section_path: Reign/Foreign relations/Relations with the Ethiopian Empire
section_name: Relations with the Ethiopian Empire
paragraph_text: Relations with the Ethiopian Empire
  
  Ethiopian Emperor Fasilides dispatched an embassy to India in 1664–65 to congratulate Aurangzeb upon his accession to the throne of the Mughal Empire. The delegation reportedly presented several valuable offerings to the Mughal Emperor, such as slaves, ivory, horses, a set of intricately adorned silver pocket pistols, a zebra and various other exotic gifts. François Bernier, describes the presents as consisting of:
  
  :"twenty-five choice slaves, nine or ten of whom were of a tender age and in a state to be made eunuchs; fifteen horses, esteemed equal to those of Arabia, and a species of mule, whose skin I have seen: no tiger is so beautifully marked, and no alacha of the Indies, or stripped silken stuff, is more finely and variously streaked; a couple of elephant's teeth, of a size so prodigious that it required, it seems, the utmost exertion of a strong man to lift either of them from the ground; and lastly, the horn of an ox, filled with civet, which was indeed enormously large, for I measured the mouth of it at Delhy, and found that it exceeded half a foot in diameter"
  
  Ethiopian Emperor Fasilides dispatched an embassy to India in 1664–65 to congratulate Aurangzeb upon his accession to the throne of the Mughal Empire. The delegation reportedly presented several valuable offerings to the Mughal Emperor, such as slaves, ivory, horses, a set of intricately adorned silver pocket pistols, a zebra and various other exotic gifts. François Bernier, describes the presents as consisting of:
  
  :"twenty-five choice slaves, nine or ten of whom were of a tender age and in a state to be made eunuchs; fifteen horses, esteemed equal to those of Arabia, and a species of mule, whose skin I have seen: no tiger is so beautifully marked, and no alacha of the Indies, or stripped silken stuff, is more finely and variously streaked; a couple of elephant's teeth, of a size so prodigious that it required, it seems, the utmost exertion of a strong man to lift either of them from the ground; and lastly, the horn of an ox, filled with civet, which was indeed enormously large, for I measured the mouth of it at Delhy, and found that it exceeded half a foot in diameter"