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The Hawulti is a pre-Aksumite or early Aksumite era obelisk located in Matara, Eritrea. It bears what has been described as the oldest known example of the old Ge'ez script (also known as "Old Ethiopic").〔Edward Ullendorff, ("The Obelisk of Matara," ''Journal of the Royal Asiatic Society of Great Britain and Ireland'' ), No. 1/2 (April, 1951), pp. 26-32〕 == Description == The monument is 18 feet high, with a solar disk and a lunar crescent at the top; Ullendorff believes these symbols "no doubt meant to place the stele under the protection of the gods, probably of Šams, the Sun goddess, and of Sin, the Moon god". These pre-Christian symbols, as well as paleolographical characteristics as the lack of vowel marks in the Ge'ez script, convinced Ullendorff that the monument dated "to the early part of the fourth century A.D."〔Ullendorff, "Obelisk of Matara", p. 28〕 Ullendorff translated of the inscription as follows: : This is the obelisk which had (causative) made : 'Agaz for his fathers who have : carried off the youth of 'W` : 'LF as well as of SBL. His translation differs from Enno Littmann at several points. First, Littmann believed the third line referred to the digging of canals nearby (his translation, "zog die Kannaele von `Aw`a") despite the lack of any signs of canals or ditches in the area; Ullendorff argues that the verb ''shb'' in the inscription should be translated as "to drag along, to capture". Second, he believed the nouns -- 'W`, 'LF, and SBL -- were placenames, and based on discussions with local informants Ullendorff identified them with nearby communities: the earlier name of Baraknaha, the site of a 12th-century church 17 kilometers from Matara, had been ''subli'', and the equally well-known church at Guna Guna, 22 kilometers from Matara, had once been known as ''Aw`a 'ilfi''.〔Ullendorff, "Obelisk of Matara", p. 31〕 抄文引用元・出典: フリー百科事典『 ウィキペディア（Wikipedia）』 ■ウィキペディアで「Hawulti (monument)」の詳細全文を読む スポンサード リンク
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