Amojjar Pass is a

mountain pass A mountain pass is a navigable route through a mountain range or over a ridge. Since mountain ranges can present formidable barriers to travel, passes have played a key role in trade, war, and both Human migration, human and animal migration t ...

in the

Adrar Plateau The Adrar (, Berber languages, Berber for "mountain") is a highland natural region, natural and historical region of the Sahara, Sahara Desert in northern Mauritania. The Adrar Region, an administrative division of Mauritania, is named after th ...

in the centre of Adrar, near

Atar Atar, Ahtra, Atash, Azar () or ''Dāštāɣni'',, s.v. ''agni-.'' is the Zoroastrian concept of holy fire, sometimes described in abstract terms as "burning and unburning fire" or "visible and invisible fire" (Mirza, 1987:389). It is conside ...

Mauritania Mauritania, officially the Islamic Republic of Mauritania, is a sovereign country in Maghreb, Northwest Africa. It is bordered by the Atlantic Ocean to the west, Western Sahara to Mauritania–Western Sahara border, the north and northwest, ...

. The pink-brown

sandstone Sandstone is a Clastic rock#Sedimentary clastic rocks, clastic sedimentary rock composed mainly of grain size, sand-sized (0.0625 to 2 mm) silicate mineral, silicate grains, Cementation (geology), cemented together by another mineral. Sand ...

of the pass was worn away by repeated cycles of extreme dryness interrupted by torrential rain. The bases of the steep valley walls are covered in

scree Scree is a collection of broken rock fragments at the base of a cliff or other steep rocky mass that has accumulated through periodic rockfall. Landforms associated with these materials are often called talus deposits. The term ''scree'' is ap ...

, loosed by the erosion of the rainfall. There is little plant life in the pass.

Acacias ''Acacia'', commonly known as wattles or acacias, is a genus of about of shrubs and trees in the subfamily Mimosoideae of the pea family Fabaceae. Initially, it comprised a group of plant species native to Africa, South America, and Australa ...

are a notable exception, as they are resistant to

drought A drought is a period of drier-than-normal conditions.Douville, H., K. Raghavan, J. Renwick, R.P. Allan, P.A. Arias, M. Barlow, R. Cerezo-Mota, A. Cherchi, T.Y. Gan, J. Gergis, D. Jiang, A. Khan, W. Pokam Mba, D. Rosenfeld, J. Tierney, ...

. Amojjar Pass is an important link for ground transportation in Mauritania because it provides a somewhat protected roadway connecting Mauritania's capital,

Nouakchott Nouakchott ( ) is the capital and largest city of Mauritania. Located in the southwestern part of the country, it is one of the largest cities in the Sahara. The city also serves as the administrative and economic center of Mauritania. Once a ...

, with other important locations such as

Ouadane Ouadane or Wādān () is a small town in the desert region of central Mauritania, situated on the southern edge of the Adrar Plateau, northeast of Chinguetti. The town was a staging post in the trans-Saharan trade and for caravans transporti ...

and

Chinguetti Chinguetti ( ; ) is a ksar and a medieval trading center in northern Mauritania, located on the Adrar Plateau east of Atar. Chinguetti had a population of 4,800 as of 2013. Founded in the 13th century as the center of several trans-Saharan trad ...

. The

Neolithic The Neolithic or New Stone Age (from Ancient Greek, Greek 'new' and 'stone') is an archaeological period, the final division of the Stone Age in Mesopotamia, Asia, Europe and Africa (c. 10,000 BCE to c. 2,000 BCE). It saw the Neolithic Revo ...

rock paintings of

Agrour Amogjar The Agrour Amogjar is a 690 m high peak near the Amogjar Pass, in the Adrar plateau of central Mauritania Mauritania, officially the Islamic Republic of Mauritania, is a sovereign country in Maghreb, Northwest Africa. It is bordered by ...

are near the pass, northeast of Atar at .{{Cite journal, last=Flight, first=Colin, date=1973, title=A Survey of Recent Results in the Radiocarbon Chronology of Northern and Western Africa, journal=The Journal of African History, volume=14, issue=4, pages=543, doi=10.1017/S0021853700013037, jstor=180899, s2cid=162557119

Gallery

Adrar-Passe d'Amogjar (1).JPG, On the Amojjar Pass Amojjar Pass NASA image STS037-84-21.jpg, Satellite image of Amojjar Pass, in the canyon just east of the large flat-topped plateau (center) North on the left.

References

External links

A NASA satellite image
Mountain passes of Mauritania Canyons and gorges of Africa Adrar region