Donatism (Latin:Donatismus, Greek:Δονατισμός Donatismós) was a Christian sect within the Roman province of Africa that flourished in the fourth and fifth centuries among Berber Christians. Donatism had its roots in the social pressures among the long-established Christian community of Roman North Africa (present-day Berber countries Algeria and Tunisia), during the persecutions of Christians under Diocletian. The Donatists (named for the Berber Christian bishop Donatus Magnus) were members of an offshoot church which did not follow the same doctrine as some other churches of the rest of Early Christianity in Late Antiquity.