History

The Life and Struggles of Our Mother Walatta Petros: A Seventeenth-Century African Biography of an Ethiopian Woman

    Edited and translated by
  • Wendy Laura Belcher
  • Michael Kleiner

The first English translation of the earliest book-length biography of an African woman

Hardcover

Price:
$42.00/£35.00
ISBN:
Published:
Oct 13, 2015
2016
Pages:
544
Size:
7 x 10 in.
Illus:
64 color illus. 18 halftones. 4 tables. 2 maps.
Buy This

This is the hardcover scholarly edition of the award-winning English translation of the earliest-known book-length biography of an African woman, and one of the few lives of an African woman written by Africans before the nineteenth century. As such, it provides an exceedingly rare and valuable picture of the experiences and thoughts of Africans, especially women, before the modern era. It is also an extraordinary account of a remarkable life—full of vivid dialogue, heartbreak, and triumph.

The Life and Struggles of Our Mother Walatta Petros (1672) tells the story of an Ethiopian saint who led a successful nonviolent movement to preserve African Christian beliefs in the face of European protocolonialism. When the Jesuits tried to convert the Ethiopians from their ancient form of Christianity, Walatta Petros (1592–1642), a noblewoman and the wife of one of the emperor’s counselors, risked her life by leaving her husband, who supported the conversion effort, and leading the struggle against the Jesuits. After her death, her disciples wrote this book, praising her as a friend of women, a devoted reader, a skilled preacher, and a radical leader. One of the earliest stories of African resistance to European influence, this biography also provides a picture of domestic life, including Walatta Petros’s life-long relationship with a female companion.

Richly illustrated with dozens of color illustrations from early manuscripts, this groundbreaking volume provides an authoritative and highly readable translation along with an extensive introduction. Other features include a chronology of Walatta Petros’s life, maps, a comprehensive glossary, and detailed notes on textual variants.


Awards and Recognition

  • Winner of the 2015 Best Scholarly Edition in Translation, Society for the Study of Early Modern Women
  • Winner of the 2017 Paul Hair Prize, African Studies Association