Borj Gourbata

Borj Gourbata was an ancient Roman-Berber town in Qafşah, Tunisia. It is located at latitude 34°16'22.01", longitude 8°32'56" and 135 meters above sea level.[1][2] The town is in the Sahel region of Tunisia, but at the junction of the Oued ech Cheria and the Oued el Jemel Wadis,[3] making it an important oasis in the Sahara. It is situated between Gafsa and Chott el Jerid.

Map of Borj Gourbata in Tunisia.

History

In Roman times the town[4][5] was on the Roman Limes in the Roman Province of Africa proconsularis and latter Byzacena.[6] The town was known as Castellum Thigensium or just Thiges.[7] As the name suggest it was a fortification,[8] and was probably the first fort on the limes being built in 75AD.[9]

The town appears on the Tabula Peutinger and was also the seat of a Christian bishopric, which survives today as a titular see of the Roman Catholic church.[10] The current Bishop is Stanislaw Gębicki of Poland.[11][12]

In the middle ages the town was known as Tgiws[13]

The French excavated ruins s in the 19th century[14]

The town was taken in the Muslim conquest of the Maghreb in 647AD,[15] though Roman and Berber populations remains the majority till the 9th century when there were revolts in the area.

References
  1. Borj Gourbata at geoview.info.
  2. Borj Gourbata at mapcarta.com.
  3. Borj Gourbata Map — Satellite Images of Borj Gourbata.
  4. Pol Trousset, Thiges and civitas Tigensium (Publications of the French School of Rome, 1990) vol 134 num1.p143-167.
  5. J. S. Wacher, The Roman World, Volume 1 (Taylor & Francis, 2002)p237.
  6. Trousset, (P.), Thiges and the Civitas Tigensium, Part of: Africa in the Roman West (1st century BC-4th century AD). Proceedings of the Rome Symposium (3-5 December 1987) (Collection of the French School of Rome 134) p143-167
  7. R.B. Hitchner, DARMC, R. Talbert, Sean Gillies, Johan Åhlfeldt, R. Warner, Jeffrey Becker, and Tom Elliott, Thiges/Castellum Thigensium: a Pleiades place resource', Pleiades: A Gazetteer of Past Places, 2014 [accessed: 24 December 2016].
  8. About: *Thiges/Castellum Thigensium, Henchir-Ragoubet.
  9. The Roman Fort of Qasr Banat in Libya - The Limes Tripolitanus.
  10. "Apostolische Nachfolge – Titularsitze". Archived from the original on 2015-02-04. Retrieved 2016-12-24.
  11. Bishops capital titular Thiges at GCatholic.org.
  12. Le Petit Episcopologe, Issue 157, Number 13.671
  13. "تاريخ مدينة توزر -". Archived from the original on 2016-08-06. Retrieved 2016-12-24.
  14. Trousset, P. (1995). "Djerid". Encyclopédie Berbère (16): 2461–2465. doi:10.4000/encyclopedieberbere.2189.
  15. Trousset, P. (1995). "Djerid". Encyclopédie Berbère (16): 2461–2465. doi:10.4000/encyclopedieberbere.2189.
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