828 religion and cosmology: Africa to hairs on his chest, they will know that he is dead and can throw all his wives, slaves, and possessions into the lake As he rides to battle, the bell falls from his chest hairs, and his servants hear it ring and obey his orders In grief, Aruan drowns himself in the lake Esigie of Benin becomes the ruler of the kingdom Aruan’s spirit inhabits the lake, and every five days, once a week in his culture, he emerges from the lake and wanders Udo The elements in this story are animistic because the story tells of the origin of a lake spirit Christianity and J udaism Medieval Nubians were probably the descendants of the ancient Nubians who had been the principal residents of the upper reaches of the Nile since ancient times and people who migrated into Nubia in the late third and early fourth centuries, intermarrying with the local people Much of the history of their lands during the medieval era is still unknown, although archaeologists have found some documents from the era as well as many impressive stone buildings, suggesting that for a long time the people of the medieval Nubian kingdoms prospered In about 540 two separate missions were sent from Constantinople to the Nubian kingdoms, representing two different schools of Christian thought Empress Theodora (ca 500–48) sponsored a Monophysite mission The Monophysites believed that Christ had a single divine nature Although the Council of Chalcedon declared the Monophysite belief heretical in 451, the Coptic church of Egypt and some Syrians adhered to the Monophysite view Emperor Justinian I (r 527–65) sent a mission that represented the Eastern Orthodox point of view, opposing the Monophysites In a ploy of the sort that gave Byzantine intrigue its notoriety, Empress Theodora persuaded the Byzantine governor of Egypt to delay Justinian’s mission while hers was allowed passage into the Nubia in 543, beginning the conversion of Nubians to Christianity Among the changes Christianity brought was the adoption of Greek as an official language Greek was still in use in the late 12th century, more than 500 years after the fall of Egypt to Muslim armies During the 10th century the Nubian language was used in religious documents, in a modified version of the Coptic alphabet By the ninth century Christianity in Nubia was apparently unified under an eparch, a term derived from provincial officials of the Byzantine Empire and in Nubia given to a bishop of the Coptic Church The societies of the Nubian kingdoms took on many of the trappings of a Near Eastern state, with fortresses in the Byzantine style and armies clad in chain-mail armor astride fine Arabian horses It seems that at least the capitals of the kingdoms were cosmopolitan and included people of vari- ous beliefs, including Muslims, who lived in their own sections of town Church and state were separate in the Nubian kingdoms, but political leaders liked to display their faith by constructing churches, many of which survive, albeit often in ruins In general, a church would be rectangular with interior columns and a curved apse at one end with an altar before it The churches were decorated with paintings that resembled those of Byzantine churches They may show that the Byzantine influence remained strong among the Nubians, or they may indicate continuing contact with Byzantine artists Some city churches and monasteries were built with stone, but more often mud brick was used Most of these sites have yet to be studied by archaeologists, and some archaeologists hope to find written records preserved in some of them Much more is known of the practices of Christians in Ethiopia Although their main church was the Orthodox Tewahedo Church, which was a Monophysite church, Ethiopia also had a minority of Christians who followed the teachings of the Eastern Orthodox Church of the Byzantine Empire The kingdom of Ethiopia derived from the ancient kingdom of Axum, which had a mixed culture of the peoples of Yemen and of eastern Africa During the medieval era Ethiopians believed that their dominant religious faith had once been Judaism In about 341 Syrian Christians converted King Ezana of Axum to Christianity, and King Ezana made Christianity the state religion In 346 one of those Syrians, Frumentius, was appointed bishop of Axum by the patriarch of Alexandria This act began the tradition of having bishops appointed by the patriarch of Alexandria These bishops rarely had much power On occasion they tried to wrest some control of the church for themselves, but in general, the power to appoint church officials belonged to the king After the seat of government moved from the city of Axum into the Ethiopian highlands, there were two principal dynasties One was the Solomonid Dynasty, whose monarch claimed direct descent from the Queen of Sheba (believed to be Makeda, r ca 1005–ca 955 b.c.e.) and King Solomon of Israel The other was the Zagwe Dynasty, which claimed that its monarchs descended from Moses Although its greatest monarch, King Lalibela (fl 1200), built some of Ethiopia’s most impressive churches and was regarded as a good king, most Ethiopians believed the Zagwe Dynasty to be usurpers of Ethiopia’s proper dynasty, the Solomonid Dynasty, which was restored in 1270 During both dynasties the Christian church was tied to the government Kings and nobles displayed their loyalty to the church by giving it expensive gifts and by building churches and monasteries The people of Ethiopia were profoundly religious and honored those kings who were generous to religious institutions Christianity gave Ethiopians a strong