Sétif (Tamazight: Sṭif, Tifinagh: ⵚⵟⵉⴼ, ) is the capital city of the Sétif Province and the 5th most populous city of Algeria, with an estimated population of 1,866,845 in 2017). It is one of the most important cities of eastern Algeria and the country as a whole, since it is considered the trade capital of the country and an industrial pole with three industrial zones within the borders of the city.
It is an inner city, situated in the eastern side of Algeria, east of Algiers, west of Constantine, in the Hautes Plaines region south of Béjaia and Jijel. The city is at an altitude of .
The city was part of the Phoenician Empire then it became part of the ancient Berber kingdom of Numidia, the capital of Mauretania Sitifensis under the rule of the Roman Empire. It was destroyed during the Arab invasion of North Africa. In 1839 when France occupied the site, they found it in ruins apart from Roman ruins of the Byzantine fortress of Setif, and the ruined civilian housing from Roman and Byzantine periods. Reconstruction of a civilian part of the city began with the construction of a Catholic Church of Setif which is the first building established by the colonial French.
The city was the starting point of the 8 May 1945 protests and massacre, which was a crucial factor to the start of the Algerian War.
Etymology Sétif was Numidian before undergoing Roman rule. The name of Sétif comes from Latin "Sitifis", that is drawn from a Berber word "Zdif" which means "black lands" referring to the fertility of its lands.
History
Prehistory The prehistory of Setif begins with the first traces of human occupation, about 2.4 million years ago, and ends with the first Carthaginian texts, in the first millennium BC.
Aïn El Ahnech in Guelta Zerka comprises several sites that, although lacking associated human fossils, have yielded very ancient lithic remains of the Oldowan type—a tool tradition first identified at Olduvai Gorge by archaeologist Louis Leakey in the 1930s. The Aïn Boucherit site delivered in 2018 lithic industry remains (carved stone tools), dated between 1.9 and 2.4 million years ago. On November 29, 2018, the journal Science announced the dating of the site by four corroborating methods: negative geomagnetic polarity reported to the Matuyama chron, ESR dating, biochronology (fossil species assemblages) and sedimentation rate. Aïn Boucherit could be the third oldest African site after Lomekwi 3 in Kenya (3.3 Ma), and Kada Gona in Ethiopia (2.55 Ma). The prehistoric site of Ain El Ahnech is located a few kilometers east of the city, and the age of the lithic remains is estimated by archaeomagnetism to be about 2.4 million years old. It is an ancient lake, located in the commune of Guelta Zerka. The site was discovered in 1947 by the French paleoanthropologist Camille Arambourg (1885-1969), during his paleontological research of continental deposits in the Setif region. On November 29, 2018, a discovery of tools dating back 2.4 million years was published, making this site, at the time of its discovery, the cradle of Humanity before that of Tanzania. Professor Mohamed Sahnouni confirms this discovery.
Ancient history
Numidia
The city, of Numidian origin, was part of the kingdom of Massaesyli in the year 225 BC. It was also considered as a capital before Juba II preferred Cherchell.
It was near Sétif that Jugurtha campaigned and lost against Marius in 105 BC. Overcome by Marius, he was taken to Rome where was executed in the prison of Tullianum. No remains of this period have been found. The city was small under the Numidian kings.
Roman Era
It was an integral part of the Roman province of Caesarian Mauritania which became Setifian Mauritania. When Jugurtha was delivered, Sitifis became part of the kingdom of Mauretania, successively attributed to Bocchus then Boccuris, Juba II and finally to Ptolemy of Mauretania, assassinated at Lugdunum at the instigation of Caligula.
For its strategic situation, Sitifis interested Nerva who installed there from 96 AD a colony for veterans the Colonia Nerviana Augusta Martialis Veteranorum Sitifensium. Although no buildings of this period are known, a cemetery excavated in the 1960s seems to have contained tombs from the early colony.R. Guéry, 1985, La Necropole orientale de Sitifis: fouilles de 1966–1967. Paris. Claudius reduced Mauritania into a Roman province, divided it in two, and attached Setif to the new Caesarian Mauritania, capital Caesarea (Cherchell). In 290, Setif became the capital of Mauretania Sitifensis (present-day eastern Algeria), detached from Mauretania Caesariensis. The new province was then under the diocese of Africa, itself under the prefecture of Italy.Francois Decret, Early Christianity in North Africa (James Clarke & Co, 2011) p. 2.
Mauretania Sitifensis
In the later division of the Roman Empire under the Emperor Diocletian, the eastern part of Mauretania Caesariensis, from Saldae to the river Ampsaga, was split into a new province, and called Mauretania Sitifensis named after the inland town of Setifis (Setif in modern Algeria).
At the time of Constantine the Great, Mauretania Sitifensis was assigned to the administrative Diocese of Africa, under the Praetorian prefecture of Italy. The new province had a huge economic development in the 4th century, until the conquest by the Vandals. In this province, the Christian denomination known as Donatism challenged the Roman Church (which was the main local religion after Constantine), while Setifis was a center of Mithraism.
After the fall of the Western Roman Empire, certain areas of Mauretania Sitifensis were under Vandal and later Byzantine control, but most of the province (until 578 AD) was ruled by Berber kingdoms like the Kingdom of Altava. Only the coastal area around Saldae and Setifis remained fully Romanized.
Byzantine emperor Maurice in 585 AD created the province of Mauretania Prima and erased the old Mauretania Sitifensis. Indeed, the emperor Maurice in that year created the office of "Exarch", which combined the supreme civil authority of a praetorian prefect and the military authority of a magister militum, and enjoyed considerable autonomy from Constantinople. Two exarchates were established, one in Italy, with seat at Ravenna (hence known as the Exarchate of Ravenna), and one in Africa, based at Carthage and including all imperial possessions in the Western Mediterranean. The first African exarch was the Patricius Gennadius: he was appointed as magister militum Africae in 578 AD, and quickly defeated the Romano-Moorish kingdom of Garmul in Mauretania extending the territory of the Mauretania Sitifensis. Among the provincial changes done by emperor Maurice, Mauretania Caesariensis and Mauretania Sitifensis were re-merged as a province of Mauretania Prima.
Mauretania Sitifensis initially had an area of 17800 square miles and had a good agriculture (cereals, etc..), that was exported through the port of Saldae. But under Byzantine control the province was reduced to only the coastal section, with one third of the original area.
In the newly prosperous town a bath building was built, decorated with fine mosaics: its restoration in the fifth century had a cold room (frigidarium) paved with a large mosaic showing the birth of Venus.E. Fentress, ed., Fouilles de Sétif 1977–1984 BAA supp. 5, Algiers, 29–92 On the northwest edge of the town two great Christian basilicas were built at the end of the fourth century, decorated, again, with splendid mosaics,P.-A. Fevrier, Fouilles de Sétif: les basiliques chrétiennes du quartier nord-ouest Paris, 1965. and a Bishopric was founded at this time. There was a Jewish community in the area.Francois Decret, Early Christianity in North Africa (James Clarke & Co, 2011) p13 The Romans built a circus at Sitifis, which aerial photographs show survived substantially intact until the 20th century; today only a small part of the curved end continues visible; the remainder has been destroyed or built over. In the 5th century it suffered from a violent earthquake.Augustine, Ep., lxxxiv; Serm., xix.
The region of Sétif was one of the granaries of ancient Rome: Caput Saltus Horreorum (today Aïn-Zada) was its seat.
The city has preserved vestiges from the 2nd and 4th centuries: ramparts, a temple, a circus, a mausoleum known as "Scipio's", etc. The product of the archaeological excavations is preserved and exhibited in the city's Archaeological Museum, and various steles in the Abd el-Kader garden. It is to put in relation with the site of Cuicul (Djemila).
Bishopric The city was the base of a Bishopric.Francois Decret, Early Christianity in North Africa (James Clarke & Co, 2011) p. 84. Augustine, who had frequent relations with Sitifis, tells us that in his day the Bishopric had a monastery and an episcopal school. Several Christian inscriptions have been found there, one of 452 mentioning the relics of Saint Lawrence, another naming two martyrs of Sitifis, Justus and Decurius.
Known Bishops Servus, mentioned in a letter of St. Augustine in 409 Novatus present at the Council of Carthage (484),Augustine letter 84.2. and exiled by Huneric Optatus, at the Council of Carthage (525). Alexis Lemaître, M. Afr. (24 Feb 1911 Appointed – 28 July 1920 Joanny Thévenoud, M. Afr. (8 Jul 1921 Appointed – 16 September 1949) André-Maurice Parenty (9 Mar 1950 Appointed – 23 November 1983) Armando Xavier Ochoa (23 Dec 1986 Appointed – 1 April 1996) Manuel Felipe Díaz Sánchez (27 Feb 1997 Appointed – 4 April 2000) John Choi Young-su (22 Dec 2000 Appointed – 3 February 2006) Broderick Soncuaco Pabillo (24 May 2006 Appointed – )
Vandal Era Preluding the fall of the Western Roman Empire in 476, the Germanic people of the Vandals, led by their king Genseric (427- 477), crossed from Spain to Africa in 429 at the request of the Roman governor Bonifatius, who was in revolt against the Emperor Valentinian III. The route of the Vandals in Africa, from Tingi (Tangier) to Carthage, passed through Setifis, which was probably reached in 430. Bonifatius defeated, Genseric established the seat of his kingdom in Carthage in 439, forcing the emperor to recognize him as master of Roman Africa.
Under the Vandals it was the chief town of a district called Zaba.
Byzantine Era
In 531, the king of the Vandals, Hilderic, was overthrown by the usurper Gelimer, giving the Roman emperor of the East Justinian, anxious to restore the Roman Empire, a pretext for intervention. After his departure from Byzantium (Constantinople / Istanbul), General Belisarius took advantage of uprisings in Tripolitania and the Moors, which enabled him to take Carthage (533) and then Gelimer himself (534).
The Byzantines found in Sitifis, a small population, because of the vandal predations. In 539, Sitifis again became the capital of a Byzantine "Roman" province: Mauritania Sitifensis. At that time, Solomon built the Byzantine fortress walls, whose west and south walls are still visible.
Islamic Era In 647 AD (the year 27 of the Hijrah), the first Muslim expedition to Africa took place. By 700 AD, the area had been conquered and converted to the Islamic faith. We know little of the early Islamic town, but by the tenth century the area outside of the fortress was once more filled with houses: on the site of the Roman baths over twelve of these were excavated, with large courtyards surrounded by long, thin, rooms.E. Fentress, ed., Fouilles de Sétif 1977–1984 BAA supp. 5, Algiers, 114–151
Setif according to the geographer and historian Al-Bakri: