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25. How the Queen came to Solomon the King
Introduction
contre les ennemis qui nous attaquaient.” The king then gave orders that the manuscript was to be fetched from Addis Abeba, where the monks tried to keep it on the pretext of copying the text, and in less than a week it was placed in the hands of M. Le Roux, who could hardly believe his eyes. Having described the manuscript and noted on the last folio the words, “This volume was returned to the King of Ethiopia by order of the Trustees of the British Museum, Dec. 14th, 1872. J. Winter Jones, Principal Librarian.” M. Le Roux says: “Il n’y avait plus de doute possible: le livre que je tenais dans mes mains était bien cette version de l’histoire de la Reine de Saba et de Salomon, que Négus et Prêtres d’Éthiopie considèrent comme le plus authentique de toutes celles qui circulent dans les bibliothèques européennes et dans les monastètes abyssins. C’était le livre que Théodoros avait caché sous son oreiller, la nuit où il se suicida, celui que les soldats anglais avaient emporté à Londres, qu’un ambassadeur rendit à I’Empereur Jean, que ce même Jean feuilleta dans sa tente, le matin du jour où il tomba sous les cimeterres des Mahdistes, celui que les moines avaient dérobé.”11 With the help of a friend M. Le Roux translated several of the Chapters of the Këbra Nagast, and in due course published his translation.12
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The catalogues of the Ethiopic MSS. in Oxford, London and Paris, which had been published by Dillmann, Wright and Zotenberg, supplied a good deal of information about the contents of the Këbra Nagast in general, but scholars felt that it was impossible to judge of the literary and historical value of the work by transcription and translations of the headings of the chapters only. In 1882 under the auspices of the Bavarian Government, Dr. C. Bezold undertook to prepare an edition of
11 Chez la Reine de Saba, Paris, 194, pp. 110–121. 12 Ibid., pp. 125–227; see also a rendering of the French into English by Mrs. J. Van Vorst, entitled Magda, Queen of Sheba, New York and London, 1907, 8vo.
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