The Origins of Tunisian Tourism

Tunisia received little attention in the copious historical scholarship on tourism with regard to its beginnings back in the late nineteenth and early twentieth centuries. Most often Tunisia is mentioned as an adjunct to Algeria, which used to be the French colonial prime winter resort. The scant and scattered evidence available on early Tunisian tourism, its roots and maturation tells but a little part of the narrative of early Tunisian tourism. This article chronicles the first tentative steps of Tunisian tourism by reaching back to the emergence of Tunisia as a popular winter resort for Europeans and others. It looks at the major factors, which gradually contributed to the incorporation of Tunisia in French colonial tourist circuits and later in European and international tourist networks.