DESSIÈ. – A city in Ethiopia, in Amhara, with 36,000 inhabitants (1939). It is one of the principal road junctions and commercial centres of the region, which gained importance when King Mika’el (d. 1921), a Muslim convert to Christianity, chose it as his seat and had his ghebi and numerous churches built there. Since 25 March 1937 it has been the seat of an apostolic prefecture entrusted to the Franciscans. In 1949 it had 250 Catholics, 2 parishes, 3 priests, 2 educational institutes, and 1 charitable institution.
Enciclopedia Cattolica