Fezzan (,
Fizzan, , ) or
Phazania is the southwestern region of modern
Libya. It is largely
desert, but broken by mountains, uplands, and dry river valleys (
wadis) in the north, where oases enable ancient towns and villages to survive deep in the otherwise inhospitable
Sahara Desert. The term originally applied to the land beyond the coastal strip of
Africa proconsularis, including the
Nafusa and extending west of modern Libya over
Ouargla and
Illizi. As these
Berber areas came to be associated with the regions of
Tripoli,
Cirta or
Algiers, the name was increasingly applied to the arid areas south of
Tripolitania.