With its mosques, medersas and fondouks, back alleys crammed with goods-laden donkeys, and a mile-long labyrinth of souks, there are enough sights in Fez el Bali (Old Fez) to fill three or four days just trying to locate them. What is undeniable is that they have the most developed Moroccan city culture, with an intellectual tradition and their own cuisine, dress and way of life. The decline of the city’s political position notwithstanding, Fassis – the people of Fez – continue to head most government ministries and have a reputation throughout Morocco as successful and sophisticated. Medieval European travellers described it with a mixture of awe and respect, as a “citadel of fanaticism” yet the most advanced seat of learning in mathematics, philosophy and medicine. It was closely and symbolically linked with the birth of an “Arabic” Moroccan state due to their mutual foundation by Moulay Idriss I, and was regarded as one of the holiest cities of the Islamic world after Mecca and Medina. The city had dominated Moroccan trade, culture and religious life – and usually its politics, too – since the end of the tenth century. To appreciate the significance of this demise, you only have to look at the Arab chronicles or old histories of Morocco – in every one, Fez takes centre stage. By building a new European city nearby – the Ville Nouvelle, now the city’s business and commercial centre – then transferring Fez’s economic and political functions to Rabat and the west coast, Lyautey ensured the city’s eclipse along with its protection. More conveniently for the French, this paternalistic protection helped to disguise the dismantling of the old culture.
Lyautey took the philanthropic and startling move of declaring the city a historical monument philanthropic because he certainly saved Fez el Bali from destruction (albeit from less benevolent Frenchmen), and startling because until then Moroccans were under the impression that Fez was still a living city – the imperial capital of the Moroccan empire rather than a preservable part of the nation’s heritage. Like much of “traditional” Morocco, Fez was “saved” then recreated by the French, under the auspices of General Lyautey, the Protectorate’s first Resident-General.
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