Abridged Chronicle of the Kings of Ethiopia

The chronicle is a compilation. Its translator, René Basset, says in his introduction that it was put together from the official annals kept by the king’s secretaries, probably under Iyasu II (1729–1753), that the annals of Susenyos, Fasilides and Yohannes I had each been written during the reign concerned, and that from Susenyos onward the compiler simply copied them. It is therefore later in its present form than the events of 1607 to 1632, but it draws on the court’s record of them.

For the reign of Susenyos it is terse. It counts by regnal years and Ethiopian months, and in the passages cited it calls the Jesuits and the Portuguese “the Franks” and the Roman doctrine the belief of the Franks. It is cited here for the Ethiopian side of events that are otherwise told by Jesuit writers such as the Travels of the Jesuits in Ethiopia. The longer chronicle of Susenyos edited by F. M. Esteves Pereira (Lisbon, 1892–1900) was not found in a freely readable copy and is not used. Basset’s notes, printed with the translation, are his own and are not cited as the chronicle.