| |
| 1857–67 |
| |
| The first Franco-Arab colleges, secondary schools for Muslim students of the urban upper classes, were founded in Algiers, Constantine, and Oran. A teacher training college opened in 1865, with ten Muslim student teachers in attendance, and a school of arts and crafts was opened in Kabylia in 1867. These French innovations did not undo the damage caused by the closure of 2,000 Islamic primary schools during the uprisings. | 1 |
| |
| 1857–71 |
| |
| The French pacified the Province of Kabylia, home to the Berber Kabyle tribe. | 2 |
| |
| 1864–83 |
| |
| The revolt of the Awlad Sidi Shaykh of the Oran Province engulfed much of southwestern and south central Algeria. A confederation of tribes organized around marabouts rebelled, helped by spies attached to local tribes, who kept track of French officials and supplies and indicated the right times for revolts. | 3 |
| |
| 1865, July 14 |
| |
| The French Sénatus Consulte allowed Algerians to obtain citizenship if they agreed to accept French civil law. Muslims would no longer be governed by Islamic law in matters of marriage, divorce, and inheritance. The latter was particularly important to the French, who hoped to attain legal rights over the lands of new Muslim citizens. The stratagem failed, and by 1906 only 1,362 Muslims had received French citizenship. | 4 |
| |
| 1866 |
| |
| Death of Mustafa ibn Azuz, rebel and leader of the Rahmaniyya Sufi order, who directed insurrections in eastern Algeria from his base in Tunisia. His center at the Nafta oasis became a center for Algerian refugees, illegal arms, and propaganda. Due in part to the example of Ibn Azuz, who was known as the Saint of Nafta, the Rahmaniyya order, founded at the end of the 18th century by a Kabyle Berber, attained the largest membership in eastern Algeria. | 5 |
| |
| 1867–68 |
| |
| Famine resulted after locusts and animal epidemics hit the interior of the country. With the French export of grain, Algeria no longer had its customary reserves, and at least 300,000 died of hunger and the attendant epidemics of typhus and cholera. | 6 |
| |
| 1870, Oct. 24 |
| |
| The Crémieux Decree granted Algerian Jews, who numbered about 40,000, French citizenship. This privilege separated them from the Muslims, who began to associate the Jews with colonists. The Europeans refused to accept the decree in practice, and much of the Jewish population left for France. | 7 |
| |
| 1871, March 14 |
| |
| A Kabyle rebellion was launched by Muhammad al-Muqrani in response to French imposition of rule over previously autonomous tribal areas. Al-Muqrani found 25,000 troops and 100,000 followers. On April 8 the leader of the Rahmaniyya Sufi order, Sheik al-Haddad, joined the Kabyle rebellion as a holy war against the French. He mustered 120,000 troops and spread the revolt to the eastern Sahara. Al-Haddad and his Sufi followers were forced to surrender in June 1871. Al-Muqrani was killed and his uprising suppressed in Jan. 1872. Eleven million acres of land were seized by the French in retribution to provide additional land for colonists. | 8 |
| |
| 1873 |
| |
| The Warnier Law promulgated by the French government provided a means for the dispossession of privately owned Muslim land (mulk). Arabs lost their most fertile coastal lands to colonists in a process that continued until 1890. | 9 |
| |
| 1881 |
| |
| The native code (code de l'indigénat) was promulgated. It imposed a series of discriminatory laws upon Algerians, who could be held, charged, and imprisoned without a trial. Algerians could be placed under surveillance and were not allowed to travel in the country without a permit. These laws were enforced until 1927. | 10 |
| |
| 1886, Sept. 10 |
| |
| A decree by the French government attempted to obliterate the authority of the Islamic legal system by decreeing that in matters of property or criminal proceedings, Algerians were subject to the French legal system. | 11 |
| |
| 1896, Dec. 31 |
| |
| The governor-general of Algeria was ceded control of ministries previously located in Paris, and French colonial control was localized in North Africa. | 12 |
| |
| |
