Kerkennah Islands

Kerkennah Islands (Tunisian Arabic: قرقنة ; Ancient Greek: Κέρκιννα [Kérkinna]; Spanish: Querquenes) are a group of islands lying off the east coast of Tunisia in the Gulf of Gabès and to the east of Sfax, at 34°42′N 11°11′E. The Islands are low-lying, being no more than 13 metres (43 feet) above sea level. The main islands are Chergui and Gharbi. The archipelago has an area of 160 square kilometres (62 mi2) and a population of 15,501 (2014).

History

The natives of Tunisia and Kerkennah originally settled there, but during the spread of the Roman Empire, Kerkennah was used as a port and look-out point by the Romans, to keep note of off-shore activity. In 2 BC, Augustus exiled Sempronius Gracchus, a lover of Julia the Elder, to the islands for 14 years for his indiscretions with his then-married daughter. Greeks called it Cercina (Ancient Greek: Κέρκινα) and Cercinna (Ancient Greek: Κέρκιννα). Strabo and Ptolemaeus wrote that the city that was on the island was also called Cercinna (Ancient Greek: Κέρκιννα), same as the island.

Among the Catholic bishops whom the Arian Vandal king Huneric summoned to Carthage in 484, was a Bishop Athenius of Cercina, the seat of the bishopric being in the most easterly island of the group. No longer a residential bishopric, Cercina is today listed by the Catholic Church as a titular see.

It was proposed to locate the monastery built in 532 by Saint Fulgentius of Ruspe on one of the islets of the group, but it was more recently argued for an identification on the Kneiss island.