Bagai was a

Roman Roman or Romans most often refers to: *Rome, the capital city of Italy *Ancient Rome, Roman civilization from 8th century BC to 5th century AD *Roman people, the people of Roman civilization *Epistle to the Romans, shortened to Romans, a letter w ...

–

Berber Berber or Berbers may refer to: Ethnic group * Berbers, an ethnic group native to Northern Africa * Berber languages, a family of Afro-Asiatic languages Places * Berber, Sudan, a town on the Nile People with the surname * Ady Berber (1913–196 ...

city A city is a human settlement of a substantial size. The term "city" has different meanings around the world and in some places the settlement can be very small. Even where the term is limited to larger settlements, there is no universally agree ...

in the

province A province is an administrative division within a country or sovereign state, state. The term derives from the ancient Roman , which was the major territorial and administrative unit of the Roman Empire, Roman Empire's territorial possessions ou ...

Africa Proconsularis Africa is the world's second-largest and second-most populous continent after Asia. At about 30.3 million km2 (11.7 million square miles) including adjacent islands, it covers 20% of Earth's land area and 6% of its total surfac ...

. It must have been of some reasonable size, as it was also the

seat A seat is a place to sit. The term may encompass additional features, such as back, armrest, head restraint but may also refer to concentrations of power in a wider sense (i.e " seat (legal entity)"). See disambiguation. Types of seat The ...

of an ancient

Catholic The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

bishopric In church governance, a diocese or bishopric is the ecclesiastical district under the jurisdiction of a bishop. History In the later organization of the Roman Empire, the increasingly subdivided provinces were administratively associate ...

. The ancient city has been identified with ruins at Ksar-Bagaï outside of Baghai, in the Aurès Mountains of the El Hamma District in

Khenchela Province Khenchela Province () is a provinces of Algeria, province (''wilaya'') in the Aures, Aurès region in Algeria. History The province was created from parts of Oum el Bouaghi Province and Tébessa Province in 1984. Administrative division The pro ...

Algeria Algeria, officially the People's Democratic Republic of Algeria, is a country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It is bordered to Algeria–Tunisia border, the northeast by Tunisia; to Algeria–Libya border, the east by Libya; to Alger ...

Location

Bagai is a town in

Numidia Numidia was the ancient kingdom of the Numidians in northwest Africa, initially comprising the territory that now makes up Algeria, but later expanding across what is today known as Tunisia and Libya. The polity was originally divided between ...

between the Aurès Mountains in the south and the

salt lake A salt lake or saline lake is a landlocked body of water that has a concentration of salts (typically sodium chloride) and other dissolved minerals significantly higher than most lakes (often defined as at least three grams of salt per liter). I ...

Garaat al-Tarf in the north. Bagaï is identified with Ksar Baghai in modern-day central Algeria, not far from Thamugadi (Timgad). 6 kilometers to the south of Bagai is Hammam Essalihine the ruins of an ancient Roman bath that dates from the time of the

Flavian dynasty The Flavian dynasty, lasting from 69 to 96 CE, was the second dynastic line of emperors to rule the Roman Empire following the Julio-Claudian dynasty, Julio-Claudians, encompassing the reigns of Vespasian and his two sons, Titus and Domitian. Th ...

. The town of Aquae Flavianae was also near these ruins.

History

In the 2nd century, the city possessed monuments and dedications to the Roman Emperors

Lucius Verus Lucius Aurelius Verus (; 15 December 130 – 23 January 169) was Roman emperor from 161 until his death in 169, alongside his adoptive brother Marcus Aurelius. He was a member of the Nerva–Antonine dynasty. Verus' succession together with Ma ...

and

Marcus Aurelius Marcus Aurelius Antoninus ( ; ; 26 April 121 – 17 March 180) was Roman emperor from 161 to 180 and a Stoicism, Stoic philosopher. He was a member of the Nerva–Antonine dynasty, the last of the rulers later known as the Five Good Emperors ...

. Around 384,

Donatist Donatism was a schism from the Catholic Church in the Archdiocese of Carthage from the fourth to the sixth centuries. Donatists argued that Christian clergy must be faultless for their ministry to be effective and their prayers and sacraments to ...

schism caused a conflict in the region. Emperor

Constans Flavius Julius Constans ( 323 – 350), also called Constans I, was Roman emperor from 337 to 350. He held the imperial rank of '' caesar'' from 333, and was the youngest son of Constantine the Great. After his father's death, he was made ''a ...

sent emissaries to reconcile the two religious parties, but the dissent led to open revolt. The massacre of Bagai resulted. The Council of Bagaï was held on 24 April 394 to discuss the Donatist question. The city was a stronghold of Donatism and in 411, a Donatist bishop was sent from Bagai to the

Council of Carthage The Councils of Carthage were church synods held during the 3rd, 4th, and 5th centuries in the city of Carthage in Africa. The most important of these are described below. Synod of 251 In May 251 a synod, assembled under the presidency of Cyprian ...

. The city was the most important capital in the conflict between Donatists and Catholics during the Late Empire. In the election of Primianus of Carthage, the region burst into flames again. The Berbers destroyed the city and ransacked the library. In the 5th century, Baghai was invaded by the

Vandals The Vandals were a Germanic people who were first reported in the written records as inhabitants of what is now Poland, during the period of the Roman Empire. Much later, in the fifth century, a group of Vandals led by kings established Vand ...

, who were later driven out by the Berbers. In 538,

Guntarith Guntarith ( Vandalic: ''Gontharis''; died 546), sometimes referred to as Guntharic, was an Eastern Roman military officer and rebel of Vandalic descent. Life After the conquest of the Vandal Kingdom by Belisarius in 533/534, the Eastern Roman E ...

, an officer of Byzantine general

Solomon Solomon (), also called Jedidiah, was the fourth monarch of the Kingdom of Israel (united monarchy), Kingdom of Israel and Judah, according to the Hebrew Bible. The successor of his father David, he is described as having been the penultimate ...

who reconquered the ancient

Roman Africa Roman Africa or Roman North Africa is the culture of Roman Africans that developed from 146 BC, when the Roman Republic defeated Carthage and the Punic Wars ended, with subsequent institution of Roman Empire, Roman Imperial government, through th ...

settled his camp near the deserted city, but was defeated by the

Berbers Berbers, or the Berber peoples, also known as Amazigh or Imazighen, are a diverse grouping of distinct ethnic groups indigenous to North Africa who predate the arrival of Arab migrations to the Maghreb, Arabs in the Maghreb. Their main connec ...

who regained control of the city, and strengthened it by surrounding it with an enclosure. It is the starting point of his second campaign in the

Aurès Aurès () is a natural region located in the mountainous area of the Aurès Mountains, Aurès range, in eastern Algeria. The region includes the provinces of Algeria, Algerian provinces of Batna Province, Batna, Tebessa Province, Tebessa, Consta ...

. In the

Middle Ages In the history of Europe, the Middle Ages or medieval period lasted approximately from the 5th to the late 15th centuries, similarly to the post-classical period of global history. It began with the fall of the Western Roman Empire and ...

, the Umayyads attacked the city. The Berber queen Kahina rebelled against Hasan ibn al-Nu'man (governor of the

Maghreb The Maghreb (; ), also known as the Arab Maghreb () and Northwest Africa, is the western part of the Arab world. The region comprises western and central North Africa, including Algeria, Libya, Mauritania, Morocco, and Tunisia. The Maghreb al ...

) in 698. The Berbers destroyed the city and left nothing to the Umayyads. Subsequently, the

Fatimids The Fatimid Caliphate (; ), also known as the Fatimid Empire, was a caliphate extant from the tenth to the twelfth centuries CE under the rule of the Fatimid dynasty, Fatimids, an Isma'ili Shi'a dynasty. Spanning a large area of North Africa ...

took the city in 903. In 943,

Abu Yazid Abū Yazīd Makhlad ibn Kaydād Dajjal (; – 19 August 947), was a member of the Ibadi sect. He opposed the Ismaili Shia rule of the Fatimids in North Africa and sought to restore Ibadi dominance in the region. Known as the Man on the Donke ...

took the city, but after his death the city fell into the hands of the

Zirids The Zirid dynasty (), Banu Ziri (), was a Sanhaja Berber dynasty from what is now Algeria which ruled the central Maghreb from 972 to 1014 and Ifriqiya (eastern Maghreb) from 972 to 1148. Descendants of Ziri ibn Manad, a military leader of th ...

and then in 1015 to the Hammadids. The latter attacked the inhabitants of the city. Subsequently, the

Banu Hilal The Banu Hilal () was a confederation of Arab tribes from the Najd region of the central Arabian Peninsula that emigrated to the Maghreb region of North Africa in the 11th century. They ruled the Najd, and campaigned in the borderlands between I ...

destroyed the whole city. Al Idrissi mentions that there was a double wall around the city in his writings before it was destroyed.

Etymology

The city was called by

Augustine Augustine of Hippo ( , ; ; 13 November 354 – 28 August 430) was a theologian and philosopher of Berber origin and the bishop of Hippo Regius in Numidia, Roman North Africa. His writings deeply influenced the development of Western philosop ...

''Vagaïa''. Procope of Caesarea transcribed it Bagaè and the Arab historians (

Ibn Khaldun Ibn Khaldun (27 May 1332 – 17 March 1406, 732–808 Hijri year, AH) was an Arabs, Arab Islamic scholar, historian, philosopher and sociologist. He is widely acknowledged to be one of the greatest social scientists of the Middle Ages, and cons ...

Al-Bakri Abū ʿUbayd ʿAbd Allāh ibn ʿAbd al-ʿAzīz ibn Muḥammad ibn Ayyūb ibn ʿAmr al-Bakrī (), or simply al-Bakrī (c. 1040–1094) was an Arab Andalusian historian and a geographer of the Muslim West. Life Al-Bakri was born in Huelva, the ...

, etc.) wrote Baghaïa.

Bishopric

Bagai was the

of an ancient

, and a center of

Donatism Donatism was a schism from the Catholic Church in the Archdiocese of Carthage from the fourth to the sixth centuries. Donatists argued that Christianity, Christian clergy must be faultless for their ministry to be effective and their prayers and ...

. Bagai was the home of Donatus of Bagai fl 347 and Marculus of Bagai fl 347.

wrote of many leading citizens of Bagai. In 340 Bagai was the site of a massacre by imperial legate Macarius which forever fractured the possibility of conciliation between Donatist and Catholic factions and made the schism increasingly violent. In 401, divisions were still so strong in Bagai that when the

bishop Maximian of Bagai converted to Catholicism he was twice nearly murdered, such that

once said of him "He has more scars than limbs". The Donatist Council of Bagai was held with 310 bishops in 394 AD. The Council of Bagai condemned Maximianist and supported Primian of Carthage as Primate of Africa. The

diocese In Ecclesiastical polity, church governance, a diocese or bishopric is the ecclesiastical district under the jurisdiction of a bishop. History In the later organization of the Roman Empire, the increasingly subdivided Roman province, prov ...

survives today as a

titular see A titular see in various churches is an episcopal see of a former diocese that no longer functions, sometimes called a "dead diocese". The ordinary or hierarch of such a see may be styled a "titular metropolitan" (highest rank), "titular archbi ...

of the

Roman Catholic Church The Catholic Church (), also known as the Roman Catholic Church, is the List of Christian denominations by number of members, largest Christian church, with 1.27 to 1.41 billion baptized Catholics Catholic Church by country, worldwid ...

.Titular Episcopal See of Bagai
at catholic.org.

Bishops of Bagai

* Donatus of Bagai fl.347 * Maximian of Bagai fl.414 *Castorius (brother of Maximian) * Hugh Boyle (1948–1951) * Noël Laurent Boucheix (1953–1958) * Bernardo Regno,(1958–1971) *Lolesio (Laurent) Fuahea (1972–1974) * Francis Xavier Roque (1983–2019) * David de la Torre Altamirano (18 Oct 2019– )

References

{{reflist, 2 Archaeological sites in Algeria Berber Christians Catholic titular sees in Africa Former populated places in Algeria Early Christianity Numidia (Roman provinces) Schisms in Christianity Roman towns and cities in Algeria