10 most difficult North Africa riddles

When the British first got involved in Egypt in the nineteenth century, Egypt was using a monetary unit known as the piastre, or Qirsh. Since 100 piastres was roughly between the value of one pound sterling and one Guinea, a new unit, called the pound in English and the ginaih in Arabic, was created equal to one hundred piastres. The Egyptian pound, however, has never been exactly equal in value to the pound sterling.

The Berber language is ancient and has 2200 years of written tradition. In 2011 Berber became a constitutionally official language of Morocco, after years of persecution (under the policy of Arabization). There is a movement among speakers of the closely related varieties of Northern Berber to unite them under a standard language.

The Mediterranean Sea makes up the majority of Israel's coastline. But Israel also has a small coastline on the Red Sea in the south, with the port of Eilat. This 11 km (7 miles) wide strip of land separates Egypt from Jordan, so tourists visiting Egypt typically need to approach Jordan by the sea if they want to visit Petra.

The Kingdom of Kush was an ancient kingdom situated south of Egypt, on the confluences of the Blue Nile and White Nile. Approximately 255 pyramids were constructed at three sites (including Meroe listed as UNESCO World Heritage Site) over a period of a few hundred years to serve as tombs for the Kushite kings and queens. These steep pyramids differ from Egyptian ones and were constructed much later.

Most of the Sahara consists of rocky hamada; ergs (large areas covered with sand dunes) form only about 20% of the total area.

The English name Egypt is derived from the Ancient Greek Aígyptos, but it has nothing in common with the local name of the country (except maybe with the Late Egyptian name of Memphis - Hikuptah). Ancient Egyptians called their land Kemet, meaning "black soil" (as opposed to the desert). Today, Misr is the official name of Egypt, while Masr is the Egyptian-local pronunciation in the Egyptian Arabic.

This is an astronaut photo of the Al Khufrah Oasis in Libya. The circular shape of fields is characteristic of center pivot irrigation. These fields are approximately 0.6 mile (1 kilometer) in diameter. Lighter colors indicate fields that have been harvested recently or just planted.

The name of fez comes from the city of Fes, Morocco, where it became fashionable among Andalusian Arabs in the 17th century. The fez got widely popular in the Ottoman Empire after 1829, when Sultan Mahmud II ordered his civil officials to wear the plain fez, and also banned the wearing of turbans.

The Alboran Sea is the westernmost portion of the Mediterranean Sea. The name of the sea is derived from the small Alboran Island in the middle of the sea. The island is named after a Tunisian pirate, Al Borani, who had a base on the island in the 16th century.

The picture shows argania, a tree endemic to the calcareous semidesert Sous valley of southwestern Morocco. In some parts of Morocco, argan takes the place of the olive as a source of forage, oil, timber, and fuel in Berber society. Especially near Essaouira, the argan tree is frequently climbed by goats.