On September 12, 1974 the Derg, a committee of junior and mid-level military officers, deposed Emperor Haile Selassie I of Ethiopia, ending the ancient Solomonic monarchy and the emperor's forty-four-year reign in the culminating act of a creeping revolution. The upheaval had built through 1974 from army mutinies over pay, spiraling inflation, and above all fury over the government's concealment of the 1973 Wollo and Tigray famine, which killed an estimated 100,000 to 200,000 people. The Coordinating Committee of the Armed Forces, Police, and Territorial Army, formed in June 1974 and soon known as the Derg, extracted concessions from the emperor allowing it to arrest officials, and through the summer imprisoned two former prime ministers, most of their cabinets, regional governors, and court officials.
After a proposed constitutional monarchy was floated, the Derg dismantled the imperial apparatus, and on September 12 tanks surrounded the Jubilee Palace, officers read the aged emperor a deposition order, and he was driven away to imprisonment in a Volkswagen. Three days later the committee renamed itself the Provisional Military Administrative Council. Haile Selassie died in custody in August 1975 under disputed circumstances.
Films & Footage
Emperor Haile Selassie is driven from Jubilee Palace after his deposition by the Derg, September 12, 1974. Photo: Officer of the Provisional Military Administrative Council
Independent research, added record by record. Hover any label for what it means.
Target identified in Coup Atlas research: Emperor Haile Selassie I, deposed on September 12, 1974 and imprisoned; he was held at the palace until his death in custody on August 27, 1975 under disputed circumstances.
RESEARCHED NAME
Key figures
Haile Selassie I (emperor deposed and imprisoned)
The Derg / Coordinating Committee (military junta that seized power)
Aman Andom (early Derg chairman and head of state)
Sources
On 12 September 1974 Emperor Haile Selassie was deposed by the Coordinating Committee of the Armed Forces, Police, and Territorial Army, a military junta that consequently ruled Ethiopia as the Derg until 1991; upon deposing the emperor, many of his associates were imprisoned.
In July the Derg obtained key concessions from the emperor including the power to arrest government officials at every level, and soon both former Prime Ministers Aklilu Habte-Wold and Endelkachew Makonnen along with most of their cabinets, most regional governors, and many officials were imprisoned; the Derg deposed and imprisoned the emperor on 12 September 1974 and three days later renamed itself the Provisional Military Administrative Council.
The 1974 coup culminating on 12 September involved the deposition of Emperor Haile Selassie I by the Derg, ending the Solomonic dynasty's rule, with the revolution's origins in inflation, chronic military underpayment, and the devastating effects of a 1973 to 1974 drought that precipitated famine in Wollo and Tigray, and on September 12 tanks surrounded the Jubilee Palace in Addis Ababa amid mass protests.
A council of combined security forces known as the Derg staged a coup on September 12, 1974 against Emperor Haile Selassie I, arresting and imprisoning the monarch who had ruled for decades, then renaming itself the Provisional Military Administrative Council, soon abolishing the monarchy; Haile Selassie died in August 1975, with some believing his successor Mengistu Haile Mariam was complicit in his death.
SOURCE REVIEWEDAssociation for Diplomatic Studies and Training, Anatomy of an Overthrowopen source ↗
Editorial Note
Major event: the deposition of Haile Selassie ended a monarchy that traced its claimed lineage over centuries and reshaped the Horn of Africa, installing the Marxist Derg. Paired record: this September 12 record is the deposition of the emperor; the companion record 1974-11-23 is the Derg's internal Bloody Saturday massacre of 60 officials, and the two are distinct dataset events. Fate coding: the emperor was arrested and imprisoned, matching the dataset fate; he died in custody on August 27, 1975 under disputed circumstances, widely suspected to have been killed on the new regime's orders, which is recorded as disputed rather than asserted. Coding note: sources describe a creeping coup from February to September 1974; the dataset dates the culminating deposition to September 12. The famine deaths (roughly 100,000 to 200,000) are given as attributed estimates.
How It Unfolded
Hand-coded by Coup Atlas from the sources on this page, using a fixed list of tactics. Only events we have read through carry this coding, so most records do not have it yet.
Led by
Military
How long it took
Under a day — resolved within 24 hours
Detention or expulsion of the incumbent leader
Suspension of the constitution or dissolution of institutions
Cross-Reference
Datasets agree. At least two of the three reference datasets we check against carry this event, and none of them disagrees about its date or its result.
Identifiers for finding this same event in the other datasets:
Coup Atlas research identifies the target as: Emperor Haile Selassie I, deposed on September 12, 1974 and imprisoned; he was held at the palace until his death in custody on August 27, 1975 under disputed circumstances..
Baseline coding: Incumbent executive removed from power. Recorded leader fate: deposed; arrested or jailed. The baseline file does not name individual targets; researched names are kept in a separate layer.
Baseline Dataset Citation
Cline Center Coup d’État Project Dataset, v2.2.2
Peyton, Buddy, Joseph Bajjalieh, Michael Martin, and Andrea Gerald. 2026. Cline Center Coup d’État Project Dataset. Cline Center for Advanced Social Research. V.2.2.2. February 17. University of Illinois Urbana-Champaign. doi: 10.13012/B2IDB-9651987_V10
“Ethiopian Military Assails the Emperor,” September 12, 1974
“ETHIOPIANS DEMAND TRIAL FOR SELASSIE,” September 16, 1974
This is the citation trail carried by the baseline dataset, grouped by outlet and rejoined from the line-wrapped original. Coup Atlas has not independently re-checked every document; read the original before citing a specific claim. URLs the import damaged beyond safe repair are shown as plain text and listed in citations-report.md. How this list is built →
