Alamata is a town in northern Ethiopia

Ethiopia

Ethiopia , officially known as the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a country located in the Horn of Africa. It is the second-most populous nation in Africa, with over 82 million inhabitants, and the tenth-largest by area, occupying 1,100,000 km2...

. Located in the Debubawi

Debubawi Zone

Debubawi is one of five Zones in the Ethiopian Region of Tigray. Debubawi is bordered on the south and west by the Amhara Region, on the northwest by Mehakelegnaw , the north by Misraqawi and on the east by the Afar Region...

 (Southern) zone

Zones of Ethiopia

||The regions of Ethiopia are divided into 68 or more zones . The exact number of zones is unclear, as the names and number of zones given in documents by Ethiopia's Central Statistical Agency differ between 2005...

 of the Tigray

Tigray Region

Tigray Region is the northernmost of the nine ethnic regions of Ethiopia containing the homeland of the Tigray people. It was formerly known as Region 1...

 region

Regions of Ethiopia

||Ethiopia is divided into 9 ethnically-based administrative regions and two chartered cities...

 (or kilil), it has a latitude and longitude of 12°25′N 39°33′E and an elevation of 1520 meters above sea level. It is the administrative center of Alamata

Alamata (woreda)

Alamata is one of the 36 woredas in the Tigray Region of Ethiopia. Part of the Debubawi Zone, Alamata is bordered on the south and west by the Amhara Region, on the northwest by Ofla, and on the northeast by Raya Azebo...

 woreda

Woreda

Woreda is an administrative division of Ethiopia , equivalent to a district . Woredas are composed of a number of Kebele, or neighborhood associations, which are the smallest unit of local government in Ethiopia...

.

Based on figures from the Central Statistical Agency

Central Statistical Agency (Ethiopia)

The Central Statistical Agency is an agency of the government of Ethiopia designated to provide all surveys and censuses for that country used to monitor economic and social growth, as well as to act as an official training center in that field. It is part of the Ethiopian Ministry of Finance and...

 in 2005, Alamata has an estimated total population of 45,632 of whom 22,712 were males and 22,920 were females. The 1994 census reported this town had a total population of 26,179 of whom 12,094 were males and 14,085 were females.

History

On 14 December 1895, Emperor Menilek's

Menelek II of Ethiopia

Emperor Menelik II GCB, GCMG, baptized as Sahle Maryam , was Negus of Shewa , then of Ethiopia from 1889 to his death. At the height of his internal power and external prestige, the process of territorial expansion and creation of the modern empire-state had been completed by 1898...

 passed through Alamata on their way northwards against the Italians

Italy

Italy , officially the Italian Republic languages]] under the European Charter for Regional or Minority Languages. In each of these, Italy's official name is as follows:;;;;;;;;), is a unitary parliamentary republic in South-Central Europe. To the north it borders France, Switzerland, Austria and...

. Arbegnoch under British leadership, liberated the town from Italian control during the Second World War on 5 May 1941; it was at the southern edge of the Woyane rebellion of 1943.

The first reports of crop failure

Famines in Ethiopia

Traditionally the Economy of Ethiopia was based on subsistence agriculture, with an aristocracy that consumed the surplus. Due to a number of causes, the peasants lacked incentives to either improve production or to store their excess harvest; as a result, they lived from harvest to harvest.Despite...

 in Wollo

Wollo

Wollo was a historical region and province in the northeastern part of Ethiopia, with its capital city at Dessie. The province was named after the Wollo Oromo, who settled in this part of Ethiopia in the 17th century...

, were made in October 1971 by the chief municipal officer of Alamata; this report was handled very indifferently by his superiors who did not respond until July 1972, when they asked for a revised report.

Alamata was garrisoned by the Derg

Derg

The Derg or Dergue was a Communist military junta that came to power in Ethiopia following the ousting of Haile Selassie I. Derg, which means "committee" or "council" in Ge'ez, is the short name of the Coordinating Committee of the Armed Forces, Police, and Territorial Army, a committee of...

 during the Ethiopian Civil War

Ethiopian Civil War

The Ethiopian Civil War began on September 12, 1974 when the Marxist Derg staged a coup d'état against Emperor Haile Selassie, and lasted until the Ethiopian People's Revolutionary Democratic Front , a coalition of rebel groups, overthrew the government in 1991. The war overlapped other Cold War...

. The Tigrayan People's Liberation Front

Tigrayan People's Liberation Front

The Tigrayan People's Liberation Front , known more commonly and sometimes pejoratively in Ethiopia as Woyane or Weyane is a political party in Ethiopia...

 captured the town in 1988.