The Mazices were Berbers of

North Africa North Africa, or Northern Africa is a region encompassing the northern portion of the African continent. There is no singularly accepted scope for the region, and it is sometimes defined as stretching from the Atlantic shores of Mauritania in ...

who appear in classical and

late antique Late antiquity is the time of transition from classical antiquity to the Middle Ages, generally spanning the 3rd–7th century in Europe and adjacent areas bordering the Mediterranean Basin. The popularization of this periodization in English has ...

Greek Greek may refer to: Greece Anything of, from, or related to Greece, a country in Southern Europe: *Greeks, an ethnic group. *Greek language, a branch of the Indo-European language family. **Proto-Greek language, the assumed last common ancestor ...

and

Latin Latin (, or , ) is a classical language belonging to the Italic branch of the Indo-European languages. Latin was originally a dialect spoken in the lower Tiber area (then known as Latium) around present-day Rome, but through the power of the ...

sources. Many variants of the name are known: Maxyes in

Herodotus Herodotus ( ; grc, , }; BC) was an ancient Greek historian and geographer A geographer is a physical scientist, social scientist or humanist whose area of study is geography, the study of Earth's natural environment and human society ...

; Mazyes in Hecataeus; Mazaces; Mazikes; Mazazaces; etc. They are all derived from the Berber autoethnonym ''Imazighen'' (singular ''Amazigh''). These terms were used both for Berbers in general and for certain Berber tribes. It is not clear if the original Berber term was used to refer to all Berbers or only a tribe or other subset. Salem Chaker (1986)
"Amaziɣ (le/un Berbère)"
''

Encyclopédie berbère ''Encyclopédie berbère'' (English: ''Berber Encyclopaedia'') is a French-language encyclopaedia dealing with subjects related to the Berber peoples (''Imazighen'' in Berber language), published both in print editions and in a partial online ...

'', 4, pp. 562–568, retrieved 25 January 2020. The Egyptian term '' Meshwesh'' for a tribe of ancient Libyans is probably a cognate. Anthony Leahy (2001)
"Libya"
in Donald B. Redford (ed.), ''The Oxford Encyclopedia of Ancient Egypt'' (Oxford University Press), retrieved 25 January 2020. In the 1st century AD, Lucan uses Mazax, the singular form of Mazaces, as a collective noun for the people. In the 3rd century, the ''Chronicle'' of Pseudo-Hippolytus placed the Mazices on the same level as the

Mauri Mauri (from which derives the English term "Moors") was the Latin designation for the Berber population of Mauretania, located in the part of North Africa west of Numidia, in present-day northern Morocco and northwestern Algeria. Name ''Mauri'' ...

, Gaetuli and

Afri (singular ) was a Latin name for the inhabitants of Africa, referring in its widest sense to all the lands south of the Mediterranean (Ancient Libya). Latin speakers at first used as an adjective, meaning "of Africa". As a substantive, it den ...

. In the last decade of the 4th century, the Mazices and Austurians began ravaging

Cyrenaica Cyrenaica ( ) or Kyrenaika ( ar, برقة, Barqah, grc-koi, Κυρηναϊκή ��παρχίαKurēnaïkḗ parkhíā}, after the city of Cyrene), is the eastern region of Libya. Cyrenaica includes all of the eastern part of Libya between ...

. During the tenure of the '' strategos'' Cerealis, the Mazices besieged Cyrene. Bishop Synesius took part in the defence of the city. The period of unrest in Cyrenaica lasts until about 410.Oric Bates, ''The Eastern Libyans: An Essay'' (Macmillan, 1914), pp. 237–238. In 407 or 408, the Mazices raided the monasteries of Scetis. Among their victims were Abba Moses the Black and seven companions. John the Dwarf and Bishoi also fled Scetis as a result of this raid. The Mazices raided again in 410 and 434. About 445, the Mazices harried some Blemmyes retreating from a raid on an Egyptian oasis. In 491, they raided Cyrenaica again. During the reign of Byzantine Emperor

Justin I Justin I ( la, Iustinus; grc-gre, Ἰουστῖνος, ''Ioustînos''; 450 – 1 August 527) was the Eastern Roman emperor from 518 to 527. Born to a peasant family, he rose through the ranks of the army to become commander of the imperial ...

(518–527), the Mazices plundered Egypt in conjunction with the Blemmyes. In the 580s, several monasteries in the Wadi El Natrun were razed by Mazices. Some 3,500 monks were dispersed into the

Levant The Levant () is an approximate historical geographical term referring to a large area in the Eastern Mediterranean region of Western Asia. In its narrowest sense, which is in use today in archaeology and other cultural contexts, it is ...

.William Dalrymple (2005), ''From the Holy Mountain'' (Harper Perennial), pp. 413–414.

References

Further reading