Misr: The name by which Arabs (and other Semites) called Egypt, which was otherwise called by its own people, Kemet, "the Black Land." Misr is also the name used in colloquial Egyptian until today to refer to the capital city of al-Qahira (Cairo), perhaps in deference to the city that dominates the political and economic life of the country and embodies its cultural identity. The term Misr was also used to designate many of the early Islamic garrison towns, examples of which were founded in all the conquered regions: Busra and Kufa in Iraq, Jabiyya in Syria, Fustat in Egypt, and Qayrawan in Tunisia. Most of these settlements grew from more or less informal encampments around a central mosque space to sophisticated capital cities within the first century Hegire (7th-8th century C. E.).