The Merchants of Oran: A Jewish Port at the Dawn of Empire

The Merchants of Oran weaves together the history of a Mediterranean port city with the lives of Oran's Jewish mercantile elite during the transition to French colonial rule. Through the life of Jacob Lasry and other influential Jewish merchants, Joshua Schreier tells the story of how this diverse and fiercely divided group both responded to, and in turn influenced, French colonialism in Algeria.

Jacob Lasry and his cohort established themselves in Oran in the decades after the Regency of A...