section_path: Name/Etymology
section_name: Etymology
paragraph_text: Etymology
  
  Algeria's name derives from the city of Algiers, which in turn derives from the Arabic al-Jazāʾir (الجزائر, "the islands"), referring to four small islands off its coast, a truncated form of the older Jazāʾir Banī Mazghanna (جزائر بني مزغنة, "islands of Bani Mazghanna"). The name was given by Buluggin ibn Ziri after he established the city on the ruins of the Phoenician city of Icosium in 950. It was employed by medieval geographers such as Muhammad al-Idrisi and Yaqut al-Hamawi.
  
  Algeria took its name from the Regency of Algeria or Regency of Algiers, when Ottoman rule was established in the central Maghreb in early 16th century. This period saw the installation of a political and administrative organization which participated in the establishment of the Watan el djazâïr (وطن الجزائر, country of Algiers) and the definition of its borders with its neighboring entities on the east and west. The Ottoman Turks who settled in Algeria referred both to themselves and the peoples as " Algerians ". Acting as a central military and political authority in the regency, the Ottoman Turks shaped the modern political identity of Algeria as a state possessing all the attributes of sovereign independence, despite still being nominally subject to the Ottoman sultan. Algerian nationalist, historian and statesman Ahmed Tewfik El Madani regarded the regency as the "first Algerian state" and the "Algerian Ottoman republic".