History of Gibraltar
Gibraltar was known in ancient times as a promontory or Mount Calpe (in Latin: Mons Calpe), one of the two mythical pillars of Hercules, and later renamed as a derivation from the Arabic Ŷabal Ṭāriq (جبل طارق), or "Táriq mountain", in memory of the general Táriq ibn Ziyad, who led the landing at this place of the forces of the Umayyad Caliphate of Walid I in 711.
Integrated into the Crown of Castile since the second half of the 15th century, it was occupied in 1704 by an Anglo-Dutch squadron in support of the claimant Charles III of Spain during the War of the Spanish Succession, at the end of which, it was ceded to the British Crown in application of the Treaty of Utrecht in 1713. Since then, the political future of Gibraltar has been the subject of controversy in Spanish-British relations.
Prehistory
There is evidence about the settlement of the rock by Neanderthal man. A skull belonging to said species was found in the Forbes quarry in 1848, in fact before the "original" in the Neander Valley. In 1926, the skull of a Neanderthal child was found in Devil's Tower. Various engravings and samples of Neanderthal intellectual activity are found in Gorham's Cave.
Ancient Age
The Phoenicians visited the area as early as 950 BC. C. Gibraltar and Abila (ancient city and promontory in present-day Ceuta) formed the so-called Pillars of Hercules, which the Phoenician sailors marked with silver columns to indicate the safe limits of navigation to the Mediterranean peoples.
Although it is possible that the first to navigate the rock were the Phoenicians, the ancient Greeks believed that the mythical hero Hercules opened the strait in one fell swoop to be able to unite the Mediterranean Sea with the Atlantic Ocean in order to continue searching for the cattle of Gerion, king of the indigenous Tartessos people in Andalusia, who according to Hellenic legends, was a deformed giant.
Middle Ages
Little was built during the first four centuries of Muslim control. It was not until 1160 that the Almohad caliph Abd al-Mumin ordered the construction of the first permanent settlement, including a fortification. The main tower of this castle still stands today.
Later it passed to the kingdom of Granada. In 1309 it was conquered by Alonso de Guzmán at the service of the Crown of Castile and with the help of the Crown of Aragon. Shortly after, in 1333 it was taken by the Merinids (traditionally known as Benimerines), who had invaded Muslim Spain. In 1374 it fell into the hands of the Nasrids of the Kingdom of Granada. On August 26, 1407, a Castilian fleet defeated a joint fleet from Granada, Tunisia and Tremecen. In 1411 the Nasrids had to reconquer the square, when its inhabitants rebelled and went over to the Benimerines.
After an unsuccessful attempt at conquest in 1436, Gibraltar definitively passed into Christian hands in 1462, when it was conquered by Alonso de Arcos, in the service of the Duke of Medina Sidonia, under whose lordship the square remained, which shortly after was claimed as royal domain by the Crown of Castile. Taking advantage of the turbulence of the reign of Henry IV, the Medina Sidonias took Gibraltar by force in 1467, relying on a donation from the claimant 'Alfonso XII', subsequently achieving confirmation of said lordship by Henry IV himself through Privilege Shot from May 1470.
On the death of Enrique IV, in 1474, his sister and heiress Isabel gathered support to cement her position in the War of Succession that pitted her against Juana la Beltraneja. The Medina Sidonia were thus gratified with the Marquisate of Gibraltar (September 30, 1478). The city remained under Asidonian rule until the Catholic Monarchs suppressed the title in 1501 and reincorporated the territory into the royal domains of the Crown of Castile. However, the Duke of Medina Sidonia tried again to assert his rights by besieging the square in 1506.
Gonzalo Piña Ludueña was from Gibraltar, who founded the city of Gibraltar in Venezuela in 1592, on the shores of Lake Maracaibo.
18th and 19th centuries
On November 1, 1700, Charles II of Spain died and, in compliance with his will, his grandnephew, Philip V, succeeded him on the throne. However, England, the United Provinces of the Netherlands and the Holy Roman Empire They were opposed to the aspiration of a Bourbon like Philip to the throne of Spain, since this would provide the King of France with a powerful ally to continue his European hegemony; Instead, they were in favor of the continuation of the house of Austria on the Spanish throne, at the hands of Archduke Charles (nephew of the late king, although not carnal). Thus, in 1702 the war of Spanish succession broke out between the aforementioned detractors of the Bourbons and their supporters. In July of that year an Anglo-Dutch fleet arrived in Cádiz and landed in Rota and El Puerto de Santa María, but failed to take the places; Upon their return to England they destroyed the Indies fleet in the port of Vigo, although the treasure it contained could be saved. In 1703 Portugal joined the anti-Bourbon alliance, which left Spanish territories in the Iberian Peninsula dangerously exposed.
On August 1, 1704, the Anglo-Dutch squadron under the command of the Prince of Hesse-Darmstadt and Admiral Rooke—with 10,000 men, 1,500 cannons and supported by a battalion of 350 Catalan Austrian soldiers—arrived in Gibraltar. These demanded the unconditional delivery of the square to King "Charles III" and an oath of fidelity to him, but the military governor of Gibraltar, Diego de Salinas, showed himself faithful to Philip V, rejecting the claims of the Australists that same day with a letter..
His Excellency, having received this city the letter of V. Exc. His date today, he says in response: He has a jury for King and natural Lord to Lord D. Philip V; and that as his faithful and loyal vassals sacrifice their lives in his defense, so this city as its inhabitants, through what is left of him to say about what the incluse contains, which is what is offered, and I wish our Lord to keep V. Exc the many years I can. Gibraltar and August 1st of a thousand seven hundred four.
At the beginning of the 3rd, the Prince of Darmstadt gave a half-hour ultimatum for the unconditional surrender of the square, but on this occasion it was not answered. The Anglo-Dutch siege began at 5:00 a.m. on the 4th; The castle and the city itself suffered intense bombardments, being defended only by 80 soldiers and 300 militiamen with little or no military training, equipped with 120 cannons of which a third were useless. After five hours of siege, several English sailors took women and children hostage, before which the defenders of the city decided to capitulate; The English sources themselves admit that if it had not been for this, the square could have resisted for a long time. The surrender allowed the evacuation of Spanish military and civilians who wished to leave the city, respecting the usual rights and freedoms of those who decided to stay. However, looting and desecration by English and Dutch soldiers meant that, by August 6, only 47 residents remained on the rock; Of them, 12 were Spanish (one woman and eleven men, among whom was the parish priest Juan Romero de Figueroa) and 35 were Genoese. The rest, about 4,000 people, fled to various places: the majority moved to the hermitage of San Roque, others settled in the current Los Barrios and many others took refuge in the depopulated Algeciras (abandoned since 1379); All of them would end up founding on May 21, 1706 the «Very Noble and Most Loyal City of San Roque, where the City of Gibraltar resides», where important objects from the history of Gibraltar are preserved to this day., like an image of the Crowned Virgin, the old banner brought in the flight or the royal decree of the Catholic Monarchs who in 1502 had granted the coat of arms to the city.
Attempts at reconquest came in October 1704, laying siege to Gibraltar, but it was raised in March 1705 without being able to recover the city. Queen Anne of England reacted by taking the square for herself, snatching it from her standard-bearer, Archduke Charles, without his consent: in October 1705 she gave the order to expel the little remaining civilian population from there (the presence of the Catholic parish priest was respected)., De Figueroa); In 1706 she proclaimed Gibraltar an English free port; in 1707 the queen would appoint her own governor of Gibraltar, the British general Roger Elliott; and finally, in 1711, she expelled all foreign troops, leaving only the British military in charge of Gibraltar.
On July 13, 1713, the British invasion of Gibraltar was formalized by the Treaty of Utrecht between Spain and Great Britain, in whose article of Gibraltar, together with its port, defenses and fortresses that belong to it, giving the said property absolutely so that it may be held and enjoyed with full right and forever, without exception or impediment. However, this transfer was not total, since it was added that "to avoid any abuses and frauds in the introduction of the merchandise, the Catholic king wants and assumes that this is how it must be understood, that said property be transferred to the Great Britain without any territorial jurisdiction and without any open communication with the surrounding country by land, that is, the cession was solely in property, with Spain retaining sovereignty over the territory (and consequently that of its waters). and airspace); Also note that the dividing line between the ceded territory and the rest of Spain is not an ordinary border between countries, since it should always be closed except in exceptional cases. Finally, Gibraltar was subject to its return to the Spanish crown in case the British crown decided to get rid of it: "if at any time the Crown of Great Britain should see fit to give, sell, alienate in any way the property of the said City of Gibraltar, it has been agreed and agreed upon by this Treaty that the first action shall be given to the Crown of Spain before others to redeem it». Since then and in accordance with the treaty, the British would officially know Gibraltar as Town and Garrison of Gibraltar in the Kingdom of Spain.
The conditions of the treaty were not fully respected by the British, who ignored Spanish legality, trafficked in various types of merchandise and ended up occupying the Molino and the Torre del diablo, located on the western and eastern coast respectively of the isthmus that connects the rock with the rest of the Iberian Peninsula. To this we must add the expulsion in 1726 of José López de la Peña, De Figueroa's successor at the head of the Catholic parish and the last Spaniard left in the city. All of this led to a second siege of Gibraltar in the Anglo-Spanish War of 1727, also without success; The war ended with the Treaty of Seville (1729) which, among other things, confirmed British possession of the city. Spain and Great Britain then agreed that the isthmus would be constituted as a neutral zone where there would be no presence of either country; To this area the British should contribute the territories they had occupied, something they never did. Given this attitude, in 1730 the King of Spain ordered the construction of a line of fortifications behind his part of the neutral zone.
The third and last military attempt at reconquest took place during the War of Independence of the United States of America, in the so-called Great Siege, between 1779 and 1783; The Spanish writer José Cadalso died during this siege, being buried in San Roque. The decline that Spain suffered after its War of Independence limited claims to the level of diplomacy, which was used by Great Britain to achieve its own interests: in 1815 an epidemic served as an excuse to take control over more of the country. isthmus, constituted as a neutral zone; On August 20, 1830, the British changed its name and status to Crown Colony of Gibraltar, becoming a British colony and thus stealing its sovereignty from Spain; and in 1854 another epidemic once again served as a pretext to occupy more of a neutral zone. With the opening of the Suez Canal in 1869, Gibraltar increased in strategic importance and value to Great Britain; Its position as a supply and port of call was notably strengthened.
During the entire 18th century the population of Gibraltar was very limited: since the exile in 1704 of its original population, The rock was only populated by British soldiers and refugees from different parts of the Mediterranean (mainly Genoese and Jews). According to the 1791 census, the population was 2,890 inhabitants compared to nearly 4,000 before the British invasion. The 19th century led to notable demographic growth but was strongly slowed by numerous epidemics: from 1804, which caused 4,864 deaths in a Gibraltar of 6,000 inhabitants, until 1865, which reduced the population to 15,782 inhabitants. This means that it was not until 1886, by Order Council of January 1, when the definition of the concept "native of Gibraltar" appears, that is, when it is defined for the first time who has Gibraltar citizenship; and it was not until December 1, 1921 when the current town hall was established. The small population of British Gibraltar contrasts with the enormous consolidation of the population on the other side of the isthmus: the exiled Gibraltarians had founded the city of San Roque in 1706, from which the municipalities of Los Barrios and Algeciras would later be segregated in 1755.; In 1870 La Línea de la Concepción would also be segregated.
20th century
During the first years of the century, the rock was excavated to build tunnels that linked the eastern and western parts; The extracted material was used to reclaim some 26 hectares from the bay of Algeciras, thus allowing the expansion of the port facilities and the crowded enclave at the expense of Spanish waters. In 1909 the British built a seven-foot high fence (the famous 'Gibraltar fence') consecrating the occupation of more than 800 meters of isthmus located in neutral territory. In this way Gibraltar appropriated more than half of a land whose neutralization had been agreed in the XVIII century by Spain and Great Britain.
A similar policy was followed with respect to territorial waters, which under the terms of the Treaty of Utrecht were recognized as "that area surrounding the colony to which the cannons of the colony could reach. fortress of the Peñón". Over the years these territorial waters have been unilaterally increased de facto by the United Kingdom, based on what is established by the United Nations Convention on the Law of the Sea, which allows reaching the limit of 12 nautical miles. Spain has considered such an increase as contrary to law, as it contravened the terms of the Treaty of Utrecht, and therefore does not recognize to the United Kingdom more waters than those of the port of Gibraltar (ceded by the Treaty of Utrecht) nor more airspace than the located on the vertical of the Rock.
During the Spanish Civil War (1936-39), thousands of Spaniards, from both sides, took refuge in Gibraltar. In 1938, the construction of a military airport was approved in the territory located between the fence and the rock. In 1941, approval was given to the layout of the airport, whose landing strip extended more than 800 meters into the bay of Algeciras, in a unilateral interpretation made by Great Britain of the scope of the jurisdictional waters of the colony, considered illegal by Spain. in light of the terms of the Treaty of Utrecht and other international conventions.
In the context of the Second World War, Gibraltar was the base of British military operations between the Atlantic and the Mediterranean, and a vital stopping point for Allied convoys, as it was one of the few territories in continental Europe which remained free of occupation by Axis forces or their allies.
In 1946 and by Chapter XI of the United Nations Charter, the United Kingdom registered Gibraltar as a "non-self-governing territory". Gibraltar was included in the list of territories subject to decolonization, and therefore within the scope of action of the Special Committee Charged with Examining the Situation with Respect to the Application of the Declaration on the Granting of Independence to Colonial Countries and Peoples (Committee of 24). According to Gibraltarians, the UN Charter and section 2 of resolution 1514 (XV) would guarantee the right of self-determination of Gibraltarians. The Spanish position and that of the United Nations is diametrically opposed, and is based first of all on the Treaty of Utrecht itself, which establishes that if at any time the Crown of Great Britain sees fit to give, sell or alienate, in any case, the ownership of the said City of Gibraltar, it has been agreed and agreed by this Treaty that the first action will be given to the Crown of Spain before others to redeem it, so that the culmination of the The decolonization process would inevitably result in the retrocession of the colony to Spain; secondly, in the same resolution 1514 (XV) that, at the same time that it guarantees in its section 2 the right of peoples to dispose of themselves, also expressly states in its section 6 that any attempt to totally or partially break the national unity and the territorial integrity of a country is incompatible with the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations. For all these reasons, the Spanish government and international authorities have considered Gibraltarians as mere settlers in Spanish territory.
The Gibraltarians argue that the question of territorial integrity is not applicable, since Gibraltar is British territory and not Spanish. Furthermore, they invoke Article 73 of the United Nations Charter (which establishes that Members of the United Nations that have or assume responsibility for administering territories whose people have not yet achieved full self-government [... ] are obliged [...] to develop self-government, to take due account of the political aspirations of the people, and to assist them in the progressive development of their free political institutions) to justify the gradual increase in self-government (issue that has always been rejected by Spain as contrary to what was established in the Treaty of Utrecht and that led to the closure of the fence in 1969). Finally, they take advantage of Article 103 which establishes that in the event of a conflict between the obligations assumed by the Members of the United Nations under this Charter and their obligations under any other international convention, the obligations imposed shall prevail. by this Letter. Spain, for its part, denies that there is a contradiction between the Treaty of Utrecht and the Charter of the United Nations, once again relying on the territorial integrity of Spain.
In its resolution 2231 (XXI), of December 20, 1966 (text here, "Question of Gibraltar"), the United Nations declared:
The General Assembly, having considered the question of Gibraltar,[...] 1. It regrets the delay in the decolonization process and in the implementation of General Assembly resolution 1514 (XV) to Gibraltar. 2. Invites the parties to continue their negotiations, taking into account the interests of the people of the territory and requests the administering Power to accelerate without any obstacles, and in consultation with the Government of Spain, the decolonization of Gibraltar [... ]
One year later, in its resolution 2353 (XXII), of December 19, 1967 (text here, "Question of Gibraltar"), the United Nations declared:
The General Assembly, having considered the question of Gibraltar, [...]. Considering that any colonial situation which partially or totally destroys the national unity and territorial integrity of a country is incompatible with the purposes and principles of the Charter of the United Nations and specifically with paragraph 6 of General Assembly resolution 1514 (XV), [...] 1. Regrets the interruption of the negotiations recommended in General Assembly resolutions 2070 (XX) and 2231 (XXI); 2. It states that the holding by the administering Power of the referendum of 10 September 1967 contravenes the provisions of General Assembly resolution 2231 (XXI) and those of the resolution adopted on 1 September 1967 by the Special Committee [...]. 3. Invites the Governments of Spain and the United Kingdom to resume without delay the negotiations envisaged in General Assembly resolutions 2070 (XX) and 2231 (XXI), with a view to ending the colonial situation in Gibraltar and safeguarding the interests of the population at the end of that colonial situation.
In the face of such resolutions, the Government of Gibraltar places emphasis on the obligation to safeguard the "interests" of the colony's population, declaring that they are not safeguarded if their wishes and democratic rights are not respected.
On the other hand, Spain has always opposed all the modifications the British government has introduced in the political status of Gibraltarians, because such modifications meant the provision of increasingly representative instruments that undermined the strictly colonial character of Gibraltarians. Gibraltar. For all these reasons, given the holding of a referendum in 1967, giving Gibraltarians the opportunity to choose between Spanish sovereignty or continuing united with Great Britain (an option that won by an overwhelming 12,138 to 44 votes), and the subsequent promulgation of the Constitution of Gibraltar on 30 May 1969 (which guaranteed full self-government in internal matters, while stating in its preamble that Her Majesty's Government will never enter into dealings as a result of which the people of Gibraltar could become be under the sovereignty of another state against its freely and democratically expressed wishes), the Franco government made the decision to close the fence that same year, which prevented direct communication between the populations on both sides. of the border. The Spanish government maintained that such a decision was in accordance with international law since the Treaty of Utrecht establishes that "said property be ceded to Great Britain without any territorial jurisdiction and without any open communication with the surrounding country by part of land". During the first government of Felipe González, the passage of travelers and goods through the gate resumed on February 5, 1985, after the EEC imposed the opening of the gate as an essential requirement to admit Spain. The Treaty of Rome establishes that European territories must allow the free movement of people.
21st century
Currently, the Spanish Government continues to claim sovereignty of the Rock, although this has always been rejected by the British Government. The inhabitants of Gibraltar have defended 'their right to self-determination', and in referendums they have clearly supported the option of not reintegrating into Spain. In the last referendum, held in 2002, Spanish-British co-sovereignty was rejected by a margin of 87.92%.
The Spanish Government maintains various restrictions in Gibraltar, in defense of what they consider their legitimate rights (for example, given that the isthmus was never ceded by Spain, neither through the Treaty of Utrecht nor by any other act or treaty, it does not recognize the international border character of the current limit marked by the fence, in the middle of the isthmus, about 800 meters north of the control line agreed in 1713, located right at the foot of the Rock).
In 2016, the vast majority of the Gibraltarian population (95%) voted in favor of remaining in the European Union in the referendum held that year, but in the United Kingdom the exit won, which caused Gibraltar to leave said organization two years later.