Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
Warriors Unveiled: The Almoravids
With religious leaders and scholars to help regulate trade, northern Morocco began to take
shape as an economic entity under the Idrissids. But the south was another story. A dissid-
ent prophet emerged near Salé brandishing a Berber version of the Quran, and established
an apocryphal Islam called Barghawata that continued to be practised in the region for cen-
turies. The military strongmen who were left in control of trading outposts in the Atlas
Mountains and the Sahara demanded what they called 'alms' - bogus religious nomen-
clature that didn't fool anyone, and stirred up resentments among the faithful.
From this desert discontent arose the Sanhaja, the pious Saharan Berber tribe that foun-
ded the Almoravid dynasty. While the Idrissid princes were distracted by disputes over
Spain and Mediterranean Morocco, the Sanhaja swept into the south of Morocco from what
is today Senegal and Mauritania. Tough doesn't do justice to the Sanhaja; they lived on
camels' meat and milk instead of bread, wore wool in the scorching desert and abstained
from wine, music and multiple wives. Their manly habit of wearing dark veils is still prac-
tised today by the few remaining Tuareg, the legendary 'Blue Men' of the desert (and the
many tourists who imitate them in camel-riding photo-ops). When these intimidating
shrouded men rode into Shiite and Barghawata outposts under the command of Yahya ibn
Umar and his brother Abu Bakr, they demolished brothels and musical instruments as well
as their opponents.
An incisive look at religious life on opposite ends of the Muslim world, anthropologist Cliford
Geertz's groundbreaking
Islam Observed: Religious Development in Morocco and Indonesia
reveals complex
variations within the vast mosaic of Islam.
From Marrakesh to Barcelona, the Ultimate Power Couple
After Yahya was killed and Abu Bakr was recalled to the Sahara to settle Sanhaja disputes
in 1061, their cousin Youssef ben Tachfine was left to run military operations from a camp-
site that would become Marrakesh the magnificent. To spare his wife the hardships of life
in the Sahara, Abu Bakr divorced brilliant Berber heiress Zeinab en-Nafzawiyyat and ar-
ranged her remarriage to his cousin. Though an odd romantic gesture by today's standards,
it was an inspired match. It would be Zeinab's third marriage: before marrying Abu Bakr,
she was the widow of one of the leading citizens of Aghmat, and had considerable fortune
and political experience at her command. Between Ben Tachfine's initiative and Zeinab's
financing and strategic counsel, the Almoravids were unstoppable.
