Contrebandiers (Grotte des Contrebandiers)

[EN]Grotte des Contrebandiers (Smugglers’ Cave), commonly referred to as “Contrebandiers,” is one of several archaeology-bearing coastal caves in the Rabat-Temara region of Morocco. It lies c. 17 km south of Rabat and 250 m from the current Atlantic coastline (Fig. 1; 33.92°N, 6.96°W). Archaeological work along the Atlantic littoral of Morocco began in the late 1930s. In 1937, A. Ruhlmann excavated Dar es Soltane 1 (33.979°N, 6.898°W), and in 1956, J. Roche discovered Contrebandiers Cave where he excavated until 1976. In 2005, within the framework of acollaboration between the Institut National des Sciences de l’Archéologie et du Patrimoine (INSAP) and the University of Pennsylvania, M.A. El Hajraoui and the late H.L. Dibble directed new excavations of the cave. This was part of a larger research program, “The Prehistory of the Rabat-Témara Region,” which also included excavations at the nearby caves of El Mnasra and El Harhoura 2 (studied jointly by M.A. El Hajraoui, the late A. Debénath, and R. Nespoulet) (el Hajraoui, 2018)