There is evidence of human settlement on the eastern coastline of
Djibouti dating back to the
Bronze Age. From 1862 until 1894, the land to the north of the
Gulf of Tadjoura was called
Obock and was ruled by
Issa and
Afar Sultans, local authorities with whom France signed various treaties between 1883 and 1887 to first gain a foothold in the region. The exchange of Franco-British diplomatic notes of 2 and 9 February 1888 fixed the territorial limit between the colonies of the two countries; leaving explicitly under
French authority the southern coasts of the Gulf of Tadjoura, including a
peninsula composed of insubmersible plateaux, Ras Djibouti as a highly strategic location, a future bridgehead for French designs in the rest of Africa and Asia. It is then that this point begins to be used as departure for caravans towards
Harar. The French subsequently founded Djibouti in 1888, in a previously
uninhabited stretch of coast. According to one account, this was due to "its superiority to
Obok both in respect to harbour accommodation and in nearness to
Harrar."
Ambouli was a small village before the French arrived, about south of Ras Djiboutil. Ambouli is identified with the city of Canbala by
O.G.S. Crawford, appearing in
Muhammad al-Idrisi's map of 1192 on the coast of the
Horn of Africa, southeast of the straits of
Bab-el-Mandeb, and with Cambaleh, a town where the Venetian traveler Bragadino, a thirteenth-century European visitor to
Ethiopia, resided for eight years. In 1896, the settlement was made the capital of
French Somaliland. The main purpose of the French interest in colonizing the region was to protect their trade routes to
Madagascar and
Indochina from the encroachment of other European powers. The town later grew considerably in size following the construction of the
Franco-Ethiopian Railway. In 1895, Djibouti, which, not so long ago, was just a
peninsula, already had 5,000
inhabitants. Many Issa and Afar
nomads left their herds to settle here, built houses on what is now the downtown area. They became
dockers and constitute the first local proletariat. The French and natives built hotels, houses, mosques and churches. The Yemeni, Egyptian,
Greek,
Armenian and Italian merchants and traders flocked to this promise that Djibouti represented. Additionally, the rich agricultural southern area of
Ambouli continued to flourish due to an abundance of
date palm farms and
orchards. Djibouti did not attract as many boats as
Aden. In 1896,
Léonce Lagarde became the first governor of the French Somali Coast, a new name for the French dependencies in the region. At the start of the 20th century, Djibouti had 10,000 inhabitants and was considered a major regional port. Its main activity remains the supply of French ships en route to
Indochina or
Madagascar. Only 150,000 tonnes of
freight per year were handled. In addition, the railway line has not yet been fully exploited. Although the initial French efforts to establish commercial influence in the region proved to be unsuccessful enough to require a
government bailout, the
Franco-Ethiopian Railway itself was a success and allowed Djibouti's commerce to quickly eclipse the former caravan-based trade carried on with nearby
Zeila in
British Somaliland. Djibouti became the center of exports from southern Ethiopia and the
Ogaden, including trade in
Harari coffee and
khat. Djibouti began to develop as a commercial center. On 12 July 1926, the Fontainebleau, a Messageries Maritimes steamer loaded with cotton and heading for China caught fire while approaching Djibouti. The captain decided to flood the holds and run aground his ship in the middle of the harbor of Djibouti, causing significant inconvenience for port traffic. The city then proposed using the wreck as a promontory of a new
deep-water port, connecting it to the Marabout plateau by a 700-meter jetty. The idea was accepted and work began in 1931. The first phase was completed in 1935 and considerably increased port and
rail traffic. In 1933, Djibouti was the first town to be wired to electricity in
French Somaliland, and an
oil terminal was built in 1937. in the 1940s During the
Second World War, Djibouti was hit by
Italian airstrikes on 21 June 1940, which killed many people in the town. The
anti-aircraft fire was intense and two
Italian aircraft failed to return, but fires and explosions were seen in Djibouti. Overnight, several waves of
Savoia-Marchetti SM.81 bombers attacked the port facilities. After the
defeat of France the colony came under the control of the
pro-Axis Vichy government. By that time, the
Allied offensive against the Italians included a
blockade of
French Somaliland. On 25 September the
RAF launched several airstrikes on the city, prompting governor
Pierre Nouailhetas to institute a brutal reign of terror against Europeans and African inhabitants of the city.
Famine set in and malnutrition-related diseases took many lives, 70% of them women and children, and many townsfolk left for the
hinterland. The locals named the blockade the carmii, a word for a type of sorghum usually reserved for cattle, but used as human food at the height of the famine. The head doctor at the hospital committed suicide in despair. Only a few Arab dhows (boutres) managed to run the blockade to Djibouti and
Obock and only two French ships from
Madagascar managed to run it. The
Japanese declaration of war (7 December 1941) gave the colony some respite, since the
Royal Navy were forced to withdraw all but two ships from the
blockade for use in the Far East. The rule of Nouailhetas was too brutal for even the authoritarian leaders at
Vichy to stand for. In October 1942 he was recalled and forced to retire without a pension, Following the war, he escaped to
Portugal. He returned to face a military
tribunal and was acquitted on 17 July 1953, which sparked outrage in
Djibouti. The
Commander-in-Chief, East Africa,
William Platt, codenamed the negotiations for the surrender of French Somaliland "Pentagon", because there were five sides: himself, the Vichy governor, the
Free French, the British minister at Addis Ababa and the United States.
Christian Raimond Dupont, the governor of French Somaliland, surrendered and Colonel Raynal's troops crossed back into
French Somaliland on 26 December 1942, completing its liberation. The official handover took place at 10:00 p.m. on 28 December. The first governor appointed under the
Free French was
André Bayardelle. In 1946,
Djibouti received the status of
overseas territory. An elected territorial
assembly was created then, in 1956, a government council charged, under the chairmanship of the head of the
territory, with the management of local affairs. At the same time, fiscal, customs and monetary measures are put in place to promote the development of the deep-water port, to finally compete with
Aden. Port facilities expanded considerably and could afford to accommodate 2,000 ships per year. Djibouti becomes a
free port and abandons the
free zone. In 1948, a new currency, the Côte Française des Somalis, was created, pegged to the
gold standard and convertible into dollars. In August 1966, an official visit to the territory by then
French President, General
Charles de Gaulle, was also met with
demonstrations and rioting. In response to the protests, de Gaulle ordered another referendum. The population of Djibouti was growing rapidly, from officially about 17,000 inhabitants in 1947. In 1949, the plan of Djibouti consisted of four main features: a hierarchical system of streets laid out in a grid, large blocks consisting of small-scale domestic dwellings, the organization of these blocks around central open spaces, and the concentration of cultural institutions to form a civic center. It then became the headquarters of the succeeding
French Territory of the Afars and Issas. When
Djibouti declared
Independence on 27 June 1977, the population of Djibouti was over 110,000, the city has since served as the administrative and commercial capital of the Republic of Djibouti. ==Climate==