Travels in Morocco, Volume 2. by James Richardson
page 82 of 181 (45%)
page 82 of 181 (45%)
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Fez and Mequinez. Whenever his Imperial Highness has anything
disagreeable with foreign European powers, he comes down from Fez to Morocco, to get out of the way. Occasionally, he travels from town to town of the interior, to awe by his presence the ever restless disaflfection of the tribes, or excite their loyalty for the Shereefian throne. Morocco is placed in Lat. 31° 37" 31' N. and Long. 7° 35" 30', W. Tafilett consists of a group of towns or villages, situate on the south-eastern side of the Atlas, which may he added to the royal cities, being inhabited in part by the Imperial family, and is the birth-place of their sovereign power--emphatically called Beladesh-Sherfa, "country of the Shereefs." The country was anciently called Sedjelmasa, and retained this name up to 1530 A.D., when the principal city acquired the apellation of Tafilett, said to be derived from an Arab immigrant, called Filal, who improved the culture of dates, and whose name on this account, under the Berber form of Tafilett, was given to a plantation of dates cultivated by him, and then passed to the surrounding districts. At the present time, Tafilett consists of a group of fortified or castle-built villages, environed by walls mounted with square towers, which extend on both sides of the river Zig. There is also a castle, or rather small town, upon the left side of the river, called by the ordinary name of Kesar, which is in the hands of the Shereefs, and inhabited entirely by the family of the Prophet. The principal and most flourishing place was a long time called Tafilett, but is now according to Callie, Ghourlan, and the residence of the Governor of the province of Ressant, a town distinguished by a magnificent gateway surrounded with various coloured Dutch tiles, symmetrically arranged in a diamond |
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