Overview
Ankober (), formerly known as Ankobar, is a town in central Ethiopia. Located in the North Shewa Zone of the Amhara Region, it's perched on the eastern escarpment of the Ethiopian Highlands at an elevation of about . It is to the east of Debre Birhan and about northeast of Addis Ababa. Ankober was formerly the capital of the Ethiopian kingdom of Shewa founded by Yekuno Amlak in the thirteenth century. Buildings that survive from the Shewa period include the Kidus Mikael Church, built by Sahle Selassie.
According to Philip Briggs, all that survives of Menelik's palace, which he had built on the site of his father's palace, is "one long stone-and-mortar wall measuring some 1.5m high." Briggs comments that it is "difficult to say why this one wall should have survived virtually intact when the rest of the palace crumbled into virtual oblivion." Ankober is also known as where the endemic Ankober serin was first observed by ornithologists in 1979.
History
Ankober may have formerly been known as Gorobela. Meridazmach Amha Iyasus, moved the capital of Shewa from Doqaqit (located near Debre Sina) to Ankober. It remained the principal residence of the rulers of Shewa until Negus (later Emperor) Menelik II moved it to Mount Entoto in 1878, although Wossen Seged preferred to live at Qundi during his reign. The name of the town is said to have been taken from an Oromo Queen, Anko, who ruled the town during the reign of Qedami Qal. The first Europeans to record their visit to Ankober were the Evangelical missionaries Carl Wilhelm Isenberg and Johann Ludwig Krapf in 1839. However, at the time there was a small colony of Greeks, who made their living as craftsmen and tradesmen. In the following years, a steady stream of travellers visited Ankober, including Captain William Cornwallis Harris.
Following the death of Meridazmach Sahle Selassie in 1847, the Abichu Oromo rebelled and attacked Ankober; only the firearms Sahle Selassie had collected there saved the capital. The Shewans burned the town in 1856 in reaction to the invasion, and eventual conquest, of Emperor Tewodros II. It was soon rebuilt, and used by Tewodros's appointees Haile Mikael and Seyfe Sahle Selassie as their seat of power. Around the time of the First World War, the population was around 2000. In the military actions leading to the Battle of Segale, on 18 October 1916 Negus Mikael's troops crushed an advance force of 11,000 men stationed in Ankober and killed their leader, Ras Lul Seged. During the Italian occupation, the town consisted of about 3,000 inhabitants living on two hilltops of different height.
The Italian Resident lived on the higher hill, and on the lower hill were the two round churches Maryam and Medhane Alem. Around this time the Italians partly moved Ankober to a more accessible plateau. The Italians also carried out a number of bombings against the Arbegnoch in the neighboring area.
Demographics
Based on figures from the Central Statistical Agency of Ethiopia published in 2005, Ankober has an estimated population of 1114 males and 1174 females for a total population of 2288. Despite its status as a former capital, Ankober is only the second-largest town in Ankober woreda.
Transportation
The 42-kilometer gravel road between Ankober and Debre Berhan was overhauled in May 2009.