Morocco Travel Guide

(Ben Green) #1

and a triumphal gate (Bab Agnaou). But the Almohads soon lost their showpiece to the
Merenids, who turned royal attention to Meknès and Fez.


Life became sweet again in the 16th century, when the Saadians made Marrakesh the crux
of lucrative sugar-trade routes. With the proceeds, Sultan Moulay Abdullah rebuilt Almoravid Ali
ben Youssef Mosque and Medersa, established a trading centre for Christians and a protected
mellah (Jewish quarter) in 1558. His glitz-loving successor, Ahmed al-Mansour ed-Dahbi (the
Victorious and Golden), paved the Badi Palace with gold and took opulence to the grave in the
gilded Saadian Tombs.


Alawite leader Moulay Ismail preferred docile Meknès to unruly Marrakesh, and moved his
headquarters there – though not before looting the Badi Palace. Marrakesh entered its Wild
West period, with big guns vying for control. Those who prevailed built extravagant riads , but
medina walls were left to crumble, and much of the population lived hand to mouth in crowded
funduqs (rooming houses). In 1912 the French protectorate granted Pasha Glaoui the run of
southern Morocco and several medina palaces, while French and Spanish colonists built
themselves a ville nouvelle. After the independence movement reduced the pasha to snivelling
before King Mohammed V, independent Morocco got organised. Rabat became the nation’s
capital, Fez remained the spiritual centre, and Casablanca was business as usual – but what
would become of Marrakesh?


Without a clear role, Marrakesh resumed its fall-back career as a caravanserai – and
became the nation’s breakaway success. Roving hippies and spiritual seekers built the city’s
mystique in the 1960s and ’70s, and visits by the Rolling Stones, Beatles and Led Zeppelin
gave the city star power. Fashion arrived in fierce force with Yves Saint Laurent, Jean-Paul
Gaultier, sundry Vogue editors and gaggles of supermodels, all demanding chic digs. In the
1990s private medina mansions were converted into B&Bs, just as low-cost airlines delivered
weekenders to brass-studded riad doors.


The city has doubled in size, and now eagerly awaits your arrival. After a thousand years of
trading-post hospitality, a 2011 bomb blast in the Djemaa el-Fna left the city in shock (for more
see www.lonelyplanet.com/marrakesh). But after surviving historic tragedies and triumphs,
Marrakesh knew what to do: it dried its tears, gathered its wits, and put on another pot of mint
tea.

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