Editing Melilla (section)

=== Late Modern period ===
The current limits of the Spanish territory around the Melilla fortress were fixed by treaties with Morocco in 1859, [[Spanish-Moroccan War (1859)|1860]], 1861, and 1894. In the late 19th century, as Spanish influence expanded in this area, the Crown authorized Melilla as the only centre of trade on the [[Rif]] coast between [[Tetuan]] and the [[Algeria]]n border. The value of trade increased, with goat skins, eggs and [[beeswax]] the principal exports, and cotton goods, tea, sugar and candles the chief imports.

Melilla's civil population in 1860 still amounted to only 375 estimated inhabitants.{{Sfn|Saro Gandarillas|1985|p=23}} In a 1866 Hispano-Moroccan arrangement signed in [[Fes]], both parties agreed to allow for the installment of a customs office near the border with Melilla, to be operated by Moroccan officials.{{Sfn|Remacha Tejada|1994|p=218}} The Treaty of Peace with Morocco that followed the 1859–60 War entailed the acquisition of a new perimeter for Melilla, bringing its area to that where the 12&nbsp;km<sup>2</sup> the autonomous city currently stands.{{Sfn|Saro Gandarillas|1993|pp=99–100}} Following the declaration of Melilla as a [[free port]] in 1863, the population began to increase, chiefly with Sephardi Jews fleeing from [[Tetouan]] who fostered trade in and out of the city.{{Sfn|Saro Gandarillas|1993|p=100}} The first Jews from Tetouan probably arrived in 1864,{{Sfn|Díaz Rodríguez|2011|p=67}} and the first rabbi arrived in 1867 and began to operate the first synagogue, located in the Calle de San Miguel.{{Sfn|Díaz Rodríguez|2011|p=68}} Many Jews arrived fleeing from persecution in Morocco instigated by [[Bou Hmara|Roghi Bu Hamara]].{{Sfn|Fernández García|2015|p=108}} Following the 1868 lifting of the veto of emigration to Melilla from Peninsular Spain, the population further increased with Spaniards.{{Sfn|López Guzmán|González Fernández|Herrera Torres|Lorenzo Quiles|2007|p=11}} The Jewish population, who also progressively acquired Spanish citizenship, increased to 572 in 1893.{{Sfn|Díaz Rodríguez|2011|pp=67–68}} The economic opportunities created in Melilla henceforth favoured the installment of a Berber population.{{Sfn|López Guzmán|González Fernández|Herrera Torres|Lorenzo Quiles|2007|p=11}}

<gallery mode="packed" captions="Views of Melilla taken from an elevated position in 1893">
File:1893-10-30, La Ilustración Española y Americana, Vista general de la plaza de Melilla y de su campo, Venancio Álvarez Cabrera (cropped).jpg
File:1893-10-30, La Ilustración Española y Americana, Vista general de la plaza de Melilla y de su campo, Venancio Álvarez Cabrera (cropped 2).jpg
</gallery>

The first body of local government was the ''junta de arbitrios'' created in 1879,{{Sfn|Saro Gandarillas|1985|p=24}} in which the military enjoy preponderance.{{Sfn|Morala Martínez|1985|pp=107–108}} The Polígono excepcional de Tiro, the first neighborhood outside the walled core ([[Melilla la Vieja]]), began construction in 1888.{{Sfn|Cantón Fernández|Riaño López|1984|p=18}}
[[File:1909-09-15, Actualidades, En el barrio judío de Melilla, Tipo de mujer judía en el interior de su domicilio, Alba (cropped).jpg|thumb|Jewish woman in the Jewish quarter (1909)]]
In 1893, Riffian tribesmen launched the [[First Melillan campaign]] to try to conquer the city; the Spanish government sent 25,000 soldiers to defend it against them. The conflict was also known as the ''Margallo War'', after Spanish General [[Juan García y Margallo]], Governor of Melilla, who was killed in the battle. The new 1894 agreement with Morocco that followed the conflict increased trade with the [[hinterland]], bringing the economic prosperity of the city to a new level.{{Sfn|Saro Gandarillas|1993|p=102}} The total population of Melilla amounted to 10,004 inhabitants in 1896.{{Sfn|Perpén Rueda|1987|p=289}}

[[File:Casa Melul.jpg|thumb|Art Nouveau buildings in the Plaza de España (c. 1917)]]
The turn of the new century saw attempts by France (based in [[French Algeria]]) to profit from their newly acquired [[sphere of influence]] in Morocco to counter Melilla's trading prowess by fostering trade links with the Algerian cities of [[Ghazaouet]] and [[Oran]].{{Sfn|Saro Gandarillas|1993|p=107}} Melilla began to suffer from this, to which the instability brought by revolts against [[Abdelaziz of Morocco|Muley Abdel Aziz]] in the hinterland also added,{{Sfn|Saro Gandarillas|1993|pp=106–108}} although after 1905 Sultan pretender El Rogui ([[Bou Hmara]]) carried out a defusing policy in the area that favoured Spain.{{Sfn|Saro Gandarillas|1993|pp=113–114}} The French occupation of [[Oujda]] in 1907 compromised the Melillan trade with that city,{{Sfn|Saro Gandarillas|1993|pp=110–115}} and the enduring instability in the Rif still threatened Melilla.{{Sfn|Saro Gandarillas|1993|p=120}} Between 1909 and 1945, the ''modernista'' ([[Art Nouveau]]) style was prevalent in local architecture, making Melilla's streets a "true museum of ''modernista''-style architecture", second only to Barcelona, mainly stemming from the work of architect [[Enrique Nieto (architect)|Enrique Nieto]].{{Sfn|Cantón Fernández|Riaño López|1984|pp=16; 19}}

Mining companies began to enter the hinterland of Melilla by 1908.{{Sfn|Saro Gandarillas|1993|p=121}} A Spanish company, the {{ill|Compañía Española de las Minas del Rif|es}}, was constituted in July 1908, shared by Clemente Fernández, Enrique Macpherson, the [[Count of Romanones]], the [[Rodrigo Figueroa y Torres|Duke of Tovar]] and {{ill|Juan Antonio Güell|es|Juan Antonio Güell y López}}, who appointed [[Miguel Villanueva y Gómez|Miguel Villanueva]] as chairman.{{Sfn|Escudero|2014|p=331}} Thus two mining companies under the protection of Bou Hmara started mining lead and iron 20 kilometers (12.4 miles) from Melilla. They started to construct a railway between the port and the mines. In October of that year, Bou Hmara's vassals revolted against him and raided the mines, which remained closed until June 1909. By July the workmen were again attacked and several were killed. Severe fighting between the Spaniards and the tribesmen followed, in the [[Second Melillan campaign]] that took place in the vicinity of Melilla.

In 1910, the Spaniards restarted the mines and undertook harbor works at Mar Chica, but hostilities broke out again in 1911. On 22 July 1921, the Berbers under the leadership of [[Muhammad Ibn 'Abd al-Karim al-Khattabi|Abd el Krim]] inflicted a grave defeat on the Spanish at the [[Battle of Annual]]. The Spanish retreated to Melilla, leaving most of the protectorate under the control of the [[Republic of the Rif]].

A royal decree pursuing the creation of an ''[[Ayuntamiento (Spain)|ayuntamiento]]'' in Melilla was signed on 13 December 1918 but the regulation did not come into force, and thus the existing government body, the {{lang|es|junta de arbitrios}}, remained in force.{{Sfn|Morala Martínez|1985|pp=107–108}}
[[File:Centro de Melilla, Parque Hernández, Plaza de España, Barrio Héroes de España y Mantelete.jpg|thumb|City centre in 1926]]
A "junta municipal" with a rather civil composition was created in 1927; on 10 April 1930, an ''ayuntamiento'' featuring the same membership as the junta was created,{{Sfn|Morala Martínez|1985|p=120}} equalling to the same municipal regime as the rest of Spain on 14 April 1931, with the arrival of the first democratically elected municipal corporation on the wake of the proclamation of the [[Second Spanish Republic|Second Republic]].{{Sfn|Fernández Díaz|2009|pp=25; 27}}

The city was used as one of the staging grounds for [[July 1936 military uprising in Melilla|the July 1936 military coup d'état]] that started the [[Spanish Civil War]].

In the context of the passing of the Ley de Extranjería in 1986, and following social mobilization from the Berber community, conditions for citizenship acquisition were flexibilised and allowed for the naturalisation of a substantial number of inhabitants, until then born in Melilla but without Spanish citizenship.{{Sfn|Fernández García|2015|p=110}}