Dotawo/content/article/adamsimmons.md

---
title: "A Short Note on Queen Gaua: A New Last Known Ruler of Dotawo (r. around
1520-6)?"
authors: ["adamsimmons.md"]
abstract: The Nubian Christian kingdom of Dotawo is attested in Old Nubian sources from the eleventh to the late fifteenth centuries. The reign of Dotawo's last "king" is dated to the period between 1463 and 1483 (at least). This short note wishes to highlight another ruler, a Queen Gaua (or Jawe), who is mentioned by the Portuguese historian João de Barros in his imperial history entitled the Terceira Década da Ásia (“Third Decade of Asia”), published in 1563. Her reign can be dated to encompass the early 1520s and knowledge thereof challenges certain narratives regarding the latter period of Dotawo and this note poses questions for further research to explore regarding Christian Nubia in the sixteenth century. 
keywords: ["Dotawo", "Christian", "queen", "Gaua", "Jawe", "sixteenth century", "Joel", "Portuguese" ,"Ethiopia", "João de Barros", "Francisco Álvares", "Dongola"]
---

The Nubian Christian kingdom of Dotawo, which was the product of the
unification between the kingdoms of Makuria and Alwa, is attested in Old
Nubian sources from the eleventh century to the late fifteenth
century.[^1] Spanning from Aswan to an unknown distance beyond the
confluence of the White and Blue Niles, this region had been politically
Christian since the sixth century. The last *ourou* ("king") of Dotawo
named in Old Nubian sources is Joel \[II\], who reigned between at least
1463 and 1483.[^2] His reign is often seen as reflecting the last period
of the Christian Kingdom of Dotawo before the kingdom witnessed
increasing strain, and ultimate collapse, following the Funj conquest of
Soba in 1504 and their establishment along the Nile. How long this
process took remains open for debate. The next known named ruler in the
surviving corpus is Ḥasan *walad* Kuškuš, Muslim *mekk* ("king": Funj
title akin to Arabic *al-malik*) of Dongola in the 1680s, seemingly
after the disintegration of the Christian kingdom.[^3]

This short note wishes to highlight another named ruler, a Queen
Gaua,[^4] who was first mentioned by the Portuguese historian João de
Barros in his imperial history entitled the *Terceira Década da Ásia*
("Third Decade of Asia"), published in 1563. Her reign can be dated to
encompass the early 1520s as she is said to have sent an embassy to
Ethiopia as the Portuguese were resident at the Ethiopian court which
would date this embassy between 1520 and 1526: the dates that the
Portuguese arrived and left the Ethiopian kingdom. To date, she has
hitherto been overlooked but she offers a significant anomaly in our
current understanding of Christian Nubia: Gaua would be the only known
female ruler to hold power throughout Christian Nubian history. Her
reign also comes during a period of almost complete source silence, both
internally and by external observers. Whether Gaua was a ruler of Dotawo
or of a successor kingdom cannot be explored adequately here. As such,
it is not the intention of this short note to explore the many questions
her reign asks in-depth, but, rather, to offer some initial
interpretations which shall receive greater attention at a later date.

Unlike the text of Francisco Álvares, a Portuguese Franciscan who was
part of the Portuguese embassy to Ethiopia between 1520 and 1526 and who
related a few comments about a people he called the *Nobiis*, which is
known in Nubian Studies, the work of João de Barros remains
overlooked.[^5] Before looking at the text of Barros, here is the most
significant passage by Álvares for our purposes:

> E contra ho norte confinam estes bellomos com una gente que se chamam
> Nobiis: & estes dizem que foram xp̃aos & regidos por Roma. Ouvi a hum
> homem Suriano natural de Tripulli de Suria, & se chama Joam de Suria
> (que andou com nosco tres annos na terra do Preste, & veyo comnosco a
> Portugal): que fora nesta terra, & que ha nella cento & cincoenta
> igrejas: & que ainda tem crucifixos & imagemes de Nossa Senhora: &
> outras imagemes pintadas pollas paredes & tudo velho: & ha gente da
> terra nam sam christãos, mouros, nem judeus: & que vivem com desejos
> de serem christãos. Estas igrejas todas estam em fortalezas velhas
> antigas que ha polla terra: & quantas fortalezas ha tantas igrejas
> tem. E sendo nos na terra do Preste Joam vieram de aquella terra leis
> homemes aho mesmo Preste como embaixadores, pedindolhe que lhes
> mandasse clerigos & frades que hos ensinassem: & elle hos nam quis
> mandar, & deziam que lhes disera, que elle havia ho seu Abima da terra
> dos mouros .f. do Patriarca de Alexandria que estava em poder de
> mouros: como poderia elle dar clerigos & frades, pois outro lhos dava?
> & assi se tornaram. Dizem que estes antigamente haviam tudo de Roma, &
> que ha grandes tempos que lhe falleceo hum Bispo que de Roma tinham: &
> pollas guerras dos mouros, nam poderam haver outro: & assi careceram
> de toda ha clerecia & de toda sua christandade. Estes confinam com
> Egipto & dizem haver nesta terra muyto ouro & fino: & jaz esta terra
> de tromte de çuaquem que he perto do mar roxo: & sam estas senhorias
> de Nobiis de aquem & dalem Nillo: & dizem que quantas sam has
> fortalezas, tantos sam hos capitães: nam tem rey senam capitães.[^6]
>
> Towards the north, these Bellonos border upon a people who are called
> Nobiis: and they say that they had \[once\] been Christians and ruled
> from Rome. I heard from a Syrian man, a native of Tripoli of Syria,
> who was called John of Syria (he accompanied us for three years in the
> Prester's country, and came with us to Portugal), that he had been to
> this country, and that there are a hundred and fifty churches in it,
> which still contain crucifixes and images of Our Lady, and other
> images painted on the walls. All are old. And the people of this
> country are neither Christians, Moors, nor Jews; and that they live in
> the desire to become Christians. These churches are all in ancient old
> castles which are \[dotted\] throughout the country; and as many
> castles there are, so there are as many churches. While we were in the
> country of Prester John there came six men from that country \[of the
> Nobiis\] as ambassadors to the Prester himself, begging him to send
> them priests and friars to teach them. He did not send them; and it
> was said that he told them that \[Ethiopia\] had the Abun from the
> country of the Moors, that is to say from the Patriarch of Alexandria,
> who is under the rule of the Moors; how could he give priests and
> friars when \[it was the power of\] another to give them. And so \[the
> ambassadors\] returned. They say that in ancient times these people
> had everything from Rome, and that it was a very long time ago that a
> bishop had died, whom they had got from Rome, \[but\] on account of
> the wars of the Moors they could not get another, and so they lost all
> their clergy and their Christianity. These \[Nobiis\] border up to
> Egypt, and they say that they have much fine gold in their country.
> This country lies in front of Suakin, which is close to the Red Sea.
> The lordships of the Nobiis are on both sides of the Nile, and they
> say that as many castles as there are, so \[too are as\] many
> captains: they have no king, but only captains.

Álvares' account was first published in 1540 and, while a second
printing in Italian in 1550 shows some changes, the content remains
largely the same in this instance.[^7] Elsewhere in his narrative
Álvares also highlights the strength of these *Nobiis*, saying that on
their frontier regions there are four or five hundred cavalry who were
great warriors, that the kingdom was well supplied, and that only a
short time ago they killed the son of the Ethiopian Bäḥr Nǝguś ("ruler
of the sea"), a quasi-independent regional ruler centred in modern
Eritrea within the dominion of the Ethiopian *Nǝguś* ("king") Lǝbnä
Dǝngǝl (r. 1508-40), though no great detail about this conflict is
forthcoming.[^8] Álvares portrays a kingdom which is both simultaneously
fragmented and apparently in decline, yet militarily strong.

The text of João de Barros equally relates the embassy but adds one
additional key detail to the text of Álvares: Nubia was actually ruled
by a queen called Gaua. The career of João de Barros (b. 1496-d. 1570)
had him at the centre of Portuguese imperial affairs throughout his
life.[^9] Educated at the palace of Dom Manuel I (r.1495-1521), his
career saw him hold numerous roles: notably having a brief stint as
captain of São Jorge da Mina (1524-5), becoming treasurer of the Casa da
Índia (1525-8), and receiving a captaincy which made him a driving force
behind the Portuguese colonisation of the region of Maranhão in Brazil
from 1539. Following a stroke, he retired in 1567, returning to
Portugal, before dying of another stroke in 1570. He wrote numerous
published and unpublished works. His four-volume history of the
Portuguese in India, the *Décadas da Ásia* (1552-1615), is the most
well-known and is a key set of texts for chronicling the history of the
first two centuries of the Portuguese empire and are remarkably
well-informed.[^10] Whether the noting of Queen Gaua remained an
oversight on the part of Álvares or was contained in lost unpublished
manuscripts remains impossible to know.

In a passage in Book Four, Chapter Two of the *Terceira Década* *da
Ásia* Barros makes note of a Queen of Nubia (*Nobia*), who the
Ethiopians (*Abasiis*) called Gaua, and who was said to be "not of small
stature" (*nam de pequeno estádo*)[^11] and had sent an embassy to
Ethiopia.[^12] Given the two descriptions of a Nubian embassy being sent
to Ethiopia concerned with the same issue of requiring clerics, it would
appear that both Álvares and Barros were describing the same event. It
was likely while treasurer of the Casa da Índia at the heart of the
Portuguese imperial project that Barros had heard news or viewed
documents relating to a Queen Gaua of Nubia soon after her embassy had
arrived in Ethiopia. Nothing else is said of this queen. For example, it
is not made known how long this Queen Gaua had ruled or would rule. The
wider passage is about the Queen of Sheba in Ethiopian tradition,
describing her as a Candace (*kandake*: "queen" or "queen-mother") of
Meroë before leading on to a passage about Gaua inserted within the
broader narrative. The section concerning Gaua relates:

![João de Barros. *Terceira Década da Ásia*. Lisbon: Impressa per João Barreira, 1563, fo. 88, Mi,v.](../static/images/simmons.jpg "João de Barros. *Terceira Década da Ásia*. Lisbon: Impressa per João Barreira, 1563, fo. 88, Mi,v.")

**~~João de Barros. *Terceira Década da Ásia*. Lisbon: Impressa per João Barreira, 1563, fo. 88, Mi,v.~~**


>
> E ainda que nam seja com nome de Candaçe, sabemos que quásy naquelles
> confiis que dissemos oje rey na huma molhęr, & nam de pequeno estádo:
> a qual os mesmos Abasiis chamão Gaua. Nas tęrras de qual,
> prinçipalmente nas que sam da regiam a que chamámos Nobia, & os
> Abexiis Nobá, algũus dos nósses que aly foram, viram muytos templos da
> Christiandáde que aquella tęrra teue: os quáes jaziam aruinados das
> mãos dis mouros, & em algũas paredes imagenes de sanctos pintádas. E a
> causa desta destruiçam segundo elles diziam: foy serem desemparádos
> igreja Romana, por razá do grande numero de mouros que ons tinham
> çercádo. E sendo os nossos na corte de Pręste Ioam, em companhia de
> hum embaixador que Diogo López de Sequeira desta vez do porto de
> Arquico lhe mandou (como logo veremos): esta Gaua raynha daquelles
> Nobiis, mandou pedir ao mesmo Pręste per seus embaixadores, que lhe
> mandasse clerigos & frádes pera lhe reformar o seu povo, que com a
> entráda dos mouros avia muyto tempo que estáva sem doctrina
> Evangęlica, pom am poderem aver Bispo Romano como já tevęram. Ao que o
> Pręste respondeo que o nam podia fazer, porque tandem o seu Abuna,
> debaixo da doctrina do qual estava toda a igreja da Ethiópia: elle os
> avia do Patriarcha Alexandrino que estáva entre os mouros, & sem
> recádo do que pediam se tornaram estes embaixadores da Gaua.
>
> And even though she is not named Candace, we know that in this region
> they say that the king today is a woman, and \[she\] is not of small
> stature: who these Abyssinians call Gaua. These lands are principally
> those which we call Nubia and the Abyssinians call Noba. Some of our
> people who went there saw many Christian temples that belonged to the
> land: they lay in ruins from the hands of the Muslims, and on some
> walls there were painted images of saints. The cause of their
> destruction, according to what they said, was that they were abandoned
> by the Roman Church because they had become surrounded by a large
> number of Muslims. And to the court of Prester John, in the company of
> the ambassador who Diogo López de Sequeira had sent to the port of
> Arkiko (as we will see), this Queen Gaua of the Nubians sent to the
> same Prester her ambassadors to ask for clerics and friars to be sent
> to Nubia to reform her people, who, as a result of Muslim incursion,
> had been without Christian doctrine for a long time so that they could
> see a Roman bishop as they used to have. The Prester replied that he
> could not do this, as they had the Abun, whose authority oversaw all
> of the Ethiopian Church: he had been sent from the Alexandrian
> Patriarch who was among the Muslims. No more \[information\] was
> received of what became of these ambassadors of Gaua.

While clearly the passage is portraying a Latin discourse onto Nubia
with the suggestion that they sought Latin Christian priests -- Bishop
Tivoli was made first Latin Christian Bishop of Dongola in 1330, though
likely only in name, following a period of increasing relations between
Nubia and Latin Europe -- it should not be dismissed out of hand.[^13]
Indeed, the *Noba* (ኖባ) were the Nubians in Ethiopian Gəʿəz texts, as
can be witnessed in the account of the monk Täklä ʾÄlfa who travelled
through Dongola in 1596 as a near contemporary example.[^14] The
fundamental elements of the text, Gaua's name and the act of sending an
embassy to Ethiopia, need to be taken into consideration and not
dismissed as purely Latin Christian hearsay and rumours. For instance,
firstly, it is notable that Gaua could readily be a form of the female
name Jawe (ⳝⲁⲩⲉ), known in at least one c. tenth-century Old Nubian text
regarding somebody described as the wife (ⲉⲧ̅ⲧⲟⲩ ⳝⲁⲩⲉ: lit. "his wife
Jawe") of Ṅešš of Atwa in a colophon of a hymn to the Cross and
discourse on Christ, when rendered into Portuguese.[^15] While error and
conflation are often a feature of European texts writing about regions
of Africa without direct authorial experience, Barros does appear to be
referencing a Nubian queen rather than combining different pieces of
information. It should be said that a contemporary female ruler called
Gaʿəwa is recorded in both Arabic and Gəʿəz sources as leading the
Sultanate of Säläwa/Mäzäga in Tigray from 1534 (initially as her brother
the sultan lay dying) until at least 1558. She allied with Aḥmad ibn
Ibrāhīm al-Ġāzī, the initial leader of a period of Muslim conquest
within the Kingdom of Ethiopia until the latter was killed in battle by
Ethiopian forces in 1543, before Gaʿəwa then allied with his
followers.[^16] Barros certainly would have had ample opportunity to
learn about this other Gaʿəwa prior to the publication of his *Terceira*
*Década* in 1563 which could have resulted in a later conflation.
However, Gaʿəwa is never portrayed as a Christian ruler -- which her
later nominal association with the tenth-century destruction of the
pagan Queen Gudit, who also became to be known as Gaʿəwa by some as a
result, attests -- let alone a ruler who would have wanted Christian
clerics sent to her kingdom, and it is unknown how much power she held
in the early 1520s in any case. Moreover, her kingdom was to the east of
the Kingdom of Ethiopia towards the Red Sea, whereas Barros makes clear
that he intended the region of the Nile Valley below Egypt in his text.
It would therefore appear that any similarly in name between the Nubian
Gaua/Jawe and the Ethiopian Gaʿəwa is purely coincidental and need not
necessarily result in any uncritical dismissal of the possibility of
Gaua as a Nubian queen.

Despite being the only known female Nubian Christian ruler in the
surviving corpus, it is unclear how unique, or indeed even unremarkable,
Gaua's reign may actually have been given the fragmentary nature of our
knowledge of rulers in general. Indeed, her reign poses questions
regarding the commonality of the ability of daughters and nieces to be
able to assume the throne akin to sons and nephews, whether as a sole
heir or as a rival to a male challenger. Alternatively, she may have
been acting as regent for a child male *ourou* and not an outright ruler
after all, yet was still somebody who wielded significant power.[^17] In
the absence of another illustrative Nubian scenario, a similar
contemporary example of the latter situation can be found in
neighbouring Ethiopia where an embassy was sent to Lisbon in 1509 by
dowager queen Ǝleni, the acting primary regent for her adoptive
great-grandson Lǝbnä Dǝngǝl who would not become of age to rule
independently until 1516. She had held significant influence at the
Ethiopian court since the 1440s: Solomonic Ethiopia only witnessed one
outright female ruler (Zäwditu, r. 1916-30) in its history between 1270
and 1974. Secondly, while the request for Latin Christian priests was in
all likelihood a Portuguese fallacy, requesting aid from its sister
church in Ethiopia would otherwise make sense for a ruler of Nubia. The
relationship between the Churches of Nubia and Ethiopia is remarkably
seldom featured in either internal or external sources beyond noting its
existence. Nevertheless, these were not two disconnected Christian
neighbours. Despite this passage, it remains unclear whether Dotawo
continued to function in the same form into this latter period or had
morphed into something new.

Questions remain regarding the territorial extent of Dotawo after Joel
\[II\]. Indeed, while it is commonly assumed that the capital at Dongola
relocated to Daw in 1365, both archaeological and textual evidence is by
no means conclusive and remains open to the possibility for a new
narrative: this will surely come to light in future work, but it is not
for this brief note here to discuss this any further beyond providing a
few key details for initial consideration. The most southern Ottoman
permanent presence during this period was established at Sai Island by
the late sixteenth century -- though they appear to have had increasing
influence as far south as Hannek -- whereas Funj evidence does not
suggest any prominent offensive into Nubian territory beyond Soba until
the second decade of the seventeenth century, leaving a region along the
Nile, which significantly included Dongola, potentially stretching as
much as c.170 miles unconquered.[^18] In turn, given this reference to
Gaua, a picture can be painted which highlights the possibility for the
continuing functioning of a Christian kingdom centred at Dongola between
both the Ottomans and the Funj for at least a century after 1504. It is
also not until this mid-seventeenth-century period where archaeology is
increasingly dating new urban developments in Dongola.[^19] Such
developments may potentially speak to a later dating to the eventual
Funj conquest and subsequent submission of Dongola as a client kingdom
to the Funj under rulers such as *mekk* Ḥasan *walad* Kuškuš if such
evidence is to be viewed in this way. The acknowledgement of Gaua now
poses even more questions for our understanding of sixteenth-century
Nubia and further adds fuel to the need for a continual re-evaluation of
this later period of Christian Nubian history prior to the *true* onset
of the Ottoman and Funj periods.

Bibliography

Sources

Álvares, Francisco. *Verdadeira informaçam das terras do Preste Joãm*.
Lisbon: Impressa per Luis Rodrigues, 1540.

---------. "Viaggio fatto nella Ethiopia per don Francesco Alvarez
Portoghese." In *Primo volume delle navigationi et viaggi nel qual si
contiene la descrittione dell'Africa, et del paese del Prete Ianni, con
varii viaggi, dal mar Rosso a Calicut & infin all'isole Molucche, dove
nascono le Spetiere et la navigatione attorno il mondo: li nomi de gli
auttori, et le navigationi, et i viaggi piu particolarmente si mostrano
nel foglio seguente*, edited by Giovanni Batista Ramusio. Venice:
Appresso gli Heredi di Lucantonio Giunti, 1550.

De Barros, João. *Ásia de Joam de Barros, dos fectos que os Portugueses
fizeram no descobrimento et conquista dos mares et terras do Oriente*.
Lisbon: Impressa per Germão Galharde, 1552.

---------. *Quarta* *Década da Ásia*, edited by João Baptista Lavanha.
Madrid: Impressão Real, 1615.

---------. *Segunda* *Década da Ásia* (Lisbon: Impressa per Germão
Galharde, 1553.

---------. *Terceira* *Década da Ásia* (Lisbon: Impressa per João
Barreira, 1563.

Faḍl Ḥasan, Yūsuf. *Kitāb al-tạbaqāt fī khusụ̄s ̣al-awliyāʼ wa-al-sạ̄lihị̄n
wa-al-ʻulamāʼ wa-al-shuʻarāʼ fī al-Sūdān*. Khartoum: University of
Khartoum Press, 1974.

Strabo. *Geography*, edited and translated by Horace L. Jones, 8 vols.
Cambridge, MA: Harvard University Press, 1917-1932.

Studies

Boxer, Charles R. *João de Barros: Portuguese Humanist and Historian of
Asia*. New Delhi: Concept Publishing Company, 1981.

Ceccarelli-Morolli, Danilo. "Un interessante brano di un manoscritto
etiopico del XVI sec. concernente la Nubia." In *Actes de la VIIIe
Conférence internationale des études nubiennes: Lille, 11-17 septembre
1994*, 3 vols, vol. III, pp. 67-72. Villeneuve-d'Ascq: Université Charles de Gaulle--Lille
III, 1995-1998.

Coelho, Antonio B. *João de Barros: Vida e obra*. Lisbon: Grupo de
Trabalho do Ministério da Educação para as Comemorações dos
Descobrimentos Portueses, 1997.

Elzein, Intisar. "Ottoman Archaeology of the Middle Nile Valley in the
Sudan." In *The Frontiers of the Ottoman World*, edited by Andrew C. S.
Peacock, pp. 371-383. Oxford: Oxford University Press, 2009.

Van Gerven Oei, Vincent. *A Reference Grammar of Old Nubian*. Leuven:
Peeters, 2021.

Van Gerven Oei, Vincent and Alexandros Tsakos. "Apostolic Memoirs in Old
Nubian." In *Parabiblica Coptica,* edited by Ivan Miroshnikov. Tübingen:
Mohr Siebeck, forthcoming.

Griffith, Francis L. *The Nubian Texts of the Christian Period*. Berlin:
Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1913.

Łajtar, Adam. *A Late Christian Pilgrimage Centre in Nubia: The Evidence
of Wall Inscriptions in the Upper Church at Banganarti*. Leuven:
Peeters, 2020.

Łajtar, Adam and Giovanni Ruffini. "Qasr Ibrim's Last Land Sale, AD 1463
(EA 90225)." In *Nubian Voices: Studies in Nubian Christian
Civilization*, edited by Adam Łajtar and Jacques van der Vliet, pp. 121-131. Warsaw:
University of Warsaw/Raphael Taubenschlag Foundation, 2011.

Levi, Caroline A. *Yodit*. Unpublished PhD Thesis, School of Oriental
and African Studies, 1992.

Obłuski, Artur and Dorota Dzierzbicka. *Old Dongola: Development,
Heritage, Archaeology: Fieldwork in 2018-2019, vol. 1: Excavations*.
Leuven: Peeters, 2021.

Ruffini, Giovanni. "Newer Light on the Kingdom of Dotawo." In *Qasr
Ibrim, Between Egypt and Africa: Studies in Cultural Exchange (Nino
Symposium, Leiden, 11-12 December 2009)*, edited by Jacques van der
Vliet and Joost Hagen, pp. 179-191. Leuven: Peeters, 2013.

Simmons, Adam. *Nubia, Ethiopia, and the Crusading World, 1095-1402*.
Abingdon: Routledge, 2022.

Small, Margaret. *Framing the World: Classical Influences on
Sixteenth-Century Geographical Thought*. Woodbridge: Boydell and Brewer,
2020.

Werner, Roland. *Das Christentum in Nubien: Geschichte und Gestalt einer
afrikanischen Kirche*. Münster: LIT Verlag, 2013.

[^1]: The circumstances of this unification are still unknown, though it
    would appear to be the result of a political union of both kingdoms
    via marriage, as there is no currently known evidence reflecting
    upheaval or a Makuritan conquest of Alwa. For a brief summary with
    references, see: Van Gerven Oei, *Reference Grammar*, p. 1n2. On
    Dotawo in the sources, see: Ruffini, "Newer Light on the Kingdom of
    Dotawo."

[^2]: He is the second Joel known in the corpus but there may have been
    others not yet known. The earlier Joel is recorded as ruling in 1322
    in an as-yet-published new interpretation of an inscription by Adam
    Łajtar: Łajtar, *A Late Christian Pilgrimage Centre in Nubia*, p.
    388. On Joel \[II\], see: Łajtar & Ruffini, "Qasr Ibrim's Last Land
    Sale." The 1483 document found at Gebel Adda is known and currently
    housed at the Egyptian Museum in Cairo but remains unpublished.

[^3]: Faḍl Ḥasan, *Kitāb al-tạbaqāt*, pp. 183, 275.

[^4]: There are currently no other known female rulers of Dotawo or of
    the earlier kingdoms of Makuria, Alwa, or Nobadia to know for sure
    what indigenous title akin to *ourou* Gaua would have held so
    "queen" is employed here for familiarity and in keeping with the
    Portuguese text.

[^5]: For example: Werner, *Das Christentum in Nubien*, pp. 149-50.

[^6]: Álvares, *Verdadeira informaçam*, p. 168.

[^7]: Álvares, "Viaggio fatto nella Ethiopia per don Francesco Alvarez
    Portoghese", p. 269a.

[^8]: Álvares, *Verdadeira informaçam*, p. 30.

[^9]: On his life and works, see: Boxer, *João de Barros*; Coelho, *João
    de Barros*.

[^10]: *Ásia de Joam de Barros,* *Segunda* *Década da Ásia*, and
    *Terceira* *Década da Ásia* were published in his lifetime, with the
    *Quarta* *Década da Ásia* being posthumously published in an edited
    and reworked form by João Baptista Lavanha.

[^11]: It is unclear here whether this is a contemporary description or,
    given it follows a passage about Queen Candaces, was imitating
    Strabo's description of his Queen Candace as being a "masculine
    woman" (ἀνδρική τις γυνὴ: Strabo, *Geography*, 17.1.54). Barros
    certainly knew the text of Strabo and makes reference to it
    elsewhere; see: SMALL, *Framing the World*, p. 68.

[^12]: De Barros, *Terceira Década da Ásia*, fo. 88ff.

[^13]: On Bishop Tivoli, see: Simmons, *Nubia, Ethiopia, and the
    Crusading World,* p. 132.

[^14]: Ceccarelli-Morolli, "Un interessante brano."

[^15]: Griffith, *Nubian Texts of the Christian Period*, p. 47. On this
    text, see: Van Gerven Oei & Tsakos, "Apostolic Memoirs in Old
    Nubian."

[^16]: Levi, *Yodit*, pp. 104-6.

[^17]: There are numerous examples of women who held the title of
    *ngonnen*, or "queen-mother", in the surviving corpus and these
    individuals were influential and active in Nubian politics and
    society. Regrettably, we are not aware of an instance of a similar
    regency scenario prior to Gaua, if, indeed, that was the case, to be
    able to expand on this suggestion any further. The naming of Gaua
    directly would, however, suggest that she wielded great power in any
    case.

[^18]: Elzein, "Ottoman Archaeology"; Faḍl Ḥasan, *Kitāb al-tạbaqāt*, p.
    61.

[^19]: For example, see the results in: Obłuski & Dzierzbicka, *Old
    Dongola 2018-2019 vol. 1.*