The Obelisk of Axum: taken to Rome, returned after 68 years

At sunrise on 19 April 2005, a huge cargo aircraft landed at Aksum, in northern Ethiopia. It carried the middle section of a granite stele, about 58 tonnes, and a crowd was waiting. The Guardian reported the scene. The block had been away for 68 years.

The Obelisk of Axum, also called Stele 2, is about 1,700 years old. UN News gives its height as 24.6 metres and its weight as about 160 tons. It once marked a royal tomb at Aksum, and it is a symbol of Ethiopian identity. Before 1937 it lay fallen and broken. The Italian foreign ministry says it had come down about a thousand years earlier, probably after an earthquake.

In 1937 Italy occupied Ethiopia, and Benito Mussolini, Italy’s fascist dictator, ordered the stele taken to Rome. Sources disagree on its state. The Italian foreign ministry says it was already five joined blocks. The BBC says Italian troops cut it into three. The pieces went by road to Massawa, now in Eritrea, then by ship to Naples and on to Rome. The stele was rebuilt in Piazza di Porta Capena, in front of the colonial ministry building.

Article 37 of the 1947 peace treaty required it to restore, within 18 months, works of art and objects of historical value taken from Ethiopia since 3 October 1935. The article does not name the obelisk. Press and scholars apply it to the stele. The deadline passed and the stele stayed. The Los Angeles Times counts later promises in 1956 and 1997. In 1997 a joint Italian and Ethiopian commission was set up. The BBC says the Ethiopia-Eritrea border war put the plans on hold. In 2001 Vittorio Sgarbi, Italy’s culture undersecretary, said the obelisk had become a “naturalised citizen” and should stay.

On the night of 27 May 2002, lightning struck the stele in Rome. A piece of granite about two metres long fell from the top. Sgarbi then said it was too fragile to move. Ethiopian prime minister Meles Zenawi told a Rome hunger summit in 2002 that Italy had given Ethiopia “the runaround” for 55 years, the Los Angeles Times reported. On 18 July 2002 the Italian cabinet announced that it would return the obelisk. Sgarbi said it might as well go back now that it was damaged. In 2003 a contractor took the stele apart into three blocks and stored them near Fiumicino airport.

Delays followed. The Aksum runway was short and there was no safe sea route. Only an Antonov An-124 could carry the blocks. The three flights took place in April 2005. The last arrived by 25 April, or on 24 April by the Italian foreign ministry’s count. UNESCO drew up the plan to set the stele up again. Work began in June 2008, and the last block was mounted on 31 July 2008. Italy funded it. An official ceremony took place at Aksum on 4 September 2008.

The Obelisk of Axum now stands at its original site at Aksum, a UNESCO World Heritage Site. Nobody was charged or tried over the removal.