Before the Crescent
Phoenicians, Romans, Vandals, Byzantines — Morocco before Islam arrived in the 7th century
The Amazigh were first. The indigenous population of North Africa — called Berbers by the Romans, Amazigh by themselves — inhabited Morocco long before any foreign power arrived. Cave paintings in the Anti-Atlas and the Draa Valley date human presence to at least 12,000 years ago. The Amazigh were not one people but many — dozens of tribes with distinct languages, territories, and political structures.
The Phoenicians arrived around the 12th century BCE. Traders from modern Lebanon, they established coastal settlements at Lixus (near modern Larache), Mogador (Essaouira), and Tingis (Tangier). These were trading posts, not colonies — the Phoenicians came for gold, purple dye (from the murex snail), and access to trans-Saharan trade routes. Carthage, the greatest Phoenician colony, controlled Morocco's coast until its destruction by Rome in 146 BCE.
Rome took Morocco in stages. The Kingdom of Mauretania — ruled by Amazigh kings allied with Rome — was annexed as a province in 40 CE. Volubilis, near modern Meknes, became the provincial capital. The ruins are Morocco's finest Roman site — a forum, basilica, triumphal arch, and mosaics that rival anything in the western Mediterranean. Rome's presence was coastal and northern; the Atlas and the south remained beyond effective control.
The Vandals crossed from Spain in 429 CE — Germanic warriors who swept across North Africa and sacked Rome itself in 455. Their presence in Morocco was brief and destructive. The Byzantines reclaimed parts of the coast in the 6th century, but their hold was tenuous.
The Arab conquest arrived in the late 7th century. Uqba ibn Nafi reached the Atlantic in 683. Musa ibn Nusayr established control by 710. The following year, Tariq ibn Ziyad crossed to Spain. Islam spread rapidly — partly by conversion, partly by political alliance, partly by force. But it spread across a landscape already shaped by three thousand years of Amazigh, Phoenician, Roman, and Mediterranean civilisation.
Explore the full interactive module — with archaeological site maps, timeline, and the pre-Islamic cultural layers documented — at Dancing with Lions: https://www.dancingwiththelions.com/data/before-the-crescent
Interactive Module
Data and visualisation by Dancing with Lions
