Kebra Nagast: Encyclopedia II - Kebra Nagast - Early Portuguese translations

Kebra Nagast - Early Portuguese translations

One of the earliest collections of documents of Ethiopia came through the writings of Francisco Alvarez, official envoy which king Manuel I of Portugal, sent to Dawit II of Ethiopia, under Ambassador Don Rodrigo De Lima. In the papers concerning this mission, Alvarez included an account of the Emperor of Ethiopia, and a description in Portuguese of the habits of the Ethiopians, titled The Prester John of the Indies, which was printed in 1533.

In the first quarter of the 16th century, P.N. Godinho published some traditions about King Solomon and his son Menelek, derived from the Kebra Nagast. Further information about the contents of the Kebra Nagast was supplied by Baltazar Téllez (1595-1675), the author of the Historia General de Etiopía Alta (Coimbra, 1660). The sources of his work were the histories of Manoel Almeida, Alfonso Méndez and Jerónimo Lobo.

Among the most complete, and least known, translations of the Kebra Nagast, is the exhaustive work of Heinrich Cornelius Agrippa Historia de las cosas de Etiopía (Toledo, 1528) -- a greatly amplified account. Agrippa was an alchemist, a physician, and expert in magical sciences and Kabala; he resided in the courts of Maximilian I and Charles V; eventually he suffered imprisonment in Grenoble by order of King Francis I of France, where he died.

Additional information on Arabic additions to the original narratives of the Kebra Nagast was included by the Jesuit priest Manoel Almeida (1580-1646) in his Historia de Etiopía which does not appear to have been published in its entirety. Almeida was sent out as a missionary to Ethiopia, and had abundant opportunity to learn about the Kebra Nagast at first hand, owing to his excellent command of the language. His manuscript is a valuable work. His brother, Apollinare, also went out to the country as a missionary and was, along with his two companions, stoned to death in Tigray.

Adapted from the Wikipedia article "Early Portuguese translations", under the G.N U Free Docmentation License. Please also see http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki