city state · Egypt, North Africa and Sudan

Lixus

800 BCE – 25 BCE (approx.) · capital Lixus

An ancient Phoenician and Punic port on the Atlantic coast of Morocco, linked in Greek myth to the Garden of the Hesperides.

Origins

Lixus lay on a hill above the Loukkos river near modern Larache. Pliny the Elder believed it was among the oldest Phoenician foundations, with a temple of Melqart older than that of Gades. Archaeology shows Phoenician settlers there from about the 8th century BCE, trading with the Berber peoples of the interior.

Rule and society

Lixus was a self-governing town with Phoenician gods and Punic language, part of the trading world of the Punic Empire. Its economy rested on fishing, fish-salting and garum production, and it traded ivory, gold and grain along the Atlantic coast. Greek writers placed the Garden of the Hesperides and the struggle of Heracles with Antaeus nearby.

Decline and legacy

After the fall of Carthage Lixus came under the Kingdom of Mauretania, minting coins with Punic legends, and was fully absorbed under Juba II around 25 BCE. Claudius later made it a Roman colony, and its ruins, with large fish-salting works, are an archaeological site.

Few sources survive for this state; details are uncertain.

Lineage

LixusKingdom of Mauretania 225 BCE – 40 CE

Connections (1)

Lixus was part of Punic Empire500 BCE – 146 BCE

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Cite this page

APA: The Epoch Institute. (2026). Lixus. In The Epoch Institute States Register. https://the-epoch-institute.org/state/lixus
MLA: “Lixus.” The Epoch Institute States Register, The Epoch Institute, 2026, https://the-epoch-institute.org/state/lixus. Accessed .
Chicago: The Epoch Institute. “Lixus.” The Epoch Institute States Register. 2026. https://the-epoch-institute.org/state/lixus.
Harvard: The Epoch Institute (2026) ‘Lixus’, The Epoch Institute States Register. Available at: https://the-epoch-institute.org/state/lixus (Accessed: ).

Last reviewed October 2026Random state ↻