Ouazebas (late 4th century) was a King of the

Kingdom of Aksum The Kingdom of Aksum ( gez, መንግሥተ አክሱም, ), also known as the Kingdom of Axum or the Aksumite Empire, was a kingdom centered in Northeast Africa and South Arabia from Classical antiquity to the Middle Ages. Based primarily in wh ...

. He is primarily known through the

coins A coin is a small, flat (usually depending on the country or value), round piece of metal or plastic used primarily as a medium of exchange or legal tender. They are standardized in weight, and produced in large quantities at a mint in order to ...

that were minted during his reign. Ouazebas' coins were found beneath the remains of the largest

stela A stele ( ),Anglicized plural steles ( ); Greek plural stelai ( ), from Greek , ''stēlē''. The Greek plural is written , ''stēlai'', but this is only rarely encountered in English. or occasionally stela (plural ''stelas'' or ''stelæ''), whe ...

in the city of

Axum Axum, or Aksum (pronounced: ), is a town in the Tigray Region of Ethiopia with a population of 66,900 residents (as of 2015). It is the site of the historic capital of the Aksumite Empire, a naval and trading power that ruled the whole region ...

. This suggests that the stele had fallen as early as his reign. S. C. Munro-Hay suggests that this particular stela was the last one erected, and that "possibly they went out of favor as Christianity spread, bringing with it new ideas about burial. Ouazebas reintroduced on his coins a motto from the time of

Ezana Ezana ( gez, ዔዛና ''‘Ezana'', unvocalized ዐዘነ ''‘zn''; also spelled Aezana or Aizan) was ruler of the Kingdom of Axum, an ancient kingdom located in what is now Eritrea and Ethiopia. (320s – c. 360 AD). He himself employed the ...

: ''TOYTOAPECHTHXWPA'', meaning "May this please the people". Munro-Hay comments that this motto is "a rather attractive peculiarity of Aksumite coinage, giving a feeling of royal concern and responsibility towards the people's wishes and contentment".Munro-Hay, ''Aksum'', p. 192.

Notes

{{Ethiopia-royal-stub Kings of Axum 4th-century monarchs in Africa