History of Algeria

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The history of Algeria includes developments in the territory of the People's Democratic Republic of Algeria from prehistory to the present. It began with the first human traces 1.78 million years ago, the Old Paleolithic.

Prehistory and early history

Ancient Paleolithic (1.78 million years ago)

The oldest human traces of North Africa were found in Algeria. About 1.78 million years old are the artifacts of Aïn el-Hanech (in archaeological literature usually shortened to Ain Hanech) in northeastern Algeria, about 12 km north-northwest of El Eulma.

There were cobbles, whole flakes, various fragments and retouched workpieces. The high age of the site was doubted in the meantime, but also recently found advocates. In each case, it was shown that the manufacturers of these tools lived in a savanna-like landscape and that meat played an important part in the diet. In addition to the remains of typical hunting prey such as rhinos and elephants, whose bones show traces of processing, one found mainly those of Equus tabeti, a horse species.

Excavations have been carried out for some time, resulting in particularly early dated finds in various places in Morocco and Algeria; in Tunisia, however, only one artifact from the time before the Acheuléen, characterized by the guiding form of the hand wedge, namely chopper or hacker, has been found so far. This is a debris device of the early Paleolithic, the cutting edge of which was produced by machining an edge. Choppers are the oldest stone devices of mankind and at the same time the first core devices.

In northern Algeria, in addition to Ain Hanech, the Mansourah site in the northeast, Djebel Meksem near Ain Hanech and Monts Tessala in the northwest are known. In addition, there are sites in the Sahara like Aoulef and Reggan in the middle of the country, then Saoura in the west and Bordj Tan Kena on the border with Libya. Mostly important stratigraphic information was missing, leading to premature and very early dating that is no longer sustainable today. A major hurdle to more accurate dating is the fact that common dating methods cannot be used, for example because the region lacks volcanoes whose material otherwise allows the determination of dating intervals.

Excavations in 1992-1993 and 1998-1999 led to the conclusion that Ain Hanech is not a single site, but that there are four sites on an area of about one square kilometer. These are next to Ain Boucherit, which lies about 200 m southeast of Ain Hanech west of the eponymous stream Ain Boucherit, the squares El-Kherba and El-Beidha, which lie 300 and 800 m respectively south of the classical sites. Paleomagnetic investigations determined for the relevant layer in Ain Hanech, where numerous artifacts were discovered on a former creek run