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Article: The Danakil Diary: Journeys Through Abyssinia, 1930-34.
- Article from:
- The Middle East
- Article date:
- March 1, 1997
CopyrightCOPYRIGHT 1997 IC Publications Ltd. This material is published under license from the publisher through the Gale Group, Farmington Hills, Michigan. All inquiries regarding rights should be directed to the Gale Group. (Hide copyright information)
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In 1930 Wilfred Thesiger attended the coronation of HIM Haile Selassie in Addis Ababa, at the Emperor's personal invitation. Afterwards he spent a month hunting alone in the hostile Danakil desert of Abyssinia (now Ethiopia), a thrilling experience which led three years later to his successful exploration of the Awash River. Today the famed Arabian traveller still regards that expedition as the most dangerous he ever undertook.
Aged only 23, Thesiger became the first European to travel through the fabled Sultanate of Aussa, a forbidding land where two Italian expeditions and an Egyptian army had previously been wiped out by Danakil tribesmen. Thesiger's remarkable ...