544 
DISSERTATION ON THE 
be no other than the Axomites, or, as they term themselves in their 
pipst antient books, Agazi. 
- " The Abyssinians, in their modern books, lay claim to great 
antiquity, as being descended from* Ham. They also boast that 
one of their queens, named Magueda, was the Queen of the South, 
who visited Solomon, by whom she had a son named Menilech, 
from whom their present kings are lineally descended. The only 
thing like evidence on this subject, depends on the authenticity of a 
series of chronicles, said to have been kept regularly by the priests 
at the ancient city of Axum. The authority of these has, however, 
been with reason disputed, as it is scarcely possible that they 
should have been preserved, considering the wars in which the 
country has continually been engaged. Besides, the evidence of the 
Axum inscription seems decisive against them, as a king certainly 
would not call himself son of Mars, who prided himself on his 
descent from Solomon. It seems, on the whole, probable, that this 
idea was borrowed from their dependents, the Homerites, and was 
assumed long after the introduction of Christianity. 
" Whatever their religion may have been in early times, they 
do not appear to have been exclusively attached to it, since, when 
the Romans succeeded to the trade of the Red Sea, they found the 
Axomites, as they were then called, ready to receive, together 
with their merchandize, the worship of their gods. This is proved 
by the inscription I found at Axum, where the sovereign of the 
country styles himself son of the God, the invincible Mars ; even if 
we do not refer to the second Adulitic, which, if allowed to have been 
erected by an Abyssinian king, would be still more satisfactory. 
i * Mendez and Bmce's History, 
