Recent work has shown early modern human occupation at Jebel Irhoud, Morocco, dating as far back as MIS 9 (337–300 Ka). Such early dates double the period in which modern humans were present in North Africa, with implications for several key debates on modern human origins and subsequent spread. Routes across a ‘Green Sahara’ allowed population movement intermittently from sub-Saharan Africa and across the Saharan region in general. This has implications for the debate about the timing and routes of modern human expansion across and out of Africa, but also has the effect of focusing discussion on the archaeological record of sub-Saharan Africa and even Arabia for evidence of human behaviour and adaptations. This may be unfortunate as the record for much of the vast area of sub-Saharan Africa and Arabia is extremely limited and the more detailed record of the Levantine region is overlooked. Work at the Haua Fteah and in its surrounding region (Cyrenaican Libya) provides an opportunity to investigate how far the Palaeolithic record for this part of North Africa is, in fact, a product of trans-Saharan, North African or Levantine, influences. The genetic evidence suggests the process of modern human expansion out of Africa, and just as importantly within Africa itself, was a complex one that may have involved population movements into and out of North Africa from several different directions. A concentration upon the Green Sahara hypothesis may distract current research from this broader picture.

Building upon Brass’ previous research on Jebel Moya, which included a comprehensive reanalysis of the pottery from Wellcome's 1911–14 expeditions curated at the British Museum, new research activities by the University College London–University of Khartoum–NCAM Expedition to the Southern Gezira project have included locating and examining for the first time the Late Mesolithic sherds from Jebel Moya curated at the National Museum in Khartoum. Representative samples from the sites of Shaqadud Midden and Shaqadud S21 at the British Museum have also been re-examined. The aims of these activities were threefold: to test the reliability and cohesiveness of and patterning in the Shaqadud collection through the expanded application of attribute analysis, to determine if Caneva's observations of décor patterns on Jebel Moya's Late Mesolithic sherds could be replicated and to obtain better visibility into the nature of its pottery assemblage from this time, and to use the resulting data to test the viability of the central Sudan being a fulcrum of cultural interchanges during the late sixth and early fifth millennium BC. We conclude that there was a piecemeal establishment of networks along which there was diffusion of ideas and animals, and perhaps low numbers of people, into the central and south-central Sudan.

This contribution offers a new reading of the ancient landscape of the periphery of Lepcis Magna thanks mainly to the data from the survey campaigns carried out by the Archaeological Mission of Roma Tre University (2007–13) together with new archival research and GIS analysis. The new data are related to the road network of the Lepcitanian territory and its inner suburban areas. They include both the already known routes (essentially the coastal via publica and the via in mediterraneum) and new roads here presented merging the new information with the already published archaeological evidence. Beside the road network, a new topographic reading of the south-east suburb shows also traces of an ancient land partition based on Roman measurements. This latter discovery would represent, up to now, the first evidence of a cadastrian land partition in Tripolitania.

This paper provides an interpretative framework and classification for the macro- and microscopic identification and provenancing of ancient Greek and Roman ceramic fabrics from Cyrenaica and the wider North African littoral based on ceramic petrology and the kinds of clay sources available for ancient pottery production.

During his four decades of rule, Genseric appears to many Africans – Catholic and pro-Roman – as the incarnation of the Antichrist. For the African municipal aristocracy he represented the image of a greedy barbarian obsessed with power, the persecutor and the gravedigger of Romanitas. If we look closely, Genseric had learned from the Romans how to manage strength and diplomacy, for negotiating with the Romans in particular. He sought to perpetuate his conquests by organising treaties with Ravenna and Constantinople, which did not prevent him from launching parallel plundering campaigns in Africa and along the coast that brought him respect and financial gain. First king of the vandals, he managed to create the first barbaric state on the territory of the empire. He was the type of leader who can be considered a visionary, bringing to fulfilment the material, political and spiritual conquests of a new era, the Spätantike.

The four cemeteries of Cyrene were a living archaeological landscape whose life continued far beyond antiquity. The habit of using monumental tombs was a long-lasting one in Cyrene, starting in the Archaic period and continuing until Roman times. The concept of ‘reuse’ is in itself a problematic one since, from a semantic point of view, it implies the presence of a clear-cut division between an original ‘phase of use’ and of a later ‘phase of reuse’. This approach could have sense when a clear hiatus is present, for example when speaking of modern reuse of ancient Greek tombs. However, the main problem is the use of the term ‘reuse’ when describing two ancient phases, such as a Hellenistic phase and a Roman phase of the same tomb, implying a clear hiatus between them even if one often lacks the elements for identifying the existence of such a hiatus. In particular, the Southern and Northern Necropolises have been analysed here to investigate this subject, basing the hypotheses on data coming from field research and previous studies. However, the topic of reuse for the tombs of Cyrene would need far more space than this paper, so this work should be considered an introduction to a matter that needs a far deeper and a far wider analysis. Given these limits, an ‘anthological’ approach is here proposed, with a sequence of various subjects connected to the ‘reuse’ topic and some new data coming from recent research (such as the surveys in the Northern and Southern Necropolises and the excavation of Tomb S1 by the Chieti University team, and of a tomb in the Northern Necropolis by a team of colleagues from the local Department of Antiquities).

The evidence on the relationship of seamen at Sfax with holiness, absent or hardly mentioned in the written texts, is revealed through archaeological data and in particular by epigraphic inscriptions. The oratory of Sîdî al-Bahrî and the minaret of Sîdî ʿAmar Kammûn in the medina of Sfax illustrate this relationship and demonstrate religious honour and the spread of a marine piety, in particular by the gifts offered by the sailors for the building, enlarging, embellishing or restoring of these pious constructions. The maritime community's attachment to the saints can be explained only by its fear of the sea, where many dangers occur of a natural, climatic and conflictual nature, bad weather, storm, aggression, etc. The saints thus became the symbol of the invulnerability of this port city.

Legumes seem to have been cultivated and to have formed an essential part of the human diet during the Greek and Roman periods. This paper examines the cultivation of pulses in Cyrenaica during the Hellenistic era. It considers the regional production capacity for legumes to meet local needs and argues the involvement of different kinds of pulses in interregional commerce alongside cereals and other dry grains. This study has been implemented via investigating Hellenistic epigraphic evidence from Cyrene. It has traced the cost of pulses mentioned in inscriptions of the fourth and third/second centuries BC and compared them with that of wheat and barley. Pulses and cereal costs indicated by Diocletian's ‘Edict on Maximum Prices of AD 301’ have also been investigated to assess the general trend of their prices over time. The examination demonstrates that varieties of pulses were produced in Cyrenaica during the Hellenistic era and were likely as significant as wheat and barley. It also indicates that they were probably traded from the region alongside other dry commodities.

Among the members of a religious college revealed by a monumental Latin inscription recently discovered in the medina of Sousse (Hadrumetum, Proconsular Africa), there is a member in charge of moctor. This is in fact an unprecedented function among the clergy of the temples of the Roman-African cities. It seems to have been formed from the Semitic consonantal skeleton KTR or QTR, which we find in KTRT (incense) and QTRT (perfume) words. Thus, it is quite possible that moctor is a nominal Semitic form of the root KTR / QTR prefixed with M to designate in the Phoenicio-Punic etymology the ‘offering to incense’. This evidence of a function of Semitic origin in a Latin inscription is not unusual when one understands the privileged place occupied by incense in rituals of Punic and Oriental cults. Similarly, the presence of this function is not surprising in a city with a significant Phoenician-Punic foundation and heritage. If this comparison is plausible, we will have here additional evidence of the resurgence of the religious vocabulary of Semitic origin among the religious language of the Roman provinces of Africa.

The paper presents first results of a joint German–Tunisian research project in Carthage, Tunisia. Archaeological fieldwork has been undertaken (preceded by a geophysical survey) in the southwestern quarter of the ancient city to study the architecture, chronology and urban context of the circus. The area has, unlike the rest of Carthage, not been targeted by excavations of the late nineteenth/early twentieth centuries and, also unlike the rest of Carthage, is mostly not overbuilt, although under pressure from neighbouring communities. The area is the last one allowing a large-scale diachronic urban study in which the circus and its impact on the quarter is in the centre. From our first results, we can date the beginning of the construction of the circus to the late first century AD, with interventions in the early third century and usage continuing into the sixth. We were able to define the extension of the northern cavea and to study the western part of the spina and identify the meta at this point. Information has been obtained on early Roman, pre-circus use of the area as well as data on the Punic phases. Sixth- and seventh-century levels are also well preserved.

This paper reports the preliminary results from two short seasons of fieldwork that the Tunisian–British Bulla Regia Archaeological Report was able to undertake in September 2016 and 2017. In 2016, the work focused on a geophysical survey of the western cemetery and revealed a complex landscape of funerary enclosures and mausolea outside the protected boundaries of the site, likely to be of Roman date. In 2017, photogrammetric techniques were used to record and plan a Late Antique church and cemetery that was discovered during a rescue excavation in 2010. The church consists of three naves and a series of funerary annexes, which contained burials covered by mosaic or stone epitaphs, including those marking the graves of two bishops and two priests. The church is surrounded by an extensive cemetery with a variety of different tomb types, such as mosaic caissons and simple stepped masonry tombs. The mosaics, inscriptions and finds (ceramics, glass, coins) support a fourth to sixth/seventh century date for the church and cemetery.