Nineteenth-century Egyptians were largely ignorant of the Sudan they ruled.

Evidence

But what was this Sudan? Until 1884, the Sudan and Nubia were ostensibly united under the Egyptian aegis, yet throughout the nineteenth century the majority of Egyptians had little idea about real life in these two regions, and instead entertained highly romanticized and vague fantasies about life in Nubia or along the White Nile. — Eve M. Troutt Powell, A Different Shade of Colonialism_…, 308

Categorization

• XREF: Parallels the ‘imperial metropole ignorance’ pattern described for France’s Algeria or Britain’s India - colonizers lack knowledge of the territories they govern.