Sefrou
| Sefrou صفرو ⵚⴼⵕⵓ |
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| Basic data | |||||
| State : |
 Morocco
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| Region : | Fès-Meknes | ||||
| Province : | Sefrou | ||||
| Coordinates | 33 ° 50 ′ N , 4 ° 51 ′ W | ||||
| Residents : | 64.006 (2004) | ||||
| Height : | 850 m | ||||
Sefrou (from the mazirischen ⵚⴼⵕⵓ Sfṛu ; arabic صفرو, DMG Şafrū / Sifrū ) is a provincial capital with around 70,000 inhabitants in the Fès-Meknes region in northern Morocco at the foothills of the Middle Atlas . One of the largest Jewish minorities in the country lived in the walled old town until the middle of the 20th century . Today the picturesque mountain town near Fès is a popular destination. In the ethnological literature, Sefrou is a household name through the field research of Clifford Geertz and others.
location
Sefrou is located 30 kilometers southeast of Fès on a mountain slope of the gentle foothills of the Middle Atlas at an altitude of about 800 to 900 meters. The side road R 503 leads further south over a nearly 1800 meter high pass into the central Atlas Mountains to Boulemane and to Midelt . The national road 8 from Fez to the south via Azrou and Khénifra runs 20 kilometers west of the city. In between rises the Kandar Mountains with the Jbel Abad , from whose 1768 meter high summit the irrigated fields of the fertile lowlands of Sais and the houses of Fès can be seen.
The city is nestled between orchards on the southern edge of the Sais plain at the transition to the deforested Atlas Mountains with little vegetation on their crests. Mainly cherries and strawberries thrive on the nearby slopes. After the cherry harvest in June, a three-day cherry festival ( moussem des cérises ) with equestrian competitions ( Fantasias ) and a large market is organized. Olive trees are also planted in the area; To the west, a 1.5 kilometer long footpath leads through the Oued Aggai stream valley, which is densely overgrown with cedars and deciduous trees, to a waterfall. Without its own water sources, the ecological niche of Sefrou would be as dry as the rocky hills and plateaus further south; The natural forest region of Forêt de Jabla only begins several kilometers to the southeast .
history
A first camp or settlement was created in the 7th century in pre-Islamic times by the Jewish Berber tribe of Ahel Sefrou, whose memory has been preserved in the place name. Jews and Christians are mentioned in the Sefrou area up to the 9th century. According to local, unconfirmed legend, the city of Sefrou is said to have been founded in the 8th century before Fez. The plans for the construction of Fès date from 789, when Idris I announced the construction of a new capital for the later Idrisid dynasty, the first Arab succession in Morocco. Idris I had subjugated the Jewish and Christian tribes in the area, but only his successor Idris II is considered to be the actual founder of the independent Idrisid state, who relocated his official seat from Walila ( Volubilis ) to Fez in 809 and expanded Fez to the capital. The Islamization of the region goes back to him. Sefrou also probably became a city at the same time. Under Muhammad ibn Idris (r. 828-836) there was a dispute over rule and the fragmentation of the empire. His son Ali ibn Idris ibn Idris (ruled 836-848) used Sefrou as a base for an attack on Fez.
In the 11th century, Sefrou was a walled city of some importance. During the 13th century, Jewish immigrants came from Tafilalet . According to local tradition, there was a special Jewish quarter ( Mellah ) within the old town in the 15th century during the Merinid period . A defined mellah presupposes that there was a ban on Jews from settling outside. If the Mellah had been introduced under Abdalhaqq II (ruled 1421–1465), this would have happened around the same time as it was established in Fez in 1438. The local Mellah is considered to be the oldest Jewish quarter in Morocco.
Sefrou developed as a walled city with certain quarters for markets ( suqs ), mellah, a Muslim residential area ( medina ) , a fortress ( kasbah ) and an outside market. The Kasbah has been prepared by Alawites -Sultan Moulay Ismail (r. 1672-1727) built, who saw threatened the eastern frontier of his kingdom of unrest and uprisings of the Berber. He undertook several military expeditions against the rebels and in order to secure his sultan's power permanently, he had a series of fortresses built in the 1680s from Taza in the northeast on the edge of the Atlas Mountains via Sefrou, Azrou, Kasba Tadla to Beni Mellal . Mulai Ismail had set up special troops made up of black African slaves to guard the kasbahs and smaller fortifications. Sefrou's prosperity stemmed at least in part from the trade in caravans that traveled north via Tafilet on the edge of the Sahara . When the caravans shifted their route to Fez further east in the 19th century, they no longer passed through Sefrou and the place lost some of its economic power.
The number of Jewish residents in the 17th and 18th centuries was fewer than in Fez or Meknes , but Sefrou was still a center of Jewish education. This was particularly thanks to the legal scholar R. Moses bin Hamo, who ran a religious school at the end of the 17th century. From his correspondence it appears that he taught the students the Hulin tract from the Talmud in the morning and gave a course for over 20 advanced students in the afternoon. Among his disciples were some who were later recognized as spiritual leaders in the 18th century.
Around 1900 there were about 6000 inhabitants in Sefrou, half of them Jews and Muslims. With the treaty of March 30, 1912, which Sultan Mulai Abd al-Hafiz signed in Fez, Morocco became a French protectorate and French troops occupied the Meknes-Fez region. The Sais Plain became a heartland of agricultural development during colonial times. In the 1920s, French farmers set up farms surrounded by fences with accommodation for the local farm workers. Investments in agriculture on the plain increased until the 1950s, compared to the well-tended buildings with tiled roofs, the poor mud brick dwellings of the local population in the hills around Sefrou formed a social contrast. The economic neglect of the hinterland around Sefrou during the colonial period led to an immigration movement into the city.
According to the general French colonial policy, a European Ville Nouvelle was planned separately from the old town. Nevertheless, the proportion of French in Sefrou did not exceed one percent of the population.
In 1950 the Oued Aggai, which normally flows as a small stream across the city, burst its banks in a spring tide. 30 people were killed and major damage was done to the buildings. Thereupon the creek bed was dug several meters deep, whereby the old washing place of the Jewish women disappeared.
The French New Town extends southwest of the old town on the slopes that were originally irrigated gardens. Half of the population there in the 1960s consisted of a wealthy Moroccan class of former landowners who had moved outside with their families from the old town, and European-oriented city dwellers. The other half belonged to the lower class. By 1970 at the latest, most of the Jews had left the city for political reasons, the few remaining had moved to new parts of the city.
Sefrou is one of the socio-scientifically best researched cities in Morocco. Between 1965 and 1971, the American ethnologist Clifford Geertz, his wife Hildred Geertz and some of his students stayed in Sefrou for a long time to do field research in the city and its surroundings. The compact, traditionally structured old town - for Geertz "a little Fez" - was particularly suitable for studying an Islamic society because of the numerous Sufi brotherhoods ( Tarīqas ) . Among his younger colleagues was Paul Rabinow , who from 1968-69 examined the Sufi brotherhood of the 17th century saint in the nearby village of Sidi Lahcen Lyusi. Dale F. Eickelmann, whose dissertation is based on field research 1968-70 in Boujad , was also related to Geertz. Until 1986, Geertz kept coming back to Sefrou for different lengths of work, and was in the city for the last time in May 2000 for a conference.
Between 1960 and 1986, a rapid population shift from the countryside to the city was observed. With an area of 10 square kilometers, Sefrou is the only city in the approximately 2000 square kilometer district. The ratio of urban to rural population changed from one to four in 1960 to one to one in 1986. The result was a population split into long-established and newcomers; both are dissatisfied with their fate. In September 2007 there was a so-called "bread riot" in Sefrou. The unrest began when a women's organization called for a demonstration against the rise in food prices and quickly degenerated into violent protests after the provincial governor's police force appeared in large numbers. The images were documented photographically and with video cameras and published on YouTube .
Cityscape
The old town, which is completely surrounded by an oval city wall, is traversed by the Oued Aggai in its longitudinal extension from west to east. The brook divides the old town into the two roughly equal residential areas of the Muslim Medina in the north and the Jewish Mellah in the south. Especially the alleys in the Mellah are relatively straight, but very narrow, so that orientation is difficult. The main entrances are the Bab el-Maqam in the north and the Bab Merba in the south, near which, outside the city wall, is the now closed synagogue . Five mosques are distributed within the wall. The most famous Sufi pilgrimage site in the Mellah is the Zawiya of Sidi Lahcen ben Ahmed, a saint from the 17th century. Its mausoleum ( Qubba ) is the largest in the mountains of the region, every year in August a pilgrimage festival ( Moussem ) is held. Members of this brotherhood tend to avoid the Aissaouas in the city. Their Islamic popular beliefs include healing rituals and snake charms.
The bus station and taxi rank are located in the large Moulay Hassan square northwest of the old town on the road to Fès. The French New Town extends beyond the Boulevard Mohammed V as a spacious, quiet garden city to the southwest up the hill; the entire current city expansion in the north and east covers a multiple of the walled old town. Market day is Thursday, on the other days of the week Sefrou does not seem busy.
Following the stream to the west, a winding road after half a kilometer leads past al-Qala (Ksar el Kelaa), a fortified village with now impoverished inhabitants, and on to the aforementioned waterfall. Two kilometers outside is the sanctuary of the marabout Sidi Bou Ali Serghin, and nearby is the spring of the female saint Lalla Rekia, to whom animals were once sacrificed so that she might cure mental illnesses.
Another route leads from the city after a few kilometers to the formerly important Jewish pilgrimage site Kef el Yehudi ("Jewish cave"), where Jews venerated the grave of Saint Daniel or four Kwahnas (holy Jewish Berbers). For Muslims, this was the cave for the seven companions known from the legend of the dormouse . The seven young men slept very late and when they woke up they wanted to buy bread in Sefrou. Since their money was no longer accepted - it was now out of date - they went back to sleep, which they still do today. Followers of both religions used to offer candles and incense sticks.
See also
literature
- Clifford Geertz : Reading Traces: The Ethnologist and the Slipping of Facts. [Comparison of cities Sefrou in Morocco and Pare in Indonesia over four decades]. CH Beck, Munich 1997. ISBN 978-3-406-41902-7
- Clifford Geertz, Hildred Geertz, Lawrence Rosen: Meaning and Order in Moroccan Society: Three Essays in Cultural Analysis. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1979
- Ingeborg Lehmann, Rita Henss: Morocco. Karl Baedeker, Ostfildern 2009, pp. 271f, ISBN 978-3829711562
- Paul Rabinow : Reflections on Fieldwork in Morocco. University of California Press, Berkeley / Los Angeles / London 1977 ( as google book )
- Norman A. Stillman: The language and culture of the Jews of Sefrou, Morocco: an ethnolinguistic study. University of Manchester, Manchester 1988
Web links
- City website (French)
- Sefrou. The unspoiled city. LookLex
- Sefrou, Morocco Observed: The Photographs of Paul Hyman. Photos by Paul Hyman, taken in Sefrou in 1969 at the invitation of Paul Rabinow. 64 of these photos are shown in Geertz, 1979
Individual evidence
- ↑ Moroccan population statistics ( Memento of the original from July 1, 2016 in the Internet Archive ) Info: The archive link was inserted automatically and has not yet been checked. Please check the original and archive link according to the instructions and then remove this notice.
- ^ Jamil M. Abun-Nasr: A history of the Maghrib in the Islamic period. Cambridge University Press, Cambridge 1987, p. 51
- ↑ Jane S. Gerber: Jewish Society in Fez. 1450-1700. Studies in Communal and Economic Life. (Studies in Judaism in Modern Times, Vol. 6) EJ Brill, Leiden, 1980, pp. 10, 19
- ↑ Jamil M. Abun-Nasr, p. 231
- ↑ Thomas K. Park, Aomar Boum: Sefrou. In: Historical Dictionary of Morocco. Library of Congress. 2nd ed., Scarecrow Press, Lanham 2006, p. 318
- ↑ Saul I. Aranov: A descriptive catalog of the Bension collection of Sephardic manuscripts and texts. University of Alberta Press, Edmonton 1979, p. 22
- ↑ Rabinow, pp. 8-10
- ↑ Rabinow, p. 22
- ↑ Geertz 1997, p. 23
- ↑ Geertz 1997, p. 25
- ↑ Sefrou la ville du danger 23/09/2007. Youtube video about the unrest in September 2007
- ↑ Rabinow, pp. 52, 131
- ^ Arnold Betten: Morocco. Antiquity, Berber Traditions and Islam - History, Art and Culture in the Maghreb. DuMont, Ostfildern 2009, pp. 189f
- ^ Edward Westermarck : Ritual and Belief in Morocco. Vol. 1, Macmillan and Co., London 1926, p. 72
