page_title: Nobatia
section_title: History
hierarchical_section_title: Nobatia / History
caption_attribution_description: English: The crown of a local Nubian king who ruled between the collapse of the Meroitic dynasty in 350 or 400 AD and the founding of the Christian kingdom of Nubia in 600 AD. It was found in Tomb 118 at Ballana in Lower Nubia by the British Egyptologist W.B. Emery
context_page_description: Nobatia or Nobadia was a late antique kingdom in Lower Nubia. Together with the two other Nubian kingdoms, Makuria and Alodia, it succeeded the kingdom of Kush. After its establishment in around 400, Nobadia gradually expanded by defeating the Blemmyes in the north and incorporating the territory between the second and third Nile cataract in the south. In 543, it converted to Coptic Christianity. It would then be annexed by Makuria, under unknown circumstances, during the 7th century.
context_section_description: The kingdom of Nobatia had been founded in the former Meroitic province of Akine, which comprised large parts of Lower Nubia and is speculated to have been autonomous already before the ultimate fall of the Meroitic kingdom in the mid 4th century.  While the Nobatae /ˈnɒbəti/ had been invited into the region from the Western Desert by the Roman Emperor Diocletian already in 297 AD, their kingdom becomes tangible only in around 400 AD. Early Nobatia is quite likely the same civilization that is known to archeologists as the Ballana culture. Eventually the Nobatae were successful in defeating the Blemmyes, and an inscription by Silko, "Basiliskos" of the Nobatae, claims to have driven the Blemmyes into the Eastern Desert. Around this time the Nobatian capital was established at Pakhoras (modern Faras); soon after, Nobatia converted to non-Chalcedonian Christianity.
  By 707, Nobatia had been annexed to its southern neighbor, Makuria. The circumstances of this merger are unknown. It is also unknown what happened to the royal Nobadian family. The merger most likely occurred before the Muslim conquest in 652, since the Arab histories speak of only one Christian state in Nubia and reached at least as far as Old Dongola. Nobatia seems to have maintained some autonomy in the new state. It was ruled by an eparch of Nobatia who was also titled the Domestikos of Pakhoras. These were originally appointed but seem to be dynastic in the later period. Some of their records have been found at Fort Ibrim, presenting a figure with a great deal of power. Nobatia՚s name is often given as al-Maris in Arabic histories. The eparchate of Nobadia remained an integral part of the kingdom of Makuria until the very end, as is confirmed by a document from 1463 mentioning an eparch named Teedderre.
caption: Royal crown discovered in Ballana (5th century)
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