How did the Umayyad conquest of North Africa unfold?

The Muslim conquest of the Maghreb was a lengthy military campaign spanning from 647 to 709 AD, conducted by the Rashidun and Umayyad Caliphates. It dismantled the Byzantine Exarchate in North Africa and integrated local Berber populations through large-scale recruitment and Islamization. This historic expansion ultimately paved the way for the subsequent Umayyad invasion of the Iberian Peninsula.

What we know

• The conquest of the Maghreb took nearly 70 years, commencing in the 640s soon after the fall of Egypt and concluding in 709 under Caliph al-Walid I. [1, 2]
• Uqba ibn Nafi founded Qayrawan in 670 and eventually pushed all the way to the Atlantic coast before being defeated. [2]
• By 698, the Byzantine presence was effectively ended after the capture of Carthage, bringing an end to Eastern Roman control in the region. [2, 4]
• Musa ibn Nusayr conquered modern-day Algeria and Morocco, initiating mass recruitment and Islamization of the Berbers on a scale unseen elsewhere. [2]

Where to go next

• how it workedWhat forces enabled early Muslim expansion?
• what followedHow did the campaign lead into Europe?
• the bigger pictureWhat was North Africa like under Roman rule?
• whenWhen did the campaign begin relative to Egypt?
• whoWho were the key commanders in the Maghreb?
• an unexpected connectionHow did North African campaigns link to the fall of the Umayyads?The western expansion from Ifriqiya was part of an overstretched military network that ultimately collapsed when provincial rebellions and the Khorasani forces broke the Umayyad order.

Sources

• [1]Muslim conquest of the Maghreb (Wikidata Q925960) · CC0 1.0
• [2]Muslim conquest of the Maghreb · CC BY-SA 4.0
• [3]Muslim conquest of the Iberian Peninsula · CC BY-SA 4.0
• [4]North Africa during classical antiquity · CC BY-SA 4.0
• [5]Umayyad army · CC BY-SA 4.0