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 Tan-Tan ( ar, طانطان, ber, ⵟⴰⵏⵟⴰⵏ) is a city in Tan-Tan Province in the region of Guelmim-Oued Noun in southwestern Morocco. It is a desert town with a population (2014 census) of 73,209. It is the largest city in the provi ...

, 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 Tekna () is a semi-nomadic Sahrawi tribal confederation of Lamta Sanhaja Berber and Arab Hassani origins. Its constituents today inhabit southern Morocco and northern Western Sahara, but traditionally with wider migration routes. Nowadays, it ...

, the native Saharawi tribe). The region is presently the far south of internationally recognized Morocco, and makes up a semi-desert

buffer zone A buffer zone is a neutral zonal area that lies between two or more bodies of land, usually pertaining to countries. Depending on the type of buffer zone, it may serve to separate regions or conjoin them. Common types of buffer zones are demil ...

between Morocco proper at the

Draa River :''Dra is also the abbreviation for the constellation Draco.'' The Draa ( ber, Asif en Dra, ⴰⵙⵉⴼ ⴻⵏ ⴷⵔⴰ, ary, واد درعة, wad dərʿa; also spelled Dra or Drâa, in older sources mostly Darha or Dara) is Morocco's longes ...

and

Western Sahara Western Sahara ( '; ; ) is a disputed territory on the northwest coast and in the Maghreb region of North and West Africa. About 20% of the territory is controlled by the self-proclaimed Sahrawi Arab Democratic Republic (SADR), while ...

. The strip was under Spanish rule during much of the 20th century, officially as part of the

Spanish protectorate in Morocco The Spanish protectorate in Morocco ; es, Protectorado español de Marruecos, links=no, was established on 27 November 1912 by a treaty between France and Spain that converted the Spanish sphere of influence in Morocco into a formal protect ...

, but mainly administered alongside Saguía el-Hamra and

Río de Oro Río de Oro ( Spanish for "Gold River"; , ''wādī-að-ðahab'', often transliterated as ''Oued Edhahab'') was, with Saguia el-Hamra, one of the two territories that formed the Spanish province of Spanish Sahara after 1969; it had been taken a ...

as part of

Spanish Sahara Spanish Sahara ( es, Sahara Español; ar, الصحراء الإسبانية, As-Sahrā'a Al-Isbānīyah), officially the Spanish Possessions in the Sahara from 1884 to 1958 then Province of the Sahara between 1958 and 1976, was the name used f ...

, with which the Strip had closer cultural and historical links.

Modern history

Precolonial era

On May 28, 1767,

Mohammed ben Abdallah ''Sidi'' Mohammed ben Abdallah ''al-Khatib'' ( ar, سيدي محمد بن عبد الله الخطيب), known as Mohammed III ( ar, محمد الثالث), born in 1710 in Fes and died on 9 April 1790 in Meknes, was the Sultan of Morocco from 17 ...

, 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

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 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 Spanish province of Spanish Sahara after 1969. Its name ...

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

and the

Ifni Ifni was a Spanish province on the Atlantic coast of Morocco, south of Agadir and across from the Canary Islands. It had a total area of , and a population of 51,517 in 1964. The main industry was fishing. The present-day Moroccan province in th ...

enclave, as

Spanish West Africa Spanish West Africa (, AOE) was a grouping of Spanish colonies along the Atlantic coast of northwest Africa. It was formed in 1946 by joining the southern zone of the Spanish protectorate in Morocco, the colony of Ifni and the colony of Spanish ...

. 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 The Sahara Sea was the name of a hypothetical macro-engineering project which proposed flooding endorheic basins in the Sahara Desert with waters from the Atlantic Ocean or Mediterranean Sea. The goal of this unrealized project was to create an ...

. 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 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 Spanish province of Spanish Sahara after 1969. Its name ...

. 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 Sebkha Tah, also named as Sabkhat Tah, Sebja Tah or Sebjet Tah, is a sabkha in southern Morocco. At 55 metres below sea level it is the lowest point of the country. It is located close to Atlantic Ocean and the border with Western Sahara. The ma ...

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 lake A salt lake or saline lake is a landlocked body of water that has a concentration of salts (typically sodium chloride) and other dissolved minerals significantly higher than most lakes (often defined as at least three grams of salt per litre). ...

s, 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 The Qattara Depression ( ar, منخفض القطارة, Munḫafaḍ al-Qaṭṭārah) is a depression in northwestern Egypt, specifically in the Matruh Governorate. The depression is part of the Western Desert of Egypt. The Qattara Depress ...

is perhaps the largest such basin in North Africa.

References