Pied-noir

Pied-Noir

Pied-Noir (, Black-Foot), plural Pieds-Noirs, is a term referring to French citizens who lived in French Algeria before independence. Specifically, Pieds-Noirs include those of European settlers descent from France or other European countries (such as Spain, Italy and Malta), who were born in Algeria. From the French invasion on 18 June 1830 until its independence, Algeria was administratively part of France. This name started to be used commonly shortly before the end of the Algerian independence war in 1962, while formerly they were simply called Algerians, whereas Muslim people of Algeria were called Muslims or Indigenous. As of the last census in Algeria, taken on 1 June 1960, there were 1,050,000 non-Muslim civilians in Algeria (10% of the total population including 130,000 Algerian Jews).