For modernisation approach it is as the West had the magic wand [...] whose touch enabled non-Western societies to leave the past behind them (Pappe 2010: 3). This definition takes for granted not only that local pre-modern pasts are irrelevant but also that, as long as they are not Westernized, the locals themselves are not part of a modern history. To the historian they appear only as receptacles, passive human beings whose lives are changed through the intervention of external and dynamic powers saving them from stagnation. (Pappe 2010: 3)

Dipinto della battaglia di Cialdiran, 1514 (Palazzo Mirto, Palermo). Particolare

The madrasa and mosque of Sultan Hasan (14th century): unquestionably one of the masterpieces of Mamluk architecture in Cairo

The Ottoman Empire

Regency of Tunis Muradites (17 th century) Murad Kursu, the Corsican ( ) Husaynites ( ) Hussein Bey was an Ottoman of Greek descent whose mother was Ifriqiyan

Regency of Tripoli Qaramanlis ( ) Ahmad al-Qaramanli was a kulughlu (Turkish-native background)

Sidi Mahrez, Tunis 1899

Privateering Ali Biçnin, head of the captains guild, owner of many boats and hundreds of prisoners, influent figure in 1640 Algiers, was the Italian Piccinino. Usta Murad, who was captain of the galleys in Tunis and dominated the political scene from 1637 to 1640, came from Genoa.