Al-Mansuriya

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Al-Mansuriya ( Arabic المنصورية, DMG al-Manṣūriya ), also Sabra (صبرة, Ṣabra , “hard stone”), was a palace city in Ifrīqiya (today's Tunisia ) named after its founder, the Fatimid caliph Ismail al-Mansur . It is located about 1 mile southeast of Kairuan , replaced al-Mahdiya as the seat of government and also served the Zirids as the capital until 1053.

Fatimid al-Muizz's dinar struck in al-Mansuriya

Al-Mansur founded his new royal seat in 946 , before his final victory over Abu Yazid . Based on the model of Baghdad , it was laid out as a round town with the palace in the center and was later to serve as a model for Cairo . The building material was mainly taken from the old aghlabid residence Raqqada . The construction work could only be completed under Abu Tamin al-Muizz , who ensured the water supply with the construction of an aqueduct . Besides courtiers and slave troops, 14,000 Kutama Berbers, the base of the Fatimid power, were also settled in al-Mansuriya. The new city is on coins tooمدينة عزّ الإسلام( Madīnat ʿizz al-islām , "City of the Strength of Islam").

After the Fatimids moved to Egypt (973), al-Mansuriya remained the capital even under their viceroys, the Zirids. As early as 1016, however, it was badly damaged in a Sunni uprising. During the invasion of the Banu Hilal in 1053 the Zirids finally relocated the residence to al-Mahdiya; al-Mansuriya was looted and subsequently served as a quarry for the residents of Kairuan.

In 1921 the first French excavations took place, which have been continued in a Franco-Tunisian project since 1972. The prospection, supplemented with methods of aerial photo archeology, produced an ellipsoidal base area of ​​the city, the largest and smallest axes of which were determined by surveying at 1350 m and 1050 m. The contour of the city wall made of bricks could largely be verified by remote sensing.

Notes and individual references

  1. which were found during excavations and are exhibited today in the Center d'Études de la Civilization et des Arts Islamiques in Raqqada (12 km from Kairuan)
  2. Patrice Cressier, Mourad Rammah: Première campagne de fouilles à Ṣabra al-Manṣūriya (Kairouan, Tunisie). Casa De Velzquez, 2011, pp. 401-409 , accessed on March 22, 2011 (French, research results).

literature

  • Georges Marçais: Tunis et Kairouan . Paris 1937. pp. 53-62; Chapter IV: Kairouan sous les Fatimides et les Zirides
  • SM Zbiss: Mahdia et Sabra-Mansoûriya . In: Journal Asiatique, Volume (1956), pp. 79–93
  • The Encyclopaedia of Islam . New Edition. Brill, Leiden, Vol. 8, p. 688

Coordinates: 35 ° 39 ′ 29 ″  N , 10 ° 6 ′ 50 ″  E