[This article was first published in July 2022. We are republishing it in light of the humanitarian crisis in Ceuta]The two lions guarding the main entrance of the Congress of Deputies were made with the melted cannons of the Moroccans defeated in the battle of Wad Ras. This confrontation, along with the battles of Tetuan and Los Castillejos, brought victory to Spain in the first declared war against the Rif tribes from 1859 to 1860. The Sultanate of Morocco, the Riffian tribes, and later, the Alawite kingdom have been a constant source of conflict for the Spanish State for more than a century and a half. All in all, the armed contingents from this area of the Maghreb have constituted, by far, the foreign forces that have fought the longest against the Spanish army since the Peninsular War.