Maghreb

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Image:Atlas Mountains over roofs of Marrakech.jpg

The Maghreb (المغرب العربي al-Maġrib al-ʿArabī; also rendered Maghrib (or rarely Moghreb), meaning "western" in Arabic, is the region of Africa north of the Sahara Desert and west of the Nile — specifically, coinciding with the Atlas Mountains. Geopolitically, the area is reckoned to include Morocco, Western Sahara, Algeria, Tunisia, sometimes Libya, and rarely Mauritania. Apropos, the Arab Maghreb Union includes all of the territories listed above except, due to its political status, Western Sahara. An inhabitant or thing of the Maghreb is called a Maghrebian or Maghrebi.

1 Etymology
2 Culture and roots
3 History
4 Modern territories of the Maghreb
5 Medieval regions of the Maghreb
6 See also

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Etymology

The word maghrib is an Arabic term for "of the setting (sun)" from the root ghuroob, meaning "to set" or "to be hidden" (however, it is not used to refer to the setting of the moon). It is also used in a manner similar to the metaphorical use "to be eclipsed", which is used in English.

In Arabic but not in English, Al Maghreb commonly refers to Morocco: the full Arabic name of Morocco (Al Mamlakah al Maghribīyah) translates to "the Western Kingdom of Morocco". Historically, Morocco was called Al Maghreb al Aqşá ("the Furthest West").

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Culture and roots

Though Maghreb culture has both African and Middle Eastern roots, Maghrebis are of mixed origins. They are either of African- Moorish, Arabic, Berber, Moriscos or convert Jewish ancestry in some old cities like Fes, Sale, Rabat or Tlemcen, while a few are of predominantly African ancestry brought in by the trans-Saharan trade. The corsairs also brought in significant amounts of French, Italian, Spanish, and Turkish ancestry in the big coastal cities. The Arabic dialects of the Maghreb share many common characteristics (like a first person singular present with n-) that set them apart from the dialects of the Middle East and most of Egypt; Berber languages are almost exclusively spoken in the Maghreb, and were originally spoken throughout it. It largely shares a common culinary tradition; indeed, the Maghreb was jocularly defined by Habib Bourguiba as the part of North Africa where couscous is the staple food.

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History

From the end of the Ice Age, when the Sahara Desert dried up, contact between the Maghreb and sub-Saharan Africa was extremely limited by the difficulty in crossing the desert. This remained the case until after the time of the Arab expansion and the spread of Islam; even then, trans-Saharan trade was restricted to costly (but often profitable) caravan expeditions, trading such goods as salt, gold, ivory, and slaves.

Originally, the Maghreb was inhabited by "European" Cro-Magnoids (Iberomaurusians) in the north and by "African" peoples in the Sahara. Later, about 8000 BC, there came from the east "European" speakers of northern Afro-Asiatic languages such as Berber at least since the Capsian culture.

Many ports along the Maghreb coast were occupied by Phoenicians, particularly Carthaginians; with the defeat of Carthage, many of these ports naturally passed to Rome, and ultimately it took control of the entire Maghreb north of the Atlas Mountains, apart from some of the most mountainous regions like the Moroccan Rif.

The Arabs reached the Maghreb in early Umayyad times, but their control over it was quite weak, and various Islamic "heresies" such as the Ibadis and the Shia, adopted by some Berbers, quickly threw off Caliphal control in the name of their interpretations of Islam. The Arabic language became widespread only later, as a result of the invasion of the Banu Hilal (unleashed, ironically, by the Berber Fatimids in punishment for their Zirid clients' defection) in the 1100's. Throughout this period, the Maghreb fluctuated between occasional unity (as under the Almohads, and briefly under the Hafsids) and more commonly division into three states roughly corresponding to modern Morocco, western Algeria, and eastern Algeria and Tunisia.

After the Middle Ages, the area was loosely under the control of the Ottoman Empire, except Morocco. After the 19th century, it was colonized by France, Spain and later Italy.

Today over two and a half million Maghrebins live in France, especially from Algeria, as well as many more French of Maghrebin origin.

Image:Maghreb.PNG

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