English Tangier English Tangier English Tangier refers to the Moroccan city of Tangier during the period of its colonial occupation by the Kingdom of England, which lasted from 1661 to 1684. Tangier had been under Portuguese rule before KingCharlesII acquired the city as part of the dowry when he married the Portuguese infanta Catherine. The marriage treaty was an extensive renewal of the Anglo-Portuguese Alliance; it was opposed by Spain (at war with Portugal) but clandestinely supported by France. England garrisoned and fortified the city against hostile (but disunited) Moroccan forces. When Morocco was later united under the Alaouites, the cost of
Tangier and during other spying periods of the 19th and 20th centuries is legendary. Tangier acquired the reputation of a spying and smuggling centre and attracted foreign capital due to political neutrality and commercial liberty at that time. It was via a British bank in Tangier that the Bank of England in 1943 for the first time obtained samples of the high-quality forged British currency produced by the Nazis in "Operation Bernhard". The city has also been a subject for many spy fiction books and films (see Tangier in popular culture). Tangier is twinned with: Tangier Tangier (Arabic: طنجة, Berber: ⵟⴰⵏⴵⴰ)