Mauri (from which derives the English term "Moors") was the Latin designation for the Berber population of Mauretania, located in the west side of North Africa on the shores of the Mediterranean Sea, Mauretania Tingitana and Mauretania Caesariensis, in the North of present-day Morocco and north western Algeria.
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Mauretania (/ˌmɒrɪˈteɪniə, ˌmɔːrɪ-/; Classical Latin: [mau̯.reːˈt̪aː.ni.a]) is the Latin name for a region in the ancient Maghreb. It extended from central present-day Algeria to the Atlantic, encompassing northern present-day Morocco, and from the Mediterranean in the north to the Atlas Mountains. Its native inhabitants, of Berber ancestry, were known to the Romans as the Mauri and the Masaesyli.
In 25 BC, the kings of Mauretania became Roman vassals until about 44 AD, when the area was annexed to Rome and divided into two provinces: Mauretania Tingitana and Mauretania Caesariensis. Christianity spread there from the 3rd century onwards. After the Muslim Arabs subdued the region in the 7th century, Islam became the dominant religion.
Africa was a Roman province on the northern coast of the continent of Africa. It was established in 146 BC, following the Roman Republic's conquest of Carthage in the Third Punic War. It roughly comprised the territory of present-day Tunisia, the northeast of Algeria, and the coast of western Libya along the Gulf of Sidra. The territory was originally and still is inhabited by Berbers, known in Latin as the Numidae and Maurii, indigenous to all of North Africa west of Egypt. In the 9th century BC, Semitic-speaking Phoenicians from the Levant built coastal settlements across the Mediterranean to support and expand their shipping networks. In the 8th century BC, the settlement of Carthage became the predominant Phoenician colony. Rome began expanding into Africa after annexing Carthage in 146 BC at the end of the Punic Wars, and into Numidia from 25 BC, establishing Roman colonies in the region.
Africa was one of the wealthiest provinces in the Roman Empire, second only to Italy. It was said that Africa fed the Roman populace for eight months of the year, while Egypt provided the remaining four months' supply. The area east of the Fossa Regia was fully Romanized with one third of the population made of Italian colonists and their descendants, the other two thirds were Romanized Berbers, who were all Christians and nearly all Latin speaking.