Arab migrations to the Maghreb

Arab migrations to the Maghreb
	Map depicting the routes Umayyad armies took during the Arab conquest of the Maghreb in the 7th century
Date	c. 7th century — 17th century
Location	Maghreb, North Africa
Cause	See §Causes
Participants	Total unknown: 150,000 (7th century); 1,000,000 (11th century);
Outcome	Arabs become the predominant demographic group; Arabic becomes the lingua franca and dominant language; Near-complete Arabization and displacement of the indigenous populations; Regional culture transformed into Arab culture; Total conversion to Islam;

The Arab migrations to the Maghreb^[a] involved successive waves of migration and settlement by Arab people in the Maghreb region of Africa, encompassing modern-day Algeria, Libya, Morocco and Tunisia. The process took place over several centuries, lasting from the early 7th century to the 17th century. The Arab migrants hailed from the Middle East, particularly the Arabian Peninsula, with later groups arriving from the Levant and Iraq.

The influx of Arabs to the Maghreb began in the 7th century with the Arab conquest of the Maghreb, when Arab armies conquered the region as part of the early Muslim conquests. This initial wave of Arab migration was followed by subsequent periods of migration and settlement, notably during the Umayyad and Abbasid caliphates and later Arab dynasties. However, the most significant wave of Arab migration occurred in the 11th century with the arrival of more Bedouin tribes from the Arabian Peninsula, such as Banu Hilal, Banu Sulaym, and Maqil. The last significant wave of Arab migration to the Maghreb was from Al-Andalus in the 17th century as a result of the Reconquista. These migrants established numerous Arab empires and dynasties in the Maghreb, such as the Aghlabids, Idrisids, Sulaymanids, Salihids, Fatimids, Saadians and 'Alawites.

The Arab migrations to the Maghreb had a profound impact on the demographics and culture of the Maghreb. It resulted in the population of the Maghreb becoming predominantly Arab,^[6] the displacement and Arabization of the Berber and Punic populations,^[8]^[9] and the spread of the Arabic language and Arab culture throughout the region.^[7] The Arab migrants essentially transformed the pre-Islamic culture of the Maghreb into Arab culture and spread the Bedouin way of life.^[10] The descendants of the Arab settlers in the Maghreb are known as Maghrebi Arabs. Historians have characterized the Arab migrations, particularly those of the Hilalians, as the most significant event in the medieval history of the Maghreb.^[15]

^ Ruthven, Malise; Nanji, Azim (2004). Historical Atlas of Islam. Harvard University Press. p. 28. ISBN 9780674013858.
^ Spickard, Paul R. (2005). Race and Nation: Ethnic Systems in the Modern World. Psychology Press. p. 135. ISBN 978-0-415-95002-2. It is estimated that Arab invasions brought about 150,000 people to North Africa during the early conquest of the seventh century
^ Bateson, Mary Catherine (1967). Arabic Language Handbook. Georgetown University Press. p. 106. ISBN 978-0-87840-386-8. North Africa was conquered by the Arabs in the seventh and eighth centuries, but only some 150,000 troops settled there, while the greater number pressed on to Spain.
^ Cite error: The named reference :2 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
^ Kusters, Christiaan Wouter (2003). Linguistic Complexity: The Influence of Social Change on Verbal Inflection. p. 97. ISBN 978-90-76864-41-9. Egypt initially only had 80,000 Arabs in a population of 8 million, and the number of Arabs in the whole Maghreb was probably between 70,000 and 150,000, although later, from the 11th until 14th century, about a million Arabs migrated to the Maghreb which had consisted of five million people until then.
^ ^a ^b Manning, Patrick; Trimmer, Tiffany (2020-05-04). Migration in World History. Routledge. ISBN 978-1-351-25666-7. In a migration that was part invasion and part settlement, the Bedouin tribes took control of Tunisia and extended their influence all the way to Morocco. As they arrived the Beni Hilal and Beni Sulaym settled, married into local populations, turned agricultural land into grazing lands, and expanded the influence of their lifestyle so that within three centuries the population was principally Arab in identity and language rather than Berber. From Morocco, Arabs continued migrating into the desert, and what is now Mauritania became Arabic-speaking.
^ ^a ^b Cite error: The named reference :42 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).
^ ^a ^b Studies, American University (Washington, D. C.) Foreign Area (1979). Algeria, a Country Study. Department of Defense, Department of the Army. p. 17. The Arab impact on the central Maghreb was devastating in both demographic and economic terms. Over a long period of time Arabs displaced Berber farmers from their land and converted it to pasturage. For the first time the extensive use of Arabic spread to the countryside. Sedentary Berbers who sought their protection were gradually Arabized. Others, driven from their traditional lands, joined the Hilalians as nomads or fled to the mountains.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)
^ ^a ^b Nyrop, Richard F. (1972). Area Handbook for Morocco. U.S. Government Printing Office. p. 36. Even more important to the future of Morocco was the large-scale Arab immigration that began in the eleventh century. Before that time the Arabs in Morocco consisted mainly of the descendants of the relatively small numbers of initial invaders and of the Idrisids, who had married Berber women. Many of these early arrivals had been aristocrats from Arabia who settled in the cities. The character of the Arab migrations of the eleventh century was distinctly different. The Fatimids, at this time ruling from their capital in Cairo and infuriated by Berber refusal to acknowledge to acknowledge their hegemony, encourages masses of beduin Arabs of the Beni Hilal and Beni Salim tribes to migrate into North Africa. Over a long period, they displaced the Berbers from some of the best lands or settled among them. This immigration introduced for the first time comparatively large numbers of Arabs into the Moroccan population and quickly spread the use of the Arabic language.
^ ^a ^b el-Hasan, Hasan Afif (2019-05-01). Killing the Arab Spring. Algora Publishing. pp. 81–82. ISBN 978-1-62894-349-8. The Arab tribes began the process of transforming North African culture into Arabic including the nomad tribal life in areas where agriculture had previously been dominant.
^ Shillington, Kevin (2005). Encyclopedia of African History 3-Volume Set. Routledge. p. 1151. ISBN 978-1-135-45670-2. The invasions and incorporation of North Africa into the wider Islamic world resulted not only in an increased Arab presence in the region but also in the Islamization of North Africa and the almost complete elimination of North African Christianity (with the exception of Egypt).
^ Poulton, Robin; Youssouf, Ibrahim ag; Research, United Nations Institute for Disarmament (1998). A Peace of Timbuktu: Democratic Governance, Development and African Peacemaking. UN. p. 24. ISBN 978-92-9045-125-9.
^ Fentress, Elizabeth. "Islamization of Berber lifestyles" (PDF). p. 75.
^ Miller, Catherine; Al-Wer, Enam; Caubet, Dominique; Watson, Janet C. E. (2007-12-14). Arabic in the City: Issues in Dialect Contact and Language Variation. Routledge. p. 78. ISBN 978-1-135-97876-1.
^ Joffé, George (2023-11-20). Routledge Handbook on the Modern Maghrib. Taylor & Francis. p. 263. ISBN 978-0-429-99964-2. According to Ch-A. Julien, a specialist in North African history, the Hilalian invasion was "the most important event of the entire medieval period in the Maghrib". It was, he writes, "an invading torrent of nomadic peoples who destroyed the beginnings of Berber organization — which might very well have developed in its own way and put nothing whatever in its place".

Cite error: There are <ref group=lower-alpha> tags or {{efn}} templates on this page, but the references will not show without a {{reflist|group=lower-alpha}} template or {{notelist}} template (see the help page).

[1] Ruthven, Malise; Nanji, Azim (2004). Historical Atlas of Islam. Harvard University Press. p. 28. ISBN 9780674013858.

[Spickard_2005_135-2] Spickard, Paul R. (2005). Race and Nation: Ethnic Systems in the Modern World. Psychology Press. p. 135. ISBN 978-0-415-95002-2. It is estimated that Arab invasions brought about 150,000 people to North Africa during the early conquest of the seventh century

[Bateson_1967_106-3] Bateson, Mary Catherine (1967). Arabic Language Handbook. Georgetown University Press. p. 106. ISBN 978-0-87840-386-8. North Africa was conquered by the Arabs in the seventh and eighth centuries, but only some 150,000 troops settled there, while the greater number pressed on to Spain.

[:2-4] Cite error: The named reference :2 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

[Kusters_2003_97-5] Kusters, Christiaan Wouter (2003). Linguistic Complexity: The Influence of Social Change on Verbal Inflection. p. 97. ISBN 978-90-76864-41-9. Egypt initially only had 80,000 Arabs in a population of 8 million, and the number of Arabs in the whole Maghreb was probably between 70,000 and 150,000, although later, from the 11th until 14th century, about a million Arabs migrated to the Maghreb which had consisted of five million people until then.

[:14-6] Manning, Patrick; Trimmer, Tiffany (2020-05-04). Migration in World History. Routledge. ISBN 978-1-351-25666-7. In a migration that was part invasion and part settlement, the Bedouin tribes took control of Tunisia and extended their influence all the way to Morocco. As they arrived the Beni Hilal and Beni Sulaym settled, married into local populations, turned agricultural land into grazing lands, and expanded the influence of their lifestyle so that within three centuries the population was principally Arab in identity and language rather than Berber. From Morocco, Arabs continued migrating into the desert, and what is now Mauritania became Arabic-speaking.

[:42-7] Cite error: The named reference :42 was invoked but never defined (see the help page).

[imp-8] Studies, American University (Washington, D. C.) Foreign Area (1979). Algeria, a Country Study. Department of Defense, Department of the Army. p. 17. The Arab impact on the central Maghreb was devastating in both demographic and economic terms. Over a long period of time Arabs displaced Berber farmers from their land and converted it to pasturage. For the first time the extensive use of Arabic spread to the countryside. Sedentary Berbers who sought their protection were gradually Arabized. Others, driven from their traditional lands, joined the Hilalians as nomads or fled to the mountains.{{cite book}}: CS1 maint: multiple names: authors list (link)

[:11-9] Nyrop, Richard F. (1972). Area Handbook for Morocco. U.S. Government Printing Office. p. 36. Even more important to the future of Morocco was the large-scale Arab immigration that began in the eleventh century. Before that time the Arabs in Morocco consisted mainly of the descendants of the relatively small numbers of initial invaders and of the Idrisids, who had married Berber women. Many of these early arrivals had been aristocrats from Arabia who settled in the cities. The character of the Arab migrations of the eleventh century was distinctly different. The Fatimids, at this time ruling from their capital in Cairo and infuriated by Berber refusal to acknowledge to acknowledge their hegemony, encourages masses of beduin Arabs of the Beni Hilal and Beni Salim tribes to migrate into North Africa. Over a long period, they displaced the Berbers from some of the best lands or settled among them. This immigration introduced for the first time comparatively large numbers of Arabs into the Moroccan population and quickly spread the use of the Arabic language.

[cul-10] -Hasan, Hasan Afif (2019-05-01). Killing the Arab Spring. Algora Publishing. pp. 81–82. ISBN 978-1-62894-349-8. The Arab tribes began the process of transforming North African culture into Arabic including the nomad tribal life in areas where agriculture had previously been dominant.

[11] Shillington, Kevin (2005). Encyclopedia of African History 3-Volume Set. Routledge. p. 1151. ISBN 978-1-135-45670-2. The invasions and incorporation of North Africa into the wider Islamic world resulted not only in an increased Arab presence in the region but also in the Islamization of North Africa and the almost complete elimination of North African Christianity (with the exception of Egypt).

[12] Poulton, Robin; Youssouf, Ibrahim ag; Research, United Nations Institute for Disarmament (1998). A Peace of Timbuktu: Democratic Governance, Development and African Peacemaking. UN. p. 24. ISBN 978-92-9045-125-9.

[13] Fentress, Elizabeth. "Islamization of Berber lifestyles" (PDF). p. 75.

[14] Miller, Catherine; Al-Wer, Enam; Caubet, Dominique; Watson, Janet C. E. (2007-12-14). Arabic in the City: Issues in Dialect Contact and Language Variation. Routledge. p. 78. ISBN 978-1-135-97876-1.

[:13-16] Joffé, George (2023-11-20). Routledge Handbook on the Modern Maghrib. Taylor & Francis. p. 263. ISBN 978-0-429-99964-2. According to Ch-A. Julien, a specialist in North African history, the Hilalian invasion was "the most important event of the entire medieval period in the Maghrib". It was, he writes, "an invading torrent of nomadic peoples who destroyed the beginnings of Berber organization — which might very well have developed in its own way and put nothing whatever in its place".

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