’The Bible Dream’: Official Travel in Morocco, c. 1845–1935

Abstract

Travel to Morocco burgeoned in the late nineteenth century.¹ Steamships offering superior comforts crossed from Gibraltar to Tangier, often calling at Morocco’s coastal towns before returning to British and Continental ports. The General Treaty of 1856 between Britain and Morocco permitted the appointment of British consuls in towns in the interior as well as on the coast. It also allowed British subjects to travel or live in any part of the Sultan of Morocco’s dominions. But until, and even for some time after, the French protectorate commenced in 1912, travellers portrayed Morocco as a timeless, fairy-tale land, whose colours, smells and sounds formed a direct link to the Arabian Nights. Thus, in 1845, the Political Agent and Consul-General at Tangier, John (later Sir John) Hay Drummond Hay, observed that Morocco resembled the land of the Scriptures. ‘The Bible and the “Arabian Nights” are your best handbooks, and would best prepare you for the scene.’² To Arnold Robertson, British Agent and Consul-General at Tangier (1921–4), Morocco was still a ‘Bible dream’ in 1922.³ But in and around Tangier, the juxtaposition of East and West was also manifest. The MP David Urquhart noted this when visiting Miss Duncan’s house there in 1848. Shortly, he was seated at a table, before a roaring fire. ‘On the table stood cruet-stand, knife and fork, Staffordshire plates, and Scotch broth.’⁴