Page 629 : ETHIOPIA — ETNA
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Ethio′pia (the Cush of the Bible), the name given to the countries south of Egypt and Libya, on the upper Nile. It included modern Nubia, Sennaar, Kordofan and Abyssinia. The name Ethiopian was originally given to all the nations inhabiting the southern part of the globe, or, rather, to all people of a dark-brown or black color. The word is supposed to come from two Greek words meaning sun-burned. The part of Ethiopia of which we have the most ancient knowledge is the kingdom of Meroë, an island formed by two rivers tributary to the Nile. Its capital was Napata. The island was very fertile, with an abundance of animals and metals. It also was the site of an oracle of Jupiter Ammon. This made it a great place of resort and a trading place for India, Arabia, Egypt, Libya and Carthage, so that it grew rapidly and became, about 1000 B. C., one of the most powerful kingdoms of the ancient world. It threw off the yoke of Egypt about 760, and in turn ruled Egypt for sixty years. At one time 240,000 Egyptians settled in Meroë, and, being artisans and traders, added to its prosperity. It was conquered by Cambyses about 530 B. C. The Ethiopians sent to Darius every third year four pints of gold-dust, 200 logs of ebony, five negro slaves and 20 tusks of ivory. Augustus conquered Meroë, and we find Queen Candace (Candace means the queen) of Ethiopia mentioned among his vassals. The remains of the ancient civilization of Ethiopia are the ruins of large buildings covered with sculptures representing battles and religious ceremonies, rows of broken sphinxes, temples hewn in the rocks and several pyramids, which are higher in proportion to their base than those of Egypt. The names of 30 kings and queens have been found, the first one, named Meneliheh, being said to be the son of Solomon and the queen of Sheba. The modern history of the country belongs to Abyssinia. The area is over 400,000 square miles, with an estimated population of over 5,000,000. See Abyssinia and Nubia.
Ethnology. See Races.
Et′na or Ætna, a volcano on the eastern coast of Sicily, 10,850 feet high. It ends in a single cone, with a crater 1,000 feet deep and from two to three miles around. On the sides of the mountain are a large number of smaller cones, the chief being the Monti Rossi, twin peaks cast up in the eruption of 1669. The mountain rises through three zones—the cultivated region, of about 2,000 feet, where date-palms, bananas, oranges, lemons, olives, figs and almonds are grown; the wooded region in the middle, planted with forests of chestnut, cork, beech, pine, maple and oak; and the desert region beginning at about 6,300 feet from the base of the mountain, a dreary waste of black lava, ashes and sand, covered through a large part of the year with snow. The famous chestnut-tree, one of the largest and oldest trees in the world, formed by seven trees grown together and 163 feet in circumference, is in the wooded region of the slope. Nine thousand and seventy-five feet above the sea an observatory was built in 1880, which is the highest inhabited house in Europe, being 1,000 feet higher than the shelter on the Great St. Bernard. The earliest recorded eruption of Mount Etna has no date, but seems to have happened before the Trojan War. The earliest date is 475 B. C. The most remarkable eruptions are the following: In 1169, when Catania with 15,000 citizens was destroyed; 1329, when a new crater was opened; 1444, when the cone fell into the crater; 1537, which overwhelmed two villages; 1669, when a chasm 12 miles long was opened and a new crater made. In 1852–53 there was an eruption, which lasted nine months and sent out a torrent of lava six miles long, two miles wide and 12 feet deep. There have been in all about 100 eruptions, 16 of them occurring in the i9th century. The ascent is usually made from Catania. See Etna and Its Eruptions, by Rodwell.
Image: MOUNT ETNA AS SEEN FROM REGGIO IN CALABRIA
