TUNISIA
tunisia is a small country in the maghreg area of north africa, to the west is algeria, to the east libya. the population is 18 mio, the capital city is tunis. tunisia achieved independence from france in 1956. it is an islamic country, languages are arabic and french.
from (probably) 2000 b.c., the area of tunisia was settled by berber tribes, who were nomads yet became farmers. the northern coast got seized by phoenicians. they founded bizerte, and carthage in the 9th century b.c. they brought their culture, business style and religion from their home towns like byblos and tyre. soon carthage became the powerhouse of the whole area. yet in the punic wars with rome, it finally got trounced (in spite of hannibal), and became a roman province in 146 b.c.
that ended when the (in)famous germanic vandals ruled the area for 100 years (430-533 a.d.). then the byzantine (east-roman) empire grapped it - yet in the 7th century arab muslims took over the whole maghreb. in 670 the mosque in karouan was assembled - a symbolic date, since then tunisia is islamic.
much later, in 1574 the ottoman empire conquered tunisia, and from 1881 to 1956 france reigned it, as whole north-africa. finally in 2011 the "tunisian revolution" established a reasonably democratic country.
re photography - from 4 visits in 1975, 1983, 1985 and 1989, all by car, very many photos resulted. yet these were utilized as 'slides', digital pictures were not in use at that time. also, the original travel diary is not accessible anymore. so far, only few pic's of the slide galleries have been converted - thus just a brief "advent tunisia" could be created. moreover, tunisia's classic architecture hasn't changed, but social life has, quite a bit.
