💎The Queen of Sheba
The Legendary Woman Ruler of the Arabian Peninsula / East Africa Who Visited King Solomon
One Legend Remembered for Life · Small Roles, Famous Names
The Hebrew Bible AccountThe Ethiopian "Kebra Nagast" LegendThe Kingdom of Sheba
Who they are
The legend of the Queen of Sheba is found mainly in the Book of Kings of the Hebrew Bible, telling how, hearing of the fame of King Solomon’s wisdom, she made a long journey to Jerusalem bearing abundant spices, gold, and jewels, testing Solomon’s wisdom with a series of hard questions, all of which he answered fully, so that the Queen of Sheba was deeply impressed. Historians offer differing conjectures on the exact location of the kingdom of Sheba, the mainstream view holding it in the southern Arabian Peninsula around present-day Yemen (a region indeed famed in antiquity for the trade in spices such as frankincense and myrrh), but the traditional Ethiopian epic the Kebra Nagast claims the Queen of Sheba came from Ethiopia and bore Solomon a son, Menelik I, becoming the legendary origin of the "Solomonic dynasty" lineage of the Ethiopian imperial house, a narrative that profoundly shaped the construction of Ethiopian national historical identity.
Primary sourcesThe Hebrew Bible, 1 KingsThe Ethiopian Kebra Nagast (Glory of the Kings)
Key stories
The Test of Wisdom
The Hebrew Bible records that on reaching Jerusalem the Queen of Sheba put a series of tricky hard questions to King Solomon to test whether his fame for wisdom was deserved, and Solomon "explained all to her; there was nothing she asked that he could not answer"; seeing the splendor of Solomon’s palace and the good order of his courtiers, the Queen of Sheba could not help sighing that "the report I heard was not the half of what I now see with my own eyes," and then gave Solomon abundant gold and spices and returned satisfied.
The Ethiopian "Kebra Nagast" Legend
The traditional Ethiopian epic the Kebra Nagast records that during her meeting with King Solomon the Queen of Sheba bore a son, Menelik I, who on reaching adulthood went to Jerusalem to visit his father and, on returning home, by tradition carried the "Ark of the Covenant" (the sacred object holding the stone tablets of Moses’ Ten Commandments); the Ethiopian imperial house thereby claimed descent from Solomon and the Queen of Sheba, and this legend was thereafter long a central narrative foundation in the construction of the legitimacy of the Ethiopian imperial lineage and of national historical identity.
Version differences
On the exact historical original and location of the Queen of Sheba, scholars hold differing hypotheses of the ancient kingdom of Sheba in Yemen, Ethiopia, and elsewhere, and the Ethiopian tradition further develops the detailed narrative of her bearing Solomon a son (from whom the Ethiopian imperial house traces its lineage); this content is all religious and national tradition construction, lacking independent archaeological support, and this site clearly marks it as legendary in nature.
Echoes today
Below are how modern works borrow or reinterpret this name or story — not the original material. The two differ, so keep them apart.
The Ethiopian imperial "Solomonic dynasty" lineage legendThe Ethiopian emperors through to the last emperor Haile Selassie I in the twentieth century all took the "Solomonic dynasty" lineage, by tradition descended from the son of the Queen of Sheba and Solomon, as an important historical narrative basis for the legitimacy of their rule.