Camille Douls (1864-1889) was a French explorer and one of the first Europeans to venture into the Western Sahara, a region forbidden to foreigners at the time, and to live among the nomadic Moorish population. He was able to bring back valuable information on their way of life and environment.
His solo expedition in 1887 was fraught with adventure: captured, robbed, condemned to death, then adopted after passing himself off as a Muslim thanks to his fluency in Arabic. A sheikh even offered his daughter in marriage… but Douls escaped and managed to return to France, where he published his observations.