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Capsa
Gafsa ( aeb, ڨفصة '; ar, قفصة qafṣah), originally called Capsa in Latin, is the capital of Gafsa Governorate of Tunisia. It lends its Latin name to the Mesolithic Capsian culture. With a population of 111,170, Gafsa is the ninth-largest Tunisian city and it is 335 kilometers from the capital Tunis. Overview Gafsa is the capital of the southwest of Tunisia and is both a historical oasis and home to the mining industry of Tunisia. The city had 111,170 inhabitants at the 2014 census, under the rule of the mayor, Helmi Belhani. The city lies by road southwest of Tunis. Its geographical coordinates are . Ancient history Excavations at prehistoric sites in the Gafsa area have yielded artefacts and skeletal remains associated with the Capsian culture. This Mesolithic civilisation has been radiocarbon dated to between 10,000 and 6,000 BCE. The associated ancient population, known as the ''Snail eaters'', are known for their extensive middens of snail shells. They ar ...
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Capsian Culture
The Capsian culture was a Mesolithic and Neolithic culture centered in the Maghreb that lasted from about 8,000 to 2,700 BC. It was named after the town of Gafsa in Tunisia, which was known as Capsa in Roman times. Capsian industry was concentrated mainly in modern Tunisia and Algeria, with some lithic sites attested from southern Spain to Sicily. It is traditionally divided into two horizons, the ''Capsien typique'' (Typical Capsian) and the ''Capsien supérieur'' (Upper Capsian), which are sometimes found in chronostratigraphic sequence. Sometimes, a third period, ''Capsian Neolithic'' (6,200–5,300 BP) is also specified. They represent variants of one tradition, the differences between them being both typological and technological.2005 D. Lubell. Continuité et changement dans l'Epipaléolithique du Maghreb. In, M. Sahnouni (ed.) ''Le Paléolithique en Afrique: l’histoire la plus longue'', pp. 205–226. Paris: Guides de la Préhistoire Mondiale, Éditions Artcom’/Errance ...
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Sufet
In several ancient Semitic-speaking cultures and associated historical regions, the shopheṭ or shofeṭ (plural shophṭim or shofeṭim; he, שׁוֹפֵט ''šōfēṭ'', phn, 𐤔𐤐𐤈 ''šōfēṭ'', xpu, 𐤔𐤐𐤈 ''šūfeṭ'', uga, 𐎘𐎔𐎉 ''ṯāpiṭ'') was a community leader of significant civic stature, often functioning as a chief magistrate with authority roughly equivalent to Roman consular powers. Etymology In Hebrew and several other Semitic languages, shopheṭ literally means "Judge", from the Semitic root ''Š-P-Ṭ'', "to pass judgment". Cognate titles exist in other Semitic cultures, notably Phoenicia. Hebrew In the Hebrew Bible, the shofṭim were chieftains who united various Israelite tribes in time of mutual danger to defeat foreign enemies. Phoenician In the various independent Phoenician city-states—on the coasts of present-day Lebanon and western Syria, the Punic colonies on the Mediterranean Sea, and in Carthage itself—a shof ...
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Romano-Berber States
Mauretania (; ) is the Latin name for a region in the ancient Maghreb. It stretched from central present-day Algeria westwards to the Atlantic, covering northern present-day Morocco, and southward to the Atlas Mountains. Its native inhabitants, seminomadic pastoralists of Berber ancestry, were known to the Romans as the Mauri and the Masaesyli. In 25 BC, the kings of Mauretania became Roman vassals until about 44 AD, when the area was annexed to Rome and divided into two provinces: Mauretania Tingitana and Mauretania Caesariensis. Christianity spread there from the 3rd century onwards. After the Muslim Arabs subdued the region in the 7th century, Islam became the dominant religion. Moorish kingdom Mauretania existed as a tribal kingdom of the Berber Mauri people. In the early 1st century Strabo recorded ''Maûroi'' (Μαῦροι in greek) as the native name of a people opposite the Iberian Peninsula. This appellation was adopted into Latin, whereas the Greek name for ...
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Gaius Marius
Gaius Marius (; – 13 January 86 BC) was a Roman general and statesman. Victor of the Cimbric and Jugurthine wars, he held the office of consul an unprecedented seven times during his career. He was also noted for his important reforms of Roman armies. He set the precedent for the shift from the militia levies of the middle Republic to the professional soldiery of the late Republic; he also improved the '' pilum'', a javelin, and made large-scale changes to the logistical structure of the Roman army. Rising from a well-off provincial Italian family in Arpinum, Marius acquired his initial military experience serving with Scipio Aemilianus at the Siege of Numantia in 134 BC. He won election as tribune of the plebs in 119 BC and passed a law limiting aristocratic interference in elections. Barely elected praetor in 115 BC, he next became the governor of Further Spain where he campaigned against bandits. On his return from Spain he married Julia, the aunt of J ...
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Gafsa Oases
Gafsa Oases (Arabic: واحة قفصة, French: ''Oasis de Gafsa'') is a cluster of oasis sites (Sakdoud, Ksar, Lela, Gafsa and El Guettar) in southwestern Tunisia, near the northern edge of the Sahara Desert. The Gafsa Oases were known to the ancient Romans and cover approximately 700 hectares. The oases have been designated as a Globally Important Agricultural Heritage System since 2011. Background An oasis is an intensive human-mediated agroforestry system located in an arid or semi-arid climate, usually located in close proximity to an underground aquifer. The Oases of the Maghreb specifically have been described as “islands of lush greenery that flourish amidst the harsh and restrictive conditions of a desert ecosystem.” Date palm oases in the southern part of Tunisia are historically watered through the farrow and basin irrigation technique. There are an estimated 50 historic date palm oases in Tunisia, another 100 in neighboring Algeria, and still more in Morocco, t ...
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Midden
A midden (also kitchen midden or shell heap) is an old dump for domestic waste which may consist of animal bone, human excrement, botanical material, mollusc shells, potsherds, lithics (especially debitage), and other artifacts and ecofacts associated with past human occupation. These features provide a useful resource for archaeologists who wish to study the diets and habits of past societies. Middens with damp, anaerobic conditions can even preserve organic remains in deposits as the debris of daily life are tossed on the pile. Each individual toss will contribute a different mix of materials depending upon the activity associated with that particular toss. During the course of deposition sedimentary material is deposited as well. Different mechanisms, from wind and water to animal digs, create a matrix which can also be analysed to provide seasonal and climatic information. In some middens individual dumps of material can be discerned and analysed. Shells A shell mi ...
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Genseric
Gaiseric ( – 25 January 477), also known as Geiseric or Genseric ( la, Gaisericus, Geisericus; reconstructed Vandalic: ) was King of the Vandals and Alans (428–477), ruling a kingdom he established, and was one of the key players in the difficulties faced by the Western Roman Empire during the 5th century. Through his nearly 50 years of rule, he raised a relatively insignificant Germanic tribe to the status of a major Mediterranean power. His most famous exploit, however, was the capture and plundering of Rome in June 455. He also defeated two major efforts by the Romans to overthrow him, the first one by the emperor Majorian in 460 or 461, and another by Basiliscus at the Battle of Cape Bon in 468. After his death in Carthage, Gaiseric was succeeded by his son Huneric. Early life and accession Gaiseric was an illegitimate son of King Godigisel and a slave woman. After his father's death in a battle against the Franks during the Crossing of the Rhine, Gaiseric became th ...
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Vandals
The Vandals were a Germanic peoples, Germanic people who first inhabited what is now southern Poland. They established Vandal Kingdom, Vandal kingdoms on the Iberian Peninsula, Mediterranean islands, and North Africa in the fifth century. The Vandals migrated to the area between the lower Oder and Vistula rivers in the second century BC and settled in Silesia from around 120 BC. They are associated with the Przeworsk culture and were possibly the same people as the Lugii. Expanding into Roman Dacia, Dacia during the Marcomannic Wars and to Pannonia during the Crisis of the Third Century, the Vandals were confined to Pannonia by the Goths around 330 AD, where they received permission to settle from Constantine the Great. Around 400, raids by the Huns from the east forced many Germanic tribes to migrate west into the territory of the Roman Empire and, fearing that they might be targeted next, the Vandals were also pushed westwards, Crossing of the Rhine, crossing the Rhine in ...
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Fossatum Africae
''Fossatum Africae'' ("African ditch") is one or more linear defensive structures (sometimes called ''limes'') claimed to extend over or more in northern Africa constructed during the Roman Empire to defend and control the southern borders of the Empire in Africa. It is considered to be part of the greater frontier system in Roman Africa. It is considered to have many similarities of construction to Hadrian's Wall, one of the northern borders of the Empire in Britain. History The Fossa regia was the first frontier line to be built in Roman Africa, used to initially divide the Berber kingdom of Numidia from the territory of Carthage that was conquered by the Romans in the second century, but this is considered to be independent of the Fossatum Africae. There is only a single mention of the Fossatum (as such) in historical literature prior to the 20th century. This occurs in a letter written by the co-emperors Honorius and Theodosius II to Gaudentius, the ''vicarius Africae' ...
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Africa (Roman Province)
Africa Proconsularis was a Roman province on the northern African coast that was established in 146 BC following the defeat of Carthage in the Third Punic War. It roughly comprised the territory of present-day Tunisia, the northeast of Algeria, and the coast of western Libya along the Gulf of Sirte. The territory was originally inhabited by Berber people, known in Latin as ''Mauri'' indigenous to all of North Africa west of Egypt; in the 9th century BC, Phoenicians built settlements along the Mediterranean Sea to facilitate shipping, of which Carthage rose to dominance in the 8th century BC until its conquest by the Roman Republic. It was one of the wealthiest provinces in the western part of the Roman Empire, second only to Italy. Apart from the city of Carthage, other large settlements in the province were Hadrumetum (modern Sousse, Tunisia), capital of Byzacena, and Hippo Regius (modern Annaba, Algeria). History Rome's first province in northern Africa was established ...
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Catholic Encyclopedia
The ''Catholic Encyclopedia: An International Work of Reference on the Constitution, Doctrine, Discipline, and History of the Catholic Church'' (also referred to as the ''Old Catholic Encyclopedia'' and the ''Original Catholic Encyclopedia'') is an English-language encyclopedia published in the United States and designed to serve the Catholic Church. The first volume appeared in March 1907 and the last three volumes appeared in 1912, followed by a master index volume in 1914 and later supplementary volumes. It was designed "to give its readers full and authoritative information on the entire cycle of Catholic interests, action and doctrine". The ''Catholic Encyclopedia'' was published by the Robert Appleton Company (RAC), a publishing company incorporated at New York in February 1905 for the express purpose of publishing the encyclopedia. The five members of the encyclopedia's Editorial Board also served as the directors of the company. In 1912 the company's name was changed to ...
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Colonia (Roman)
A Roman (plural ) was originally a Roman outpost established in conquered territory to secure it. Eventually, however, the term came to denote the highest status of a Roman city. It is also the origin of the modern term ''colony''. Characteristics Under the Roman Republic, which had no standing army, bodies of their own citizens were planted in conquered towns as a kind of garrison. There were two types: * Roman colonies, ''coloniae civium Romanorum'' or ''coloniae maritimae'', as they were often built near the sea, e.g. Ostia (350 BC) and Rimini (268 BC). The colonists consisted of about three hundred Roman families and were given a small plot of land so were probably small business owners. * Latin colonies (''coloniae Latinae'') were considerably larger than Roman colonies. They were military strongholds near or in enemy territory. The colonists were given large estates up to 35 hectares. They lost their citizenship which they could regain if they returned to Rome. Af ...
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