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Introduction
"The News of the Galla,"1 written in 1593, is among the most enduring original historical documents in Ethiopian historiography. The manuscript can be divided into four parts: a brief description of Oromo ethnography; a recording of the progress of Oromo migration, and a call for the mobilization of Christian forces for the purpose of stopping the Oromo advance- and the principal message of Abba Bahrey's work. Bahrey's manuscript is the first detailed historical document that presents the impact of Oromo warfare on the Christian kingdom, and is the most widely read and referenced source on early Oromo history. It contains a detailed description of Oromo population movements of the sixteenth century and their impact on the Christian Kingdom of Ethiopia, and the first thorough analysis of the class structure of the Christian society of the time. The manuscript was first translated from the Geez language into German, French and English and subsequently has been translated into Amharic in the 1940s. The 1954 English translation was reprinted in 1992, with a new introduction by Donald Levine. Aleme Eshete made an Amharic translation in the late 1990s, and Getatchew Haile translated the manuscript into Amharic and English in 2002. This article examines how Bahrey's manuscript shaped the presentation of the Oromo in Ethiopian historiography, discusses its strengths and weaknesses, and presents information about its famous author.
Four points should be made before advancing further. First, this article draws heavily on my two previous short articles on the works of Abba Bahrey.2 Second, while there is no doubt that Abba Bahrey's manuscript is an original historical document, originality does not imply that the manuscript is free of inaccuracies. Bahrey's manuscript has never been examined seriously for its historicity. Third, Abba Bahrey was engaged in a battle of ideas on how best to mobilize Christian forces against the Oromo. His manuscript depicts the conflict between the Christians and the migrating pastoral Oromo as a struggle between good and evil, and ever since has served as a lightening rod for political responses to Oromo nationalism that are part of Ethiopia's political discourse today. Fourth, because of its ideological appeal, the accuracy of Abba Bahrey's "The News of the Galla" has never been questioned, its ideological stand never challenged, its...