Cyrenaica In a wider sense, still in use, Cyrenaica includes all of the eastern part of Libya, including the Kufra District. Cyrenaica borders on Tripolitania in the northwest and on Fezzan in the southwest. The region that used to be Cyrenaica officially until 1963 has formed several shabiyat, the administrative divisions of Libya, since 1995. The 2011 Libyan Civil War started in Cyrenaica, which came largely under the control of the National Transitional Council (headquartered in Benghazi) for most of the war. In 2012, the National Transitional Council declared Cyrenaica to be an autonomous region of Libya. Geologically, Cyrenaica rests on
Cyrenaica term "Pentapolis" continued to be used as a synonym for Cyrenaica. In the south, the Pentapolis faded into the Saharan tribal areas, including the pharaonic oracle of Ammonium. The region produced barley, wheat, olive oil, wine, figs, apples, wool, sheep, cattle and silphium, an herb that grew only in Cyrenaica and was regarded as a medicinal cure and aphrodisiac. Cyrene became one of the greatest intellectual and artistic centers of the Greek world, famous for its medical school, learned academies and architecture, which included some of the finest examples of the Hellenistic style. The Cyrenaics, a school of thinkers who