Category: Fes

Emperors, Sultans and kings

29/11/2015

Morocco has a fascinating history. Due to the various rulers and influences through the years, we are left with some very interesting sites to explore.
Have a look at this simple timeline of Morocco to get an idea of its' history: Morocco Timeline

Chellah

The ancient city of Chellah or the Gardens of Chella existed before the Islamic rulers and displays many remnants of the Roman empire.
Tourists and locals visit Chellah mostly to look at the beautiful and unusual plants and trees in the gardens but when you look closely, you can see the ruins of the empires and dynasties that occupied this area.
Today the main residents of the gardens are storks. Look for their nests in the photographs below.

This area of the gardens was once a school or college and the little rooms surrounding the courtyard were the students' cells.
It flooded many, many years ago and eels live in the water.
Women come to this pool to feed the eels boiled eggs in the hope of having children. This man in the photograph had eggs ready for the tourists and you left a donation with him.

Volubilis

These Roman ruins date back to before 40AD.
It its peak it housed up to 20,000 people.
It had many baths, arches and a basilica.
Some of the intricate mosaics still survive.
Some of the most interesting evidence centres around the Romans love of baths, steam rooms and communal toilets (so they could keep chatting while they did their business!).
They also had underfloor heating and a drainage system throughout the city.
Unfortunately it was 50 degrees Celsius when we were walking around this site so I was a little distracted trying not to fry!

Sultan Moulay ismail

During his reign 1672-1727 Ismail made Meknes the capital of Morocco. He plundered stones from the ruins of Volubilis to build his imperial city.
I didn't spend any time in Meknes but read about the Sultan in The Sultan's Wife by Jane Johnson. He still holds the Guinness World Record for fathering the most children and his Barbary pirates captured thousands of Europeans who were taken in as slaves. The stories from his reign are so interesting but unfortunately there are few links to information other than wikipedia.

Dar Al-Makhzen

Dar al-Makhzen is the official residence of the king of Morocco.
Mohammed VI became king of Morocco on the death of his father King Hassan II in 1999.
We were told that he lives with his family in this residence most of the time. He has other residences of course but his children go to school in the royal school.
King Mohammed seems interested in the rights of women and has said that he will only take one wife. He has promised to tackle poverty and corruption in the country. Children from all different types of backgrounds share the school with his children.

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Fassi Pottery

26/10/2015

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The most distinctive Moroccan pottery is made in Fes. We visited a pottery workshop as part of our Fes Old City tour. In the workshop there were two main products - pottery and mosaics

Pottery

First of all the clay has to be "made" in a process of drying, soaking and bleaching.

The potter starts with a lump of clay and with his feet stepping on the big wheel below he spins it around to form a jug or bowl or whatever he wants.
Then it's out to the sun to dry.

All the Fassi pottery is handpainted. We watched this man paint a bowl. It took about 10 minutes.

The pottery is fired in one of these special ovens.
And the finished product......

.....my favourite porridge bowl!

Mosaic

Mosaics are also made in the same workshop. Think of making a giant jigsaw-forever! That's what making a mosaic seemed to be like. There are some similarities with the pottery process. The tiles have to be fired in the huge ovens.

In this part of the workshop, workers have to break the tiles into small pieces for the mosaic making.

The pieces are then passed onto the mosaic maker. In the photograph above he is making a frame for a mirror. This mosaic will take him days. He lays out the pieces upside down and then glues a wooden covering to the back. It is a long, slow process, requiring a lot of concentration.
Some of the bigger pieces photographed take months.

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Shops, Souqs & Médinas!

25/10/2015

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Driving around Marrakech and passing through the other Moroccan cities, you would think the shopping might be very similar to home.

However, outside of these big cities, shopping is a lot different.

Moroccans do their shopping in their local médina or souq.
Most dictionaries define a médina as the old walled part of a North African town.
A souq is defined as an open air market found in Asian and North African towns.
As part of our tour, we had time to visit the médina's of Rabat, Fes and Marrakech. Each were interesting, busy and very loud!
While initially it seems chaotic, médinas usually have sections: meat, breads, spices, fruit/veg, clothes, furniture, household items. Local people know exactly where to go to get their fresh produce for their cooking. Look closely at the photographs to identify fruit and vegetables we find on our supermarket shelves which originate in Morocco.

The médina passageways are really narrow and you can only imagine how hard it must be for the shop owners to bring their produce through. Donkeys, hand carts and motorbikes are used. There doesn't seem to be any restrictions on motorised vehicles -once it fits, it's allowed to go through!

There were many craft areas/workshops at the edges of the médina. In Fes and Marrakech we visited the leather souq, the furniture souq, the carpet souq and the ceramic souq. Craftsmen work on their products in their workshops. Nowadays, a display or show for tourists is ready for viewing. Usually the owner or manager with fluent English will lead tourists around the workshop explaining the process and finish in the shop where the tourists are encouraged to buy souvenirs.