Arab conquest of the Maghreb

Soon after taking Alexandria, Amr ibn al-As occupied Cyrenaica and Tripoli (642–643). In 647 the governor of Egypt, Abd Allah ibn Sa'd, led a large army into the Byzantine exarchate of Africa, whose exarch Gregory had just rebelled against Constans II and proclaimed himself emperor. Near Sufetula (Sbeitla) the Arabs drew Gregory into a pursuit and routed his army; Gregory was killed, and after a campaign of more than a year the provincials bought the invaders’ withdrawal with a huge tribute. The First Fitna then halted the advance. In the 660s, under Mu'awiya, the expeditions resumed; in 670 Uqba ibn Nafi founded Kairouan as a permanent base, and his successor Abu al-Muhajir Dinar, according to later sources, won over Berber tribes and their leader Kusaila.

Reinstated in 681/682, Uqba marched west through Numidia into Morocco, by tradition as far as the Atlantic, but on the way back he was ambushed and killed near Vescera (Biskra) by Kusaila and his Byzantine allies. Kusaila held Kairouan until he fell at Mamma (688 or 689); soon afterwards the Byzantines landed in Cyrenaica and killed the Arab commander Zuhayr ibn Qays. Only after winning the Second Fitna could Abd al-Malik send Hassan ibn al-Nu'man with a large army. Hassan took Carthage, lost it to a Byzantine fleet in 697 and retook and destroyed it in 698; he was then defeated by the Berber queen of the Aurès known as al-Kahina (“the priestess”) and had to withdraw to Tripolitania, but returning with reinforcements he defeated her, and she was killed, most likely in 701–703.

Hassan founded Tunis near the ruins of Carthage, organised the administration of Ifriqiya from Kairouan and enrolled thousands of Berbers in the army. His successor Musa ibn Nusayr extended Arab rule over the western Maghreb; Tangier was taken in 708 or 709, and in 711 a mostly Berber army under Tariq ibn Ziyad crossed into Spain. The conquest is known mainly from Arabic histories written from the 9th century onwards, far from the Maghreb, and from scattered Byzantine and Latin notices, so its chronology and the roles of Kusaila and al-Kahina remain uncertain; recent archaeology suggests that it was less destructive than once thought.