'The Umayyad conquest of North Africa' continued the century of rapid
Arab Muslim expansion following the death of
Muhammad in
632 CE. By
640 the Arabs controlled
Mesopotamia, had invaded
Armenia, and were concluding their conquest of
Byzantine Syria.
Damascus was the seat of the
caliphate. And by the end of
641 all of
Egypt was in Arab hands. Then, with the destruction of the
Persian army at the battle of
Nahavand (Nehawand) in
642, the conquest of the
Persian Empire was essentially finished.
It was at this point that Arab military expeditions into
North Africa were first launched by local initiative from Egypt, continuing for years and resulting in the spread of Islam.
In
644 at Damascus, Caliph
Umar (Omar) was succeeded by
Uthman ibn Affan (Othman), during whose twelve-year rule Armenia,
Cyprus, and all of
Iran, would be added to the growing Islamic empire;
Afghanistan and North Africa would receive major invasions; and Muslim sea raids would range from
Rhodes to the southern coasts of the
Iberian Peninsula. The Byzantine navy would be defeated in the eastern
Mediterranean.
Sources for the history of the invasion
Before the accounts below are read, it should be realised that there are virtually no contemporary records of the conquest, and particularly of events outside Egypt.
The earliest
Arab accounts that have come down to us are those of
Ibn Abd-el-Hakem,
Al-Baladhuri and
Ibn Khayyat, all of which were written in the 9th century some 200 years after the first invasions. These are not very detailed. In the case of the most informative, the ''History of the Conquest of Egypt and North Africa and Spain'' by
Ibn Abd-el-Hakem, Brunschvig
[1] has shown that it was written with a view to illustrating points of
Maliki law rather than documenting a history, and that some of the events it describes are probably ahistorical.
Beginning in the 11th century, scholars at
Kairouan began to construct a new version of the history of the conquest, which was finalised by
ar-Raqiq. This version was copied in its entirety, and sometimes interpolated, by later authors, reaching its zenith in the 14th century with scholars such as
Ibn Idhari,
Ibn Khaldun and
Al-Nuwayri. It differs from the earlier version not only in the greater detail, but also in giving conflicting accounts of events. This, however, is the best known version and is the one given below.
There is ongoing controversy regarding the relative merits of the two versions. For more information, refer to the works cited below by Brunschvig, Modéran and Benabbès (all supporters of the earlier version) and Siraj (supports the later version).
First invasion
The first incursion into North Africa ordered by the caliph was launched in
647. Marching from
Medina,
Arabia, 20,000 Arabs were joined in
Memphis, Egypt, by another 20,000 and led into the Byzantine
Exarchate of Africa by
Abdallah ibn al-Sa’ad.
Tripolitania in what is modern
Libya was taken. Gregory who had decleared his independence at north africa from
Byzantine Empire, gathered his allies and initiated a confrontation with the Muslims and was defeated at the battle of Sufetula at
Sufetula, a city 150 miles south of
Carthage. With the death of Gregory the whole of north Africa submitted to the
Rashidun Caliphate and payed tribute, Muslims rather made it a vassal state and Abdallah's booty-laden force returning to Egypt in
648, The campaign lasted fifteen months.
All Muslim conquests were soon interrupted, however, by a civil war between rival Arab factions that resulted in the murder of Caliph Uthman in
656. He was replaced by rival
Ali Ibn Abi Talib, who in turn was murdered in
661. The
Umayyad (Omayyad) Dynasty of largely secular and hereditary Arab caliphs then established itself at Damascus and Caliph
Muawiya I began consolidating the empire from the
Aral Sea to the western border of Egypt. He put a governor in place in Egypt at
al-Fustat, creating a subordinate seat of power that would continue for the next two centuries. He then launched more efforts outward, attacking
Sicily and
Anatolia (Turkey) in
663. In
664 Kabul, Afghanistan, fell to the invading Muslims.
Second invasion
Then from
665 to
689 a new North African campaign was carried out.
It began, according to
Will Durant, to protect Egypt "from flank attack by Byzantine Cyrene." So "an army of 40,000 Moslems advanced through the desert to
Barca, took it, and marched to the neighborhood of Carthage." An army of 30,000 Byzantine Greeks was defeated in the process.
Next came a force of 10,000 Arabs led by the Arab general
Uqba ibn Nafi and enlarged by thousands of others. Departing from Damascus, the army marched into North Africa and took the vanguard. In
670 the city of
Kairouan (roughly eighty miles or 160 kilometers south of modern
Tunis) was established as a refuge and base for further operations. This would become the capital of the Islamic province of
Ifriqiya, which would cover the coastal regions of what are today western
Libya,
Tunisia, and eastern
Algeria.
After this, as
Edward Gibbon writes, the fearless general "plunged into the heart of the country, traversed the wilderness in which his successors erected the splendid capitals of
Fes and
Morocco, and at length penetrated to the verge of the
Atlantic and the
great desert." In his conquest of the
Maghreb (western North Africa) he took the coastal city of
Bugia as well as Tingi or
Tangier, overwhelming what had once been the
Roman province of
Mauretania Tingitana.
But here he was stopped and partially repulsed. Luis Garcia de Valdeavellano writes:
:In their struggle against the Byzantines and the Berbers, the Arab chieftains had greatly extended their African dominions, and as early as the year 682 Uqba had reached the shores of the Atlantic, but he was unable to occupy Tangier, for he was forced to turn back toward the Atlas Mountains
by a man who became known to history and legend as
Count Julian.
Moreover, as Gibbon writes, Uqba, "this Mahometan Alexander, who sighed for new worlds, was unable to preserve his recent conquests. By the universal defection of the Greeks and Africans he was recalled from the shores of the Atlantic." His forces were directed at putting down rebellion. In one such battle he was surrounded by insurgents and killed.
Then, adds Gibbon, "The third general or governor of Africa,
Zuheir, avenged and encountered the fate of his predecessor. He vanquished the natives in many battles; he was overthrown by a powerful army, which
Constantinople had sent to the relief of Carthage."
Meanwhile, a new civil war among rivals of the monarchy was raging in Arabia and Syria. It resulted in a series of four caliphs between the death of Muawiya in 680 and the ascension of
Abd-al-Malik (Abdalmalek) in
685 and didn't end until
692 with the death of the rebel leader.
Third invasion
This development brought about a return of domestic order that allowed the caliph to resume the conquest of North Africa. It began with the retaking of Ifrikquiya. Gibbon writes:
But the Byzantine Empire responded with troops from Constantinople, joined by soldiers and ships from Sicily and a powerful contingent of
Visigoths from Hispania. This forced the Arab army to retreat to Kairouan. Then, writes Gibbon, "the Christians landed; the citizens hailed the ensign of the cross, and the winter was idly wasted in the dream of victory or deliverance.
The following spring, however, the Arabs launched an assault by sea and land, forcing the Byzantines and their allies to evacuate Carthage. The city was burned to the ground, leaving the area desolate for the next two centuries. Another battle was fought near
Utica and the Arabs were again victorious, forcing the Byzantines to leave that part of North Africa for good.
This was followed by a Berber rebellion against the new Arab overlords. Gibbon writes:
Five years passed before Hassan received fresh troops from the caliph. Meanwhile the people of North Africa's cities chafed under a Berber reign of destruction. Thus Hassan was welcomed upon his return. Gibbon writes that "the friends of civil society conspired against the savages of the land; and the royal prophetess was slain in the first battle."
By
698 the Arabs had taken most of North Africa from the Byzantines. The area was divided into three provinces: Egypt with its governor at al-Fustat, Ifrikquiya with its governor at Kairouan, and the
Maghreb (modern
Morocco and Mauritania) with its governor at
Fes.
Musa bin Nusair, a successful
Yemeni general in the campaign, was made governor of Ifrikquiya and given the responsibility of putting down a renewed Berber rebellion and spreading the message of Islam. Musa and his two sons prevailed, netting 300,000 captives. The caliph's portion was 60,000 of them. These were sold into slavery, the proceeds from their sale going into the public treasury. Another 30,000 captives were pressed into military service.
Musa also had to deal with constant harassment from the Byzantine navy. So he built a navy of his own which went on to conquer the islands of
Ibiza,
Majorca, and
Minorca. Advancing into the Maghreb, his forces took
Algiers in
700.
Completion of the conquest
By
709 all of North Africa was under the control of the Arab caliphate. The only possible exception was
Ceuta at the African
Pillar of Hercules. Gibbon declares: "In that age, as well as in the present, the kings of
Spain were possessed of the fortress of Ceuta [...] Musa, in the pride of victory, was repulsed from the walls of Ceuta, by the vigilance and courage of Count Julian, the general of the Goths."
Other sources, however, maintain that Ceuta represented the last Byzantine outpost in Africa and that Julian, who the Arabs called Ilyan, was an exarch or Byzantine governor. Valdeavellano offers another possibility, that "as appears more likely, he may have been a Berber who was the lord and master of the Catholic tribe of Gomera." In any case, being an able
diplomat who was adept in Visigothic, Berber, and Arab politics, Julian might well have surrendered to Musa on terms that allowed him to retain his title and command.
At this time the population of Ceuta included many refugees from a Visigothic civil war that had broken out in
Hispania (modern Portugal and Spain). These included family and confederates of the late King
Wittiza,
Arian Christians fleeing forced conversions at the hands of the Visigothic
Catholic church, and persecuted
Jews. Perhaps it was they, through Count Julian, who appealed to the North African Muslims for help in overthrowing
Roderic, the new king of the Visigoths.
As Gibbon puts it, Musa received an unexpected message from Julian, "who offered his place, his person, and his sword" to the Muslim leader in exchange for help in the civil war. Though Julian's "estates were ample, his followers bold and numerous," he "had little to hope and much to fear from the new reign." And he was too feeble to challenge Roderic directly. So he sought Musa's aid.
For Musa, Julian, "by his Andalusian and Mauritanian commands,
... held in his hands the keys of the Spanish monarchy." And so Musa ordered some initial raids on the southern coast of the
Iberian Peninsula in
710. In the spring of that same year
Tariq ibn Ziyad—a Berber, a freed slave, and a Muslim general—took Tangier. Musa thereupon made him governor there, backed by an army of 1,700.
The next year,
711, Musa directed Tariq to invade Hispania. Disembarking from Ceuta aboard ships provided by Julian, Tariq plunged into the Iberian Peninsula, defeated Roderic, and went on to take the Visigothic capital of
Toledo. He and his allies also took
Córdoba,
Ecija,
Granada,
Málaga,
Seville, and other cities. By this process, Tariq was conquering Iberia for Islam rather than taking sides in a Visigothic civil war. And in so doing he established beyond all doubt that Ceuta, the last Christian stronghold in North Africa, was now part of the Arab empire. By this means the
Umayyad conquest of Hispania brought to a close the Islamic conquest of North Africa.
See also
★
Muslim conquest of Egypt
★
Byzantine-Arab Wars
★
Umayyad conquest of Hispania
★
History of Islam in southern Italy
Notes
1. article by Brunschvig cited below
References
★ Robert Brunschvig, "Ibn Abd al-Hakam et la conquète de l'Afrique du Nord par les arabes", ''Al-Andalus'', 40 (1975), pp. 129-179
★ A. Benabbès: "Les premiers raids arabes en Numidie byzantine: questions toponymiques." In ''Identités et Cultures dans l'Algérie Antique'', University of Rouen, 2005 (ISBN 2-87775-391-3)
★ Will Durant, ''The History of Civilization: Part IV—The Age of Faith''. 1950. New York: Simon and Schuster.
★ Edward Gibbon, ''History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire'',
Chapter 51.
★ Charles Scott Kimball, ''A History of Europe''. 2001. And ''A History of Africa''. 2004. Published online at http://xenohistorian.faithweb.com/.
★ Yves Modéran: "Kusayla, l'Afrique et les Arabes." In ''Identités et Cultures dans l'Algérie Antique'', University of Rouen, 2005 (ISBN 2-87775-391-3).
★ Ahmed Siraj: ''L'Image de la Tingitane. L'historiographie arabe medievale et l'Antiquite nord-africaine''. École Française de Rome, 1995. ISBN 2-7283-0317-7.
★ James Trager, editor, ''The People's Chronology''. 1979. New York: Holt, Rinehart and Winston. ISBN 0-03-017811-8
★ Luis Garcia de Valdeavellano, ''Historia de España''. 1968. Madrid: Alianza. Quotes as translated from the Spanish by Helen R. Lane in ''Count Julian'' by
Juan Goytisolo. 1974. New York: The Viking Press, Inc. ISBN 0-670-24407-4
External links
★
''A Brief History of al-Andalus''
★
''A Taste of Maghribi History''
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