Altava
None
Altava was located between Rusadir (actual Melilla) and Oran
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Location | Algeria |
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Region | Tlemcen Province |
Coordinates | 34°53′11″N 1°01′29″W / 34.886389°N 1.024722°W / 34.886389; -1.024722 |
Altava was an ancient Romano - Berber city in present-day Algeria . It served as the capital of the ancient Berber Kingdom of Altava . During the French presence, the town was called Lamoriciere . It was situated in the modern Ouled Mimoun near Tlemcen .
History
Altava was located in western Mauretania Caesariensis on the Roman road from strategic Theveste to Numerus Syrorum (current Maghnia ). Altava was a city populated mainly by Berbers under Septimius Severus , with a small Roman garrison. The garrison—according to historian M. Ruiu—was the Cohors II Sardorum and protected the new lines of the Roman empire moved south from the Mediterranean shores to a military road called Nova Praetentura . This road went from Rapidum in Numidia to Altava and Numerus Syrorum at the border of Mauretania Tingitana . [1]
Altava, according to historian Lawless, was a vicus that achieved independent status from the castrum-fort of the garrison and had a huge Forum and an important pagan temple, later converted into a Christian church (showing the growing presence of Christianity between Berbers . The Roman settlement had an area of nearly 13 hectares and was surrounded by farms. [2]
Emperor Diocletian reorganized the Roman Empire in 298 AD and later withdrew from the area of Volubilis , the Rif mountains in northern Morocco and the western Algerian Atlas mountains after the Crisis of the 3rd Century . Berber rulers created a small independent kingdom there, centered on the capital Altava and the fully Romanised city of Volubilis . From the 7th century Byzantine historians usually called it the Kingdom of Altava .
After the Vandal invasion in 429 AD, Altava became the capital of an independent Berber state. This Mauro-Roman kingdom was situated near Mauretania Caesariensis and Mauretania Tingitana, at some distance from the Vandal nucleus. Although a Berber polity, it borrowed the sociocultural, military and religious structure of the Roman Empire. [3]
Between 550 and 578 AD, Altava served as the capital of the independent Christian Berber kingdom of Garmul .
The last time the kingdom of Altava was cited historically was in connection with a campaign of Gennadius , a magister militum sent by the Eastern Roman Empire . He defeated the Berbers and the ruler of Altava in 578 AD and his small kingdom was probably incorporated to the Byzantine Empire. [4]
We have no historical records about Altava in the seventh century, but it is also conceivable that the kingdom of Altava (or at least a small section of it) lasted until its conquest by the Arabs around 700 AD. [5]
Notes
- ↑ Altava and the Roman "Cohors II Sardorum
- ↑ Lawless, R. Mauretania Caesartiensis: anarcheological and geographical survey Section: The Roman Civilian Sites. p.122-195
- ↑ Villaverde Vega, Noé: "El Reino mauretoromano de Altava, siglo VI" (The Mauro-Roman kingdom of Altava) p.355
- ↑ Martindale et al. " The Prosopography of the later Roman Empire " Vol.III
- ↑ Philippe Sénac et Patrice Cressier : " Histoire du Maghreb médiéval VII - XI ème siècle " Armand Colin. Paris. France. 2012
Bibliography
- Framing the Early Middle Ages: Europe and the Mediterranean, 400-800
- Bowna, Alan. The Cambridge Ancient History: Volume 12, The Crisis of Empire, AD 193-337 . Cambridge university Press. Cambridge, 2005
- Conant, Jonathan (2004), "Literacy and Private Documentation in Vandal North Africa: The Case of the Albertini Tablets ", Vandals, Romans and Berbers: New Perspectives on Late Antique North Africa , Ashgate Publishing, pp. 199–224, ISBN 0-7546-4145-7
- Lawless, R. Mauretania Caesartiensis: anarcheological and geographical survey . Durham University. Durham, 1969 Altava
- Martindale, John Robert; Jones, Arnold Hugh Martin; Morris, J., eds. (1992). The Prosopography of the Later Roman Empire, Volume III: A.D. 527–641 . Cambridge, United Kingdom: Cambridge University Press. ISBN 978-0-521-20160-5 .
- Ruiu, Maria Antonietta. La Cohors II Sardorum ad Altava (Ouled-Mimoun, Algeria) . Universita' degli Studi di Sassari. Sassari, 2012
- Villaverde Noé, Vega. Tingitana en la antigüedad tardía, siglos III-VII: autoctonía y romanidad en el extremo occidente mediterráneo . Ed. Real Academia de la Historia. Madrid, 2001 ISBN 8489512949 , 9788489512948
See also
- Mauretania Caesariensis
- Kingdom of Altava
- Rusadir
- Numerus Syrorum
- Rapidum
- Albulae
- Pomaria
- Berbers and Christianity
34°53′11″N 1°01′29″W / 34.88639°N 1.02472°W / 34.88639; -1.02472