#historyonleo #onthisday On March 1st 1896 Ethiopian army under emperor Menelik II annihilates Italian army under General Oreste Barrieri in Battle of Adwa. The battle decides First Italo-Ethiopian War, making Ethiopia the only part of Africa (apart from Liberia) to remain as independent country instead of European colony. The battle will later be celebrated as African triumph and Menelik II grand hero of pan-Africanism. In Italy, the battle was seen as national humiliation and in 1935 Benito Mussolini invaded Ethiopia partly motivated with desire for revanche.