It was a war that killed some 80,000 people and sputtered to life again and again over two decades, pulling in soldiers including a young Ethiopian who fought in a contested town at the center of the conflict.
On Friday, Abiy Ahmed, now Ethiopia's prime minister, received the Nobel Peace Prize for taking the crucial step to end the fighting.
The bitter border conflict between Ethiopia and Eritrea, once a single nation, played out far from the global spotlight.