Cape Juby (, trans. ''Raʾs Juby'', es, link=no, Cabo Juby) is a

cape A cape is a clothing accessory or a sleeveless outer garment which drapes the wearer's back, arms, and chest, and connects at the neck. History Capes were common in medieval Europe, especially when combined with a hood in the chaperon. T ...

on the coast of southern

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 ...

, near the border with Western Sahara, directly east of the

Canary Islands The Canary Islands (; es, Canarias, ), also known informally as the Canaries, are a Spanish autonomous community and archipelago in the Atlantic Ocean, in Macaronesia. At their closest point to the African mainland, they are west of Mo ...

. Its surrounding area, including the cities of

Tarfaya Tarfaya ( ar, طرفاية - ''Ṭarfāya''; ber, ⵟⵔⴼⴰⵢⴰ) is a coastal Moroccan town, located at the level of Cape Juby, in western Morocco, on the Atlantic coast. It is located about 890 km southwest of the capital Rabat, an ...

and Tan-Tan, is called the Cape Juby Strip (after the

homonymous In linguistics, homonyms are words which are homographs (words that share the same spelling, regardless of pronunciation), or homophones ( equivocal words, that share the same pronunciation, regardless of spelling), or both. Using this definition ...

cape), the Tarfaya Strip (after the

city) or the Tekna Zone (after the Tekna, the native Saharawi tribe). The region is presently the far south of internationally recognized Morocco, and makes up a semi-desert buffer zone between Morocco proper at the Draa River and Western Sahara. The strip was under Spanish rule during much of the 20th century, officially as part of the Spanish protectorate in Morocco, but mainly administered alongside

Saguía el-Hamra Saguia el-Hamra ( es, Saguía el Hamra, ar, الساقية الحمراء, lit=Red Canal, translit=al-Saqiyah al-Hamra'a) was, with Río de Oro, one of the two territories that formed the Spain, Spanish province of Spanish Sahara after 1969. Its ...

and Río de Oro as part of Spanish Sahara, with which the Strip had closer cultural and historical links.

Modern history

Precolonial era

On May 28, 1767, Mohammed ben Abdallah, the Sultan of Morocco, signed a peace and commerce treaty with King

Charles III of Spain it, Carlo Sebastiano di Borbone e Farnese , house = Bourbon-Anjou , father = Philip V of Spain , mother = Elisabeth Farnese , birth_date = 20 January 1716 , birth_place = Royal Alcazar of Madrid, Spain , death_d ...

. In the treaty, Morocco was unable to guarantee the security of Spanish fishermen along the coasts south of the Noun River, as Morocco did not have control over the Tekna tribes of that area (Art. 18). On March 1, 1799, Sultan

Slimane Slimane or Sliman is an alternative of Suleiman (in Arabic name ) being the Arabic version of the name Solomon. The name means "man of peace". It is also a common given name and surname. It may refer to Given name ;Sliman *Sliman Mansour (born 194 ...

signed an accord with King

Charles IV of Spain Charles IV (Carlos Antonio Pascual Francisco Javier Juan Nepomuceno José Januario Serafín Diego) 11 November 1748 – 20 January 1819) was King of Spain and ruler of the Spanish Empire from 1788 to 1808. The Spain inherited by Charles IV ...

, in which he recognized that the Saguia el Hamra and Cape Juby regions were not part of his dominions (Art. 22). In 1879, the British North West African Company established a trading post near Cape Juby called " Port Victoria". On March 26, 1888, Moroccan soldiers attacked the post, killing the director of the post and leaving two workers badly injured. In 1895, the company sold its post to the Sultan of Morocco.

Spanish protectorate

In 1912, Spain negotiated with France (which controlled the affairs of Morocco at the time) for concessions on the southern coast of Morocco. officially occupied the Cape Juby region for Spain on July 29, 1916. It was administered by Spain as a single entity with Spanish Sahara and the Ifni enclave, as Spanish West Africa. The Spanish area comprised and had a population of 9,836. Its main town was founded by the Spanish as Villa Bens (now called

). Villa Bens was used as a staging post for

airmail Airmail (or air mail) is a mail transport service branded and sold on the basis of at least one leg of its journey being by air. Airmail items typically arrive more quickly than surface mail, and usually cost more to send. Airmail may be th ...

flights.

Retrocession to Morocco

When Morocco regained full independence in 1956, it requested the cession of officially Moroccan areas controlled by Spain. After some resistance and some fighting during 1957 (the

Ifni War The Ifni War, sometimes called the Forgotten War in Spain (''la Guerra Olvidada''), was a series of armed incursions into Spanish West Africa by Moroccan insurgents that began in October 1957 and culminated with the abortive siege of Sidi ...

), the Spanish government in 1958 ceded the Cape Juby Strip to Morocco.

Sahara sea

In 1877, the Scottish engineer Donald Mackenzie was the first to propose the creation of a Sahara Sea. Mackenzie's idea was to cut a channel from one of the sand-barred lagoons north of Cape Juby south to a large plain which Arab traders had identified to him as

El Djouf El Djouf ( ar, الجوف) is a desert, an arid natural region of sand dunes and rock salt which covers northeastern Mauritania and part of northwestern Mali. El Djouf is a part of the Sahara Desert in the north. El Djouf is 320 meters (1,050 fee ...

. Mackenzie believed this vast region was up to below sea level and that flooding it would create an inland sea of suited to commercial navigation and even agriculture. He further believed that geological evidence suggested this basin had once been connected to the Atlantic via a channel near the Saguia el-Hamra. He proposed that this inland sea, if augmented with a canal, could provide access to the

Niger River The Niger River ( ; ) is the main river of West Africa, extending about . Its drainage basin is in area. Its source is in the Guinea Highlands in south-eastern Guinea near the Sierra Leone border. It runs in a crescent shape through Mali ...

and the markets and rich resources of West Africa. There are several small depressions in the vicinity of Cape Juby; at below sea level, the Sebkha Tah is the lowest and largest. But it covers less than and is north of the geographical area identified as

(also known as the Majabat al-Koubra) which has an average elevation of 320 m. Mackenzie never travelled in this area but had read of other sub-sea level desert basins in present-day

Tunisia ) , image_map = Tunisia location (orthographic projection).svg , map_caption = Location of Tunisia in northern Africa , image_map2 = , capital = Tunis , largest_city = capital , ...

Algeria ) , image_map = Algeria (centered orthographic projection).svg , map_caption = , image_map2 = , capital = Algiers , coordinates = , largest_city = capital , religi ...

and

Egypt Egypt ( ar, مصر , ), officially the Arab Republic of Egypt, is a transcontinental country spanning the northeast corner of Africa and southwest corner of Asia via a land bridge formed by the Sinai Peninsula. It is bordered by the Med ...

similar to those found near Cape Juby. These basins contain seasonally dry salt lakes, known as

chott In geology, a chott, shott, or shatt (; ar, شط, šaṭṭ, lit=bank, coast) is a salt lake in Africa's Maghreb that stays dry for much of the year but receives some water in the winter. The elevation of a chott surface is controlled by the pos ...

s or sebkhas. Egypt's Qattara Depression is perhaps the largest such basin in North Africa.

References