The Confederatio Cirtense was an autonomous federation of four cities (centered around Cirta, now called Constantine), populated by Roman & Italian colonists in coastal Numidia. It existed approximately between 35 BC and 303 AD in Roman North Africa and was successively substituted with the province called "Numidia Cirtensis". [1]
Julius Caesar conquered the city of Cirta and the surrounding region called Numidia in 46 BC. He sent an astute roman merchant turned a clever military leader, named Publius Sittius, to take control of the area with his Italian legionaries. Sittius successively settled nearly 5000 of them (mostly from the region Campania in southern Italy) in four localities -Cirta, Milevum, Chullu and Rusicade- as colonists, in order to romanize the territory and control politically/militarily the region (that is now eastern north Algeria).
His men, the "Sittians" (Sittiani), were legionaries who controlled Cirta's lands on Rome's behalf. [2] Two thousands of them (mostly from Nuceria, the small city where Sittius was born) settled in Cirta, while one thousand of them in each of the other 3 cities. Nearly half of them settled with their italian families and so approximately 20000 colonists (including women and children) moved from Italy to the region before Augustus times: it was the first major settlement & emigration from Europe to Africa in registered History, according to academics like Ludovico Gatto (a small prelude of what happened during colonial times after the Columbus' discovery of America). [3]
Caesar was also responsible for the first major Roman settlements in Africa. His ally Sittius installed himself with his veterans on the western frontier of Africa Nova in a semi-autonomous fief based on Cirta, which formed a useful buffer state between the Roman territory and Mauretania and which, when Sittius died, could be readily absorbed into the province. Caesar also settled in Africa others of his veterans and—following the example of the Gracchi brothers—some of the dispossessed Italian peasants who were by now creating serious population problems in Rome itself. Carthage, Thysdrus (El Djem), Hippo Diarrhytus (Bizerta), Cirta and a handful of places in the Cape Bon peninsula were among the townships which seem to have received Julian colonies during Caesar’s brief reign.In 27 and 26 BC, the area's administration was restructured under Augustus, who split Cirta into communities separating the Numidians from the Sittiani and other newly settled Romans. With the expansion of the Roman limes, this colony at Cirta was at the center of the most Romanized area of Roman Africa, it was protected by the Fossatum Africae stretching from Sitifis and Icosium to Capsa on the Gulf of Gabès. Robin Daniel estimates Christianity arrived early on: while little remains of African Christianity before AD 200, records of Christians martyred at Cirta existed by the mid-3rd century, it became the chief town of an ecclesiastical district.J. Kuijck [4]
The Confederatio was increased with the addition of Cuicul, probably in the first century under Augustus. [5] Cuicul was initially populated by a colony of Roman soldiers from Italy, and eventually grew to become a large trading market. The resources that contributed to the prosperity of the city -and of the Confederatio- were essentially agricultural (cereals, olive trees and farm): the city is actually called Djemila (the 'beautiful one' in arab) and is a UNESCO World Heritage Site for its unique adaptation of Roman architecture to a mountain environment. [6]
Sittius was rewarded for his military services with an autonomous territory within "New Africa": the Confederatio Cirtense, called also Respublica IIII Coloniarum Cirtencium. Its magistrates and municipal assembly were those of the Confederation. Cirta also administered fortifications (castella) in the High Plains and at the north end of the colonies: Castellum Mastarense, Elephantum, Tidditanorum, Cletianis, Thibilis, Sigus, and others like Castellum Zugal. [7] Enjoying a certain autonomy, these "pagus et castellum" localities were administered by two 'magistri' of annual mandate, assisted by one or two aediles. [8]
The "Sittiani" and their descendants promoted the creation in their four colonies of theaters, forums, buildings, temples, acqueducts, thermae like in Italy. The region of the Confederatio -when emperor Hadrian visited it- was one of the most developed in Roman Africa and (according to Theodore Mommsen) it was fully latin speaking in the first half of the second century of the Roman Empire. [9]
The Confederatio Cirtense was an economically rich region that attracted many local Berbers to live in and soon they become the population majority. As a consequence after two centuries the descendants of the Campania colonists were a minority (who only ruled the Confederation as the local upper class) and who were not able to influence the decisions from Rome: the emperor Diocletianus ordered the disappearance of the Confederatio Cirtense around 270 AD and the creation of the "Roman Numidia" around 294 AD.
But a few years later -in 303 AD- it was created the "Numidia Cirtensis" as a follow up of the old Confederatio Cirtense (under pressure of some important roman descendants of the "Sittians", like those of the Cassius Felix's family).
Numidia Cirtensis was a Roman province resulting from the dismemberment of the province of Numidia and whose capital was Cirta, today Constantine, in Algeria; it survived only ten years, appearing with the new division of the Roman Empire by Diocletian in 303 AD and disappearing from 313 AD, being reunited with the military province of Numidia.
This roman province corresponded to the northern part of the former province of Numidia, that is to say essentially to the territory of the former Cirtense Confederation.
The city of Cirta remained the provincial capital after the merger of the provinces of Numidia Cirtensis and "Military Numidia" (that had for local capital the legionary Lambaesis).
In 311 AD, during the civil war between emperor Maxentius and usurper Domitius Alexander (a former governor of Roman Africa), the city of Cirta was destroyed. It was rebuilt in 313 AD and it was subsequently named in Latin as "Colonia Constantiniana" or "Constantina" [10] after emperor Constantine the Great, who made it the capital of all Roman Numidia.
Numidia was the ancient kingdom of the Numidians located in northwest Africa, initially originating from Algeria, but later expanding across modern-day Tunisia, Libya, and some parts of Morocco. The polity was originally divided between the Massylii in the east and the Masaesyli in the west. During the Second Punic War, Masinissa, king of the Massylii, defeated Syphax of the Masaesyli to unify Numidia into one kingdom. The kingdom began as a sovereign state and later alternated between being a Roman province and a Roman client state.
Hippo Regius is the ancient name of the modern city of Annaba, Algeria. It historically served as an important city for the Phoenicians, Berbers, Romans, and Vandals. Hippo was the capital city of the Vandal Kingdom from 435–439 C.E. until it was shifted to Carthage following the Vandal Capture of Carthage (439).
Parthenia was a Roman–Berber town in the former Roman province of Mauretania Sitifensis, the easternmost part of ancient Mauretania. It was located in what is now northern Algeria.
Lambaesis (Lambæsis), Lambaisis or Lambaesa, is a Roman archaeological site in Algeria, 11 km (7 mi) southeast of Batna and 27 km (17 mi) west of Timgad, located next to the modern village of Tazoult. The former bishopric is also a Latin Catholic titular bishopric.
Bocchus II was king of Mauretania. Son of Mastanesosus, who was dead in 49 BC.
Cirta, also known by various other names in antiquity, was the ancient Berber and Roman settlement which later became Constantine, Algeria. Cirta was the capital city of the Berber kingdom of Numidia; its strategically important port city was Russicada. Although Numidia was a key ally of the ancient Roman Republic during the Punic Wars, Cirta was subject to Roman invasions during the 2nd and 1st centuries BC. Eventually it fell under Roman dominion during the time of Julius Caesar. Cirta was then repopulated with Roman colonists by Caesar and Augustus and was surrounded by the autonomous territory of a "Confederation of four free Roman cities", ruled initially by Publius Sittius. The city was destroyed in the beginning of the 4th century and was rebuilt by the Roman emperor Constantine the Great, who gave his name to the newly constructed city, Constantine. The Vandals damaged Cirta, but emperor Justinian I reconquered and improved the Roman city. It declined in importance after the Muslim invasions, but a small community continued at the site for several centuries. Its ruins are now an archaeological site.
Djémila, formerly Cuicul, is a small mountain village in Algeria, near the northern coast east of Algiers, where some of the best preserved Roman ruins in North Africa are found. It is situated in the region bordering the Constantinois and Petite Kabylie.
Mila is a city in the northeast of Algeria and the capital of Mila Province. In antiquity, it was known as Milevum or Miraeon, Μιραίον and was situated in the Roman province of Numidia.
Milevum was a Roman–Berber city in the Roman province of Numidia. It was located in present-day Mila in eastern Algeria.
Tiddis was a Roman city that depended on Cirta and a bishopric as "Tiddi", which remains a Latin Catholic titular see.
Dothenses was a population of ancient Numidia whose location is unknown, but it could be located near the cave of Djebel-Taya and Thibilis, in Guelma (Algeria). The existence of this city is known thanks to numerous votive inscriptions dedicated to god Bacax recorded on the walls of the cave of Djebel-Taya. In five of these inscriptions is mentioned about the Dothenses community, that would be responsible for conducting the annual offerings to the deity in the spring months.
Publius Sittius was a Roman mercenary who was employed by Julius Caesar. He fought for Caesar in the civil war between Pompey and Caesar, ultimately catching and killing Faustus Cornelius Sulla.
The Fossa regia, also called the Fosse Scipio, was the first part of the Limes Africanus to be built in Africa Proconsulare.
Roman colonies in Berber Africa are the cities—populated by Roman citizens—created in Berber North Africa by the Roman Empire, mainly in the period between the reigns of Augustus and Trajan. These colonies were created in the area—now called Tamazgha by the Berbers—located between Morocco and Libyan Tripolitania.
Thibilis was a Roman and Byzantine era town in what was Numidia but is today northeast Algeria. The site has extensive Roman and Byzantine ruins.
Arabio was the last independent Numidian king, ruling the western region between 44 and 40 BC. According to Appian, he was a son of Masinissa II and probable grandson of Gauda, who had divided Numidia between his sons in 88 BC. He was of Massylian origin.
Roman-Africans were the ancient Northwest African populations of Roman North Africa that had a Romanized culture and used to speak their own variety of Latin as a result. They existed mostly from the Roman conquest in the antiquity until their language gradually faded out after the Arab conquest of North Africa in the Early Middle Ages.
Numidia was a Roman province on the North African coast, comprising roughly the territory of north-east Algeria.
Chullu was an important Roman city on the coast of Numidia.
The Battle of Hippo Regius was a naval encounter during Caesar's Civil War which occurred off the coast of the African city of Hippo Regius in 46 BC. Metellus Scipio and a number of influential senators from the Optimate faction were fleeing the disastrous Battle of Thapsus when their fleet was intercepted and destroyed by Publius Sittius, a mercenary in the employ of Gaius Julius Caesar's Populares. Scipio committed suicide and all of the other senators were killed during the battle.
