An Ethiopian Lucretius? Giusto da Urbino and the Origins of the Ḥatäta Zärʾa Yaʿɘqob Controversy

Abstract

This article uses new archival evidence to reframe the controversy over the authorship of the Ḥatäta Zärʾa Yaʿǝqob (also known as the Wärqe), a philosophical autobiography set in seventeenth-century Ethiopia. We demonstrate that, already in the context of the Catholic mission to evangelize the Oromo people of southern Ethiopia, accusations were made against a Capuchin missionary, Fr. Giusto da Urbino (1814–56), to the effect that he had endorsed, edited or even forged this work. Catholic authorities promptly attempted to suppress the Ḥatäta Zärʾa Yaʿǝqob, identified in an 1857 report as a “true Lucretius of Ethiopian literature.”