Maktaris and Kesra: Explore Tunisia's Ancient Sites and Berber Culture

Makthar, the ancient Mactaris is a city of Numidian origin located on a plateau at the northern edge of the Tunisian ridge. It is located at the limit between the North-West and the Center-West of Tunisia, 150 kilometers southwest of Tunis, and 70 kilometers southeast of Kef. With an altitude of 900 meters, it is the highest in the country.The Mactaris site is located at the entrance to the modern village of Makthar.It was once one of the richest regions of Tunisia; it is enough to see its stelae preserved in the museum of the site as well as the density of the megalithic tombs, the monuments which are drawn up until our days to realize the antiquity of the occupation and the importance of the cited. The city played a commercial role going beyond the strictly local framework, its excellent location in the geometric center of Tunisia and at the watershed point between the two slopes enabled it to control the most important passages in the region.The name Makthar is attested in Neounic inscriptions in the form MKTRYM. In the Latin inscriptions, they register MACTARIS, a name that has been conserved it until our days without great phonetic changes.The installation of man in the region of Mactaris is very old, it has been occupied for more than 2800 years as evidenced by the megaliths that have been encountered throughout the site. The birth of a city called Makthar dates back to the 4th century BC with the Numidian kings. The city took advantage of the development of Carthage before welcoming large flows of refugees when the city fell in 146 BC. J.-C.The visit ends in a small museum that houses various pieces exhumed on-site or brought from neighboring sites.

Kesra is the highest village in Tunisia “perched at 1100 meters above sea level”, still has some 2600 inhabitants, and is considered among the first Berber villages.Cradle of Berber, Punic, Roman, Byzantine, and Islamic civilizations, Kesra remains one of these mythical cities clinging to a rocky hill, in the center-west of the country, 175 km from Tunis, 20 km from Makhtar, Mactaris to the Roman era, and 50 km from Zama, an ancient city, the scene of a famous battle in 202 BC, which saw the confrontation of the Roman armies, led by Scipio Africanus and the Numidian king Massyle Massinissa, on the other hand, the Carthaginian armies, led by Hannibal and the other Numidian king Massaesyle Syphax.Its initial name “Chusira” a Numidian city that was part of one of the most urbanized provinces of the kingdom of Massinissa (king of Numidia 238 – 148 BC), recalls the nostalgia of the ancient and historical eras and gives the impression of a world, another world where time seems to have stopped or at least will have forgotten to pass.In this village where the past and the present intertwine, the life of the inhabitants, quite conservative, takes place around ancient and ancestral traditions and social practices.A natural fortress in itself, this Berber village, with its strategic position at altitude dominating the surrounding plains and the presence of natural water sources, which made it a strategic place for the civilizations that succeeded each other in the region, is also known, both for its architecture with its dry stone constructions, carved by the force of the wrists, which give it a specific cachet and integrate it completely into its environment of rocky awesome landscapes.