Mauritania

“ It was a point from which numerous caravan routes led southward into the heart of the African continent, even beyond the great desert, as well as eastward to Egypt and westward to the Atlantic coasts and Spain. Many flourishing towns surrounded this African metropolis and were the centers of many different activities, such as the cultivation of grain, the making of salt, the rearing of silk-worms and the production of silk. In Mauritania, which embraced the modern empire of Morocco and part of Algiers, the Arabs introduced the same spirit of enterprise. ”

“ Now, if what these inscriptions contain is true, it is much more credible, that the different nations, emigrating at that time, should seek their safety near hand among their friends, rather than go to an immense distance to Mauritania, to risk a precarious reception among strangers, and perhaps that country not yet inhabited. ”

“ When the Arabs came into the land some of them took to the plains inland, and continued their wild wandering idle style of life—half predatory, half pastoral; others took up their abode on the coast, became more mingled with the people of other sea-faring tribes, built towns, and came at last to be known as Mauri or Moors, from which the part of the land they dwelt in was known of old by the name of Mauritania. ”

“ The designation of Mauritania as a beneficiary sub-Saharan African country for purposes of section 506A of the 1974 Act is terminated, effective on January 1, 2009.
(2) In order to reflect in the HTS that beginning on January 1, 2009, Mauritania shall no longer be designated as a beneficiary sub-Saharan African country, general note 16 (a) to the HTS is modified by deleting “Islamic Republic of Mauritania” from the list of beneficiary sub-Saharan African countries.
(3) Kosovo is designated as a beneficiary developing country for purposes of the GSP program. ”

“ The parts of Mauritania which border on the Great Desert and the Atlantic Ocean, were filled with a fierce and untractable race of men, whose savage temper had been exasperated, rather than reclaimed, by their dread of the Roman arms. ”

“ Literacy: about 17%
Labor force: about 95,000 wage earners (1979) ; remainder of population in farming and herding; considerable unemployment
Organized labor: 30,000 union members claimed by single union, Mauritanian Workers' Union
GOVERNMENT Official name: Islamic Republic of Mauritania
Type: republic; military seized power in bloodless coup 10 July 1978
Capital: Nouakchott
Political subdivisions: 12 regions and a capital district
NOTE: Mauritania acquired administrative control of the southern third of Western (formerly Spanish) Sahara under a agreement with Morocco and Spain. ”

“ Mauritania has extensive deposits of iron ore, which account for nearly 40% of total exports. The decline in world demand for this ore, however, has led to cutbacks in production. The nation's coastal waters are among the richest fishing areas in the world, but overexploitation by foreigners threatens this key source of revenue. The country's first deepwater port opened near Nouakchott in 1986. In the past, drought and economic mismanagement resulted in a buildup of foreign debt. ”

“ The genuine Mauritania, or country of the Moors, which, from the ancient city of Tingi, or Tangier, was distinguished by the appellation of Tingitana, is represented by the modern kingdom of Fez. Salle, on the Ocean, so infamous at present for its piratical depredations, was noticed by the Romans, as the extreme object of their power, and almost of their geography. A city of their foundation may still be discovered near Mequinez, the residence of the barbarian whom we condescend to style the Emperor of Morocco ”

“ As in the rest of Mauritania, the population of Marocco still remains funda- mentally Berber, this element having, since the time of the rhocnicians, always maintained the preponderance. The successive conquering races, even the Arabs, who have remained masters on the plains and in the large towns, have succeeded only in driving the natives to the upland valleys, without acquiring a numerical superiority in the country. ”

“ Nothing seems to be more clear than the decadence of the race who now represent the Arab conquerors of Mauritania. In their better days they united to martial vigour and skill some aptitude for progress in arts and learning. Works of public utility were not unknown; and, at a time when nearly all Europe was plunged in intellectual darkness, Fez was one of the chief centres of Arabic culture. The history of the last four centuries in Marocco has been one of continuous and uninterrupted decline. ”

“ The regular commercial relations established in Mauritania between the inhabitants of the Tell and those of the oases, the former exchanging their cereals for the wool and dates of the latter, scarcely exist between the tribes of the Tripolitan oases and the people of Fezzan. Nevertheless a few palm groves in the Wady Shiati, south of the Black Mountains, belong to the Arabs of Tripoli, who yearly cross the hills and plateaux to collect their crop of dates. In general the land is distributed in fair proportion amongst the inhabitants, each of whom has his plot of ground and palm-grove ”

“ The opinion of the author of the History and Conquest of the Canary Islands, is, that the inhabitants came originally from Mauritania, and this he founds on the resemblance of names of places in Africa and in the islands: "for," says he, "Telde 214, which is the name of the oldest habitation in Canaria, Orotaba, and Tegesta, are all names which we find given to places in Mauritania and in Mount Atlas. It is to be supposed that Canaria, Fuertaventura, and Lancerotta, were peopled by the Alarbes 215, who are the nation most esteemed in Barbary ”

“ And they say, too, that after it arriveth at the other Mauritania Caesariensis, which is not a sandy land, it cometh up over the ground and there maketh another lake, in the which breed those same animals and creatures which breed in the other; and therefore men believe that all this water cometh from the Nile, and that after it floweth out from there and cometh to the other sandy districts which are beyond Mauritania and towards Ethiopia, it again disappeareth and runneth for the space of twenty days underground till it is within the land of Ethiopia. ”

“ Labor force: 12,000; 50% animal husbandry and subsistence farming, 50% other
Organized labor: none
GOVERNMENT Official name: Western Sahara
Type: legal status of territory and question of sovereignty unresolved—territory partitioned between Morocco and Mauritania in April 1976, with Morocco acquiring the northern two-thirds including the rich phosphate reserves at Bu Craa. Mauritania, under pressure from the Polisario guerrillas, abandoned all claims to its portion in August 1979; Morocco moved to occupy that sector shortly thereafter and has since asserted administrative control there ”

“ There are carved out of the territories comprised in what is officially known as French West Africa five colonies—Senegal, French Guinea, the Ivory Coast, Dahomey and the Upper Senegal and Niger, this last being entirely cut off from the sea—and the civil territory of Mauritania. To the colony of the Upper Senegal and Niger is attached the military territory of the Niger, embracing the French Sahara up to the limit of the Algerian sphere of influence. ”

“ It required semi-annual campaigns, followed by an unbroken succession of victories, to restrain the native insubordination of the African immigrants, whose multitudes, constantly recruited from the innumerable tribes of Mauritania, constituted not only the bulk of the army, but the predominant element of the population. ”

“ The whole country between Fez and Morocco is peopled with Beribas and Helots, who are a mixture of Africans and Arabs, besides other powerful Arab tribes who possess the country, and pasture their flocks between Fez and the sea. The two most powerful races of Mauritania and Tangitana, are the Ibue Maliks Sophean, and the Helots. ”

“ Fez, the capital most frequently visited by the Sultan, and the largest city in the empire, occupies an advantageous geographical position about the centre of the depression separating the Rif from the Atlas highlands. It also lies on the natural route which skirts the western foot of the Atlas range, so that its basin is intersected by the two great historic highways of Western Mauritania. The district enjoys the further advantages of a fertile and well-watered soil and pleasant scenery, diversified with rich open plains and densely wooded heights. ”

“ Recommends to the General Assembly that the Islami Republic of Mauritania be admitted to membership in the United Nations.
This work is excerpted from an official document of the United Nations. The policy of this organisation is to keep most of its documents in the public domain in order to disseminate "as widely as possible the ideas (contained) in the United Nations Publications". ”

“ AT the close of the year 1578 the slave-markets of Mauritania were glutted to their uttermost, and for once the price of a male slave was less than that of a donkey. This overstock of human ware was due to the thousands of prisoners who had survived the fateful battle fought in the neighborhood of Al-Kesar Kebir, on the banks of the Elmahassen, between the invading army of Dom Sebastian, the youthful, overbearing monarch of Lusitania, and the host of Muley Abd-al-Melek, the formidable Emir-al-Mumemin, the Commander of the true believers, the Seedna or lord of the Moorish Empire. ”

“ Heave ahead, an’ whativer ye do, steer clear o’ jaw-breakers,” murmured the seaman.
“The region,” said Lucien, “was first known as Numidia and Mauritania; Numidia being so named by the Greeks, who styled its wandering tribes Nomads. They were pastoral in their habits and thievish in their propensities, without laws or government worthy of the name. The Mauri, or Moors, devoted themselves to more settled pursuits, became traders and inhabitants of towns, and were a mixed race, although originally springing from the same stock as the Nomads, or Arabs. ”

“ Eastward from Mauritania the plain becomes narrower, the rivers fewer, and the soil less fertile, so that no great state, even if it had originated there, could have long maintained itself. The north-eastern corner of the continent, however, is the richest and most valuable of all the lands it contains. ”

“ Biodiversity, Climate Change, Desertification, Endangered Species, Hazardous Wastes, Law of the Sea, Ozone Layer Protection, Ship Pollution, Wetlands
signed, but not ratified: none of the selected agreements Geography - note: most of the population concentrated in the cities of Nouakchott and Nouadhibou and along the Senegal River in the southern part of the country
People Mauritania Population: 2,998,563 (July 2004 est.) ”

“ The Rif country to the southward, inland from the Mediterranean coast, extends about thirty-five miles and on the westward is bordered by the Tetuan province and the mountains of Khamás and Ghamára.
The population of Rif amounts, as far as can be calculated, to about 150,000 souls. The Rifians are a Berber race, and have never been conquered by the various nations—Phœnicians, Romans, Goths, and Arabs—who have invaded Mauritania: they have always maintained their independence ”

“ Fortūnātæ insulæ, islands at the west of Mauritania in the Atlantic sea. They are supposed to be the Canary isles of the moderns, thought to be only two in number, at a little distance one from the other, and 10,000 stadia from the shores of Libya. They were represented as the seats of the blessed, where the souls of the virtuous were placed after death. The air was wholesome and temperate, and the earth produced an immense number of various fruits without the labours of men. ”

“ Virgins coming from the most distant on this and that side of Mauritania desire to be consecrated here; and though all the families be in bonds, yet modesty cannot be bound. She who mourns over the hardship of slavery avows an eternal kingdom. ”

“ The Story of Júdar (vol. vi. 207) is Egyptian, to judge from its local knowledge (pp. 217 and 254) together with its ignorance of Marocco (p. 223) . It shows a contrast, in which Arabs delight, of an almost angelical goodness and forgiveness with a well-nigh diabolical malignity, and we find the same extremes in Abú Sír the noble-minded Barber and the hideously inhuman Abú Kír. The excursion to Mauritania is artfully managed and gives a novelty to the mise-en-scène. ”

“ But they are naturally most numerous in those districts which maintain the most frequent relations with their native land ; hence they prevail chiefly in Marocco, which enjoys constant commercial intercourse with Western Sudan. Even the imperial family, although claiming descent from the Prophet, is more Nngro than Arab. All the towns throughout Mauritania are largely peopled by " Moors," that is, an endlessly mixed race, resulting from the fusion of Roman, Vandal, Arab, Berber, Italian, French, Spanish, and other ^lediterranean elements. ”

“ Mauritania, Getulia, and Metagonitis, are situated in the south-west of the entire earth, and have due familiarity with the south-west triplicity, composed of Cancer, Scorpio, and Pisces; their rulers therefore are Mars and Venus, in vespertine position. From this figuration of the planets it results that the dwellers in these regions are doubly governed by a man and a woman, who are both children of the same mother; the man rules the males, and the woman the females. They are extremely hot in constitution, and desirous of women ”

“ The kingdom of Marocco is also extended aboue the Ocean Sea, vnto the citie of Azamor and Azafi, which are vpon the Ocean Sea, toward the West of the sayd kingdom. Nere Mauritania Tingitana (that is to say, by the two kingdoms of Fes, and Marocco) are in the Sea, the Ilands of Canarie, called in old time, The fortunate Ilands. Toward the south of this region is the kingdom of Guinea, with Senega, Ialofo, Gambra, and many other regions of the Blacke Moores, called Aethiopians or Negros all which are watered with the riuer Negro, called in old time Niger. ”