Numidia

The Roman province of Numidia included that portion of modern-day Algeria north of the Sahara.  Incorporated within the Roman state between 46 BC and 40 AD, the province remained Roman until the 430 when conquered by the Vandals.  A century later the Romans of Byzantium expelled the Vandal, ruling for 150 years until the Arabs arrived at the end of the 7th century.

The most recent edition of Antigone, the online magazine of the Classical World, contains an entertaining travelogue by two brothers, recent visitors to Algeria who viewed many of the Roman ruins still extant in the former province.

 

Their conclusion:

Quite simply, the Algerian people are warm, the infrastructure superb, and after Pompeii and Ostia in Italy, the Roman sites at Djémila and Timgad (“the Pompeii of Africa”) are the best in the world. The seaside remains at Tipasa aren’t far behind.

Best of all, we had these places nearly to ourselves. Walking through the sprawling, preserved Roman cities in Algeria may well be a 21^st-century traveler’s single best opportunity to imagine life in the Empire two thousand years ago.

They go on to note:

After Italy and maybe Spain, Algeria – known as Numidia in Classical antiquity – produced more Latin literature than any other region. Latin was spoken there for at least six centuries, and maybe even ten. St Augustine lived in Hippo and Apuleius came from M’Daourouch, while Fronto (who taught Marcus Aurelius), Lactantius, and Minucius Felix resided in Cirta (modern Constantine, a spectacular city of gorges and, yes, named for the Emperor). The Augustan writer Juba II ruled Mauretania from the coastal city of Caesarea (modern Cherchell), where Latin grammarian extraordinaire Priscian later grew up. Martianus Capella, Nonius Marcellus, and maybe even Suetonius were Algerians too. (By contrast, in antiquity France produced only two Latin authors – the historian Pompeius Trogus and, er, Ausonius – while England, Switzerland, Belgium, and Germany produced none at all.)

For all of its ancient wonders, Algeria is not an easy place to visit:

Tourist visas are hard to come by: Mike’s took four months to process and required repeated emails, phone calls, and two in-person visits to the New York consulate to obtain. The economy runs on cash, and mostly small bills: good luck closing your wallet. No credit cards, no ATMs for foreign withdrawals, and the official exchange rate is half what traders on the hardly-concealed black market offer. (Guys with bundles of cash, proficient with their phones’ calculator apps, hang around public squares in downtown Algiers.) Even in five-star hotels, you can’t charge to the room – meals and all else have to be paid in cash each time. There’s virtually nothing in the way of tourist infrastructure, either. There’s excellent travel infrastructure – wonderful highways, good restaurants, WiFi everywhere, and upscale lodging – but for tourists specifically, nada.

I don't think I'll be making it there, so I quite enjoyed the article and photos.