Ethiopian Epiphany becomes the new entry under the intangible cultural heritage list of The United Nations Educational, Scientific, and Cultural Organization (UNESCO). On its Twitter page hours ago, UNESCO congratulated Ethiopia for the new inscription.
The colorful Ethiopian Epiphany, also called “Timket” in Amharic, has become the fourth for Ethiopia in the list of UNESCO intangible cultural heritage lists. The festival, which is celebrated every year all over Ethiopia, aims to memorize the baptism of Jesus Christ.
The festival has multiple cultural and religious phases. The celebration starts one day earlier of the main event, which is called ‘Ketera.’ On Ketera, the replicas of the Ark of covenant called Taboots will be taken to the main event area called Timkete-Bahir, with the escort of a massive crowd of people.
January 19 is the date of the actual festival. On that day, the congregation receives the sparkle of holy water, and religious and cultural songs will be heard from every corner of the Timkete-Bahir.
Besides being religious, for young boys and girls, Timket is considered as a platform where they could meet their life partner. They prepare for weeks to look handsome and beautiful on that day. During the festival, they do cultural dances and activities of many kinds to impress the one who caught their eyes.
Several tourists travel to Ethiopia to visit the Timket festival every year.
Besides, Timket Ethiopia has three other intangible world heritages. Namely, Commemoration feast of the finding of the True Holy Cross of Christ; Fichee-Chambalaalla, New Year festival of the Sidama people; Gada system, an indigenous democratic socio-political system of the Oromo; and now the Ethiopian Epiphany.
When it comes to tangible world heritage, Ethiopia has managed to register nine heritages in UNESCO so far.
