48 Fun Facts About Tunisia

Which port city is Tunisia's second-largest city by population?

Sfax owes its size to trade: phosphates from the Gafsa mines arrive by rail for export, and its harbour is a major fishing port. Its old town still sits inside 9th-century walls.

Tunisia is bordered by Libya and which other country?

Algeria lies to the west. France, which already ruled it, invaded Tunisia in 1881 on the pretext that Tunisian tribesmen had raided across that border.

The ruins of which Phoenician-founded ancient city lie just outside the Tunisian capital?

Carthage's legendary founder, Queen Dido of Tyre, was offered only as much land as an oxhide could cover, so she cut the hide into thin strips and ringed a whole hill with them.

Which general marched war elephants over the Alps to attack Rome in 218 BC?

Hannibal ravaged Roman territory for some 15 years yet could not take Rome itself; recalled to defend his homeland, he was beaten at Zama, in today's Tunisia, in 202 BC.

What name is given to Rome's three wars against a North African rival, the last ending in 146 BC?

The Punic Wars take their name from Punicus, the Romans' word for their Phoenician-descended rival. After the third, Rome turned the conquered land into a province it called Africa.

Which Roman site in Tunisia has an amphitheatre that could hold some 35,000 spectators?

El Jem was Roman Thysdrus, a small town that grew rich enough to raise, around AD 238, a free-standing stone arena modelled on Rome's Colosseum.

Which Germanic people ruled what is now Tunisia for about a century until Belisarius defeated them in 533?

The Vandals crossed into North Africa in 429 and, from their new base, sailed to sack Rome in 455, which is why their name became a word for wanton destruction.

Which Tunisian city, founded around 670 AD, has a Great Mosque with one of the world's oldest minarets?

Kairouan began as the Arab general Uqba ibn Nafi's army camp. It later lost its rank as capital to Tunis, yet remained the Maghreb's principal holy city.

Which Ottoman corsair captured Tunis in 1534, only to lose it to Emperor Charles V the next year?

Barbarossa Hayreddin, newly made the sultan's admiral, took Tunis as a base for his raiding fleet. Charles V's crusade drove him out in 1535, and the Ottomans won the city for good only in 1574.

The 1881 treaty that made Tunisia a French protectorate is named after which Tunis suburb, home of a famous mosaic museum?

Bardo was where the beys held court, and the treaty was signed there at Ksar Saïd palace. France left the bey on his throne but took over Tunisia's foreign affairs and finances.

Which other French protectorate won independence within weeks of Tunisia in March 1956?

Morocco's French protectorate ended on 2 March 1956 and Tunisia's on 20 March. Morocco's sultan stayed on as king, while Tunisia deposed its bey the next year and became a republic.

Who was Tunisia's first president, known as the 'Supreme Combatant'?

Habib Bourguiba led the independence movement and served as president for thirty years until his prime minister had doctors declare him unfit in November 1987; his Code of Personal Status banned polygamy and abolished repudiation.

Which president fled Tunisia on 14 January 2011 after 23 years in power?

Zine El Abidine Ben Ali had taken power in 1987 by having his ageing predecessor declared unfit to rule. After 23 years he flew to Saudi Arabia as protests spread, and he died in exile in Jeddah in 2019.

Tunisia's 2011 revolution was sparked when street vendor Mohamed Bouazizi set himself on fire in which town?

Mohamed Bouazizi set himself alight outside the governor's office in Sidi Bouzid on 17 December 2010 after an official confiscated his produce cart; his death on 4 January 2011 fuelled the protests that toppled the regime.

The 2015 Nobel Peace Prize went to which Tunisian body for helping to build a pluralistic democracy?

The National Dialogue Quartet united the main labour union, the employers' federation, the human rights league and the lawyers' order in 2013, when political assassinations had brought the transition close to collapse.

Which president suspended Tunisia's parliament and dismissed the prime minister on 25 July 2021?

Kais Saied, a law professor elected in 2019, invoked an emergency article of the constitution to freeze parliament and sack the prime minister, then ruled by decree and pushed through a new constitution in 2022.

The June 2015 gun attack that killed 38 tourists on a beach took place just outside which Tunisian city?

Sousse is the city beside the resort of Port El Kantaoui, where a gunman killed 38 holidaymakers, 30 of them British. Within two weeks Britain told its tourists to come home and advised against travel to Tunisia.

Tunisia's 2011 uprising became known abroad by the name of which flower?

Jasmine was the media's name for the uprising, in the style of Georgia's Rose and Kyrgyzstan's Tulip revolutions. Its success set off a wave of protests across the Middle East and North Africa.

Which currency name does Tunisia share with Kuwait, Jordan and Serbia?

Dinar comes from the Roman denarius. Tunisia's is a closed currency: taking it out of the country is an offence, so travellers change their leftover notes back before flying home.

Cape Angela in Tunisia holds what geographic distinction?

Africa's northernmost point was long listed as nearby Cape Blanc, until Tunisia's tourism ministry declared Cape Angela the true tip in December 2014.

Tunisia's highest peak, Jebel ech Chambi, belongs to which mountain range?

The Atlas Mountains run across north-west Africa and end in Tunisia, where Jebel ech Chambi reaches 1,544 m. Its pine-clad slopes are protected as one of the last refuges of Cuvier's gazelle.

Chott el Djerid in southern Tunisia is what kind of geographic feature?

A salt lake in name, Chott el Djerid is a vast crust of salt for most of the year and holds water only after heavy rain, so a road now runs across its bed between the oases on either side.

Underground Berber homes in which Tunisian town served as Luke Skywalker's home in Star Wars?

Matmata's Hotel Sidi Driss, a pit dwelling dug around an open courtyard, played the inside of Luke's home on Tatooine. The planet itself was named after a different Tunisian town, Tataouine.

Which Tunisian chilli paste joined UNESCO's intangible heritage list in 2022?

Harissa is made by drying red chillies in the sun, then pounding them with garlic and coriander. Families and neighbours usually gather to prepare a big batch together, which is the custom UNESCO listed.

The clifftop village of Sidi Bou Said near Tunis is famous for buildings painted in which two colours?

Blue and white is the look a 1915 decree set out to protect, a rule often credited to Baron Rodolphe d'Erlanger, a painter who built a palace there. The palace now houses a centre for Arab and Mediterranean music.

The El Ghriba synagogue, which draws pilgrims every spring, stands on which Tunisian island?

Djerba is home to one of the world's oldest Jewish communities. Legend says El Ghriba was built around a stone or a door saved from the Temple in Jerusalem.

The Tanit d'or is the top prize at a Tunisian festival, founded in 1966, devoted to which art?

Film. The critic Tahar Cheriaa founded the festival to give African and Arab cinema a screen of its own, and its golden trophy is named after Tanit, a goddess of ancient North Africa.

Tunisia beat Mexico for Africa's first World Cup finals win at the 1978 tournament in which country?

Argentina hosted the 1978 World Cup, where Tunisia trailed Mexico at half-time before scoring three times. They then held the reigning champions, West Germany, to a goalless draw.

Tunisia's 2004 Africa Cup of Nations top scorer, Francileudo Santos, was born in which country?

Brazil-born Santos spent two seasons with the Tunisian club Étoile du Sahel and later chose to play for Tunisia. He struck after five minutes of the 2004 final, which brought Tunisia its first African title.

Tunisia's Oussama Mellouli won Olympic gold in the 1500m freestyle in 2008 and in which event in 2012?

The 10 km marathon swim in Hyde Park's Serpentine came days after Mellouli lost his 1500 m title and took bronze. It made him the first swimmer with Olympic golds in both pool and open water.

Tunisia hosted the 2005 men's world championship in which sport, finishing fourth?

Handball: Tunisia's left back Wissem Hmam was the tournament's top scorer, and the hosts led France by four at half-time of the bronze-medal match before losing by a single goal.

Which historian, born in Tunis in 1332, wrote the Muqaddimah, a pioneering study of why dynasties rise and fall?

Ibn Khaldun wrote it in a remote castle after quitting court politics. His big idea: dynasties are founded by hardy outsiders bound by solidarity, then decay once city comforts soften their heirs.

Which staple dish did Tunisia and three other Maghreb countries jointly add to UNESCO's heritage list in 2020?

Couscous is semolina rolled by hand into tiny grains and steamed, a skill UNESCO notes is passed on by watching and imitating rather than from written recipes.

Tunisian mosques of the majority Maliki tradition are recognisable by minarets of what shape?

Square minarets mark the mosques of Tunisia's Maliki majority. The Turks brought the Hanafi rite under Ottoman rule, and its mosques, such as the Youssef Dey Mosque in Tunis, were given octagonal minarets instead.

In 1982 which organisation moved its headquarters to Tunis, where Israeli jets bombed it in 1985?

The PLO had been driven out of Beirut by Israel's 1982 invasion of Lebanon and set up south of Tunis. Israeli jets flew more than 2,000 km to bomb the compound in 1985, a raid the UN Security Council condemned.

Which German field marshal flew home from Tunisia two months before the Axis armies there surrendered in May 1943?

Erwin Rommel, the 'Desert Fox', left on 9 March 1943 to recover his health and report to Hitler, and was never sent back. About a quarter of a million Axis troops were taken prisoner when the fighting ended on 13 May.

The Sahel plain along Tunisia's eastern coast is best known for growing which crop?

Olives thrive on the Sahel even though little rain falls there, because humid sea air makes up the difference. Date palms, by contrast, belong to the oases of the far south.

Which Indiana Jones adventure shot its desert scenes in Tunisia?

Raiders of the Lost Ark used a Tunisian city for its street scenes, and because the story is set in 1936, the crew first had to take the TV aerials down from the rooftops.

In which country did a president fall just four weeks after Tunisia's, as the Arab Spring spread in 2011?

Egypt's Hosni Mubarak resigned on 11 February 2011, 28 days after Tunisia's president fled. Yet of all the Arab Spring countries only Tunisia came out a democracy, rated the Arab world's sole one from 2014 until 2021.

The Aghlabid emirs, who ruled Tunisia in the 9th century, launched the Muslim conquest of which Mediterranean island?

Sicily was invaded in 827 after a rebel Byzantine admiral, Euphemius, asked the Aghlabids for help. The conquest then took them 75 years, until the last big stronghold fell in 902.

Which European people ruled a short-lived 'Kingdom of Africa' on Tunisia's coast in the mid-12th century?

The Normans, best known for conquering England, also took Tunisia's ports under King Roger II in the 1140s and held them with garrisons for barely a dozen years, until the Almohad caliphs drove them out.

The Fatimid caliphs, who first ruled from Tunisia, moved east in 973 to which newly founded capital?

Cairo was founded by the Fatimids' general on the Nile in 969, and the caliph moved his court there four years later. An earlier capital was Mahdia, a fortress city they built on the Tunisian coast.

Muslims expelled from which country in the early 1600s settled across northern Tunisia?

Spain expelled its Moriscos, the descendants of its Muslims, from 1609. Those who reached Tunisia settled around Tunis, the Medjerda valley and Cape Bon, bringing city crafts and better irrigation with them.

In 2011 which formerly banned Islamist party won the most seats in Tunisia's first free election?

Ennahda, banned under the old regime and legalised only in March 2011, won 89 of the 217 seats that October. It then chose to govern in a three-party coalition with two secular parties.

Which Tunisian mountain pass names the February 1943 battle in which German armour routed inexperienced American troops?

Kasserine Pass gave the US Army its first big clash with German forces, and it was driven back some 50 miles. Within two weeks the beaten corps had a new commander, George Patton.

Victor 'Young' Perez, a Tunis-born world flyweight boxing champion of the 1930s, died in 1945 after imprisonment in which Nazi camp?

Auschwitz held Perez from October 1943. Born in the Jewish quarter of Tunis, he had won the world title in Paris at 20, and he was killed on the death march out of the camp in January 1945.

The planned ELMED undersea power cable is designed to link Tunisia's grid to which country?

Italy and Tunisia plan to join their grids with a 600 MW cable about 200 km long, the first direct-current power link between Europe and Africa, so that electricity can flow in either direction.

Which Tunisian port city did French forces evacuate on 15 October 1963, seven years after independence?

Bizerte's naval base stayed in French hands after independence. A Tunisian blockade in 1961 ended in a three-day battle with heavy Tunisian losses, and France finally pulled out of the port two years later.