Steven Kaplan is an Associate Fellow of the Ethiopian Academy of Sciences. For over 35 years he taught African Studies and Comparative Religion at the Hebrew University of Jerusalem. His books include Ethiopia: History, Culture and Challenges (co-editor, 2017).

Steven Kaplan’s The Ethiopians is a masterly display of the historian’s art of truth. Respectful of the vivid legendary history of Ethiopia, he shows how state of the art modern research has further added to our knowledge of a remarkably resilient and diverse medieval polity in the Horn of Africa. - Peter Brown, Philip and Beulah Rollins Professor of History Emeritus, Princeton UniversityThe Ethiopians provides a truly revelatory overview of Ethiopia until 1500 that spans epochs and disciplines. Steven Kaplan artfully synthesizes recent research about the Ethiopian past, simultaneously narrating both new historical perspectives and shaping a critical historiography. - Kay Kaufman Shelemay, G. Gordon Watts Research Professor of Music and of African and African American Studies, Harvard UniversityThis incisive volume is one we have been waiting for. In this excellent introduction to the ancient and “medieval” history of Ethiopia from the legend of King Solomon and the Queen of Sheba to the end of the Middle Ages, Steven Kaplan has traced a clearly delineated and freshly interpreted path across the millennia. The Ethiopians is a concise synthesis of current scholarship and a welcome reinterpretation of what has been previously accepted, time and again providing innovative and compelling interpretations that offer wide-ranging food for thought for the current and future generations devoted to the study of the highlands. This book is full of valuable insights for experts, but will also greatly enhance the understanding of the history of the region and its highly diverse populations for readers with no previous knowledge. Essential reading. - Michael Gervers, Professor of History, University of Toronto