Previously To Particularizing The Population Of Morocco, I Shall Take
The Liberty Of Introducing Some General Observations On The Whole Of The
Inhabitants Of North Africa, And The Manner In Which This Country Was
Successively Peopled And Conquered.
Greek and Roman classics contain
only meagre and confused notions of the aborigines of North Africa,
although they have
Left us a mass of details on the Punic wars, and the
struggles which ensued between the Romans and the ancient Libyans,
before the domination of the Latin Republic could be firmly established.
Herodotus cites the names of a number of people who inhabited North
Africa, mostly confining himself to repeat the fables or the more
interesting facts, of which they were the object.
The nomenclature of Strabo is neither so extensive, nor does it contain
more precise or correct information. He mentions the celebrated oasis of
Ammonium and the nation of the Nasamones. Farther west, behind Carthage
and the Numidians, he also notices the Getulians, and after them the
Garamantes, a people who appear to have colonized both the oasis of
Ghadames and the oases of Fezzan. Ptolemy makes the whole of the
Mauritania, including Algeria and Morocco, to be bounded on the south by
tribes, called Gaetuliae and Melanogaeluti, on the south the latter
evidently having contracted alliance of blood with the negroes.
According to Sallust, who supports himself upon the authority of
Heimpsal, the Carthaginian historian, "North Africa was first occupied
by Libyans and Getulians, who were a barbarous people, a heterogeneous
mass, or agglomeration of people of different races, without any form of
religion or government, nourishing themselves on herbs, or devouring the
raw flesh of animals killed in the chase; for first amongst these were
found Blacks, probably some from the interior of Africa, and belonging
to the great negro family; then whites, issue of the Semitic stock, who
apparently constituted, even at that early period, the dominant race or
caste. Later, but at an epoch absolutely unknown, a new horde of
Asiatics," says Sallust, "of Medes, Persians, and Armenians, invaded the
countries of the Atlas, and, led on by Hercules, pushed their conquests
as far as Spain." [9]
The Persians, mixing themselves with the former inhabitants of the
coast, formed the tribes called Numides, or Numidians (which embrace the
provinces of Tunis and Constantina), whilst the Medes and the Armenians,
allying themselves with the Libyans, nearer to Spain, it is pretended,
gave existence to a race of Moors, the term Medes being changed into
that of Moors. [10]
As to the Getulians confined in the valleys of the Atlas, they resisted
all alliance with the new immigrants, and formed the principal nucleus
of those tribes who have ever remained in North Africa, rebels to a
foreign civilization, or rather determined champions of national
freedom, and whom, imitating the Romans and Arabs, we are pleased to
call Barbarians or Berbers (Barbari Braber [11]), and whence is derived
the name of the Barbary States. But the Romans likewise called the
aboriginal tribes of North Africa, Moors, or Mauri, and some contend
that Moors and Berbers are but two different names for the aboriginal
tribes, the former being of Greek and the latter of African origin. The
Romans might, however, confound the African term berber with barbari,
which latter they applied, like the Greeks, to all strangers and
foreigners. The revolutions of Africa cast a new tribe of emigrants upon
the North African coast, who, if we are to believe the Byzantine
historian, Procopius, of the sixth century, were no other than
Canaanites, expelled from Palestine by the victorious arms of Joshua,
when he established the Israelites in that country. Procopius affirms
that, in his time, there was a column standing at Tigisis, on which was
this inscription: - "We are those who fled from the robber Joshua, son of
Nun." [12] Now whether Tigisis was in Algeria, or was modern Tangier, as
some suppose, it is certain there are several traditions among the
Berber tribes of Morocco, which relate that their ancestors were driven
out of Palestine. Also, the Berber historian, Ebn-Khal-Doun, who
flourished in the fourteenth century, makes all the Berbers descend from
one Bar, the son of Mayigh, son of Canaan. However, what may be the
truths of these traditions of Sallust or Procopius, there is no
difficulty in believing that North Africa was peopled by fugitive and
roving tribes, and that the first settlers should be exposed to be
plundered by succeeding hordes; for such has been the history of the
migrations of all the tribes of the human race.
But the most ancient historical fact on which we can depend is, the
invasion, or more properly, the successive invasions of North Africa by
the Phoenicians. Their definite establishment on these shores took place
towards the foundation of Carthage, about 820 years before our era. Yet
we know little of their intercourse or relations with the aboriginal
tribes. When the Romans, a century and a half before Christ, received,
or wrested, the rule of Africa from the Phoenicians, or Carthaginians,
they found before them an indigenous people, whom they indifferently
called Moors, Berbers, or Barbarians. A part of these people were called
also Nudides, which is perhaps considered the same term as nomades.
Some ages later, the Romans, too weak to resist a vigorous invasion of
other conquerors, were subjugated by the Vandals, who, during a century,
held possession of North Africa; but, after this time, the Romans again
raised their heads, and completely expelled or extirpated the Vandals,
so that, as before, there were found only two people or races in Africa:
the Romans and the Moors, or aborigines.
Towards the middle of the seventh century after Christ, and a few years
after the death of Mahomet, the Romans, in the decline of their power,
had to meet the shock of the victorious arms of the Arabians, who poured
in upon them triumphant from the East; but, too weak to resist this new
tide of invasion, they opposed to them the aborigines, which latter were
soon obliged to continue alone the struggle.
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