Cape Three Forks, Cape des Trois Fourches, or Cape Tres Forcas is a headland on the Mediterranean coast of northeastern Morocco.
Cape Three Forks, Cape des Trois Fourches, or Cape Tres Forcas is a headland on the Mediterranean coast of northeastern Morocco.
The cape is a large mountainous promontory of North Africa into the Mediterranean Sea. For centuries, this cape has provided both a nautical landmark and a maritime hazard for ships in the Alboran Sea. The Spanish exclave of Melilla surrounds a smaller cape on the eastern side of the peninsula.
In antiquity, the cape was known to the Phoenicians and Carthaginians as Rusadir (Punic : 𐤓𐤔𐤀𐤃𐤓, ršʾdr), [1] giving its name to a nearby port (now Melilla). The name meant "Powerful" [2] or "High Cape", [3] but can also be understood as "Cape of the Powerful One", in reference to Baal, Tanit, and other important Punic deities. [4] [5] It was known to the Romans as Cape Metagonites (Latin : Metagonites Promontorium). [6] [7]
Cape Three Forks is known in Spanish as Cabo de Tres Forcas, in French as Cap des Trois Fourches, and in Arabic as Ras Tleta Madari, all meaning "Cape of the Three Forks".
It is also known in Arabic as Ras Uarc. [8]
On 26 August 1923 the Spanish battleship España ran aground and eventually wrecked on the cape. [9] [10]
A lighthouse is located in the north end of the cape. It is a gray tower on white two-story dwelling.
At least 11 locations in the Cape Three Forks have been identified as places of pious reflection, either small hermitages, bushes or trees, five of them featuring the tomb of the marabout. [11]
| Designations | |
|---|---|
| Official name | Cap des Trois Fourches |
| Designated | 15 January 2005 |
| Reference no. | 1473 [12] |
Cape Three Forks is a Ramsar designated site with no. 1473. It hosts different species, some of them threatened, such as the monk seal, two species of limpets ( Patella ferruginea and Patella nigra ), the loggerhead turtle, the fin whale and two species of dolphin ( Tursiops truncatus and Delphinus delphis ). The main activities taking place in the area are fishing and tourism. [13]
Melilla is an autonomous city of Spain in North Africa. It lies on the eastern side of the Cape Three Forks, bordering Morocco and facing the Mediterranean Sea. It has an area of 12.3 km2 (4.7 sq mi). It was part of the Province of Málaga until 14 March 1995, when the Statute of Autonomy of Melilla was passed.
Muhammad ibn Abd al-Karim al-Khattabi, better known as Abd el-Krim was a Moroccan political and military leader and the President of the Republic of the Rif. He and his brother M'Hammad led a large-scale revolt by a coalition of Riffian tribes against French and Spanish colonization of the Rif, in Morocco. His guerrilla tactics, which included the first-ever use of tunneling as a technique of modern warfare, directly influenced Ho Chi Minh, Mao Zedong and Che Guevara.
The Battle of Annual was fought on 22 July 1921 at Annual, in northeastern Morocco, between the Spanish Army and Rifian Berbers during the Rif War. The Spanish suffered a major military defeat, which is almost always referred to by the Spanish as the Disaster of Annual which is widely considered to be the worst defeat suffered by the modern Spanish Army.
The Spanish protectorate in Morocco 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 protectorate.
The Rif or Riff, also called Rif Mountains, is a geographic region It is bordered on the north by the Mediterranean Sea and Spain and on the west by the Atlantic Ocean, northern Morocco and is the Homeland to the indigenous people of the Rifians people. Historically, it belonged to the Rif Republic and its president, Abd el Krim, who led the Rif War from 1920 to 1927 and against a Spanish colonial empire, the Rif region was Historically a Spanish colony by the Spanish colonial empire in Africa. This mountainous and fertile area is bordered by Cape Spartel and Tangier to the west, by Berkane and the Moulouya River to the east, by the Mediterranean to the north, and by the Ouergha River to the south. The Rif mountains are separated into the eastern Rif mountains and western Rif mountains.
The Army of Africa or Moroccan Army Corps was a field army of the Spanish Army that garrisoned the Spanish protectorate in Morocco from the late 19th century until Morocco's independence in 1956.
Ras Nouadhibou is a 60-kilometre (37 mi) peninsula or headland divided by the border between Mauritania and Western Sahara on the African coast of the Atlantic Ocean. It is internationally known as Cabo Blanco in Spanish or Cap Blanc in French.
The Rif War was an armed conflict fought from 1921 to 1926 between the occupying colonialists of Spain and the Berber tribes of the mountainous Rif region of northern Morocco.
Tíjola is a municipality of Almería province, in the autonomous community of Andalusia, Spain.
Amghar Mohammed Ameziane, Prince of the Rif was the last Tribal Monarch (Amghar) of the Rif Tribes and the leader of the Riffian resistance against the Spanish colonization of the Rif. He is the great-great-grandfather of the socialite Massinissa of the Rif.
The Hispano-Moroccan War, also known as the Spanish–Moroccan War, the First Moroccan War, the Tetuán War, or, in Spain, as the War of Africa, was fought from Spain's declaration of war on Morocco on 22 October 1859 until the Treaty of Wad-Ras on 26 April 1860. It began with a conflict over the borders of the Spanish city of Ceuta and was fought in northern Morocco. Morocco sued for peace after the Spanish victory at the Battle of Tetuán.
The Second Melillan campaign was a conflict in 1909 in northern Morocco around Melilla. The fighting involved local Riffians and the Spanish Army.
Rusadir was an ancient Punic and Roman town at what is now Melilla, Spain, in northwest Africa. Under the Roman Empire, it was a colony in the province of Mauretania Tingitana.
PauknAir Flight 4101 was a British Aerospace 146 that crashed on a flight from Málaga, Spain, to the Spanish North African exclave of Melilla on 25 September 1998. All 38 passengers and crew on board the aircraft were killed in the accident.
The Alhucemas landing was a landing operation which took place on 8 September 1925 at Alhucemas by the Spanish Army and Navy and, in lesser numbers, an allied French naval and aerial contingent, that would put an end to the Rif War. It is considered the first amphibious landing in history involving the use of tanks and massive seaborne air support. Alhucemas is seen as a precursor of the Allied amphibious landings in World War II, and the first successful combined operation of the 20th century.
Isabel II Island is the central island of the Chafarinas Islands, in the Mediterranean Sea. The island belongs to Spain. It is located only 4 kilometres (2.5 mi) away from the North-African shore, in front of the Moroccan town of Ras Kebdana. Its area is 0.153 km2, and there is a military base and a church.
Cazaza was a Spanish enclave on the western coast of Cape Three Forks, in what is today Morocco, around 18 km from Melilla. It was here that the exiled Boabdil, last Emir of Granada, landed when he left the Iberian Peninsula in 1492.
The Port of Melilla is a cargo, fishing, and passenger port and marina located in Melilla, a Spanish autonomous city off the coast of North Africa.
José Marina Vega was a Spanish military officer and politician. Leader of the military operations in Melilla during the 1909 Melilla Campaign, he later served as High Commissioner of Spain in Morocco (1913–1915) and as Minister of War.
Abd el-Kader bel Hach Tieb was a Riffian tribal leader, caïd of the Beni Sicar, in northeastern Morocco.
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