The christian powers of Europe beheld the conquests of the Mahometans with dread, and a combination was formed among them for the recovery of Africa. Expeditions were sent from Constantinople, Sicily and Spain, which united under the command of John the Patrician, a renowned Captain, proceeded to the relief of Carthage. Before they arrived, that city had fallen; they however recovered it, and instantly gave battle to the enemy, under the walls of Utica. The christians were totally defeated, and the small remains of their army took refuge in the ships, and abandoned the country. The Roman power was every where overthrown; Carthage, retaken by the Arabs, was razed to the ground; and fifty miles south of it was founded a new city, called Kairuan, which was long the capital of Africa, the seat of Mahometan splendor and learning in that quarter.
But the invaders received a new check from a direction whence it was least to be expected. The sea coast as we have observed, although much reduced in point of wealth and refinement, by the excesses of the Vandals and the religious wars, was still a cultivated region, supporting a numerous population, the descendants of the Greeks, Phoenicians and Romans. But the mountains and the country behind them remained in possession of the aboriginal race, who under the name of Berbers, retained their old pastoral and predatory habits, and were a constant source of trouble to the foreign rulers of the province. Among these people appeared a female named Cahina, of extraordinary courage and address, who persuaded them that she was inspired, and that an opportunity was offered for regaining possession of the country. An immense multitude were thus speedily assembled under her banner, equally daring and enthusiastic with the Saracens, who were attacked with an impetuosity never before displayed against them in Africa. Success encouraged the mountaineers, and in an incredibly short space of time the invaders were driven into Egypt. This being effected, the prophetess proposed to take away all inducement for their return, by laying waste the country. Her proposal was readily assented to by persons who had no property but their tents, flocks and horses; and dreadful were the consequences of this determination. The fertile territory was made desolate, and the splendor of civilization, already much dimmed by the fury of Vandals and religionists, was entirely obscured. The unfortunate inhabitants of the coast, thus pressed on all sides, in their despair, invited the Saracens to return, and aided by them, made head against their savage destroyers. In the first battle the Berbers were totally routed, and their queen slain; this bond of union being destroyed, they were soon dispersed, or reduced to slavery.
The Arab power was now undisputed; in a very short period there were no more christians to be taxed. The few remaining churches became mosques; all traces of former manners and institutions disappeared; and a torrent of Asiatics overflowed the country, establishing in every part their own customs and language. Of the Arabs many betook themselves to the Desert, where their descendants still wander, scarcely distinguishable from their brethren of the Arabian sands. The others gradually amalgamated with the natives, and at the present day, the fixed inhabitants of Barbary form one race, differing but little among themselves in appearance, habits or language, and known to Europeans by the general name of Moors. The mountains and the borders of the Desert are still possessed by tribes speaking a language totally distinct from all others known—nominally professing the Mahometan religion, but regardless of its precepts—dwelling in tents, and wandering from pasture to pasture with their flocks and herds—displaying the same fierce and indomitable character which distinguished the aboriginals, from whom they are in all probability descended. The most powerful of these tribes are the Kabyles, who principally inhabit the territory of Algiers, where by their impetuous inroads, they present the greatest bar to the establishment of the French.
Africa was scarcely possessed by the Saracens, ere those restless conquerors passed over to Spain. Their character seems however to have been already softened; for we no longer find among the Moorish invaders of the peninsula, the fierce barbarism of the early followers of Mahomet; and the kingdoms which they founded in that delightful land, were celebrated for the industry, ingenuity and cultivation of their inhabitants. The Moors of Spain soon threw off their allegiance to the Caliphs in the East; and two independent kingdoms were also founded in Atlantic Barbary. In 790, Edris-ben Abdallah, governor of Almagrab, or the West, which name was applied to the ancient Mauritania, assumed the title of Sultan of Fez, from his capital city; his successors ruled supreme over Western Africa, until the middle of the eleventh century, when the Almoravides, a fanatic sect, obtained possession of the southern part, and established the kingdom of Maraksh, or Morocco. These two principalities now form the empire of Morocco. Eastern Barbary in the gradual dismemberment of the Arabian dominions, first became one kingdom under a family of sovereigns called the Aglabites, who for some time reigned with great splendor at Kairuan, they were overthrown in 909, by an expedition from Sicily, then a Saracen province, and the country was for nearly six hundred years after, ruled or ravaged by various dynasties.
At length, towards the commencement of the sixteenth century, the Moorish kingdoms in Spain were overthrown, and a rage for conquests in Africa pervaded the Peninsula. Eastward of Morocco and Fez, Barbary was at that time divided into a number of small principalities, each consisting of a strong town with as much of the surrounding country as it could keep in subjection; the principal of them were Algiers, Bugia, Oran, Tunis, Telemsen and Tripoli. Against these places numerous expeditions were sent out from Spain which generally proved fruitless; however, some places on the coast were taken, among which was Tripoli, or Trablis, as it was then called. It fell into the hands of Ferdinand, the Catholic, in 1510; but his more politic successor, the emperor Charles the Fifth, probably not knowing what else to do with places so inconvenient, surrendered it twelve years afterwards, with the adjacent island of Malta, to the knights of St. John, who had just then been expelled from Rhodes by the mighty Sultan Solyman. Malta was a barren rock, and Tripoli had sunk from its former greatness, little remaining but its walls, its castle and its port. Both places were however capable of being strongly fortified, and the knights required nothing else; they therefore accepted the assignments, and applied all their energies to render their new habitations capable of resisting the shocks to which they would soon inevitably be exposed.
The Turkish power was at this period in the zenith of its prosperity, and Europe again trembled as in the days of the immediate successors of Mahomet. The Mediterranean was swept by innumerable cruisers under its flag, commanded by daring and ferocious captains, who completely destroyed the commerce of christians in that sea, and made frequent descents on the coasts of Italy, Spain and the islands, which they plundered, carrying off the inhabitants for the purpose of extorting a ransom. Of these the most famous were Urudsch or Horuc, and his brother Chaireddin, successively dreaded in their day by the appellation of Barbarossa, or the red beard.
Urudsch being anxious to have some port in the Western Mediterranean, to which he could at intervals retire with his booty and prisoners, offered his assistance to the prince of Algiers, who was endeavoring to regain his possessions from the Spaniards; and no sooner had he effected this, than he seized upon the city, murdered his confiding ally, and declared the country subject to the Porte. On his death, which soon after happened, his brother Chaireddin assumed the command and succeeded in expelling the Spaniards from a small island, close to the city called Algesr or the island which they had for some time held; he then connected it with the main land by a causeway, and thus formed the present port of Algiers, which takes its name from the island. He was afterwards regularly invested by the Porte, with the title and powers of a Pasha, or viceroy; and obtaining large additions to his army, composed entirely of foreigners, he reduced the country to subjection.
This being effected Chaireddin turned his attention to the neighboring state of Tunis, against which he prepared a powerful armament, nominally for the purpose of reinstating its exiled prince Alraschid; under this pretence, he easily gained the capital, which he instantly declared to form a part of the Turkish empire. Alraschid died a prisoner in Constantinople; but Muley Hascem, whom Barbarossa had driven out, applied for assistance to Charles the fifth, which was readily granted, and that emperor himself commanded the expedition against Tunis. It appeared before the city on the 19th of July, 1535, consisting of five hundred vessels, bearing thirty thousand veteran troops. Barbarossa was not taken unawares, and the conflict was terrible; the celebrated fortress of the Goletta, which commands the entrance into the bay of Tunis, was defended with great bravery, by Sinan a renegade Jew, but it soon fell before the artillery of the fleet, and Tunis lay exposed. Chaireddin assembled his forces, and gave battle to the invaders; but he was totally defeated, and the outbreak of ten thousand christian captives from the prisons of the city, increased the confusion; the Turkish army fled to Bona, and Tunis was instantly stormed by the imperial troops. Muley Hascem was restored to his throne, on terms most favorable to the christians; but in a few years more, we find the Turkish power again established, and this country continued to be governed by Pashas, from Constantinople, until 1684, when a certain Hassan-ben-Ali obtained sovereign possession, and his family have ever since held the crown under the title of Bey, paying however a tribute to the Sultan.
Charles the fifth was so much elated by his success at Tunis, that he led another expedition in 1541, against Algiers, which was governed by Hascen Aga, Barbarossa having been elevated to the office of Capoudan Pasha, or High Admiral. The imperial troops landed at a short distance east of the city; but immediately after there arose one of those terrific storms of wind and rain, to which that coast is subject in the autumn; the troops unprovided as yet with tents, were drenched in rain, their ammunition was spoiled, and they were thrown into confusion at the first onset of the Turks. The ships were many of them lost, others dismasted or driven on shore, and the Emperor, after great personal hardships, made his escape with a small remnant of his gallant force.