Volume 34: The Small Western Ocean — The Kingdoms of Northern Africa, Part 2

The Four Kingdoms of the Continent of Northern Africa These are the kingdoms of Morocco and Fez mentioned in the Record of Foreign Lands; anciently divided into two kingdoms, they are now divided into four.

The "Record of Foreign Lands" (Zhi Fang Wai Ji) was a world geography written in Chinese by the Jesuit Giulio Aleni in 1623. "Fez" is here transliterated as Fusha.

The four kingdoms of the north of the African continent are called Morocco original: 摩羅果 (Moluoguo), Algiers original: 阿爾尼 (A'erni), Tunis original: 都尼司 (Dunisi), and Tripoli original: 特厘波里 (Teliboli). These four kingdoms share the same region, which is named Barbary original: 麻馬里 (Mamali). To the south, they lean against great mountains, and to the north, they border the Mediterranean Sea.

The territory is narrow but stretches a great distance, bounded to the east by Egypt and to the west by the Atlantic Ocean. Its length is estimated at two thousand li li: a Chinese unit of distance, approximately 500 meters. From the Atlas Mountains in the south to the Mediterranean in the north, its width ranges from fifty or sixty li to over a hundred li.

The Atlas Mountains original: 阿臘特斯山 (Alatesi Shan) stretch from east to west, matching the length of the Barbary region. Their highest peak is thirteen hundred zhang zhang: a unit of height; 1,300 zhang is approximately 4,300 meters or 14,000 feet, while the remaining smaller peaks are four or five hundred zhang high; all are located within the borders of Barbary. The mountain forests are deep and dense, with snow accumulating throughout the year. The indigenous inhabitants of these four kingdoms are all of the Muslim original: 麻密 (Mami); a 19th-century phonetic shorthand for Mahometan race.