Colonial history of the west coast of the Sahara

The colonial history of the Sahara west coast includes the European contacts with the West African coast of today's Western Sahara and Mauritania between the 15th and 20th centuries.

Portugal and Spain

Annoyed by the Almoravid rule in Spain in the 11th and 12th centuries, there seems to have been little contact between Mauritania and Europe during this period . The hospitable coastline of Mauritania continued to discourage travelers until the Portuguese began their African explorations in the 15th century. Lured by legends about the great riches of the inner West African kingdoms, the Portuguese built a trading castle near Arguin in the southeast of Cape Blanc ( Ras Nouadhibou ) in 1455 . The King of Portugal also maintained a trading post at Ouadane in Adrar with the intention of diverting the gold that was being transported north in caravans . Because of the little success of their search for gold, the Portuguese quickly adapted and got involved in the slave trade . In the 15th century, around 1000 slaves per year were exported from Arguin to Europe and to the Portuguese sugar plantations on the island of São Tomé in the Gulf of Guinea . With the unification of the Portuguese and Spanish crowns in 1580, the Spanish had the greatest influence along the coast.

Netherlands

In 1638 they were replaced by the Dutch, who were the first to discover the trade in gum arabic and who knew how to make use of it. Gum arabic, a product obtained from the acacia trees in Trarza and Brakna and used in printed textiles, was thought to be better than that from Arabia .

Brandenburg-Prussia

From 1685 to 1721 there was a small colonial base of the Brandenburg-African Compagnie on the West African island of Arguin .

France and Great Britain

In 1678 the French chased the Dutch out and established a permanent trading colony in Saint-Louis at the mouth of the Senegal River , where Senegalese French companies traded for more than 50 years.

The Moors , negotiating partners of the Europeans, saw the ongoing rivalries between the European powers as a sign of weakness and quickly learned to exploit the advantages of playing one power against the other. For example, they gave monopolies to the French and the Dutch at the same time. The Moors also knew how to make as much profit as possible from the Europeans, so that in the negotiations with the Amir of Trarza for a trade monopoly on gum arabic, the French gave him a considerable number of gifts in exchange. Thus began the custom of making annual payments to the Moors to regulate affairs with a government or society. In 1763, England had neutralized France's influence from the coast of West Africa. France only regained control after the Vienna Conference in 1815, when French sovereignty was recognized on the coast of West Africa from Cap Blanc to Senegal .

Francisco Quiroga noted "the almost wild independence" of these populations and their rejection of all authority, especially that of the Moroccan sultan; He reported that the Moors had told him very often that "the Arabs of the desert know no other masters than Allah and Mohammed".

literature

John Mercer: Spanish Sahara. George Allen & Unwin Ltd, London 1976