The Berber Wattasid family had been the…

The Berber Wattasid family had been the autonomous governors of the eastern Rif since the late thirteenth century, ruling from their base in Tazouta (near present day Nador).

They had close ties to the Marinid sultans and provided many of the bureaucratic elite.

While the Marinids tried to repel the Portuguese and Spanish invasions and help the kingdom of Granada to resist the Reconquista, the Wattasids had accumulated absolute power through political maneuvering.

When the Marinids became aware of the extent of the conspiracy, they had slaughtered the Wattasids in 1459, leaving only Abu Abdellah al-Shaykh Muhammad ben Yehya alive.

However, the 1465 revolt had seen the end of the Marinid dynasty as Muhammad ibn Ali Amrani-Joutey, leader of the Sharifs, was proclaimed Sultan in Fes.

He is in turn overthrown in 1471 by Muhammad ibn Yahya al-Sheikh, one of the two the surviving Wattasids from the 1459 massacre, who inaugurates the Wattasid dynasty.

Three Berber dynasties now rule the three divisions of the Maghrib: the Wattasids in Morocco, the Ziyanids in Algeria and the Hafsids in Tunisia.

The Hafsids also control Tripolitania in present Libya.