TUAT, a word sometimes applied generally to all the oases in the western part of the Algerian Sahara, i.e., between 2° W. and 24° E. 26° and 3o° N., sometimes restricted to a particular group which borders the east side of Wad Messaud between 26k° and 271° N. According to the first usage Tuat includes the oases of Gurara in the north and Tidikelt in the south with the impor tant centre of Insalah. The three groups are spoken of collectively by the French as the Tuat archipelago. The district is compara tively fertile, and produces dates and some cereals and vegetables. The wadi Saura (known in its lower course as the Messaud), formed by the junction of the wadis Zusfana and Ghir, marks the north-western boundary of the oases. The inhabitants live in ksurs or fortified villages, grouped in districts. The Tuat group forms part of the Southern Territories of Algeria; Gurara and Tuat are attached to the territory of Ain Sefra and to the native commune of Timimun. Tidikelt to the Oasis territory and to the native commune of Wargla. The total population is 57,688, of which Gurara and Tuat have 42,112 and Tidikelt 15,576. The principal ksurs are in Gurara, Timimun (pop. 6,185), Deldoul (2,284) at Tuat, Timmi (2,614), Zaoufet-Kounta (3,701); at Tidikelt, In Salah (1,088), In Char (1,383). The district com mands the routes southwards to Timbuktu and the Sudan.
The oases appear to have been inhabited from a very early period. The Arabs took possession in the loth century and im posed Islam upon the people. The treaty of 1845 between Morocco and France left the question of the possession of Tuat, Gurara and Tidikelt unsettled. In 1899 a French scientific mission,
under Flamand, was despatched to the oasis of Tidikelt. The French were attacked by the natives (Dec. 28, 1899), whom they defeated. This was the beginning of a campaign which ended in March 1901 in the complete occupation of the oases and of the Zusfana-Saura line of communication. The French were not, however, left in peaceable possession. Attacks by the nomad tribes, were made on the line of communications, and during 1903 the French troops suffered serious losses. To punish the tribes the town of Figig was bombarded (June 8, 1903). From 1904, the methods of governor Jonnart and of General Lyautey brought about rapid pacification. In 1905, the extension of the railway from South Oran to Colomb Bechar, which had been occupied in Nov. 1903, definitely stabilised French domination in that region.
1Vajor A. G. Laing visited the Tuat territory in 1825, but his papers were lost. The next European to visit Tuat was Gerhard Rohlfs, who described his explorations in Tagebuch seiner Reise durch Marokko nach That, 1864 (Gotha, 1865) and Reise durch Marokko . . . Ex ploration der Oasen von Tafilet, Tuat and Tidikelt . . . (Bremen, 1868). E. F. Gautier, Sahara algerien (Paris, 1908), Id. La conquite du Sahara, Paris, 191o; Id. Le Sahara, Paris, 1923 ; G. B. M. Flamand, Recherches geologiques et geographiques sur le haut-pays de l'Oranie et sur le Sahara, Lyon, 1911 ; Augustin Bernard and N. Lacroix, La penetration saharienne, Alger, 1906; Les territoires du Sud de l'Algerie 3 vol., Alger, 1922.