Empress Tewabech Ali

Tewabech Ali was born in 1831 into the ruling Yejju dynasty of the Ethiopian highlands, the daughter of Ras Ali II of Yejju, who from 1831 served as Ras of Begemder and de facto ruler of the empire during the twilight of the Zemene Mesafint, the "Era of the Princes." Her grandmother was the formidable Empress Menen Liben Amede, wife of Emperor Yohannes III, who dominated the councils of the imperial court at Gondar. Tewabech thus stood at the very center of the fractured power of nineteenth-century Ethiopia.

In 1848 she was given in marriage to the rising warlord Kassa Hailu of Qwara — a union arranged by her grandmother for reasons of state, to bind an ambitious young rebel to the Yejju house. Yet what began as policy became devotion. All authorities agree that Kassa truly loved and honored his wife, and remained faithful to her throughout their marriage.

In February 1855 Kassa was crowned Emperor Tewodros II, and Tewabech became his Empress consort. Historians such as Paul B. Henze record that she exerted a steadying, moderating influence upon the emperor during the early years of his reign, as he labored to reunify and consolidate the imperial state. Their marriage produced no children.

Empress Tewabech died on 19 August 1858 in Wollo, while Tewodros campaigned against rebels in that province. Chroniclers mark her death as a turning point, after which the emperor's temperament grew darker for want of her counsel. May the memory of this daughter of Yejju, who tempered a throne with grace, be held in lasting honor.