ABSTRACT
The history of Sudan in modern times is an alternation of subjection andself-rule. From 1820 to 1881 it was a part of the Ottoman empire in name and of its autonomous Egyptian pashalik in fact. From 1881 to 1898 it was ruled by the Mahdi Muhammad Ahmad Abdullah (died 1885) and his successors. From 1899 to 1955 it was subject in theory to an Anglo-Egyptian condominium, in practice to Britain. In 1956 it became an independent state, and then a member of the Arab League and the United Nations.
