Ousanas

Ousanas (fl. 320) was a King of Axum. Stuart Munro-Hay believes that it is "very likely" that Ousanas is the king to whom Aedesius and Frumentius were brought. In Eritrean and Ethiopian tradition, this king is called Ella Allada or Ella Amida.[2] Ella Amida would then be his throne name, although Ousanas is the name that appears on his coins. If this identification is correct, then it was during his reign that Christianity was introduced to Axum and the surrounding territories.

Ousanas
King of Aksum
Reignearly 320s to late 340s[1]
PredecessorWazeba
SuccessorEzana
SpouseSofya

Ousanas may have had a "relatively long reign" and campaigned in Nubia.[1] It is also possible that he was briefly ousted by Wazeba, a usurper.[1]

W.R.O. Hahn, in a study published in 1983, identifies Sembrouthes, who is known only from an inscription found in Daqqi Mahari in modern Eritrea, with Ousanas. If correct, this would give Ousanas a reign of at least 27 years.[3]

Coinage

Several types of coins were minted during the reign of Ousanas: one type in gold, four in silver, and two in copper. All but one of the copper issues are distinguished from his later namesake by a disc and crescent above the head of the king, symbols of the Sun-goddess Shams and the Moon-god Sin.[4]

Munro-Hay has described the unique gold piece minted during his reign as evidence that "the Aksumite die-cutters reached the zenith of their accomplishment".[5] He speculates that Ousanas' predecessor had recruited expert die-cutters "perhaps from Alexandria, where the current coinage resembled that produced at Aksum", and others followed as late as Ousanas' reign.[5]

Coins with the name of this ruler were found in the late 1990s at archaeological sites in India.[6] The coins of Ousanas were lighter than those of his predecessors, likely due to Roman emperor Constantine I transferring lighter gold coins to the Eastern Roman Empire.[1]

Coins of Ousanas usually bear the following inscriptions:

  • Obverse: "OYCANAC ΒΑϹΙΛΕΥϹ" – "King Ousanas".[7]
  • Reverse: "AξωMITωNBI CIΓICENE" – "of the Aksumites, man of Gisene".[7]

Some copper coins have an alternate reverse inscription:

  • "Aξ+ ωMI" – "[of the] Aksum[ites]".[8]

See also

Notes
  1. Hahn, Wolfgang; West, Vincent (2016). Sylloge of Aksumite Coins in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford. Oxford: Ashmolean. p. 11.
  2. Munro-Hay, Aksum: An African Civilization of Late Antiquity (Edinburgh: University Press, 1991), p. 77. (Online text.)
  3. As cited in Munro-Hay, Excavations at Axum (London: British Institute in Eastern Africa, 1989), p. 22.
  4. Stuart Munro-Hay, The Coinage of Aksum (Manohar: 1984), pp. 56-65
  5. Munro-Hay, "Aksumite Coinage" in African Zion: The Sacred Art of Ethiopia, edited by Roderick Grierson (New Haven: Yale University Press, 1993), p. 106
  6. Details in Paul B. Henze, Layers of Time: A History of Ethiopia (New York: Palgrave, 2000), p. 31 n.18.
  7. Hahn, Wolfgang; West, Vincent (2016). Sylloge of Aksumite Coins in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford. Oxford: Ashmolean. p. 42.
  8. Hahn, Wolfgang; West, Vincent (2016). Sylloge of Aksumite Coins in the Ashmolean Museum, Oxford. Oxford: Ashmolean. p. 48.
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