Agisymba

Agisymba is mentioned by Ptolemy to the middle of the 2nd century AD the country in Sub-Saharan Africa.

After the disclosure of Ptolemy Agisymba was 4 months south of the Fezzan with large animals of the African savannah and with high and numerous mountains.

The king of the Garamantes took 83-92 AD a military campaign against Agisymba to bring the black African inhabitants of the land, which he regarded as his subjects again under his dominion. Ptolemy is based on the written 107-115 AD Marinos of Tyre, who described the journey of Julius Maternus.

So far, the ethno historians could not decide whether Agisymba was in the Aïr, in Tibesti, in the Lake Chad region, or elsewhere. The intense trading on the used before the Arabs route of the central Sahara between Tripoli, the Fezzan, the Kaouar Valley and the Lake Chad region, provides a clear indication that the direction specified by Ptolemy with the facts.

However, there are in the Lake Chad area not as Ptolemy indicates many unnamed high mountains. Due to further evidence of the great age and suspected by some historians Phoenician influence on the foundation of states of the Central Sudan, it could therefore be considered as a precursor of the kingdom, first mentioned by Arab geographers Kanem Empire.

Swell

• Ptolemy I Geographika 6f, 7.2, 8.2, 8.5, 9.8, 10.1, 11.4f, 12.2; IV 8.5, VII 5.2