Azougui
Azougui ( Arabic آزوكي, DMG Azūkī ) or Azuggi is an oasis settlement and ruined city in Mauritania , which was the headquarters of the Almoravids in the 11th century .
geography
The remains of the wall of the former city lie in an oasis of the Oued Tayaret about 10 kilometers northwest of Atar between two layers of the Adrar Plateau . In the west the strata rises with the Mesoproterozoic Agueni formation . Immediately to the east, a ravine has cut into the strata consisting of the Azougui Formation and the Foum Choir Formation that covers it .
Today's small village cluster is located in the middle of a date palm grove . During the date harvest in the hot summer time, the place is filled with families from the cities who come to the harvest and at the same time spend their holidays here. They live in huts ( tikkits ) or in tents (khaimas) .
history
From Azougui, the Islamicized Berber nomads of the Sanhajah attacked the black African empire of Ghana in the south and the Berber and Arab empires in Morocco and Spain .
The historian Al-Bakri reported that in Azougui one of 20,000 date palms surrounded fortress named Ardschi (or Arji ) of Yannu ibn Umar , a brother of the two Almoravidenanführer Yahya ibn Umar al-Lamtuni and Abu Bakr ibn Umar was built . It was on the border between the tribal area of the former friends of the Lamtuna and Judala , two desert tribes of the Sanhajah Berbers. However, after the Judala had given up the alliance with the Lamtuna, only the latter formed the core of the Almoravid dynasty. In 1056 the Lamtuna suffered their first major defeat at the nearby Tabfarilla , when the Judala destroyed a Lamtuna army stationed in Azougui and killed their leader Yahya ibn Umar. Later, Azougui and the neighboring battlefield were considered by the Almoravids to be one of their venerable sites. The chronicler Al-Zuhri , who wrote around 1150, described Azougui as the capital of the Almoravids.
Al-Idrisi saw in Azougui an inevitable stopover of the Trans-Saharan trade between Morocco and the Empire of Ghana:
He also notes that the people of Guinea (probably referring to the Soninke ) knew Azugui as Quqadam .
As finds of stone tools, several stone circles and petroglyphs from the 7th century prove, Azougui was settled long before. Today parts of the old citadel and the necropolis of al-Imam al-Hadrami still stand .
geology
The place is named for the geological Azougui formation .
UNESCO world heritage
On June 14, 2001, Azougui was put on the list of proposals ( tentative list ) of Mauritania for UNESCO World Heritage in Mauritania .
literature
- Mohamed Salem Ideidbi: Mauritanie. La richesse d'une nation . al-Manar, Nouakchott 2011.
- Mohamed Salem Ideidbi: Traité de Politique ou Conseils pour la conduite du pouvoir d'al-Imam al-Hadrami (Cadi d'Azougui) . Geuthner, Paris 2011, ISBN 978-2-7053-3851-0 .
Web links
- Azougui. Citadel and Necropolis. LookLex
Individual evidence
- ^ Levtzion, N. and Hopkins, JFP (editors): Corpus of Early Arabic Sources for West African History . Cambridge University Press. 2000 edition, Cambridge, UK 1981, pp. 73 .
- ^ Levtzion, N. and Hopkins, JFP (editors): Corpus of Early Arabic Sources for West African History . Cambridge University Press. 2000 edition, Cambridge, UK 1981, pp. 95 .
- ^ Levtzion, N. and Hopkins, JFP (editors): Corpus of Early Arabic Sources for West African History . Cambridge University Press. 2000 edition, Cambridge, UK 1981, pp. 127-128 .
- ↑ Paysage culturel d'Azougui .
Coordinates: 20 ° 34 ′ N , 13 ° 6 ′ W
