Ethiopia, officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a landlocked nation in the Horn of Africa. It shares boundaries with Eritrea as well as Djibouti to the north, Somalia to the east and also northeast, Kenya to the south, South Sudan to the west, as well as Sudan to the northwest. Ethiopia has an overall area of 1,100,000 square kilometres (420,000 sq mi).

It is house to 117 million citizens and also is the 12th-most populated nation worldwide as well as the 2nd-most heavily populated in Africa after Nigeria. The nationwide resources and also largest city, Addis Ababa, exists a number of kilometres west of the East African Rift that divides the nation into the African and Somali tectonic plates.

Anatomically modern human beings arised from modern-day Ethiopia and also set out to the Near East as well as somewhere else in the Middle Paleolithic duration. Ethiopia has a lengthy background, tracing back to the first millennium BC. 2 kingdoms were developed during antiquity: the Kingdom of Dʿmt and also Kingdom of Aksum; the latter’s people was taken into consideration a great power by the 3rd century advertisement.

Christianity reached Aksum in the fourth century as well as has actually been the state religious beliefs because; Islam was introduced in Ethiopia in the seventh century. After the collapse of Aksum in the 10th century, a selection of kingdoms existed in the area that would certainly later be called Ethiopia. The Zagwe empire ruled the northern-central part of Ethiopia and Eritrea for over 3 centuries up until being overthrown by Yekuno Amlak, who ushered in the Ethiopian Realm and also its Solomonic line empire in 1270, an empire claimed descent from Biblical Solomon and also the Queen of Sheba under their boy Menelik I.

By the 14th century, the realm grew its eminence through territorial expansion. In the mid-18th century, Ethiopia experienced decentralization known as Zemene Mesafint. It was lasted at the power of Emperor Tewodros II in 1855; bringing Ethiopia to reunification and innovation. During the Scramble for Africa, Ethiopia was the only African country to safeguard its sovereignty from European colonial powers; beating Italy in the Fight of Adwa, caused armistice Treaty of Addis Ababa. From 1878 to 1904, Emperor Menelik II released a series of occupations, combining Ethiopia’s modern boundaries.

Ethiopia was inhabited by Fascist Italy in 1935 and was merged with Italian had Eritrea as well as Somaliland to end up being Italian East Africa. In 1941, it was freed by the British military and an Arbegnoch guerrilla unit during the Second World War. The Derg, a Soviet-backed communist military junta, took power in 1974 after deposing Emperor Haile Selassie and the Solomonic empire, ruling nearly 17 years with a civil war accepted by bloody suppression, starvation, and also revolt of Tigray-Eritrean separatist rebels, as well as Ethiopian– Somali dispute.

After beating the Derg, the Ethiopian Individuals’s Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) controlled the country with a new constitution as well as ethnic-based federalism. Afterwards, Ethiopia withstood extended as well as unsolved inter-ethnic stress and also clashes and also political instability marked by democratic backsliding.