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Abdallah ben Aisha (), also Abdellah bin Aicha, was a Moroccan Admiral and ambassador to 
One of Abdallah's main missions had been to obtain an agreement to prevent the capture of Muslims by French ships, and to obtain the return of captured Moroccan pirates employed on French
Abdallah ben Aisha (), also Abdellah bin Aicha, was a Moroccan Admiral and ambassador to France
France (), officially the French Republic ( ), is a country primarily located in Western Europe. It also comprises of overseas regions and territories in the Americas and the Atlantic, Pacific and Indian Oceans. Its metropolitan area ...
and England
England is a country that is part of the United Kingdom. It shares land borders with Wales to its west and Scotland to its north. The Irish Sea lies northwest and the Celtic Sea to the southwest. It is separated from continental Europe b ...
in the 17th century. Abdallah departed for France on 11 November 1698 in order to negotiate a treaty.''In the Land of the Christians'' by Nabil Matar, p.197 He spoke Spanish and English fluently, but not French. His embassy followed the visit of François Pidou de Saint Olon to Morocco in 1689.
Abdallah met with Louis XIV
, house = Bourbon
, father = Louis XIII
, mother = Anne of Austria
, birth_date =
, birth_place = Château de Saint-Germain-en-Laye, Saint-Germain-en-Laye, France
, death_date =
, death_place = Palace of Ver ...
on 16 February 1699. He was welcomed warmly in Paris and visited many landmarks. He also met with the deposed English king James II, exiled in France at that time, whom he had apparently known in his youth when he had been a captive in England.
One of Abdallah's main missions had been to obtain an agreement to prevent the capture of Muslims by French ships, and to obtain the return of captured Moroccan pirates employed on French galleys
A galley is a type of ship that is propelled mainly by oars. The galley is characterized by its long, slender hull, shallow draft, and low freeboard (clearance between sea and gunwale). Virtually all types of galleys had sails that could be use ...
. Louis XIV however denied a treaty, and on the contrary boasted about his power to the Moroccan king.
After Abdallah's return to Morocco
Morocco (),, ) officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is the westernmost country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It overlooks the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria t ...
, numerous letters continued to be exchanged with France, and the Moroccan ruler Mulay Ismail even offered James II military support to reinstal him on the English throne if he wished to convert to Islam, and if not, at least to Protestantism
Protestantism is a branch of Christianity that follows the theological tenets of the Protestant Reformation, a movement that began seeking to reform the Catholic Church from within in the 16th century against what its followers perceived to b ...
.
See also
* Islam and Protestantism * Anglo-Moroccan alliance *Franco-Ottoman alliance
The Franco-Ottoman Alliance, also known as the Franco-Turkish Alliance, was an alliance established in 1536 between the King of France Francis I and the Sultan of the Ottoman Empire Suleiman I. The strategic and sometimes tactical alliance was o ...
Notes
References
* Matar, Nabil ''In the Land of the Christians'' Routledge 2003, New York and London, Morocco–United Kingdom relations Ambassadors of Morocco to England Ambassadors of Morocco to France 17th-century Moroccan people Moroccan diplomats Moroccan translators 17th-century diplomats {{Morocco-bio-stub