History of Casablanca

Casablanca in 1572, when it was still called Anfa

The history of the city of Casablanca in Morocco has been one of many political and cultural changes. At different times it has been governed by Berber, Roman, Arab, Portuguese, Spanish, French, British, and Moroccan regimes. It has had an important position in the region as a port city, making it valuable to a series of conquerors during its early history.

The original Berber name, Anfa (meaning: "hill" in English), was used by the locals, and Berber-speaking, city dwellers until the French occupation army entered the city in 1907 and adopted the Spanish name, Casablanca. "Anfa" now refers to the original old city quarters of Casablanca.

Roman Anfa

Anfa est une grande cité, edifiée par les Romans sur le rivage de la mer Oceane... (Leo Africanus: Anfa is a big city, built by the Romans on the ocean shore...) [1]

The area which is today Casablanca was founded and settled by the Berbers by about the 10th century BC. It was used as a port by the Phoenicians and later by the Romans.

Roman coin of Juba II similar to those found in a wreckage inside Roman Anfa port

Romans occupied the area in 15 BC and created a commercial port, directly connected to the Mogador island in the Iles Purpuraires of southern Mauritania. From there they obtained a special dye, that colored the purple stripe in Imperial Roman Senatorial togas. The expedition of Juba II to discover the Canary islands and Madeira probably departed from Anfa.

The Roman port, probably called Anfus, was part of a Berber client state of Rome until Emperor Augustus. When Rome annexed Ptolemy of Mauretania's kingdom, Anfa was incorporated into the Roman Empire by Caligula. But this was done only nominally because the Roman limes was a few dozen kilometers north of the port (the Roman military fortifications of Mauretania Tingitana were just a few kilometers south of the Roman colonia named Sala Colonia). However, Roman Anfa—connected mainly by commerce and by socio-cultural ties to Volubilis ("autonomous" from Rome since 285 AD)—lasted until the 5th century, when Vandals conquered Roman northwestern Africa.

A Roman wreck of the 2nd century, from which were salvaged 169 silver coins, shows that the Romans appreciated this useful port for commerce. There is even evidence of oil commerce with Roman Volubilis and Tingis in the 3rd century.

Meanwhile, a large Berber tribe, the Berghouata, settled in the area between the rivers Bou Regreg to the north and Oum er-Rbia to the south of the Roman port. Consequently, the independent Berber kingdom called Barghawata, in the area then named Anfa, arose around in 744 AD, and continued until it was conquered by the new Berber kingdom of the Almoravids in 1068 AD.

Abou El Kassem El Ziani refers to ancient Casablanca as "Anfa" and stated that the Zenatiyins (Berber dynasty under Arab rule) were the first people that established Anfa in the period of their settlement in Tamassna.

Leo Africanus defined Anfa as a Roman city in his famous Della descrittione dell’Africa et delle cose notabili che ivi sono (Description of Africa), written in the 16th century.

Before the French Protectorate

During the 14th century, under the Berber dynasty Merinids, the town rose in importance as a port and in the early 15th century, became independent once again. It emerged as a safe harbour for pirates. This led to attacks by the Portuguese, who destroyed the town in 1468 AD. The Portuguese used the ruins to build a military fortress in 1515 AD. The village that grew up around it was called "Casabranca", meaning "White House" in Portuguese. They eventually abandoned the area completely in 1755 AD following an earthquake which destroyed it.

Artifacts in the Jewish Museum of Casablanca.

The town and the medina of Casablanca as it is today was founded in 1770 AD by sultan Mohammed ben Abdallah (1756–1790), the grandson of Moulay Ismail. Built with the aid of Spaniards, the town was called Casa Blanca (white house in Spanish) translated Dar el Beida in Arabic.

Casablanca's street plan is based on that of a French architect named Henri Prost, who placed the center of the city where the main market of Anfa had been. From this point all main streets radiate to the east and to the south. More city plans were developed in 1946 AD, and later in the 1980s.

In the 19th century Casablanca became a major supplier of wool to the booming textile industry in Britain and shipping traffic increased (the British, in return, began importing Morocco's now famous national drink, gunpowder tea). By the 1860s, there were around 5,000 residents, and the population grew to around 10,000 by the late 1880s. Casablanca remained a modestly sized port, with a population reaching around 12,000 within a few years of the French conquest and arrival of French colonialists in the town, at first administrators within a sovereign sultanate, in 1906. By 1921, this was to rise to 110,000, largely through the development of bidonvilles

French rule

Main articles: Bombardment of Casablanca (1907) and French Protectorate in Morocco

French Invasion

The Galilée, a French cruiser stationed at Casablanca in response to the Casablanca Cemetery Rail Riots of June 1907.

Following the Treaty of Algeciras in 1906, which granted the French holding company La Compagnie Marocaine rights to build modern ports in Casablanca and in Asfi, construction at the port of Casablanca began on May 2, 1907. A narrow gauge railway extending from the port to a quarry in Roches Noires for stones to build the breakwater, passed over the Sidi Belyout necropolis, an area held sacred by the Moroccans. In addition, the French had started to control the customs.

On July 28, a delegation representing the tribes of the Chaouia, led by Hajj Hamou of the Ouled Hariz tribe, pressed Abu Bakr Bin Buzaid (بوبكر بن بوزيد السلاوي), pasha of Casablanca and representative of Sultan Abdelaziz and the Makhzen in the city, with 3 demands: the removal of the French officers from the customs house, an immediate halt on the construction of the port, and the destruction of the railroad.

The pasha equivocated and postponed his decision to mid-day on July 30, by which time regional tribesmen had populated the city and started an insurrection. A group waited for the train to make its way out to Roches Noires to pick up rocks from the quarry, then piled rocks onto the tracks behind it to isolate it. When the train returned, it was ambushed and the French, Spanish, and Italian workers aboard were killed and the train destroyed.

This was the justification the French had been waiting for. From August 5-7, a fleet of French armored cruisers bombarded Casablanca and French troops were landed, marking the beginning of the invasion of Morocco. The French then took control of Casablanca and the Chaouia. This effectively began the process of colonization, although French control of Casablanca was not formalized until the signature of the Treaty of Fez March 30, 1912.

It was especially during the years of military governor Hubert Lyautey that Casablanca became Morocco's economic center and Africa's biggest harbor.

The famous 1942 film Casablanca underlined the city's colonial status at the time—depicting it as the scene of a power struggle between competing European powers, carried out without any reference to the local population, and with the film's vast cosmopolitan cast of characters (American, French, German, Czech and some other nationalities) including not a single Arab.

World War II

Casablanca was an important strategic port during World War II. In November 1942, the British and Americans organised a 3-pronged attack on North Africa (Operation Torch), of which the westernmost one was at Casablanca.

The Task Force landed before daybreak on 8 November 1942, at three points in Morocco: Asfi (Operation Blackstone), Fedala (Operation Brushwood, the largest landing with 19,000 men), and Mehdiya-Port Lyautey (Operation Goalpost). Because it was hoped that the French would not resist, there were no preliminary bombardments. This proved to be a costly error as French defenses took a toll of American landing forces.

On the night of 7 November, pro-Allied General Antoine Béthouart attempted a coup d'etat against the French command in Morocco, so that he could surrender to the Allies the next day. His forces surrounded the villa of General Charles Noguès, the Vichy-loyal high commissioner. However, Noguès telephoned loyal forces, who stopped the coup. In addition, the coup attempt alerted Noguès to the impending Allied invasion, and he immediately bolstered French coastal defenses.

A flyer in French and Arabic that was distributed by Allied forces in the streets of Casablanca, calling on citizens to cooperate with the Allied forces.

At Safi, the objective being capturing the port facilities to land the Western Task Force's medium tanks, the landings were mostly successful. The landings were begun without covering fire, in the hope that the French would not resist at all. However, once French coastal batteries opened fire, Allied warships returned fire. By the time General Ernest Harmon's 2nd Armored Division arrived, French snipers had pinned the assault troops (most of whom were in combat for the first time) on Safi's beaches. Most of the landings occurred behind schedule. Carrier aircraft destroyed a French truck convoy bringing reinforcements to the beach defenses. Safi surrendered on the afternoon of 8 November. By 10 November, the remaining defenders were pinned down, and the bulk of Harmon's forces raced to join the siege of Casablanca.

At Port-Lyautey, the landing troops were uncertain of their position, and the second wave was delayed. This gave the French defenders time to organize resistance, and the remaining landings were conducted under artillery bombardment. With the assistance of air support from the carriers, the troops pushed ahead, and the objectives were captured.

At Fedala, weather disrupted the landings. The landing beaches again came under French fire after daybreak. Patton landed at 08:00, and the beachheads were secured later in the day. The Americans surrounded the port of Casablanca by 10 November, and the city surrendered an hour before the final assault was due to take place.

Casablanca hosted the Casablanca Conference -called even "Anfa Conference"- in 1943 (from January 14 to January 24), in which Churchill and Roosevelt discussed the progress of the war. Casablanca was the site of a large American air base, which was the staging area for all American aircraft for the European Theater of Operations during World War II.

Toward Independence

During the 1940s and 1950s, Casablanca was a major center of anti-colonial struggle.

In 1947, when the Sultan went to the Tangier International Zone to deliver speech requesting independence from colonial powers, the first stage of the Revolution of the King and the People, French colonial forces instigated a conflict between Senegalese Tirailleurs serving the French colonial empire and Moroccan locals in a failed attempt to sabotage the Sultan's journey to Tangier. The massacre of Casablanca lasted for about 24 hours from April 7-8 1947, as the tirailleurs fired randomly into residential buildings in working class neighborhoods, killing 180 Moroccan civilians. The Sultan returned to Casablanca to comfort the families of the victims, then proceeded to Tangier to deliver the historic speech.

The assassination of the Tunisian labor unionist Farhat Hached by La Main Rouge—the clandestine militant wing of French intelligence—sparked protests in cities around the world and riots in Casablanca from December 7-8 1952.

On December 24, 1953, in response to violence and abuses from French colonists culminating in the forced exile of Sultan Mohammed V on Eid al-Adha, Mohammed Zerktouni orchestrated the bombing of the Central Market, killing 16 people.

Since independence

Morocco regained independence from France on 2 March 1956.

In 1930, Casablanca hosted a round of the Formula One world championship. The race was held at the new Anfa Racecourse. In 1958, the race was held at Ain-Diab circuit - (see Moroccan Grand Prix). In 1983, Casablanca hosted the Mediterranean Games.

The city is now developing a tourism industry. Casablanca has become the economic and business capital of Morocco, while Rabat is the political capital.

In March 2000, women's groups organised demonstrations in Casablanca proposing reforms to the legal status of women in the country. 40,000 women attended, calling for a ban on polygamy and the introduction of divorce law (divorce being a purely religious procedure at that time). Although counter-demonstration attracted half a million participants, the movement for change started in 2000 was influential on King Mohammed VI, and he enacted a new Mudawana, or family law, in early 2004, meeting some of the demands of women's rights activists.

On May 16, 2003, 33 civilians were killed and more than 100 people were injured when Casablanca was hit by a multiple suicide bomb attack carried out by Moroccans and claimed by some to have been linked to al-Qaeda.

A string of suicide bombings struck the city in early 2007. A suspected militant blew himself up at a Casablanca internet cafe on March 11, 2007. On April 10, three suicide bombers blew themselves up during a police raid of their safe house. Two days later, police set up barricades around the city and detained two more men who had escaped the raid. On April 14, two brothers blew themselves up in downtown Casablanca, one near the American Consulate, and one a few blocks away near the American Language Center. Only one person was injured aside from the bombers, but the Consulate was closed for more than a month.

See also

• Timeline of Casablanca
• Tingis
• Sala Colonia
• Volubilis
• Acheulean
• Mousterian
• Aterian
• Mesolithic

Further reading

See also: Timeline of Casablanca § Bibliography

External links

Maghreb Arabe Presse: 500k-year human fossil remains found in Casablanca (05/26/2006)

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