Construction
historic palace complex in Meknes, Morocco
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The Kasbah of Moulay Ismail is a vast palace complex and royal kasbah (citadel) built by the Moroccan sultan Moulay Isma'il ibn Sharif (also spelled "Ismail") in Meknes, Morocco. It is also known, among other names, as the Imperial City (French: Ville Impériale) or Palace of Moulay Ismail, or the Kasbah of Meknes. It was built by Moulay Isma'il over the many decades of his reign between 1672 and 1727, when he made Meknes the capital of Morocco, and received occasional additions under later sultans.
In addition to Moulay Isma'il's own importance in the history of Morocco, his imperial palace in Meknes was notable for its vast scale and its complex infrastructure. The area covered by the kasbah was significantly larger than the old city of Meknes itself and operated as its own city with its own fortifications, water supply, food stockpiles, and troops. Historians later nicknamed it the "Moroccan Versailles". Today, many of the buildings from Moulay Isma'il's era have disappeared or fallen into ruin, but some notable monumental structures remain. A part of the area, the Dar al-Makhzen, is still in use as an occasional royal residence of the King of Morocco, while other sections of the complex have been converted to other functions or replaced with general residential neighbourhoods.
The kasbah of Meknes was first created on this site by the Marinid sultan Abu Yusuf Ya'qub in 1276 CE; the same year that the citadel of Fes el-Jdid was built in nearby Fes as the new capital of the Marinid empire. (Though some sources also cite a kasbah existing near or on the site of Place el-Hedim since the Almoravid period.) During this period, Meknes was frequently the residence of Marinid princes (appointed there as governors) and especially of viziers. The Mosque of the Kasbah (the later Mosque of Lalla Aouda) was also founded and first built in 1276. After the end of the Marinid period, however, Meknes suffered from neglect as the new Saadian dynasty (16th and early 17th century) focused their attention on their capital at Marrakesh.
It wasn't until the Alaouite dynasty in the second half of the 17th century that Meknes received renewed attention. Under Moulay Rashid (ruled 1666–1672), the first Alaouite sultan to unite Morocco under his rule, Fes became the capital once more and his brother, Moulay Isma'il ibn Sharif, governed Meknes. Upon Rashid's death in 1672, Moulay Isma'il became sultan and chose Meknes as his capital. As sultan, Isma'il's 55-year reign was one of longest in Moroccan history. He distinguished himself as a ruler who wished to establish a unified Moroccan state as the absolute authority in the land, independent of any particular group within Morocco – in contrast to previous dynasties which relied on certain tribes or regions as the base of their power. He succeeded in part by creating a new army composed of Black slaves (the 'Abid al-Bukhari) from Sub-Saharan Africa (or descendants of previously imported slaves), many of them Muslims, whose loyalty was to him alone. Isma'il himself was half Black, his mother having been a Black slave. He also continuously led military campaigns against rebels, rivals, and European positions along the Moroccan coast. In practice, he still had to rely on various groups to control outlying areas, but he nonetheless succeeded in retaking many coastal cities occupied by England and Spain and managed to enforce order and heavy taxation throughout his territories. He put a definitive end to Ottoman attempts to gain influence in Morocco and established Morocco on more equal diplomatic footing with European powers in part by forcing them to ransom Christian captives at his court. These Christians were mostly captured by Moroccan pirate fleets which he heavily sponsored as a means of both revenue and warfare. While in captivity, prisoners were often forced into labour on his construction projects. All of these activities and policies gave him a reputation for ruthlessness and cruelty among European writers and a mixed reputation among Moroccan historians as well, though he is credited with unifying Morocco under strong (but brutal) leadership.
In addition to any attachment to the city he had previously acquired as its governor, a number of reasons may have pushed Isma'il to choose Meknes as his capital. One may have been the fact that Ismail had to fight hard to reconquer both Fes and Marrakesh from his rival nephew (Ahmad al-Mahriz, son of Moulay Rashid) during the first years of his reign, which may have rendered him skeptical towards both cities as possible centers of power. Moreover, Moulay Rashid had garrisoned much of Fes with his own contingents from the Tafilalt and eastern Morocco while Moulay Isma'il was forming his own personal royal regiments composed of Black slaves, and there may have been concerns that not all these contingents could be garrisoned simultaneously in Fes. The ulema (religious scholars) of Fes were also particularly disapproving of his ways, including his use of slaves (many of whom were of Muslim background), and maintained tense relations with him throughout his reign. Choosing Meknes thus removed him from the influence of traditional elites and allowed him to build a fresh base from which he hoped to exercise absolute power. The threat of Ottoman attacks from the east (from Algeria) and the increasing insecurity in central Morocco due to tribal migrations from the Atlas and Sahara regions may have also persuaded Ismail that Meknes, situated further west, was more defensible than Fes.
Whatever the reasons, Ismail made Meknes the center of Morocco in his time and construction on a new monumental palace-city continued throughout the 55 years of his reign. Work on the vast palace complex began as soon as his accession to the throne in 1672. Existing structures dating from the earlier medieval kasbah of the city were demolished to make way; the name of the large public square in front of the Kasbah today, el-Hedim (or Place el-Hedim), means "the rubble" and came from the masses of rubble and debris which were piled here during the demolition. This clearing of space also allowed for the sultan to leave an empty buffer zone between the kasbah's walls and the city, making them more defensible. It was also in Moulay Ismail's reign that the Jewish inhabitants of the city were moved to a new Mellah or Jewish district to the west, near the kasbah, not unlike the Mellah of Fes or that of Marrakesh. Moulay Isma'il also undertook works throughout the old city too by renovating mosques, refortifying the walls, and building new city gates (e.g. Bab Berda'in and Bab Khemis).
Labour was carried out by paid workers as well as by contingents of slaves, particularly Christian prisoners. Estimates on the total number of workers involved range from 25,000 and 55,000. Nonetheless, frequently-told stories about the tens of thousands of Christian slaves used for labour and the large underground dungeons where they were kept are somewhat exaggerated and originate from the accounts of European ambassadors who visited Isma'il's court (often to negotiate the release of prisoners from their countries). In reality, the number of Christian slaves was likely closer to a few thousand at most and the chambers popularly called "prisons" were actually storage rooms for grain and supplies. Marianne Barrucand, in her study of Moulay Isma'il's construction projects, cites earlier research that estimates the number of Christian slaves in the first half of Isma'il's reign between 550 and 650, and at around 800 in 1708.
The first component to be built was the Dar al-Kebira, the private palace of the sultan and his family, located on the site of the earlier kasbah of the city. It was finished in 1679. The kasbah's main mosque, now known as the Lalla Aouda Mosque, was also renovated or rebuilt, possibly around 1677. Moulay Isma'il chose the nearby tomb of a local saint, Sidi Abd ar-Rahman al-Majdoub, as the site of a new mausoleum that he founded for himself. New structures were added or expanded to the kasbah throughout his reign. One of the last constructions before his death, carried out between 1721 and 1725, was the Heri al-Mansur, a palace on the far southern edge of the kasbah (still partly preserved today) which included vast stables. The monumental gate known as Bab Mansur al-'Alj (or Bab Mansour), still preserved today overlooking Place al-Hedim, was only finished in 1732 by his son Moulay Abdallah. His other son and brief successor, Moulay Ahmad ad-Dhahabi, carried out modifications on Isma'il's mausoleum during his two brief reigns (in 1727–28 and 1728–29) and was himself buried here in 1729.
Following Moulay Isma'il's death, however, the political situation in Morocco degenerated into relative anarchy. His sons fought each other for power and his former 'abid army became the dominant power in the state, effectively ruling behind the throne. Meknes lost its status as capital and suffered damage in the 1755 earthquake. The city was neglected and many parts of the enormous imperial kasbah fell into disrepair. The site received only occasional royal attention in the following centuries. Sultan Muhammad ibn Abdallah, who ruled between 1757 and 1790, added the Dar al-Bayda Palace in the Agdal garden to the southeast of the main palace complex, which was later turned into a royal military academy. He also constructed the Er-Roua Mosque in the southern part of the kasbah (not far from the Heri al-Mansur), which is the largest mosque in Meknes. The Dar al-Kebira, however, was abandoned and progressively transformed into a residential neighbourhood where the inhabitants constructed their houses within and between the former palace structures of Isma'il's time. In the early 19th century, Sultan Moulay Abd ar-Rahman added a loggia structure in front of Bab al-Mansur which served as a meeting place for ceremonies and the governor's tribunal, though this structure was later removed.
Today, a part of the kasbah, the Dar al-Makhzen, is still used by the King of Morocco and is off-limits to the public. Other sites, such as Moulay Isma'il's mausoleum and the Heri es-Souani, are open as religious sites or tourist attractions.
The kasbah of Moulay Isma'il covers a vast, roughly quadrilateral area surrounded by a circuit of walls over 7 kilometers long. Within this area are several walled enclosures which contained their own independent palaces, while a number of other separate palace buildings and functional structures existed beyond these. A large part of the kasbah, especially its southern and eastern regions, was taken up by gardens, fields, and training grounds. Two outlying kasbahs or enclosures, were part of the larger Kasbah and are occupied by residential neighbourhoods today: the Kasbah Beni Muhammad and the Kasbah Hadrash.
The main materials used for construction were rammed earth (or pisé) and brick, of which most walls were made, as well as marble, plaster, and tile used for decoration. Ancient Roman and more recent Saadian spolia (especially marble) were looted from other sites in Morocco wherever available (such as Volubilis and the Badi Palace) and reused for the palaces. The decorative motifs on display are in keeping with the existing artistic traditions of Moroccan architecture, which had by this point been fused with earlier Andalusi (Moorish) architecture.
The general layout of buildings reflects an arrangement seen in the Royal Kasbah of Marrakesh and other Islamic-era palaces in the wider region: a variety of enclosed gardens, pavilions, and apartments were constituted into multiple autonomous palaces, complete with their own amenities and infrastructure, existing separately in conjunction throughout the site. The Qasr al-Muhannasha bears particular resemblances in its spatial arrangement to the Saadian-era Badi Palace of Marrakesh. Isma'il's kasbah, however, was on a larger scale than ever seen before. By some estimates, it covers an area four times larger than the old city of Meknes itself. The architecture of Moulay Isma'il's reign in Meknes is likewise distinguished by its size and scale. The scale and ambition of the project has led historians to nickname it the "Versailles of Morocco". The kasbah also contains a great amount of empty or open space in comparison with the dense urban fabric of the old city. This contrast also kept with the tradition of isolating the sultan and his family from the noise and crowds of the popular city, a tendency apparent in the region since the early Islamic period with examples such as Madinat al-Zahra.
Text from the Wikipedia article “Kasbah of Moulay Ismail”, available under CC BY-SA 4.0.