Mauri tan i a

or Mauretania . The ancient name of the northwestern part of Africa, corresponding in its limits to the present sultanate of Morocco and the western portion of Algeria. It derived its name from its inhabitants, the Mauri (Moors). The country was conquered by the Romans, who founded many colonies in it, and in 49 B.C. Julius Cæsar appointed Bogudes and Bocchoris joint kings of Mauri tan i a. In 429 the Vandal king Genseric, at the invitation of Count Boniface, cro ed the Straits of Gades, and Mauri tan i a, with other African provinces, fell into the hands of the barbarian conquerors. Belisarius destroyed the kingdom of the Vandals, and Mauri tan i a again became a Roman province under an Eastern exarch. In 698, when the Arabs made the final conquest of Africa, the Moors adopted the religion, name, and origin of their conquerors, and sunk back into their more congenial state of Mohammedan savages.