Béjaïa

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Béjaïa or Bougie (Kabyle Bgayet /β'gajəθ]; Arabic بجاية [bi'ʤε:jah] / [b'ʤε:jʌ], also transliterated Bijāyah) is a Mediterranean port on the Gulf of Béjaïa, capital of Béjaïa Province, northern Algeria. It was formerly known under various bastardizing European orthographies, such as Budschaja in German, Bugia in Italian, and under French colonial rule until 1962 as Bougie /bu'ʒi/ (both also the word for candle).

The population of the city in 1998 was 147,076, while the population of the whole wilaya (province) was 905,000.[1] The northern terminus of the Hassi Messaoud oil pipeline from the Sahara, Béjaïa is the principal oil port of the Western Mediterranean. Exports, aside from crude petroleum, include iron, phosphates, wines, dried figs, and plums. The city also has textile and cork industries.

A minor port in Carthaginian and Roman times, Béjaïa was the Roman Saldae, a veteran colony founded by emperor Vespasian of great importance in the province of Mauretania Caesariensis, later in the fraction Sitifensis. It became the capital of the short-lived African kingdom of the Germanic Vandals (founded in 429-430), which was wiped out circa 533 by the Byzantines who established the African prefecture and later the Exarchate of Carthage. It had disappeared but was refounded by the Berber Hammadid dynasty (whose capital it became) in the 11th century, and became an important port and cultural center. The son of a Pisan merchant (and probably consul), posthumously known as Fibonacci, there learned under the Almohad dynasty about Arabic numerals, and introduced them and modern mathematics into feudal Europe. After a Spanish 'late Crusader' occupation (1510–55), the city was taken by the Ottoman Turks. Until it was captured by the French in 1833, Bejaïa was a stronghold of the Barbary pirates (see Barbary States).

It was Christianized in the 5th century, became officially Arian under the Vandals, and then Muslim under the Berbers. It was the site of the martyrdom by lapidation of Raymond Lull in 1325 and has also been a titular bishopric.

City landmarks include a 16th-century mosque and a casbah (fortress) built by the Spanish in 1545.

In the museum of Bejaïa can be seen a picture of Orientalist painter Maurice Boitel, who painted in the city for a while.

The town is overlooked by the mountain Lalla Gouraya, whose profile is said to resemble a sleeping woman; other nearby scenic spots include the Pic des Singes (Monkey Peak) and the Zigouates beaches. All three are contained in the Gouraya National Park. The Soummam river runs through the town.