Tunisia [antikvár]

Tunisia Located between the Mediterranean's two basins in the eastern part of the Maghreb in Northern Africa, Tunisia opens amply to the sea with 1300 kilometers of coastline. The sea's influence is felt both climatically as well as socially, favoring the interaction with other peoples. Equally subject to the effects of the Sahara Desert in the south, Tunisia remains the least desert-like of its immediate neighbors, Libya and Algeria. With one third of its area having an altitude of over 200 meters, Tunisia is a relatively low-lying country with a mountain chain occupying the northern half of the country near the sea; its mounts (Dje-bel) Khemir, Mogod, and Nefza have their highest point at 1212 meters above sea level. Another more important and higher chain crosses the country from the north to the western center with Mount Chaambi having its peak at 1544 meters. Dividing these chains is the Medjerda River which, nothwithstanding its irregularity, remains the only waterway in the country meriting such a name. Climate, regions, population Intense heat and drought in the summer and a certain moderation and humidity in the winter characterize a climate that is subject to both the Mediterranean Sea and to the Sahara Desert. The annual median rainfall is 1000 mm. In the north and less than 200 mm in the center and south, with variations relative to the proximity to the coast. Such climatic data combined with those due to the mountainous zones, are at the origin of the instability that has always existed between the northern'coastal zone and the center, west and the south. The former, favorable to agriculture, continues to concentrate the wealthier portion of the population and the more heavily populated cities such as BIzerta, Tunis, Sousse, and Sfax. The cultivation of grains is practiced in the rich flood plains of Mateur and Beja, while olives are grown in the Sahel. In the other central regions along the Algerian border and in the south, agriculture is more dependent on the variations in the fertility of the land and the quantity of rainfall. The reality of Tunisia's agricultural production, excluding date production in the Jerid region as well as irrigated and greenhouse production, runs from weak to poor. The population which numbered 7,700,000 according to the 1985 census, is still growing despite recent progress in birth control. It is a youthful population, with half under the age of 20. The origin of the barbers Approximately a million years ago, man, or more precisely, a hominid-like species, appeared in Tunisia. Only during the early Paleolithic Age was this presence confirmed living in a warm and humid climate in savanna inhabited by large buffalo, zebra and hippopotamus. This gave way, in the mid-Paleolithic age to a dryer, more Mediterraneanlike forest inhabited by bears, boars and deer. This hominid, whose existence is confirmed by the findings of Gafsa and Sidi Zin (early Paleolithic) and those of Ain Materchen near Fariana (mid-Paleolithic) seems not to attain all of its "human" traits until later towards the IX millenium when he assumes characteristics similar to the Cro-Magnon man. From a very rudimentary civilization during the Epipaleolithic Age, he moves towards a less crude one accompanied by a geographic expansion originating in the Gafsa region {from which the appelative, Capsian, derives) towards the southern Sahara and towards western Algeria. Living primarily by means of hunting and gathering (the climate, flora and fauna were much more "African" than today) this man of the megalithic epoch (IV millenium B.C.) was subject to, probably starting in the III millenium, after the drying of the Sahara, the influences of the Africans and the Egyptians who were, without a doubt, more evolved and who were immigrating towards the north. It was this mixed population called Capsian that the Greeks much later were to call Libyan and that the Latins in their turn were to call "Barbarus": the Berbers. According to some, the language of these "protolibyans" is related to ancient Egyptian, and to others, to the semi-tic languages. Both nomadic and sedentary, varying with the region and the epoch, the Berbers cultivated the land, hunted and produced utensils of terra cotta. Their habitat was similar to the defensive aspect of the eagle's nest, evidenced at Qalat Sinan, Takrouna, Matmata and Doui-ret. The gandura and the burnus woven from animal fur were the preferred male garments. The malya was favored by the women. Couscous continues even today to be the preferred dish of the Tunisians. They worship the stars (the sun and the moon) and natural forces (such as storms, springs and trees) and remain, even after their conversion to non-pagan religions, particularly superstitious, perpetuating ancestral rites and beliefs. Lovers of freedom, the Berbers have always fiercely resisted their invaders. Carthage and the Struggle against Rome The Berbers who lived along the coast in contact with the sea during the first millenium B.C. appeared to be willing to negotiate with the Phoenicians (from the Libyan coast) the founding of commercial centers that these latter sought to set up in Berber territory. In 1100 B.C. Utica was founded near the Medjerda delta, followed by Hadrume-turn (Sousse). As the legend goes, when Elyssa or Dido, the Phoenician princess from Tyre, wanted to found her own colony she used a subterfuge to obtain the necessary terrain from the Berbers. Since she could only occupy the space of a cowhide, she cut the hide into thin strips and uniting them end to end, formed the borders of what was to become the "Qart Hadasht" territory - Carthage (the new city).