Discover the Bizaken Kingdom
Bizaken
The Lost Latin of Africa
What if Latin had never died in North Africa?
Carthage, AD 990.
The morning sun rises over the Mediterranean. Ships from Sicily, Egypt, and Constantinople enter the harbour. Merchants open their shops, craftsmen begin their work, and the streets fill with the voices of a city awakening.
Above the rooftops, church bells ring. In the marketplace, traders bargain over cloth, grain, oil, and spices. Beyond the city walls, farmers work the land as their ancestors have done for centuries.
Ancient Roman buildings still stand, but the city has changed around them. New houses rise beside old columns. Churches have been enlarged, roads repaired, and public buildings adapted to the needs of successive generations.
Carthage is no longer a Roman provincial capital. It is the capital of an independent kingdom.
And its people speak Bizaken.
A language descended from the Latin of Roman Africa, transformed by centuries of history into something familiar yet distinctly its own.
Welcome to a different history of the Mediterranean.
A Kingdom That History Might Have Produced
In the fifth century, the Vandals established a kingdom in Roman North Africa, with Carthage as its capital.
In actual history, that kingdom fell to the armies of the Eastern Roman Empire in AD 534. The region later passed through further upheavals, and Carthage fell to Arab forces in AD 698.
But imagine another course of events.
The Vandal kingdom survives. Over the centuries, its rulers and people become increasingly integrated into the Roman and African society around them. Roman institutions continue to function, Christianity remains central to public life, and Latin survives as the common language of a changing population.
When Arab armies conquer much of North Africa, the fortified kingdom around Carthage holds out.
Its territory changes. Its neighbours change. Its language changes.
But the kingdom survives.
By AD 990, it is no longer simply a Vandal kingdom, nor a surviving fragment of the Roman Empire. It has become a civilisation of its own, shaped by Roman, African, Vandal, and wider Mediterranean traditions.
Its capital is Karthagine.
Its language is Bizaken.
Discover Karthagine
An ancient city that never ceased to live.
Walk through streets whose stones were laid in Roman times. Pass beneath arches repaired by generations of builders. See inscriptions left by emperors whose names have long since passed into history.
The city has preserved its Roman inheritance, not by remaining unchanged, but by continuing to use it.
In the great circus, crowds gather to watch chariot races. Supporters of the Reds, Whites, Greens, and Blues argue over their favourite drivers, while merchants sell food and drink among the spectators.
Theatres still welcome audiences. Comedies from the ancient Roman tradition are performed before people whose language has changed, but whose sense of humour remains recognisably human.
In the markets, traders from distant lands mingle with local craftsmen and merchants. The harbour connects Karthagine with the wider Mediterranean, carrying not only goods but news, ideas, and political rumours.
And at the heart of the city stands the great Cathedral of Saint Cyprian, where the kingdom's Christian traditions have developed over the centuries.
This is a city with a long memory.
Its people live among the works of their ancestors, repairing what has been damaged, replacing what has worn out, and adding something of their own.
Explore Karthagine →
The People of the Kingdom
Kings, princes, bishops, and noble families appear in the chronicles of the kingdom. But most of its inhabitants are merchants, farmers, craftsmen, sailors, soldiers, and their families.
Their lives revolve around familiar concerns: work, marriage, children, prices, neighbours, religious festivals, and the hope of a secure future.
In Karthagine lives Maximu, a cloth merchant whose business takes him between the market, the harbour, and the countryside.
His wife Tazrint manages the household and helps with the family's affairs. Their children, Marku and Titrit, grow up in a city where Roman buildings, African traditions, and Mediterranean commerce are simply part of everyday life.
Through this family, the world of Bizaken becomes more than a collection of dates, institutions, and historical possibilities.
We see the city as its inhabitants see it.
A crowded market is a place to earn a living. A festival is an occasion to enjoy. A royal procession is something the children do not want to miss.
And the affairs of distant rulers sometimes find their way into the conversations of ordinary people.
Meet the People of Bizaken →
Faith, Kingship, and the Wider World
The kingdom of AD 990 is Christian, but its church has followed a history of its own.
Rooted in the Christianity of Roman and Vandal Africa, it has preserved its independence and developed its own customs and institutions.
The Cathedral of Saint Cyprian is among the great religious centres of Karthagine. Bishops and priests occupy an important place in public life, and religion shapes the kingdom's understanding of justice, duty, and legitimate rule.
The king's authority is not understood as power without obligations. A ruler is expected to preserve justice, protect his people, and maintain peace.
Beyond the kingdom's borders, however, the Mediterranean remains a world of competing powers.
The Christian empire centred on Constantinople is an important diplomatic partner. Muslim rulers govern neighbouring territories and command considerable political and military strength.
Trade continues across religious and political boundaries, even as alliances, rivalries, and threats shape the decisions of kings.
In AD 990, the marriage of the Bizaken prince to a daughter of the Roman emperor in Constantinople brings these relationships into sharper focus.
When the newly married couple returns to Karthagine, the whole city celebrates.
But a royal marriage is more than a family occasion. It is also an alliance, and not every neighbouring ruler welcomes it.
Discover the Kingdom's History →
A Language Born from African Latin
For centuries, Latin was spoken and written throughout Roman North Africa.
The region produced celebrated authors, including Apuleius, Augustine of Hippo, and the poet Dracontius. Latin belonged not only to scholars and officials but also to the everyday world of towns, farms, markets, and households.
In the imagined history of Bizaken, that spoken language never disappears.
Generation after generation, its speakers reshape it. Old endings gradually fall away. New grammatical patterns develop. Words are inherited, adapted, and borrowed through contact with other peoples.
By AD 990, the language of Karthagine is no longer classical Latin.
It is a Romance language with a regular grammar, a largely Latin-derived vocabulary, and a character of its own.
For speakers of Italian, Spanish, French, Portuguese, and other Romance languages, many words will seem familiar. Readers who know some Latin will recognise even more.
Yet Bizaken is not merely simplified Latin. It is intended to be a language in which people can converse, argue, joke, tell stories, write poetry, and express complex ideas.
Discover the Bizaken Language →
Enter the Stories
The best way to discover a civilisation is through the lives of its people.
The Bizaken readers follow Maximu, Tazrint, Marku, and Titrit through the streets, markets, churches, and public buildings of Karthagine.
Beginning with simple everyday situations, the stories gradually open onto a larger world of theatre, festivals, religious traditions, royal ceremonies, political affairs, and Mediterranean history.
Four graded readers, from A1 to B2, offer a progressive introduction to the language and its imagined society.
Beyond the readers, Bizaken has its own growing collection of literature, poetry, and songs.
You can also read Lu Historia de Apolloniu lu Rege de lu Tyru, a Bizaken adaptation of an ancient Mediterranean romance, freely on this website.
The grammar and wordlist are available without charge, allowing anyone to explore the language and begin reading.
Read in Bizaken →
Explore the Four Readers →
Learn the Language →
A World That Might Have Been
The kingdom of Bizaken is fictional. Its historical foundations are not.
Roman Africa was one of the great cultural regions of the ancient Mediterranean. Its cities, literature, Christianity, and Latin-speaking population formed part of a civilisation whose influence extended far beyond Africa.
The Vandals really did establish a kingdom in Carthage. The Eastern Roman Empire really did recover North Africa. Arab armies really did conquer the region, and forms of Latin appear to have survived for centuries after Roman political rule ended.
Bizaken asks what might have happened if one part of that world had followed a different path.
What if Carthage had remained independent?
What if African Latin had continued to develop, just as Latin developed into the Romance languages of Europe?
What would North Africa have looked like in AD 990?
What would its people have believed, celebrated, argued about, and written?
And what would their language have sounded like?
Bizaken is an attempt to bring that possibility to life.
Explore the kingdom. Meet its people. Discover its language.
Welcome to Bizaken.