Ksar-El-Kelb

Ksar-El-Kelb is a location in Tunisia. It existed in the Roman province of Numidia and has been suggested as a plausible location (along Ksar-Bou-Saïd and Henchir-El-Abiodh) of the Ancient city and former bishopric of Vegesela in Numidia, which remains a Latin Catholic titular see [1].

History

The name means Castle of the Dog,[2] and was known in antiquity as Vegesela when it was a Roman Era Imperial estate[3] and a station on the African Limes [4] between Bagai and Theveste[5] located at 7.48551 35.37199.

The town had a rectangular Basilica[6] and was a center of Donatist beliefs.[7] This Church Building was a memorial to and possibly burial for the Donatist Bishop and Martyr Maculus. In 347 imperial emissary, Macarius, sent by Constans, stopped here during his purge of the Donastists. Maculus and 9 other bishops were executed and tortured, by Macarius.[8] an event that damaged relationships between Donatist and Roman Catholics till the Muslim conquest of the Maghreb, 300 years later. The event was still the basis of hostilities generations later and in many ways birthed the Donatist idea of resistance to the state.

In Roman Antiquity the town and bishopric of Germania in Numidia was nearby.

References
  1. GCatholic http://www.gcatholic.org/dioceses/former/t1946.htm
  2. Brent D. Shaw, Sacred Violence: African Christians and Sectarian Hatred in the Age of Augustine (Cambridge University Press, 1 Sep. 2011
  3. Brent D. Shaw, Sacred Violence: African Christians and Sectarian Hatred in the Age of Augustine (Cambridge University Press, 2011)p183.
  4. "Vegesela, Ksar el Kelb – Digital Atlas of the Roman Empire". imperium.ahlfeldt.se. Retrieved 2016-12-12.
  5. Barrington Atlas, 2000, pl. 34 F2
  6. Pierre Courcelle, Une seconde campagne de fouilles à Ksar-el-Kelb Mélanges d'archéologie et d'histoire (1936) Vol53 Num1 pp.166-197.
  7. Jairus Banaji, Agrarian Change in Late Antiquity: Gold, Labour, and Aristocratic Dominance (OUP Oxford, 17 May 2007).p7.
  8. Brent D. Shaw, Sacred Violence: African Christians and Sectarian Hatred in the Age of Augustine (Cambridge University Press, 2011) p183.
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