History of the Regency of Algiers

The history of the Regency of Algiers includes political, economic and military events in the Regency of Algiers from its founding in 1516 to the French invasion of 1830. The Regency of Algiers was a largely independent tributary state of the Ottoman Empire. Founded by the corsair brothers Aruj and Khayr ad-Din Barbarossa, it became involved in numerous armed conflicts with European powers, and was an important pirate base notorious for Barbary corsairs.

Algiers, Tunis and Tripoli were known in Europe as the Barbary States. The Ottomans called them Garb Ocakları (western garrisons). Ottoman-appointed governors initially acted as regents, but later the regents became military rulers elected by the janissary diwân council of government.

The state financed itself primarily through privateering and the slave trade. Algerian corsairs waged a holy war on the Christian powers of Europe, capturing European merchant ships and plundering coastal regions in the Mediterranean and the Atlantic as far north as Ireland and Iceland. Algiers also asserted its dominance over neighboring Maghrebi states, imposing tribute and border delimitation on Tunisian and Moroccan sovereigns.

For more than three centuries, Spanish, French, British, Dutch and later the U.S navies fought the Barbary states until in the early 19th century they were able to inflict heavy defeats. State revenues declined when poor wheat harvests, political intrigue and janissary mutinies compounded the reduced privateering booty after various treaties were signed. Attempts to make up this shortfall with higher taxes led to internal unrest; violent tribal revolts broke out, led by maraboutic orders like the Darqawiyya and Tijānīya.

France took advantage of the domestic politics to conquer Algeria in 1830, leading to French colonial rule until 1962.