Fezzan: Turkey’s Slaving Frontier

Abstract

The mid-Saharan region of Fezzan was nearly always a semi-independent political and trading entity before the 19th century. Only after 1842 did the Ottoman empire, newly returned to Tripoli, establish a token administration and limited military presence at one or two of the more important oases. In the late 19th and early 20th centuries the Turks failed to consolidate their presence in Fezzan or, in the face of European encroachment from both the north and south, to reinforce vague territorial claims deeper into central Africa with any significant political or military presence. They thus left future colonial and independent regimes in Libya a legacy of unresolved questions over Fezzan’s southern frontiers and territorial extent.