ABSTRACT
As more than one recent student has observed, a prime obstacle to the reconstruction of the history of the lands of the central and eastern Maghreb – modern terms, Algiers, Tunis and Tripoli – in the period of Turkish ascendancy is the loss of many, though not all, of the region’s indigenous archival sources. In Algiers, however, the shipbuilding revolution occurs much earlier, at the beginning of the 17th century. Ethnic signifies identified with individual commanders named in the Fleet Lists are italicized. The history of Algiers during the Turkish ascendancy has failed to attract much academic attention from Anglo-Saxon scholars. It would appear that the English consuls, who compiled a majority of the Algerine fleet lists published, were accustomed never to mention by ‘name’ any Algerine vessel to which they make reference in their despatches.
