Chebba (La Chebba, Ash Shabbah, aš-Šābbah, Sheba) is a small city in the Mahdia Governorate of

Tunisia Tunisia, officially the Republic of Tunisia, is a country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It is bordered by Algeria to the west and southwest, Libya to the southeast, and the Mediterranean Sea to the north and east. Tunisia also shares m ...

North Africa North Africa (sometimes Northern Africa) is a region encompassing the northern portion of the African continent. There is no singularly accepted scope for the region. However, it is sometimes defined as stretching from the Atlantic shores of t ...

on the coast of the

Mediterranean Sea The Mediterranean Sea ( ) is a sea connected to the Atlantic Ocean, surrounded by the Mediterranean basin and almost completely enclosed by land: on the east by the Levant in West Asia, on the north by Anatolia in West Asia and Southern Eur ...

.Jacobs, Daniel and Morris, Peter (2001) ''The rough guide to Tunisia'' Rough Guides, London
page 235

History

The city of Chebba derives its name from the

headland A headland, also known as a head, is a coastal landform, a point of land usually high and often with a sheer drop, that extends into a body of water. It is a type of promontory. A headland of considerable size often is called a cape.Whittow, Jo ...

to the east, which was classically known as Caput Vada (''headland above the shoals'').Hannezo, G. (1905
"Chebba et Ras-Kapoudia: Notes Historique"
''Bulletin de la Société archéologique de Sousse'' 3(5): pp. 135–140; in French The Byzantine general

Belisarius BelisariusSometimes called Flavia gens#Later use, Flavius Belisarius. The name became a courtesy title by the late 4th century, see (; ; The exact date of his birth is unknown. March 565) was a military commander of the Byzantine Empire under ...

landed here in 533 and went on to inflict a devastating defeat on 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 ...

. The town of Chebba was founded by Justinian about 534 CE after the defeat of the

, and named Justinianopolis. The headland (Caput Vada) is now known as Ras Kaboudia and is site of the ruins of the ''bordj'' (harbor fortress) of Bordj Khadidja, which was built upon

Byzantine The Byzantine Empire, also known as the Eastern Roman Empire, was the continuation of the Roman Empire centred on Constantinople during late antiquity and the Middle Ages. Having survived the events that caused the fall of the Western Roman E ...

foundations. The fortress guarded the harbor entrance and was one of a chain of similar forts built by the Abbasids along the coast of

in the 8th century. It was later renamed after Khadija Ben Kalthoum, a poet of the eleventh century, who was born in Chebba.Sadiqi, Fatima ''et al.'' (2009) ''Women writing Africa: The Northern region'' Feminist Press at The City University of New York, New York
page 89

Notes

External links

"Chebba Map — Satellite Images of Chebba"
Maplandia World Gazetteer * {{Communes of Tunisia Populated places in Mahdia Governorate Communes of Tunisia