... the antique Roman city,
ancient capital of Mauretania Tingitane
In Morocco, border of Africa, gateway to Europe, the "imperial cities" are those which, over the successive Moroccan dynasties, have been the capital of the country : Rabat, Meknes, Fez, Marrakech ....
Our visits date from November 2010, in a circuit performed at the pace of a race, at the speed of a fantasian, almost in apnea.
Centuries before the Arabs came, when were only the Berbers, here was Volubilis, a Roman city, which will not really be an imperial city.
The history of this ancient city is summarized here from the detailed information of the superb and very professional site on Volubilis. From which some illustrations or photos are also extracted.
The Berber village of Volubilis is the capital of Mauretania (Maghreb region from the Atlantic coast until the Wadi el-Kebir in the east) during the 4th and the 3rd centuries BC.
It adopts from the 3rd century the Punic language and institutions ("Phoenician" in Latin), ie from the heirs of the Phoenicians, the Carthaginians, implanted in North Africa between -1100 and -700.
During the Punic Wars between Rome and Carthage (264 to 146 BC), the first Mauretanian kings and especially Baga support Rome with the Numidians against Carthage.
Victorious Rome in 146 BC, Mauretania is unified and the Roman Empire extended its hegemony over Spain and North Africa.
In 33 BC, Octavian (Augustus), 1st Roman emperor, had the Mauretanian kingdom administered directly without a sovereign and founded a Roman colony at Volubilis.
After the appeasement that followed the Roman victory against Carthage, it was necessary to concern the former soldiers and consolidate the Empire.
Like for Fréjus for example, veteran colonies are created when conditions permit, with the grant of land and sound and stumbling species, which contribute to the Pax Romana of the great Empire.
In the manner of the Greeks before, the choice of sites of ancient Roman cities organises perspectives and checks for the presence of constant natural resources. This is the case for the Volubilis site, from its gently sloping intermediate plateau, between neighbouring hills and lower level.
In this climate, hot and dry in summer, cold without frost but humid in winter, ocean rains guarantee the supply of the springs and nearby wadis.
The environment contributes to the supply of building materials (sandstone, limestone, oak wood, heavy land for the manufacture of bricks, pottery ...), and the production of food crops, cereals, vines, olive trees, vegetable crops.
In 25 BC, Octavian placed at the head of the kingdom Juba II, a Numidian whio was raised in Rome (Numidia : Berber kingdom covering northern Algeria, part of Tunisia southwest, southwest Libya and southeast Morocco ...) .
Volubilis may have hosted one of his royal residences for a time ; but its capital is Caesarea of Mauretania (to-day Cherchell in Algeria).
Juba II reigned for 48 years (since about 25) and helped the Romans suppress Numidian revolts.
His son Ptolemy of Mauretania succeeded him with the title of "king allied and friend of Rome".
But he was assassinated in 40 by Emperor Caligula (3rd Roman emperor, "the mad despot") in Lyon, for having, according to legend, dared to wear the purple coat, a very exclusive imperial color.
Rome took back vigourously the kingdom in hand, and divided the Mauretania into a western part called "Tingitane" (from Tangier, ancient Tingi) and an eastern part called "caesarean section" (from Caesarea, Cherchell today) corresponding mainly to Algeria.
From the reign of Juba II, the Roman imprint will mark the city over nearly two and a half centuries, until the abandonment around 285, much more due to the loosening of the great Roman Empire which distends than to local struggles.
Its population reaches a few thousand inhabitants, up to 10,000 it is said.
Especially local Berbers, a small Roman ruling elite but also the one that is of local origin by the lever of Roman institutions, a small Jewish community.
Religions of various origins (Roman, Phrygian, Moorish, Egyptian, etc.) are practiced there. Few slaves, many freedmen.
The region produced olive oil (for food, lighting, ointments and remedies, soap ...) and wheat : about sixty oil mills and 64 flour mills in Volubilis have been found.
A category of stone wheel named ring (movable stone ring revolving around a fixed tronconical stone) was used either to grind flour or to knead olives. The diagram comes from the site on Volubilis.
All professions related to construction and development, decoration are present ; potters, ceramists, brickmakers, tile makers, blacksmiths, ironworkers, mosaicists, bronziers, weavers, shoemakers, savory makers, tanners, dyers... More than 20 shops have been identified.
The soldiers ensuring the defense came from everywhere : Gallic, Syrian, Breton, Asturian, Galician...
In the earliest times, from the 13th century BC, it is Buruberri (new town), which then deforms into Volubilis.
Temporarily, Volubilis became Ksar Faraoun at the time of Juba II and his son Ptolemy of Mauretania, grandson of Cleopatra.
Then is transformed into Walili (or Oualili) from 789 and the arrival of Islam and Moulay Idriss; which meant the city of oleanders. or of liserons.
Became Volubilis again in modern times.
__________________
Our guide, tall and emaciated in his gandoura, tells Volubilis with talent, but constantly with dirty-minded words about the "gazelles".
Practitioner houses and mosaics
Among the remarkable remains of Volubilis, a large practitioner house, called "house of the Cortege of Venus", with two mosaics of mythological motifs (perfect representation seen from top to left, and our very poor shot of the SAME mosaic on the right).
They tell the banal daily domestic life among gods and heroes, with its great passions and little pettinesses. And are a bit like the photo-novels of the time.
The 1st mosaic, "Hylas removed by the nymphs"; in love with the beauty of Hylas, lover of Hercules, the nymphs abduct him and drag him forever into the depths. One wonders what for to do with him...
The 2nd, "Diana and Actaeon"; Actaeon, grandson of Apollo, a skilful hunter who knows how to hunt with his dogs, surprises Diana one day in her bath.
Diana is not a nymph and Actaeon, even grandson of Apollo, seems not to have inherited the beauty of his grandfather. At least not to the point of seducing Diane.
Goddess offended as a prudish bourgeois, furious, she turns him into a deer; he dies torn apart by her pack.
In the "house of the labours of Hercules", on the edge of a small basin, here are other less refined and more symbolic mosaics : dolphin, swastika, trident, Dionysian crater (two handles vase)... and a guinea fowl-like. Motives "intended to ward off the evil eye".
And of course the representation, this time of a beautiful workmanship of some of the 12 famous labours of Hercules.
In the "house of the Desultor", another mosaic represents a rider upside down on his horse : acrobat or humorous representation?
Elsewhere, in the "house of the Nereids", these include the four seasons, "symbol of immortality", each represented by a head surrounded by the plant attributes of the season in question.
In the "house of the Rider", Bacchus discovers Ariane asleep, beautiful mosaic a little degraded.
It is remembered that the daughter of Minos, against her father and thanks to her thread, helps Theseus, son of Aegean king of Athens, to defeat the Minotaur his monstrous half-brother, and to escape from the famous Labyrinth designed by Daedalus.
Then Ariane leaves Crete to flee the paternal revenge with the dashing man she loves.
But finally,...
- version 1, optimistic :
Theseus abandons her when they stop on the island of Naxos (Dia in the past), while she takes a little nap. Bacchus, the divine drunkard, protector of the island, discovers Ariane asleep (see the mosaic), and, taken of compassion and love makes her immortal and marries her. The golden tiara he offers her becomes a constellation in the sky.
- version 2, tragic :
Theseus takes to the sea because it is propitious to him, at the request of the gods or wanting to find another love in Greece; but then returns towards Ariane whom he discovers dead.
Good people, what a lot of adventures!!
But which version do you prefer?
Other geometric patterns are probably from the "catalogues" of patterns on cardboard that the mosaicists offered throughout the Empire.
Incredible Romans who also invented catalog sales.
The city, main roads and monuments
At the top of the main road (decumanus maximus), the so-called Tangier Gate.
At the other end, a little offset from the axis of the track (because it is posterior), the triumphal arch of Caracalla.
But the most imposing building, on the edge of the forum, is the basilica (which meant "royal hall"). Without any religious role, it housed administration, justice, with sometimes shops ; assemblies were also taken place here.
With a floor space of 1000 m², with its 8 bays whose height inside was reaching 15 meters, it was covered with a roof of tiles on wooden frame.
The thermal baths had their place, whose water was brought by a discreet aqueduct from the nearby heights,...
... as well today as the nest, round as a schtreimel, - not the cake but this Jewish fur hat for ceremony,- which is made by impertinent storks, living and unexpected pinnacle of some columns.
Columns often looted in the following centuries, as for the unfinished mosque of Rabat, or the palaces of Moulay Ismail in Meknes.
One cannot leave Volubilis without contemplating for a few minutes the flower whose name it bears - perhaps an imposture -, delicate and intense as an savage oriental girl.
A few feet adorn the entrance to the site.
Moulay Idriss, sacred white city
In the distance, the white city of Moulay Idriss, is a holy city for Muslims, because it houses the mausoleum of Idriss 1st.
Soon after the Hegira, the struggles are fierce.
Great-grandson of Fatima daughter of Muhammed, an Arab prince (Cherif) named Idriss,is defeated near Mecca in 786 by the Abbasids (named after Abbas, an uncle of Muhammad) whose power he challenged. He is of the Zaidist faith, a branch of Shiism.
In danger of death, he flees Baghdad with his family to the west and on February 5, 789 founds his city here. It will be the starting point of the Islamization of the Berbers of Morocco, and Idriss 1st is considered as the founder of Morocco, the Cherifian empire.
Idriss 1st is also the founder of Fez which developed under the reign of his son Idriss II.
But he dies poisoned 5 years later in 791 on the orders of the Abbasid caliph Harun al-Rashid, who feared the success of the Idrissids in the west of the Maghreb, and already that of the Umayyads in Cordoba.
Yes so! it is indeed Haroun, the caliph of the tale of the "Thousand and One Nights"; that of the splendour, the refinements, the wonders of the most beautiful and great city in the world at the time, Baghdad...
But also that of ruthless cruelties, and of considerable diplomatic and strategic actions: he fights Byzantium and dialogues with Charlemagne and China.
Then, after a dazzling boom (2 or 3 decades), the climax is short and it is the decline of his empire, which some attribute to his incompetences, others to the internal conflicts of power (hey hey! which inspired the famous comic of Goscinny where Iznogoud the vizier "wants to be caliph in the place of the caliph").
He will leave his successors a dismembered empire.
and then going to Casablanca, Rabat, Meknès, Fez, Marrakesch...
_______________________________________
A pithy summary of Morocco's history
North-south geographical crossroads at the African continental limit towards the Ocean : Morocco.
Historically, the Maghreb has been inhabited by Berbers (also called the Moors). Nothing to do with the Arabs, future invaders from the East and Arabia.
Permanent but nomadic, they rub shoulders with several waves of invaders over time, often adopting their religion, but retaining a fierce autonomy in the mosaic of still bellicose tribes. A link in the entire history of the Maghreb.
Who are the invaders?
In antiquity,
12th century BC: the Phoenicians, merchant sailors go at least to the port of Essaouira (formerly Mogador).
5th century BC: the Carthaginians are there, strong power in North Africa.
End of the 4th century BC: creation in the north of Morocco of the kingdom of Mauretania (and not "Mauritania") by the Berbers.
From the 2nd BC to the 4th AD: the Romans consolidate Mauretania Tingitane (Tangier).
The dromedaries then introduced (only the horse was used until then) increased the autonomy of the Berber tribes.
Remarkable cultural, architectural and economic development during the reign of Juba II (husband of the daughter of Cleopatra and Mark Antony).
And foundation of the Roman city of Volubilis.
Around 439, capture of Carthage in Tunisia by the Vandals, who, by driving the Romans from the West make it the capital of their kingdom, far from mauretania Tingitan.
533-534: with a powerful army under the command of his already famous general Belisarius (left), the Eastern Roman Emperor Justinian 1st the Byzantine (right) defeats the Vandals and pushes them out of North Africa.
However, the Berbers, accustomed to a certain autonomy, resisted, rebelled.
Arrival of Islam ; for a global vision of the Arab-Andalusian civilization
622: year 1 of the Hegira. Of Arabia began the conquest in 640 towards the west ; it reached the Atlantic coast around 705 with the submission of Berber tribes.
From then on, Morocco became the bridgehead of the conquest to the north and the Iberian Peninsula, via the Strait of Gibraltar.
But the huge Arab empire is mishanding itself. Strong resistance appears.
February 5, 789: Idriss ibn Abdallah, descendant of the prophet - he is the grandson of his daughter - founds, under the name of Idriss 1st the dynasty of the Idrissids and the city of Fez; he gathers together the Berbers of northern Morocco.
It is the 2nd Muslim kingdom after Andalusia to emancipate itself from the Caliphate of Baghdad. Dynasty that then erupts in successions.
1061: Nomadic Berbers from Western Sahara take possession of Morocco and found the almoravid dynasty who appropriated the Muslim religion; creating the city of Marrakesh, they then conquer Andalusia.
Around 1125: another dynasty of Berbers this time Mauretanians, the Almohads,intransigent Muslims and Puritans take power, from Spain to Libya. Their most famous sultan is Yacoub el Mansour. But the Christians are trying to reconquer. The Empire is vast and distended.
1269 to 1421: the Merinid dynasty succeeds him, and remakes the unity of the Maghreb, New dissensions; the Portuguese seize some coastal sites.
1472 to 1492: the Wattassid dynasty that took over comes up against the apogee of the Christian Reconquest.
After the Reconquista
1578: The Saadians, another Arab dynasty engages in holy war against the Christians, defeats the Portuguese, takes to the south Timbuktu in 1591 and Mali ; it enriches itself by controlling salt mines, gold, and strengthening the slave trade of black Africa.
Around 1660: the Alawite dynasty (descendants of Ali, son-in-law of the prophet) whose members lead a poor, meditative and virtuous life takes power.
1672 to 1727: from the same Alawite dynasty, a contemporary of Louis XIV, King Moulay Ismail reorganizes Morocco, fighting against the rebellious Berber tribes, the Ottoman Turks, the Christians. He was nicknamed "the Bloodthirsty".
The modern era
With the plague at the beginning of the 19th century and the decline of the economy, Morocco withdrew into itself and is exposed to European expansion ambitions.
1912: French protectorate. Lyautey assumes the role of Resident General (Governor). With great respect for Islam, he vouched for the country's traditional values, including local notables in his reorganization. Still honored by Moroccans, his situation is special in the history of the French colonial period.
1925: Predicting the natural "detachment" of Morocco, he is immediately excluded by the French government.
March 2, 1956: independence of Morocco, without too much pain on either side, unlike Algeria for example; this may be explained by the attitude of Lyautey governor.
The Residents who succeeded him, less sagacious, less intelligent, try to oppose Berbers and Arabs with the complicity of the rich Glaoui Berber pasha allied with France, provoking in reaction the commitment of the UNITED STATES alongside Mohammed V for independence.
The current King Mohammed VI, his father Hassan II are the direct representatives and descendants of the Alawite dynasty, hence their title of "Commander of the Believers", which gives them a certain religious legitimacy throughout the Muslim world even today.
Comments