From iol.co.za: Archaeologists find ‘lost’ Islamic kingdom.

French archaeologists said on Tuesday that they had uncovered the remains of three large towns that may have been the heart of a legendary Islamic kingdom in Ethiopia.

Ancient manuscripts have long told of the kingdom of Shoa, which between the 10th and 16th centuries straddled key trade routes between the Christian highlands and Muslim ports on the Red Sea. But Shoa’s precise place on the map has never been clear.

The National Centre for Scientific Research (CNRS) said a team of archaeologists had laid bare the remains of three medieval towns, Asbari, Masal and Nora, on a high escarpment of the Rift Valley.

Shoa – also written as Shewa – was an autonomous state from about the 10th century until it was absorbed by the sultanate of Ifat at around the end of the 13th century. [continue]