why
Menelik won victory, and why he could not continue his military
success and drove the
Italians out from their colonial possession of Eritrea? An
explanation to these complex
issues lies in the study of the resource system and military
strategic culture of the
Ethiopian state. One premises of this paper is that the scale of
military operation, the
ways and means of preparing for a war depends on the form and
size of the economy and
military resources of a state. A military strategy which fails
to consider the real
military-economic resources of a state and the capabilities of
an enemy to conduct war is
adventurist, and as a rule, it ultimately suffers defeat.
The second premises of this paper is that the Ethiopian army was
based on two
qualitatively different types of resource acquisition and
allocation systems during the
second half of the nineteenth century. The first type of
logistic system was based on the
Rist-Gult system which was geographically entrenched in what was
commonly called M!s!fint
Hag!r, namely the present day highlands of Eritrea, the region
of Tigray, Gonder, Gojjam,
and Wello. The rest of Ethiopia was under the second type of
resource system, namely the
Gebar Mad!riya system, which formed the basis of the fiscal and
military organization of
Menelik's government .
The battles against the British military expedition at Meqdela
(1868), against Egypt at
Gundet (1875) and Gura (1876), against Italy at Dogali in 1887,
and against the Mahdist
Sudan at Metemma in 1889 were conducted based on the Rist-Gult
system, while the battle of
Adwa against Italy in 1896 was based mainly on the Gebar Mad!
riya system. In terms of the
social and ethnic origins, the identity of the troops which
participated in all these
battles was similar. All were drawn from the various ethnic
groups and constituted the
class of military nobility, regional aristocracy and peasantry.
However, there was a
difference in the manner of administration and using the human
and material resources of
the war. The troops of Adwa wererecruited basically through the
Gebar Mad!riya system,
which had qualitatively different methods of remuneration,
revenue administration and
provisioning which was in harmony with the form of the economy.
Methods and Means of Troop Remuneration in the Rist-Gult
System
The army of Tewedros and Yohannes were raised by a fiscal system
called here the Rist Gult
system . Since the crisis of the sixteenth century , troops
recruited through this fiscal
system consisted basically two categories. The body
guard/central troops and provincial
troops. There were differences in the method of remuneration,
command hierarchy, and
service base of the two categories of troops. Body guard troops
received annual salary and
q!l!b-ration payment and their function was to guard the
property and security of the
prince, and perform some departmental functions including
household services. Provincial
troops were recruited from peasants who served as field force,
and/or as transport and
provision corps, and they were commanded by the local chiefs.
During the Z!m!n! M!safint
the source of income for the court troops came largely from the
domain of the princes
(known by different names as Gult B!t, Wusti Gulti, Y!-N!gash
Gult, etc.). Provincial
troops were recruited by tax exemption, as in the case of z!mach-
soldiers and grant of the
right of land tax collection such as Amisho. During this period
ordinary land tax was
administered privately by the Gult!gna, and princes were
dependent on the local chiefs and
the peasants to raise force . Since the time of Tewedros kings
wanted to take over the
responsibility of remuneration of troops and securing an
independent provisioning system.
Tewedros created a central treasury from which funds were drawn
to pay the army. Initially
he confiscated properties of regional princes, but these measure
served as temporal relief
of financial burden. With the increase in the frequency and
scale of the kings campaign,
more troops were recruited or integrated into the imperial army.
At one time the number
had increased so much increased that the tall of deaths and
famine stricken among the
king's soldier were quite many .
The emperor declared policy of Hag!r B!ge and collected payment
of ordinary land tax
through royal officials. With this policy the king abolished
offices of hereditary
govornorship, both at the local and regional level . The tax
document of Tewedros,
indicated that the total revenue of the king amounted to a
quarter of a million in
1863/64. This amount excluded unrecorded revenue from direct and
indirect tax collected
from the regions of west and eastern Begemder, Wello. There were
also other unrecorded
sources of revenue such as livestock, judicial fee and
extraordinary land tax. The amount
of the king's revenue was a considerable when compared to the
income of the king's of
Z!m!n! M!safint . The income was, however, collected by
attacking the privilege of the
local and provincial Gult!gna, and this policy became a source
of conflict. As his
soldiers and number of campaign increased, the king introduced
extraordinary land tax
(F!s!s) in some region, and claimed payment of tax traditionally
belonging to the church,
and even demanded that some clergies must cultivate and pay him
tax. Again this led to
conflict with the church. The policy of T!s!ri (quartering of
soldiers on peasant houses),
which the king used it both as a means of provisioning and
salary payment, became a burden
on the peasant . The king looked desperately for a variety of
sources of revenue which led
him into conflict with the family of regional princes whose
property he confiscated, with
the local Gult!gna whose privilege he deprived by the policy of
Hag!r B!ge, conflict with
the clergy who were forced to pay extraordinary tax and
relinquish some of their judicial
right, and with the peasants who were burdened by the T!s!ri
(billeting) and F!s!s
(payment of extraordinary land tax) policy of the king. In his
last letter written to
Robert Napier, commander of the British military expedition
force to Ethiopia, Tewedros
wrote that his country men turned their back againsthim because
he wanted them pay tax .
Yohannes, his successor, did not resort to the policy of
centralization concerning the
collection and administration of ordinary land tax payment. He
followed the earlier
practice of the system, and reinstituted Gult to their former
holders . According to a
preliminary study, with this policy the kings revenue from
ordinary land tax decreased by
30 %, and this had an effect on government military expense. The
king's income from
ordinary land tax (Gebr) was that part allocated in the form of
Wust Gulti and Y!-N!gash.
His revenue from the ordinary land tax was not that considerable
in size when compared to
Tewedros. The total revenue of Yohannes includes from ordinary
land tax, 35,927 Maria
Theresa dollar (henceforward abreviated as MT$) from Mereb
Melash, Tigray 20,851 MT$ ,
Begemder when controlled by his relative could amount 34,740 MT$
excluding payment in
cloth. Compared to Tewedros, the income of Yohannes from
ordinary land tax (Gebr) was less
than at least by one-third. However, the emperor attempted to
cover the decrease in
revenue, through expanding imperial control over regions
hitherto not yet integrated into
the royal tax system and by other means such as imposing
provincial contribution.
Following the policy of Hag!r-Maqnat, the king quartered royal
soldiers in the province of
Hamassen, and eastern parts of Wello . The provincial
contribution he could get from
Gojjam and Shewa constituted a substantial amount.Assuming the
figure of Branchi and
Anatolle were correct, Shewa gave 80 000 MT$, and Gojjam 10000
MT$ three porters of gold,
and a great number of cattle . The king's troop were fed largely
by extraordinary land tax
(F!s!s) and T!s!ri-billeting system. No figure for size of
extraordinary tax F!s!s, but if
we are to judge by the period of Menelik, the districts in the
provinces of Sere paid
13090 MT$, Aksum paid 13090 MT$, Enderta 53360 MT$, Hult Awulalo
18612 MT$, Temben 110890
MT$, Agame 36294 MT$, and Adwa 34169 MT$. Total revenue from
extraordinary land tax
amounted to 279505 MT$. From salt trade about 6000 MT$ was
collected , and no amount was
given for custom tolls and market dues. In the 1880s emperor
Yohannes could raise annually
around 566,000 MT$, an amount which could be used for the court
and royal military
expenditure. The major part of the revenue came from
extraordinary land tax and provincial
contribution, which constituted additional burden to the peasant
and imposition on
regional princes. Income from these sources were precarious, and
their continues flow
depended on permanent hold of increasing number of troops, which
again raise problem of
expenditure. The purpose of discussing the revenue sources of
Tewedros and Yohannes was to
show the fiscal limits of their governments to raise more money
in par with the frequency
and scale of war . According to preliminary study, during the
time of Tewedros there was
about eighteen number of major imperial troop movements, and
during the time of Yohannes,
there was more than 31 major imperial troop movements. Constant
mobilization and
recruitment of soldiers was an increase in military expenditure,
both for the troops of
the court and the provincial-chifra. The emperors resorted to
look for various sources of
revenue, which were not dependable in nature. Ordinary land tax
was not collected and
administered by the state. It was localized and was in private
administration. Through
centuries, Gult, the benefit right from ordinary land tax, had
become part of family
property, and to abolish the system would cause conflict as was
the case with Tewedros. To
increase tax kings had to know who was paying and who was
exempted, but this was the
responsibility of the peasant community. In the Rist Gult
system, land tax assessment and
distribution was in the hands of the peasant community. The
level of the total tax
demanded from the decent group was fixed by negotiation with the
community. Once this was
done, the distribution of the land tax payment among descent
members could be made
according to custom and principles of measurement laid down by
the peasant community
itself. Princes did not know who was paying or exempted, and
thus could not increase tax
vis a vis the large number of troops and frequent of war. In
regions where the ordinary
land tax was paid in the form of Amisho, calculation of payment
was made by percentage on
the amount of produce from the land. Peasants paid one-fifth of
the produce, and the total
size which an ordinary soldier could receive depended on the
number of cultivated farm
lands. Uncultivated farm lands were not subject to taxation. The
size of revenue which a
soldier was entitled to receive could thus fluctuate from year
to year by the system of
rotation, bad harvest or household labour situation. There was
therefore insecurity to
guarantee the ideal needs of a soldier; indeed the whole method
of remuneration affects
the service base of soldiering. Peasants who owned land
communally paid the expenses in
keeping Z!mach soldiers and constantly supplying provision, in
addition to the regular
payment of the ordinary and the extraordinary land taxes. In the
Rist Gult system, the
peasant community and Gult!gna were the primary force in
providing the logistic base of
the state. Military expenses were rigidly dependent over a given
portion, no mater how
they fluctuated over the years. Increase in the number of
soldiers and thus payment to
them means, reclaiming of alienated land tax and/or increasing
the burden of taxes on
peasants. These were discretionary measures which could alienate
the support of the
Gult!gn and the peasants. Kings could not increase the basis for
the land tax. Neither
could they introduce land survey nor did the register the number
of tax paying
individuals. Other alternatives, such as extraordinary taxes and
provincial contribution
had their own problems. Extraordinary taxes were introduced in
limited regions, and F!s!s
and T!s!ri means burden to the peasants. Provincial contribution
depends on the kings
power and relationship with the princes. Thus, payment of
soldier was not regular, and in
fact there was no difference between provision and payment. With
this method it was
difficult to put troops on permanent footing. The battles of
Meqdela, Gundet, Gura, Dogali
and Metema were based on a precarious resource system. It is not
difficult to see the
desperate effort of the kings to over come the fiscal limits of
the system to fight
against external aggression.
(end of part one)
[Part Two]
[Part Three]
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