Islamic Heritage of Fez and Morocco

Fez and its medina

Fez was founded in the late eighth and early ninth centuries under the Idrisids, the first Muslim dynasty to rule in Morocco, though Islam had reached the country with the Umayyad conquests some eighty years before they arrived. Idris I is buried in the hill town of Moulay Idriss Zerhoun, above the Roman ruins of Volubilis and still one of the most venerated places in the country, and it was under his son Idris II that Fez took shape as a capital. The city grew into a great centre of learning and craft, swelled at a formative moment by waves of settlers from Andalusia and Tunisia who brought their skills and traditions with them. Its old walled city, Fes el-Bali, is a dense maze of thousands of alleyways, workshops, fountains and mosques, closed to cars and best explored slowly on foot.

The medina is a working city, not a museum: tanneries, weavers, metalworkers and food stalls fill its lanes, and the crafts practised here have changed little in centuries. Losing your bearings is inevitable and part of the experience, but orienting by the main gates, the river and the major monuments helps you find your way back to the arteries.

Al-Qarawiyyin

At the heart of the medina stands the Al-Qarawiyyin mosque and its attached centre of learning, founded in the ninth century by Fatima al-Fihri, a woman of Tunisian origin, and widely cited as one of the oldest continuously operating educational institutions in the world. For over a thousand years it has been a magnet for scholars, and its library preserves priceless manuscripts.

The mosque grew over the centuries into a vast complex whose green-tiled roofs spread across the medina, and its courtyard and prayer hall reflect the successive dynasties that patronised it. Non-Muslim visitors are generally not able to enter the prayer hall, but the gates offer glimpses of the interior, and the surrounding streets and the restored library building are rewarding in themselves.

• One of the oldest continuously operating centres of learning
• Founded in the ninth century by Fatima al-Fihri
• A historic library of rare manuscripts

The madrasas

Some of the finest architecture in Fez is found in its madrasas, the residential colleges built especially under the Marinid dynasty in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries. The Bou Inania and Al-Attarine madrasas are jewel-boxes of Moroccan craftsmanship, their courtyards lined with carved cedar, sculpted plaster and intricate zellij tilework in dazzling geometric patterns.

Unlike the working mosques, several of these madrasas are open to visitors, and they are the best places to study Moroccan decorative art at close range. Standing in a small tiled courtyard, with the play of light on carved stucco above, gives a concentrated sense of the aesthetic that runs through Moroccan and Andalusian architecture alike.

Marrakech and the imperial cities

Fez is one of Morocco's four imperial cities, and its heritage is echoed and varied in the others. Marrakech, to the south, was a capital of the Almoravids and Almohads and is dominated by the Koutoubia mosque, whose great minaret is a sibling of the Giralda in Seville and the Hassan Tower in Rabat, all products of the same Almohad building tradition. Marrakech adds gardens, palaces and the famous square at the city's heart.

Rabat, the modern capital, and Meknes, a grand Alaouite creation, complete the quartet, each with its own walls, gateways and monuments. Travelling between them traces the succession of dynasties that shaped the country, and the shared vocabulary of tile, cedar and plaster that links Moroccan architecture across the centuries.

• Marrakech and the Almohad Koutoubia minaret
• Rabat's Hassan Tower and Meknes's imperial gates
• A shared Andalusian-Moroccan decorative tradition

The Andalusian connection

Morocco and al-Andalus, Muslim Spain, were bound together for centuries, ruled at times by the same dynasties and exchanging scholars, craftsmen and refugees across the strait. That shared history explains the strong family resemblance between the monuments of Fez and Marrakech and those of Cordoba, Seville and Granada: the same horseshoe arches, carved plaster, cedar ceilings and geometric tile.

For a traveller, this makes Morocco a natural companion to a trip through Andalusia, or a fascinating destination in its own right for anyone who has admired the Alhambra and wants to see the living tradition from which it grew. Our guide to Andalusia's Islamic heritage traces the other side of that connection.

Practical notes

Spring and autumn are the most pleasant seasons; summers inland are very hot, and the Fez medina can be exhausting in the heat. A local guide for a first day in the medina is genuinely useful, both to navigate the maze and to unlock the history, after which you can explore more confidently on your own. Dress modestly, especially near mosques, and remember that the working mosques are generally not open to non-Muslim visitors.

Comfortable shoes are essential on the uneven lanes, and it is worth carrying water and small change. Between cities, trains and roads are good, making a multi-city itinerary straightforward. Browse Moroccan heritage in the destinations catalogue and use the itinerary planner to sketch a route through the imperial cities.

Frequently asked questions