Cyrenaica, a vast and historically rich region in North Africa, has long been a crossroads of civilizations, a meeting point between the Mediterranean and the African interior. Defined by its fertile coastal plains and rugged interior, it was the home of Cyrene, one of the most important Greek colonies in antiquity. The region's history is not merely that of a single city but of a cultural, political, and economic system that connected the Hellenic world with the indigenous Berber populations and later, with the powerful empires of Egypt and Rome.