About Tabarqa

Thabraca was the last Numidian city in the direction of the Zeugitana and was a Roman colony. It was connected by a road with Simitthu, to which it served as a port for the exportation of its famous marbles. At Thabraca Gildo, the brother of Firmus, committed suicide. Under the Vandal king Gaiseric it had a monastery for men and one for women Confronting it, at a distance of about 365 yards, is the small island of Tabarka, where the Genoese Lomellini, who had purchased the grant of the coral fishing from the Ottoman Turks, maintained a garrison from 1540 to 1742. Here may still be seen the ruins of a stronghold, a church and some Genoese buildings. At Tabarka the ruins consist of a pit once used as a church and some fragments of walls which belonged to Christian buildings. There were also two Ottoman Turkish fortresses, one of which has been repaired. Since in 1542 the island of Tabarca was granted to the Lomellini family of Genoa. In 1741 it was surrendered to the (nominally Ottoman, de facto autonomus) Bey of Tunis. Part of the population was moved to the Sardinian island of San Pietro, whose population still speaks a variant of Genoese dialect originating from Tabarka. It became Tabarka, under French colonial rule annexed to the civil district of Souk el-Arba, now in the Tunisian governorate of Jendouba, and a rather important fishing centre.