Monument to the Lion of Judah patriot and national hero. The work was made by the French sculptor Georges Gardet in 1930, on the occasion of the coronation of Emperor Hailé Selassié on November 2, 1930. At the end of the so-called March of the Iron Will (in italian: "Marcia della ferrea volontà") that led to the occupation of Addis Ababa by the Italian army, the statue was transported to Rome, Italy in 1935 at the end of the Second Italo-Ethiopian War. The Lion of Judah sculpture was placed just beyond Piazza dei Cinquecento, under the obelisk of the Italian Heroes of the Battle of Dogali
Monument to the Lion of Judah Monument to the Lion of Judah The monument to the Lion of Judah is a statue of the Lion of Judah, symbol of Ethiopian Emperors and Ethiopia. It is located in the square of the Addis Ababa railway station in Addis Ababa, Ethiopia. The statue is particularly well known in Ethiopia, because in the 1930s (when the sculpture had been taken to Rome) it was the cause of a protest against Italian colonialism by Eritrean patriot Zerai Deres, who wounded several people with a scimitar there. For his gesture, Zerai Deres is celebrated by Eritrean and Ethiopian historiography as a