The British expedition to Abyssinia was a rescue mission and punitive expedition carried out in 1868 by the armed forces of the British Empire against the Ethiopian Empire (also known at the time as Abyssinia). Emperor Tewodros II of Ethiopia, then often referred to by the anglicized name Theodore, imprisoned several missionaries and two representatives of the British government in an attempt to force the British government to comply with his requests for military assistance. The punitive expedition launched by the British in response required the transportation of a sizable military force hundreds of miles across mountainous terrain lacking any road system. The formidable obstacles to the action were overcome by the commander of the expedition, General Sir Robert Napier, who captured the Ethiopian capital, and rescued all the hostages. The expedition was widely hailed on its return for achieving all its objectives.

Historian Harold G. Marcus described the action as "one of the most expensive affairs of honour in history."



Ethiopia, officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a landlocked country in the Horn of Africa. It shares borders with Eritrea and Djibouti to the north, Somalia to the east and northeast, Kenya to the south, South Sudan to the west, and Sudan to the northwest. Ethiopia has a total area of 1,100,000 square kilometres (420,000 sq mi). It is home to 117 million inhabitants and is the 12th-most populous country in the world and the 2nd-most populous in Africa after Nigeria. The national capital and largest city, Addis Ababa, lies several kilometres west of the East African Rift that splits the country into the African and Somali tectonic plates.Anatomically modern humans emerged from modern-day Ethiopia and set out to the Near East and elsewhere in the Middle Paleolithic period. Linguistics suggest that Afro-Asiatic speaking people reportedly settled in the Nile Valley during Neolithic age, then dispersing thereafter. In the 1st century, the Kingdom of Aksum emerged as a great power in what is now northern Ethiopia, Eritrea, and eastern Sudan. During this time, a strong assimilating culture for an Ethiopian national identity flourished, Orthodox Tewahedo Christianity was conceived as the state religion and Islam was introduced in the early 7th century. Aksum suffered from recurring external sieges in the Early Middle Ages and collapsed in the early 10th century when a female pagan ruler Gudit conducted a raid. The remnant of Aksum fled southward and formed the Zagwe dynasty, ruling for over three centuries.

In 1270, Yekuno Amlak formed the Ethiopian Empire and Solomonic dynasty, who claimed it descended from Biblical Solomon and Queen of Sheba under their child Menelik I early in 10th century BC. By the 13th century, the empire territory gradually expand to southward, facing intense crusades with Muslim states at that time, culminating in the Ethiopian–Adal War in 1529, with ending 13 years until the Ethiopian Empire recaptured its lost vassal state. In mid-18th century, Ethiopia experienced decentralization known as Zemene Mesafint. It lasted at the reign of Emperor Tewodros II in 1855, bringing Ethiopia to reunification and modernization.Several conquests were strived in the late 19th century, including from Egypt conferring into the Scramble for Africa, where Ethiopian armies defeated Italian colonists at the Battle of Adwa in 1896; Ethiopia became the first independent African nation from European powers. Modern borders of Ethiopia was completed as a result. Ethiopia then admitted the League of Nations and United Nations. During the interwar period in 1935, Ethiopia was occupied by Fascist Italian force and annexed to former colonies of Eritrea and Somaliland, later forming Italian East Africa. Ethiopia was soon liberated by British armies in course of Second World War campaign of 1941, and entered short period of British military administration.

Ethiopia saw modernization under Emperor Haile Selassie until he was deposed from 1974 revolutionary coup of the Derg, a military junta backed by the Soviet Union. Much of its history, the Derg initiated civil war, embraced by violent repression, famine and revolt waged by Tigray-Eritrean separatist rebels, until overthrown by the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front (EPRDF) in 1991. Under EPRDF-coalition government, led by the Tigray People's Liberation Front (TPLF), Ethiopia's politics has been liberalized; conversely, Ethiopia became one-party state, with ethnically constitute federal system, while the government frequently criticized as authoritarian. Ethiopia suffered from prolong unsolved civil and ethnic conflicts and series political instability marked by democratic backsliding over successive periods thereby.Ethiopia is a multi-ethnic state with over 80 different ethnic groups, and a rich and lengthy history in language, literature, religion and culture. It has Christianity and Islam majority population. This sovereign state is a founding member of the UN, the Group of 24 (G-24), the Non-Aligned Movement, the G77 and the Organisation of African Unity. Addis Ababa is the headquarters of the African Union, the Pan African Chamber of Commerce and Industry, the United Nations Economic Commission for Africa, the African Standby Force and many of the global NGOs focused on Africa. Ethiopia is an emerging power and developing country, a fastest economic growth with rate of 9.4% from 2010 to 2020. Meanwhile, the country is regarded as poor in terms of per capita income and the Human Development Index, with high rates of poverty, poor respect for human rights, and a literacy rate of only 49%. Ethiopia remains a predominantly agrarian society, with agriculture accounting for nearly half of the national GDP and over 80% of the nation's workforce as of 2015.