Aksum , also Axum written , mighty kingdom in the north Ethiopia during the early Christian era.
Britannica Quiz Destination Africa:Fact or Fiction? Is Africa's northernmost point further north than Europe's southernmost point? See if your geographical knowledge points north or south on this journey through Africa. Despite popular belief to the contrary came from Aksum not from any of the Semitic Sabaean kingdoms South Arabia, but developed as a local power. At his high point (3rd - 6th centuries v. Chr. ) Aksum became the largest market in Northeast Africa. The merchants traded as far as Alexandria and across the Nil . Aksum dominated the Coast des Red Sea by the end of the 9th century and exerted its influence from the banks of the Gulf of Aden to Zeila on the north coast of Somaliland (modern Somalia and Djibouti ).
During the 2nd and 3rd centuries ce its growth as Trade Empire increasingly encountered the power of the empire Meroe the fall of which was brought about by an Aksumite invasion in the 4th century. During the 4th century, the kings of Aksum were Christianized and thus associated with the both politically and religiously Byzantine Egypt connected . At the same time, they extended their authority to southern Arabia. In the 6th century, an Aksumite king reduced the Yemen to a state of vassalage. In the second half of the 6th century, however, the Persians invaded southern Arabia, ending the influence of the Aksumites there. Later, Aksum's Mediterranean trade was ended by Arab incursions in the 7th and 8th centuries.
Gradually Aksumite power shifted internally to the race the Agau (agaw or agew), whose princes in the Zagwe Dynasty 12th-13th centuries formed a new Christian lineage .