Tigray Province
Tigray (, ) is a historical region and province of Ethiopia. It encompasses most of the territories of Tigrinya-speakers (and a few minority groups closely linked with them) in Ethiopia; Tigray is separated from the northern Tigrinya territories by the River Mereb, now serving as the state border to Eritrea.
Tigray Province
There was no strong concept of a "pan-Tigrayan" ethnicity, local identities often being stronger. Some areas never or only rarely submitted to the rule of a Tigrayan overlord, but stayed nurd their own autonomous rulers (such as Hamasen for most of the time, Welkait, Wajjarat, Rayya, Zebul, etc.); this was in a way solved by "atse" Yohannes IV, who due to his descent from all important Tigrayan dynasties could rally support from most Tigrayan regions. After his accession to the imperial throne, Tigray was governed by his uncle Araya Selassie Demsu, who died shortly after Yohannes. Araya successor "ras" Mengesha Yohannes, the Emperor's son, was only to some degree able to keep Tigray under his control. "Atse" Menelik II used the situation to partition again Tigray along older borders between several governors, who sent into war against each other immediately after his death (e.g. Gebre Selassie Barya Gabar of Aksum and Sebhat Aregawi of the Agame dynasty).