Conquest, Ecology and Economy in Islamic North Africa: The Example of the Central Medjerda Valley

• Applicant: Dr. Philipp Freiherr von Rummel
• Subject Area: Prehistory and World Archaeology ; Physical Geography
• Term: from 2019 to 2024
• Project identifier: Deutsche Forschungsgemeinschaft (DFG) - Project number 429040062

The Muslim conquest of North Africa and subsequent regime changes resulted in widespread changes in urbanism, agriculture and regional economies which are fundamental to understanding the development of North African society, united under Islam. Recent synthetic studies, including by the joint PIs, challenge what has long been the textbook understanding of the collapse of Roman rule and the impact of the Muslim conquests in North Africa, in which the eighth and ninth centuries have often been seen as a dark age. Ongoing excavations by the PIs at the important, neighbouring urban centres of Simitthus (Chimtou) and Bulla Regia in NW Tunisia directed by von Rummel and Fenwick respectively, have highlighted the complexity of urban trajectories, technological innovation and environmental change in the medieval period.The proposed project will build on these findings, addressing a fundamental gap in our understanding of cultural, economic and landscape transformations in medieval North Africa. Moving beyond the simple question of urban continuity or collapse in late antiquity and the early medieval period, it will investigate the extent to which the Muslim conquests and subsequent regime change represented a force of economic and social transformation. This will be assessed by tracking long-term changes in settlement patterns, landscape use, patterns of exploitation and technology –in the central Medjerda valley, the famed granary of Roman and Islamic Africa. The project will evaluate five sites with different trajectories in the medieval period: Bulla Regia, Simitthus (Chimtou), Thunusuda (Bordj Hallal), Belalis Maior (Henchir El-Faouar) and Vaga (Béja), conducting topographic and geophysical survey in order to identify suitable zones for excavation. Following this evaluation, the sites will be targeted with a systematic sampling strategy aimed at recovering a stratified material culture sequence and a high density of plant and animal remains associated with occupation sequences. Environmental data will be extracted from the sites’ hinterlands to understand changing climatic and environmental conditions. This data will be synthesized with relevant Latin, Greek and Arabic sources to assess the full extent of the transformation resulting from the Muslim conquest of North Africa, subsequent regime change and the spread of Islam. The results will be contextualized within broader trends in the Mediterranean and the Islamic world which characterize the ‘first Islamic millennium’. This project will ultimately result in both a fundamental advance of our understanding of Islamic North Africa and a new interpretative framework which can be applied to other regions of the Islamic world.

• DFG Programme: Research Grants
• International Connection: United Kingdom
• Cooperation Partner: Dr. Corisande Fenwick