Meskel

Smoke that shows the way

Meskel means “cross” in Amharic. The feast commemorates the discovery of the True Cross by the Roman empress Helena — Queen Eleni in Ethiopian tradition — in the fourth century. According to the story, she was told in a dream to light a bonfire and follow the smoke. She had the people of Jerusalem pile up wood, added frankincense, and the smoke rose high into the sky and came down exactly where the Cross was buried.

The Ethiopian Orthodox Church holds that the Cross was found in March, but the feast was moved to September to keep it out of Lent. Part of the True Cross is believed to have been brought to Ethiopia and to be kept at Amba Geshen. The month of Meskerem also marks the end of the rains.

The demera

The celebrations centre on the demera, a conical pyre of poles surrounded by branches and torches, decorated with green grass and the yellow Abyssinian daisies that stand for the New Year. In Addis Ababa it is built in Meskel Square, named after the festival, where hundreds of thousands gather as priests in bright robes chant hymns and prayers and perform their rhythmic dance; at the climax the patriarch of the Ethiopian Orthodox Tewahedo Church lights the fire. Afterwards the faithful collect charcoal from the ashes to mark a cross on their foreheads. Many city dwellers go home to their villages for the feast. UNESCO inscribed Meskel on its Representative List in 2013.