ISLAMIC DYNASTIES

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Because of the relatively distant location of Tunisia , like the case in the rest of North Africa , from the center of Islamic power , Damascus , Baghdad and later Istanbul , Tunisia was most of the time not ruled directly by the Islamic Caliphates . There used to be a fighting between rival Muslim groups both Berber and Arab which finally gave rise to a succession of local Islamic dynasties .

After Abbasid dynasty took over the Caliphate overthrowing the Umayyads in AD 750 , the ruling Abbasid Caliph appointed Ibrahim ibn al-Aghlab as governor of the province of Ifriqiyya (the Arabic name for Africa) with Kairouan as its capital In AD 797 . Ibrahim ibn al-Aghlab soon succeeded in established effective control of Tunisia , eastern Algeria and the Libyan province of Tripolitania . His efforts were rewarded by Harun aI-Rashid , the Abbasid Caliph at that time , who appointed him as hereditary emir , thus establishing the Aghlabid dynasty , which ruled Tunisia - nominally as vassals of the Abbasids - for over one century . The Aghlabids actually has enriched the country with its most endur¬ing Islamic architectural legacies among which are: The Great Mosque in Kairouan , the ribats (forts) at Sousse and Monastir .

The next dynasty that came to power after the Aghlabids is the Fatimids (named after Fatima , Prophet Mohammed's daughter) . Some Berber Shiites from the Kabylie region of central Algeria went on to depose the religiously illegitimate , as they thought it to be , Abbasid caliphate and declare their leader , Obeid Allah , as caliph . The Fatimids succeeded quickly in conquering North Africa and defeated the Aghlabids in AD 909 , and after one year from that date Obeid Allah was declared the 'true caliph' at Raqqada , south of Kairouan .

The Fatimids then built a new capital called Mahdia on a small , easily defended coastal headland because they were worrying about potential reprisals , and then they start planning the conquest of Egypt . They took over Egypt In AD 969 and founded another new capital which is Cairo .

A new dynasty , the Zirids , arose in 1045 in Ifriqiyya and claimed the return to the Sunni mainstream in defiance of the Cairo-based Fatimids . The Fatimid reaction was devastating: two nomadic tribes of Upper Egypt , Bani Hilal and Bani Sulaim invaded the Maghreb en masse , and for a the following century , North Africa was slowly reduced to ruins . Even in a time in the mid-l100s the Normans , those Vikings who invaded England in 1066 , held parts of the Tunisian coast .

The state of power vacuum eventually came to an end by the puritanical Almohads . They came to power at the beginning of the 12th century in Morocco and proceeded to the conquest of North Africa with the capture of Mahdia in 1160; however , their empire was a short-lived one and almost began to crumble . The Maghreb finally was divided into three parts: Ifriqiyya (Tunisia) came under the Hafsids; Algeria came under the Banu Abd aI-Wad; and Morocco came under the Merenids . This division remained , to a great extent , till today .

During the time of the Crusades , crusaders chose Tunis as their first target because they thought it would be the ground which may later facilitate the invasion of Egypt . However , In 1270 The French King Louis IX , died of the plague at Tunis during his leading of the ill-fated Eighth Crusade .