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In the incomparable Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire, Edward Gibbon writes of Ethiopia in the Eighth Century that, “…encompassed on all sides by the enemies of their religion, the Aethiopians slept near a thousand years, forgetful of the world by whom they were forgotten.” The isolation of this Christian, East African kingdom had only changed a little by 1910 when a son was born to the Minister in charge of the British Legation in Abyssinia, as the country was then called. Born in one of the Legation’s wattle and daub huts, this was not just the parents’ first child it was the first British child ever born in Abyssinia, and the Thesiger’s named him Wilfred.

Even after a life spent travelling and living in some of the world’s most remote places, Wilfred Thesiger always retained a great affection for the land of his birth. When he was born in Addis Ababa, which had only recently become the nation’s capital, the city was still very primitive and impoverished, devoid even of stone buildings; it was unable to offer much in the way of comfort. The site chosen for the construction of the city, below the ancient Entoto hills, was selected by the then Emperor Menelik II in 1887. His wife, the Empress Taitu, chose its name. As Thesiger rightly pointed out, “despite present-day popular usage, I never refer to Addis Ababa (which in Amharic means New Flower) as ‘Addis’; this to me is as inappropriate as referring to the New College at Oxford as ‘New’.”

Today, a modern city with an estimated population of 3 million, I was still able to find flowers growing in various museum gardens and the university grounds but it is not quite the pastoral idyll its Amharic name attempts to invoke. For all that, it is a fascinating and fast-growing city that is, with both Imperial and Communist history behind it, home to the African Union and the largest market anywhere in Africa between Johannesburg and Cairo. It can be hot and dusty or cool and wet, all of which, after the English fashion, I experienced in a single day. The city assails one with alien smells and sights, both welcome and otherwise, and concurrently it also appears strangely familiar and just strange, hectic and open.

Even for high officials, life in Abyssinia in the early years of the Twentieth Century would have been rigorous, especially if one was more used to the high-life as a city such as London could offer. It is perhaps not surprising that Thesiger junior seemed to revel in the hardships he endured on his travels, which discomforts he wore as a thinly veiled badge of honour.

It was not until 1914 that the country’s first hotel was opened. Nearly a century on, and after some extensive restoration work, the Hotel Taitu continues to accommodate visitors to Ethiopia. Before the Taitu, travellers had to rely on the generosity of locals when searching for daily necessities such as lodging and victuals. Travellers’ accounts from those times talk of hospitality being endemic and in spite of hotels now being as commonplace as anywhere else in the world, the tradition of Ethiopians being welcoming to strangers remains strong.

Before I landed at the city’s new airport, I knew little about Addis Ababa, but one thing I knew for certain was that I wanted to stay in the oldest hotel in the country and I instructed a taxi driver accordingly.
“Taitu Hotel? No problem. Merry Christmas. My name is Gabriel,” the driver added. It was January 7th and I was confused.
“Merry Christmas?”
“Today is Christmas.”

Initially, I imagined that Ethiopia had taken the words of the old song “I wish it could be Christmas everyday” to heart and passed some law to this effect. The truth, as is often the case, was more prosaic and as we drove through quiet city streets, the driver gave me a primer on the mechanics of the Ethiopian calendar. My next surprise was the realisation that while names and notices on shop-fronts and street-signs were in English, another strange set of symbols were also present. These other markings reminded me of the characters Holmes has to deceiver in the Case of the Dancing Men. My own investigations proved to be less drawn-out as Gabriel again proved he was more than just a taxi-driver as he introduced me to the ancient script that is Amharic, Ethiopia’s native language.

Gabriel’s lesson was cut short as he drove into the Hotel grounds. Named in honour of the Empress, the Taitu is striking, if silent, witness both to a century of Ethiopian history and colonial hopes and ambitions for Africa. Although recently renamed, nobody I spoke to knew the old place by anything other than its original title. As if to reinforce the point, Hotel Taitu can still be clearly seen in large, fading letters above the entrance.

As soon as one enters the hotel’s spacious lobby, negotiated via an ancient but fully functioning set of wood and glass revolving doors, one finds oneself transported to a model of European splendour in East Africa from the same moment that the Great War was beginning in Europe. Not spoiled by an overabundance of ostentatious flourishes, the interior is more impressive for what has been left out, creating an interior that is both airy and cosy. In spite of the renovation work, the hotel’s original wooden floors, including a beautiful sweeping staircase that leads to the first floor bedrooms, have thankfully managed to preserve the various creaks they have developed over the decades.

Regarding the renovations, it is arguable that they didn’t go far enough. The plumbing in my own en suite bathroom could not honestly be said to represent standards that one might expect from a modern hotel. That said, if one values relative luxury over peerless character, one is probably going to be much happier in one of the international chain hotels that can be found in the capital. On the downside, in one of these hotels it is not always obvious where in the world one is. In the splendid old surroundings of the Taitu Hotel, one knows for certain that one is in Ethiopia.

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