The importance of the central Maghreb urbs after the Islamic conquest: from the influence of the conquerors to the political and economic role –the city of Mila as a model

Abstract EN

The city of Mila was a model for the ancient cities of Eastern Algeria as it started as a center for human gatherings and, then, developed in the Numidian Era until the Roman, the Vandal, and the Byzantine periods.

In this line, after joining the Maghreb areas to Dar al-Salam after the 6th century, the pivotal role of the coastal cities and ports decreased in the 1st Islamic age after the conquest.

However, it blossomed again with the growth of the maritime trade with Andalusia in the 10th century.

The decrease of the role of these cities was on behalf of the domestic urbs such as Kairouan and those in the Middle Maghreb such as Mila, Tihrit, Telemcen, and other urbs whose primary role was political, military, and economic after the appearance of the commercial routes that link the internal cities of the Maghreb.

Thus, this paper sheds light on the historical origins of the city of Mila that had been one of the Eastern urbs in the Middle Maghreb since the preIslamic conquest until turning into a political and urban center for the Muslim conquests; later, it became a center for political, sectarian, and tribal tensions in the Median era.

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