The Kingdom of Morocco occupies the northwestern corner of Africa, forming the southern coast of the Straits of Gibraltar (12.9 km/8 mi across at its narrowest point). At the southern end of the country is the area of the Western Sahara, possession of which Morocco has been disputing with several local tribes since the start of war in 1976, and a subsequent ceasefire in 1991, with no negotiated settlement yet. Without the disputed area, Morocco covers 446,300 km2/172,300 mi2, and has a population of 37 million. Its largest city is Casablanca, and its capital is Rabat.
Disputed region of Western Sahara.
Human artifacts have been found dating back 90,000 years to the Paleolithic. External powers controlled the region for long periods of time, including colonizing Phoenicians from the 6th to the 1st centuries BCE, and then the Romans from that time until the 530’s CE. The first Moroccan state was established in 788 by the Arab Idris I, and was been ruled by a series of dynastic houses until the 20th century. In the 11th-12th centuries Morocco reached the peak of its regional power, controlling much of northwestern Africa and the Iberian Peninsula. In 1912 France and Spain divided the country between themselves, but in 1956 resistance movments and riots led to Morocco reuniting and regaining its independence. Democratic elections have been thwarted there ever since and the country is still controlled by a ruling monarch, though now with a bicameral legislature. Though the government is an autocracy, the economy is liberal, ruled not by government plan but by supply and demand. Services account for about half of it, with mining and manufacturing another quarter, and tourisn and agriculture the remaining quarter.
Marrakesh.
Morocco borders on both the Atlantic Ocean and Mediterranean Sea, being the southern jaw of the Straits of Gibraltar. Geographically there is northwestern coastal plain, backed by the northeast-southwest-trending Atlas Mountains, with the Sahara Desert to the east. Climatically the country ranges from a warm, comfortable Mediterranean climate in the northwest, through some localized cold regions in the mountains, to the torrid area in the southeast, though oases occur there.
Subtropical forest.
Mount Toubkal, Atlas Range.
Tomorrow: what’s an oasis?
Be brave, and be well.
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