An international forwarding in the valley of Omo made it possible to find, in the sedimentary layers of the large pit of the East Africa, of the hundreds of fossils of Hominides going back to 2.5 million years. In the depression of Afar, similar discoveries were made, and gave “birth” to famous Lucy. Discovered in 1963, the vast paleolithic layer of Melka Kontouré (approximately 50 km in the south of Addis-Abeba) made it possible to put at the day more than 70 archaeological levels.

Around 1500 av. J. - C., populations come from the kingdoms sabéens of Arabia started to mix with the autochtones. The birth of the kingdom of Aksoum is at the neighborhoods of 500 av. J. - C. Its power extends to all Ethiopia from North and most of the Center, to the Blue Nile in the west and the depressions of the East. Ezana, assembled on the throne towards 320 apr. J. - C., is converted with Christianity by a laic Syrian, Frumence, envoy of the patriarch of Alexandria (what will involve the adhesion of the country to the cause of the monophysism). The economic life is developed. Aksoum controls all the tracks which lead to the Red Sea: ivory, gold and slaves exchange themselves against weapons, metals and cotton.

To the VII E century, Islam appears and extends quickly, Aksoum insulator of the commercial main roads. The kingdom will crumble with X E century, victim of the revolts of pagan populations, carried out by a princess of Semien.  

In 1137, a agouée dynasty, Zagoués, seizes the power. In Roha (today Lalibela), they built remarkable churches monoliths. In 1270, they in their turn are driven out by Yekouno Amlak, which settles in Choa, in Tegoulet, and carries out wars at the same time against the Islamized populations and the pagan ones of the North-West which refuse christianization.  

The religion will remain a long time the main idea of the history of Ethiopia: to the XVI E century, the kingdom passes under the domination of the troops of the Imam Ahmad Gran and the négus request the assistance of the Portuguese, who allow to make failure with the projection of Islam (battles of Ouaïna Daga, 1543).  

In 1632, conversion with the Catholicism of king Sousneyos causes revolts which lead it to abdicate with the profit of his/her son, Fasilidas, which prohibits Catholicism, expels the Jesuits and installs the capital with Gondar. While the Moslems, and especially the Official receptions, originating in current Somalia, multiply their incursions into the Ethiopian Empire, the sovereigns gradually lose their power with the profit of the industrial barons, in particular the chiefs (short-nap cloths) of Striped, Choa and Amhara. It is the “period of the princes”, which is completed in 1855 with the come to power of Théodoros II. This one submits the chiefs of province and request to British to help it to modernize the country. But, in front of their multiple interferences in the political matters and nuns, Théodoros breaks with Great Britain: the British troops crush the Ethiopian army and Théodoros commits suicide. The chief of Striped reaches the Empire under the name of Johannès IV in 1872; he will be killed in 1889 as a combatant the troops of Mahdi. In 1887, close-cropped Alula, its lieutenant, had demolishes the Italians with Dogali, in current Erythrée.  

In 1889, Ménélik, short-nap cloth of Choa, succeed Johannès IV and continue a territorial expansion policy while negotiating with the Italians. It signs the treaty of Uccialli (May 1889), which grants to Italy Erythrée and a protectorate on Ethiopia, then denounces it and beats the Italian troops in Adoua (1896).  

After the abdication of Ménélik II, Lidj Iyassou, its grand-nephew, goes up on the throne under the supervision of his/her father, Mikhaël. Bound to the Turks and the Germans, it is waned in 1916. The power passes to the short-nap cloth Tafari, son short-nap cloth Makonnen, governor of Harar: it becomes, on on August 2nd, 1930, négus nagast (“king of the kings”), under the name of Hailé Sélassié I er.  

On October 3rd, 1935, Italians, badly given of the disaster of Adoua, making profitable the world economic crisis and the shock of the “collective security”, invade Ethiopia starting from their colonial bases of Erythrée and Somalia; after the fall of Addis-Abeba (May 1936), Ethiopia becomes Italian possession and the king of Italy, Victor-Emmanuel III, proclaims emperor of it. The aggression causes sharp controversies in Europe, but the call launched of Geneva by Hailé Sélassié before its exile in London is not followed of concrete results, not more than the sanctions which the League of Nations intends to inflict in Italy. Resistance movements, carried out by the patriots, hold in failure the army of occupation, however launched in a wild repression.  

After the victorious attack conducted starting from Kenya and of Sudan by the British troops, Hailé Sélassié returns in its empire, on on May 5th, 1941: it finds the possession of Erythrée, initially like federate State (1952), then like annexed province (1962); in 1955, it grants a new Constitution aiming at granting a greater freedom to the Chamber of Deputies. Ethiopia acquires a true international audience, and the seat of the Organization of African Unity (OAU) will be installed in Addis-Abeba in 1963.  

But in February 1974 bursts a revolt of the army, and, on on September 12th, Hailé Sélassié is deposited by Derg (provisional administrative Military council). Open period of a social and political agitation then. The lieutenant-colonel Hailé Mariam Mengistu becomes, in 1977, president of the Cabinet and the Military council, and inaugurates one period of purgings and terror.  

The new mode, which continues Marxist-Leninist, launches the land reform, creation of farms of State, elimination of illiteracy of the masses. But it must face the armed uprising of Ogaden, Erythrée and Striped, like with a war against Somalia, while the great dryness of the years 1984-1985 causes the death of hundreds of thousands of peasants and the displacement forced of many populations of the unproductive lands of North towards the south of the country.  

Supported by the cuban USSR and troops, colonel Mengistu transforms Ethiopia into Democratic republic and popular (1987), but the “red négus”, beaten in 1988, cannot survive the collapse of the Soviet Union. In May 1991, it is exiled in Zimbabwe and the guerillas of the revolutionary democratic Face of the Ethiopian people (FDRPE) enter Addis-Abeba. A “national conference”, representing the main forces of the country and the various people, receives the mission of preparing the democratic transition and the liberalization of the economy.  

The new power, confronted with the alarm clock of nationalities, recognizes the independence of Erythrée, effective on on May 3rd, 1993, which deprives Ethiopia of its maritime frontage. The regional elections of 1992 and legislature of 1994, boycotted by the independence opponents and panéthiopiens, were gained by the FDRPE. They could not be held in the East where Oromos and Somalis, worked by Islamic fronts, clash in particular in connection with the control of Dirédaoua and the railroad. The Parliament elected in August 1995 the president of the Republic Negasso Gidada, Oromo, which appointed the chief of the Meles Zenawi government, chief of the FDRPE and craftsman of the fall of Mengistu.  

With the beginning of the year 1998, the multiple attempts at negotiations of the international diplomacy to bring the government of Addis-Abeba and that of Asmara to regulate the frontier conflict which opposes the two countries, the many victims of the confrontations, the flow growing of the refugees and embargo on the weapons bound for the two belligerents, issued by the Safety advice of UNO, seem without effect on the exit of the confrontations. However, a hope to see the situation improving seems to take shape in February 1999, with the signature by the government of Addis-Abeba, of the peace plan proposed by the Organization of African Unity (OAU).

In addition to demilitarization and a re-establishment of the Ethiopian administration present before the Eritrean occupation of the zone of Badmé, this agreement envisages the deployment of a force of peace on the 1000 kilometers of common border, demilitarized under the control of UNO, in the six next months. At the end of the year, all the hopes of reconciliation between the two countries are destroyed by the resumption of the confrontations. Indeed, the involved forces did not manage to get along on the modes of enforcement of the pact of peace signed under the mediation of the OAU.