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Algeria

Algeria Collection

History Archive - Algeria Collection

Algeria was a French colony in northern Africa, fronting on the Mediterranean, and comprising besides Northern Algeria, with 17 arrondissements and 350 communes, South Algeria, which extends far to the south and west, and embraces the vast Saharan oases organized into four territories in 1905.

Algeria is an old country. Its prince was an ally of Hannibal, and it became a Roman province under the Cæsars. It was successfully conquered by the Vandals, by Belisarius, by the Saracens, the Morabites (an Arabian religious sect), the Spaniards and the Turks, who taught Algerines to be the dreaded pirates they were. Many thousand Europeans were captured and enslaved by them. This piracy grew so unbearable that the English, Dutch and French sent fleets at different times to suppress it. The French, at last, in 1830, conquered Algiers, but there were numerous revolts, especially that of Abd-el-Kadir, before France became fully master of the country and the life of a Frenchman was safe outside the walls of the capital.

The area of the Algerian Sahara effectively occupied is estimated at about 193,000 square miles, including the zones, in the southwest, with a population numbering about 62,000. The two regions (North Algeria has an area of 184,474 square miles), have a total area of about 343,500 square miles, with an aggregate population in 1911 of 5,563,828, all but 795,522 Europeans being natives—Arabs, Berbers, Tunisians, Moroccans and Musulmans.

The extent of French possessions in Africa is very large, its area extending from the Mediterranean, and including the region of Tunis, in the north, to the Gulf of Guinea in the south, together with the French Congo district, to the southeastward, and covering also all of French West Africa and the Sahara to the Atlantic, including French Guinea, the Ivory Coast, Dahomey, Upper Senegal and the Niger region, besides French Somaliland on the Gulf of Aden, at the foot of the Red Sea.

Government. The government and administration of Algeria are centralized at Algiers under a governor-general, who represents the authority of the French Republic throughout Algerian territory. He is assisted in his duties by a council; while each department sends one senator and two deputies to the French National Assembly. The revenue, estimated for 1911, of the Algerian colony was 144,549,940 francs, with an expenditure of 140,546,551; that of the southern territory, for the same year, was 5,615,244 francs, with an expenditure of 6,891 francs below the total revenue. The military force of France in the colony was, in 1911, about 56,000 of all ranks, of whom two-thirds were Europeans. The debt of Algeria (December, 1909), amounted to close upon 57¼ million francs in capital and 114 million francs in annuities, interest, etc.

Economy. Its annual commerce aggregates 1,078 million francs, 565 million representing imports and 513 representing exports. The chief items of the latter are living animals, wool, hides, cereals, wines, cork, tobacco, fruits, olive oil, phosphates and some iron and zinc ore, besides fish and various shell-fish. The chief cereals raised are wheat, oats, barley, maize and beans. In Algeria the animal stock is considerable, embracing in 1909, 233,243 horses, 187,339 mules, 278,250 asses, 205,106 camels, 4,006,913 goats, 9,066,916 sheep, besides 110,700 pigs and over 1,100,000 cattle.

Transportation. The railways of the colony, which receive state aid, were in 1910, 2,035 English miles in extent, besides 200 miles of tramway. In addition there are a considerable system of telegraphy and a fair postal service and a sound system of banking. Algiers, the capital, and chief seaport, has a population of about 110,000.

References:

The New Student's Reference Work (1914)

Available Books

Images

Image Name
Hussein Pacha dernier Dey d'Alger
Front Cover
Temple of Celestis, Dougga
A Nomad Camp
Un Marabout
A Caravan on the Sahara
View from Mustapha, Algiers
Vue de la Pointe Pescade
The Gates of the Desert
Tunis from the Belvedere
The Fruit Market, Biskra
Stone Pines, Algiers
Juives d'Alger
Mosque of Sidi Okba, Kairouan
Bedouins
Title Page
Sousse
Femme Maure a la Maison
Une Rue D'Alger
The Leopard Door, Algiers
The Mosque of the Three Doors, Kairouan
The Roman Amphitheatre, El Djem
Corsaires Algeriens
Street of the Dancing Girls, Biskra
Cavaliers Arabs
Fontaine aux Environs D'Alger
Lieutenant Colonel Marey, Commandant des Spahis
My Two Servants, Angelo and Nero
Bougainvillaea, Algiers
In the heart of an Oasis
Un Camp Francais
The Ancient Ports of Carthage
Souk el Hout, Tunis
Mosque of Sidi Ben Ziad, Tunis - the Auction Day
Coulouglis Costume Elegant
Carpet-Making
Armes et Ustensils de Menage
The Fritter Shop, Tunis
Aqueduc de Mustapha Pacha
Constantine 1837
The Carthage Aqueduct
Vue de Bone
Cabyles
Mosque of Sidi Abder Rahman, Algiers
Friday at the Cemetery, Algiers
Front Cover
Back Cover
Cafe Maure pres du Consulat d'Espagne a Alger
The Palm Village
The Old Punic Cisterns, Carthage
The Garden Court of an Old Moorish Villa, Algiers
Spinning
Gorge of the Roumel, Constantine
The Red Village, El Kantara
Rag Fair
Sketch Map of Algeria and Tunis
La Grande Rue, Kairouan
The Site of Carthage from Sidi Bou Said
A Village Street, Biskra
Rue Tourbet el Bey, Tunis
Souk el Belat, Tunis
An Old Street, Algiers
Sunset
La Porte Bab-el-Oued
The Penon, Algiers
Negre d'Alger
A Street of Arches, Tunis
Mauresque a la Fontaine
A Mozabite Fantasia
Un Coulouglis, Costume d'hiver
A River of the Sahara
Title Page
Vue d'une partie de la Place d'Alger
Tunis
The Forum, Timgad
Shooting Wild Ducks near Ain Mokra, Province of Constantine, Algeria
Point de vue pres Mustapha Pacha, d'Alger
The Zaouia of the Rue Tourbet el Bey, Tunis
Back Cover
Carding Wool
Marabout de Syde Takote
Souk el Trouk, Tunis
The Begging Marabout
Juifs d'Alger
On the Edge of the Desert
Maure d'Alger
Evening on the Sahara
The Silent Waterfall, Hammam Meskoutine
Moorish Gateway, Kairouan
Title Page
Femmes Maures hors maison
On my Balcony, Algiers
The Basket-Makers, Sousse
Zoaves
Porte Faix d'Alger
Souk el Attarin, Tunis

Maps

Map Name
Costumes, Moeurs et Usages des Algeriens - Carte de la Regence D'Alger (1837)

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