The Casbah under French Colonization

The historic development of Algeria started early in the tenth century after being discovered by Arab Zirid Dynasty, and subsequently ruled by Arab dynasties till the sixteenth century. The seventeenth century saw the Algiers becoming independent of the Ottomans, with piracy in continuation. Two centuries later in 1830, the French conquered Algeria.

Under the French empire-building process, Algiers was entangled in every little aspect of it, and the city given its European qualities. One of the first things the French did upon their arrival in the country was to divide the city into two parts with the “rue du Centre” so as to provide easy access for their troops in the event of a rebellion. Surrounding the Casbah with colonial-style buildings, the French destroyed the walls and tore down much of the northern quarter in order to build the colonial neighborhood of Bab al-Oued (Smith, 2006). With Algiers significantly divided into the casbah and the Marine Quarters (French Quarters), the latter came to be known as the ancient core of Algiers [(Celik, 1997).]

The Casbah had a striking urban aesthetic–cut into the terrain facing the Mediterranean, it was historically built as an amphitheater on a slope, was defined with interlocking masses of gleaming white houses with roof terraces opening to the bay. Defined by the sea that was formed below it and harmoniously intertwined with landscape and nature, The Casbah was the Algiers, where “the name Algiers-the-White to this glittering apparition that welcomes at dawn the boats arriving from the Port.” It was said to be “in consonance with nature” (Celik, 1997). As described by the contemporary Le Corbusier, it was The Casbah that gave the Algiers its sensuous quality. It complemented its surrounding geography, which led to the creation of an intimate relationship of the city to nature, and through this idea was a formula that equated nature with women [(Celik, 1997).]

The myth of the Casbah was developed around three major concepts: gender, mystery, and difference. Gender was linked to the feminization of the Orient and on the other hand, in the colonial context, gendering of the culture and society of Algiers became largely associated to power structure. Algerian women were essentially the “key symbols of the colony’s cultural identity” as ascribed by French intellectuals, administrative officers and the military (Celik, 1997). In Eugene Delacroix’s painting of Femmes d’Alger, a sense of mystery can be felt. It can be viewed more than what is depicted based on the artist’s perspective, but rather as a culture in itself. Drawing parallels with the collective imagination of what the casbah was like, there was a nurturing of the Orientalist cultural repertory on Islam, which went on to enhance the creation of a “myth” behind the casbah.

Unlike other French colonial cities, Algiers was not strictly segregated into European and indigenous quarters. The exception was the Casbah with its almost entirely Algerian population. Algerians found refuge in their homes, away from colonial interventions faced continually in public. It was this “inviolable” space that they could recover their true identity. Home also identified an element in the “language of refusal” created by Algerians, which involved their behavior, clothing and their entire way of life. They created for themselves barriers to remain ‘concealed’ away from the constant gaze of the Europeans. To the French, the Algerian house was a representation of their impenetrable form of Algerian life, where the core of it was devoted to family and women’s activities ( [Celik, 1997] ).

A strong interest into indigenous housing patterns did not occur until the 1880s. It was then that ethnographers began to analyze the common dwelling as an expression of the material life of a community. The main entrance would always be situated in such a way that visual access of the courtyard was restricted to the public. Prior to centennial celebrations of the French occupation, the aesthetic and architectural qualities of the houses in the Casbah were already highlighted. The Indigenous House of the Centennial, built as a model in 1930 by architect Léon Claro, was meant to showcase a sanitized summary of the architecture of the [Casbah] intended to "convey to tourists an idea of the habitation of Arabs in Algiers" (Celik, 1997). Even though details and ornamentation were mimicked closely with old materials and fragments gathered from the Casbah to illustrate its authenticity, the architecture was also alienated from it socio-cultural context.

When the French occupied Algiers in 1830, they were presented with a dense and fortified town, crowded with monuments and public buildings. The well-maintained, cosmopolitan image however, owed its uniqueness to the collective, impressive mass of white cubical residential structures (Celik, 1997). It was suggested that Le Corbusier should have the biggest credit for calling the architectural profession’s attention to Algier’s indigenous urban house. The narrow streets of the Casbah that served only as public passages were effectively sheltered from the sun by the projections of the buildings that outlined them, where Le Corbusier argued that life and poetry flourished inside the house. A counterpart of Le Corbusier, Jean de Maisonseul attempted to define a “Mediterranean” architecture where the most striking aspect was defined by the relationship shared between planes and voids, and the “predilection for the austerity of grand nude surfaces” (Celik, 1997). With reference to Algiers and the Casbah specifically, the Arab house had much to offer to the development of new architecture. Maisonseul also went on to maintain that even interiorization should not be given up despite the differences in French and Arab lifestyles. With contemporary technology, in particular reinforced concrete, “this subtle arrangement of interior spaces, the delicious gradation of diverse scales that form the passage from one volume to the other,” would be permitted especially if adopted by the Europeans.

References

* Celik, Zeynep. (1997). Urban Forms and Colonial Confrontations: Algiers under French Rule. California: Berkeley University of California Press.
* Smith, Craig S. (2006). The Crumbling of the Casbah. February 8, 2008, from http://www.nytimes.com/2006/07/23/arts/design/23smit.html?_r=2&pagewanted=1&oref=slogin.