Badi I (1611/12 – 1616/17), also known as Badi el Kawam, was a ruler of the

Kingdom of Sennar The Funj Sultanate, also known as Funjistan, Sultanate of Sennar (after its capital Sennar) or Blue Sultanate due to the traditional Sudanese convention of referring to black people as blue () was a monarchy in what is now Sudan, northwestern E ...

. During his reign, Sennar was at peace with its neighbor,

Ethiopia Ethiopia, , om, Itiyoophiyaa, so, Itoobiya, ti, ኢትዮጵያ, Ítiyop'iya, aa, Itiyoppiya officially the Federal Democratic Republic of Ethiopia, is a landlocked country in the Horn of Africa. It shares borders with Eritrea to the ...

. The Ethiopian ''Royal Chronicles'' mention that Emperor

Susenyos of Ethiopia Susenyos I ( gez, ሱስንዮስ ; circa 1571-1575 – 17 September 1632), also known as Susenyos the Catholic, was Emperor of Ethiopia from 1606 to 1632, and a member of the Solomonic dynasty. His throne names were Seltan Sagad and Malak Saga ...

responded to the gift Badi's predecessor had sent him by sending to Sultan Badi bracelets of gold and a gold-mounted saddle. However, according to

James Bruce James Bruce of Kinnaird (14 December 1730 – 27 April 1794) was a Scottish traveller and travel writer who confirmed the source of the Blue Nile. He spent more than a dozen years in North Africa and Ethiopia and in 1770 became the first Europ ...

, Badi found insult in the ''negarit'' which Emperor Susenyos had sent his father,

Abd al-Qadir Abd al-Qadir or Abdulkadir ( ar, عبد القادر) is a male Muslim given name. It is formed from the Arabic words '' Abd'', ''al-'' and '' Qadir''. The name means "servant of the powerful", ''Al-Qādir'' being one of the names of God in the ...

, interpreting it as a symbol that Sennar was a dependency of Ethiopia. This led him to sending an insulting present to Susenyos—two old, blind and lame horses—then followed up the insult by sending his retainer Nile Wed Ageeb to raid Ethiopian territories. Susenyos met this threat by making a separate treaty of peace with Wed Ageeb, who went over to the Ethiopian side. The hostilities between the two kingdoms increased when the governor of the Mazaga, Alico, who was a servant of Emperor Susenyos, fled to Sennar with a number of the Emperor's horses. Susenyos complained of this to Badi, who refused to reply; further insulted, Susenyos summoned Nile Wed Ageeb to his headquarters at

Gunka is the Japanese term for military music. While in standard use in Japan it applies both to Japanese songs and foreign songs such as "The Battle Hymn of the Republic", as an English language category it refers to songs produced by the Empire of Jap ...

, and the two of them plundered the territory of Sennar along their shared frontier as far as Fazuclo. According to Bruce, this was "a cause of much bloodshed, and of a war which, at least in intention, last to this day between the two kingdoms."Bruce, ''Travels'', vol. 3 pp. 316f

References

Rulers of Sennar 17th-century African people Year of birth uncertain {{Africa-royal-stub