La Mamora, La Mámora, Mehedía or San Miguel de Ultramar, was the Spanish

Spanish language

Spanish , also known as Castilian , is a Romance language in the Ibero-Romance group that evolved from several languages and dialects in central-northern Iberia around the 9th century and gradually spread with the expansion of the Kingdom of Castile into central and southern Iberia during the...

 name given to the current Moroccan

Morocco

Morocco , officially the Kingdom of Morocco , is a country located in North Africa. It has a population of more than 32 million and an area of 710,850 km², and also primarily administers the disputed region of the Western Sahara...

 city of Mehdia during the 17th century. It is located in northern Morocco, at the mouth of the Sebou River

Sebou River

Sebou is a river in northern Morocco. The river is 458 kilometres long and has an average water flow of 137 m3/s, which makes it the largest North African river by volume. The source is in the Middle Atlas mountains. It passes near the city of Fes and discharges to the Atlantic Ocean in Mehdia...

, in its West bank. It was under Spanish sovereignty

Spanish Empire

The Spanish Empire comprised territories and colonies administered directly by Spain in Europe, in America, Africa, Asia and Oceania. It originated during the Age of Exploration and was therefore one of the first global empires. At the time of Habsburgs, Spain reached the peak of its world power....

 between 1614 and 1681, when it was conquered by the Alaouite

Alaouite Dynasty

The Alaouite Dynasty is the name of the current Moroccan royal family. The name Alaouite comes from the ‘Alī of its founder Moulay Ali Cherif who became Prince of Tafilalt in 1631. His son Mulay r-Rshid was able to unite and pacify the country...

 ruler Moulay Ismaïl.

According to the traditions, a statue of Jesus Christ was taken there, commissioned by the Bishop of Cadiz, since La Mamora belonged to the diocese of Cadiz. The statue was taken as loot by the Moroccans after the capture of the town and later rescued by paying a ransom and carried to Madrid

Madrid

Madrid is the capital and largest city of Spain. The population of the city is roughly 3.3 million and the entire population of the Madrid metropolitan area is calculated to be 6.271 million. It is the third largest city in the European Union, after London and Berlin, and its metropolitan...

, where it is nowadays venerated with the name of Cristo de Medinaceli.