Cyrenaica

Italian Cyrenaica was an Italian colony, located in present-day eastern Libya, that existed from 1911 to 1934. It was part of the territory conquered from the Ottoman Empire during the Italo-Turkish War of 1911, alongside Italian Tripolitania.

The territory of the two colonies was sometimes referred to as “Italian Libya” or Italian North Africa (Africa Settentrionale Italiana/ ASI). Both names were also used after their unification, with Italian Libya becoming the official name of the newly combined colony.

In 1923, indigenous rebels associated with the Senussi Order organized the Libyan resistance movement against Italian settlement in Libya. The rebellion was put down by Italian forces in 1932, after the so-called “pacification campaign”, which resulted in the deaths of a quarter of Cyrenaica’s local population.

In 1934, it became part of Italian Libya.