Telouet
| Telouet تلوات ⵜⵍⵡⵉⵜ |
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| Basic data | |||||
| State : |
 Morocco
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| Region : | Drâa-Tafilalet | ||||
| Province : | Ouarzazate | ||||
| Coordinates | 31 ° 17 ′ N , 7 ° 14 ′ W | ||||
| Residents : | 14,211 (2004) | ||||
| Height : | 1160 m | ||||
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Telouet ( Arabic تلوات, Zentralatlas-Tamazight ⵜⵍⵡⵉⵜ Telwit ) is a small town and a rural municipality with about 14,500 inhabitants in the High Atlas in the province of Ouarzazate in the Drâa-Tafilalet region in southern Morocco . The place was the ancestral seat of the Berber clan of Glaoua .
location
Telouet lies at an altitude of approx. 1870 meters above sea level. d. M. and can be easily reached via an asphalt but potholed road that branches off to the east just a few kilometers south of the 2260 meter high Tizi n'Tichka pass. In addition, the former road from Ait Benhaddou to Telouet through the Ounila valley was paved in 2010/2011.
economy
For centuries, the largely sedentary inhabitants of the remote place lived on the principle of self-sufficiency from the yields of their - partly terraced - fields and some fruit trees. Rain has always been rare south of the High Atlas and so the fields were irrigated by meltwater from the mountains. Animal husbandry played a rather subordinate role. Nowadays many men work in the cities of the north or are active as small hoteliers or as tourist guides.
history
Telouet was an inconspicuous mountain village in the High Atlas for centuries. The place only came into the consciousness of Moroccans and Europeans through the activities of Thami El Glaoui in the first half of the 20th century. He was the offspring of a Berber clan that had controlled important trade routes for centuries and had become wealthy and influential through road tariffs and probably also through protection money. In 1893, the two brothers Madani († 1918) and Thami El Glaoui (1870–1956) supported and hosted Sultan Moulay Hassan, who was in political difficulties ; in return, the sultan granted them political and economic freedoms south of the High Atlas. During the colonial period, El Glaoui made pacts with the French - often against the interests of the sultan - which made the family even richer, because the French made Thami El Glaoui Pasha of Marrakech in return and gave him control over large parts of the Moroccan south and so he had large and representative kasbahs built elsewhere - for example in Ouarzazate , Skoura , Taliouine , Tinerhir etc.
When Sultan Mohammed V began to promote Moroccan independence more strongly in the post-war years, he was besieged by El Glaoui's troops in his palace in Fez (1952). El Glaoui advocated the sultan's exile to Madagascar. After the return of Mohammed V (1955) El Glaoui changed fronts and reconciled with the Sultan; However, he died a short time later. The entire property of the Glaoua clan was confiscated by the newly established Moroccan state; the kasbahs, regarded by the population as foreign bodies, were forgotten and gradually left to decay.
place
The construction of the one- or two-storey farms - depending on the prosperity of the residents - and usually grouped around an inner courtyard, in which in earlier times cattle (sheep, goats, chickens) were locked up every evening, is characteristic of the mountain regions of the High Atlas . The buildings were all built from the materials typical for this area: rubble stones or boulders in the base area as well as rammed earth mixed with small stones and plant residues for the outer walls. The ceilings rested on wooden beams with a network of branches in between and reed mats as a support for a layer of earth that prevented major damage to the reed mats. The larger, glazed windows were only added to the originally windowless buildings in the second half of the 20th century. In the rain-poor region, all houses have flat roofs, which are used by the women in the house for various household chores (food preparation, weaving, drying clothes, etc.).
Kasbah
The Kasbah El Glaouis, built at the end of the 19th and beginning of the 20th century, is located on a natural elevation just outside the village and dominates the townscape. Many parts of the building are made of clay bricks, which are rather unusual in the Moroccan south; other parts consist of the much more common rammed earth. The entire building was plastered with clay and parts of it were painted white, which was completely unusual in the Berber regions of southern Morocco. The kasbah has been uninhabited since the year of Morocco's independence (1956) and is gradually falling into disrepair. Some maintenance measures were carried out in 2010/11 - but these can only delay the deterioration of the structure by a few years.
From the outside, the multi-towered building complex, which is already provided with large windows and which the family used for residential and representative purposes alike, makes a rather poor impression, which, however, turns into a certain astonishment in the inner courtyards and in a few rooms in the representative wing: Here the walls and ceilings are decorated with tiles, stucco and paintings, the execution of which reveals a clear urban-Islamic taste. In fact, the craftsmen who carried out the work were not Berbers, but - for a certain period of time - specialists brought in from Fez and Marrakech . And El Glaoui probably saw himself less as a regional Berber prince than as a true ruler of southern Morocco.
Surroundings
Guided hiking and trekking tours into the mountains of the High Atlas are possible from Telouet and the village of Anemiter, which is about 15 kilometers away . Since 2011, an asphalt road has led through the scenic Ounila Valley to Ait Benhaddou .
See also
literature
- Arnold Betten: Morocco. Antiquity, Berber Traditions and Islam - History, Art and Culture in the Maghreb. DuMont-Verlag, Ostfildern 2012, ISBN 978-3-7701-3935-4 , p. 261ff.
Web links
- Telouet - text + photos
- Kasbah of Telouet - Photos + Text (Eng.)
- Telouet and El Glaoui - Photos and information (Engl.)
- Telouet - text + photos (English + French)