The Cultural Heritage of Fes

By Scott McCary

Our Friday in Fes, Morocco was shuffled around a bit and not as we had expected. Honestly I thought we’d do more throughout the day, but it was fun nonetheless. The day began at the Synagogue Roben Bensadoun. The outside was a nondescript facade and door that opened to a singular plaque and some stairs. However, upon entering and ascending, we found ourselves surrounded by possibly the most ornate synagogue I’ve been in. It was a small and hot room, but decorated on the floor and ceiling and everywhere in between with silver and copper designs, giving it a golden glow. White and gold curtains hung from the back, veiling the female section from the forward male section. Light flooded in through the stained glass windows of countless colors that lined the walls against the ceiling and was supplemented by hanging memorial lights and complicated chandeliers suspended by chains all throughout. The bema stood in the center of the cramped room, its redwood glimmering with copper on top of silver.  

All the metal works were done solo by Shalom, our guide for the Jewish quarter in Fes (in fact his day job is in handiwork). Several members of our group attempted to have a Hebrew conversation with Shalom with varying levels of success. He is one of the last few leaders of the Jewish community in Fes, having shrunk in population from 22,500 Jews in the city limits in 1947 to only around 150 today (many of whom are not practicing). Sometimes they must rely on foreign visitors to make a minyan of 10 men, especially for important occasions like the high holidays.

As it turns out, Shalom is the latest in a long tradition of silverworker Jews in Fes. Fes is the capital in the world for Jewish silverworking (I didn’t know Jewish silverwork was that famous as it is). The Torah crowns and bells on each stave were elaborate, one or two being made of Fes silver. However, despite being in a predominantly Sephardic synagogue, the Torah scrolls were donated by outsiders, and were therefore in the Ashkenazi style. The Torah itself was made from Gazelle skin (quite fancy).

We then left and went to the nearby Israelite Cemetery of Fes, the only Jewish cemetery in the city (it is known, however, that there are more than likely other burial sites for the Toshabim, or the “Jews of Berber origin” as stated by a plaque on the wall). All graves were splendid white marble. Jewish burial practices are complex, but in brief, the dead cannot be cremated, they must be facing east, buried in humble white shrouds, and only in simple wood coffins so as to allow disintegration. There is usually a burial society to oversee the burial process, but it was revealed that Shalom was the only member of the Fes burial society. He and only a few volunteers moved the cemetery, which used to be next to the palace, to its current location far away over the course of 3 years. There were countless people, but one notable holy man was buried in a grave with a covering to stand under and a small fireplace to light memorial or yahrzeit candles. This holy man was named Aryeh Yahudah (or the Lion of Judah) and lived from 1655 to 1733. It is said that he was captured by an enemy and thrown to a lion, but he was so holy that the lion refused to attack him.  He was killed anyway.  So it goes.

I feel it is important to mention the cats of Morocco. There are a great many all over the place; everywhere you look, a cat will be there with you. I personally made close friends with the calico hotel cat that hangs out by the pool and the breakfast area. That is beside the point however. There were many cats in the cemetery that we played with, including several black and white tuxedo kittens and a cat who appeared to be their mother. Some were more friendly than others.

Cats of Fes. Photographs by Scott McCary.

We next went to the Synagogue Aben Danan, which was non-functional and just a museum. It looked almost ransacked in that the Torahs seemed quite disheveled. It was less ornate. There was no coherent talk about the synagogue by Shalom or the teachers. However, I did wander and find the mikvah (the Jewish ritual bath) down a flight of stone stairs. I showed some more people, then Shalom came down, and everyone was trying to explain to each other what a mikvah was. The whole Jewish Quarter experience reminded me quite of home: a bunch of Jews arguing about the right way to do things and insisting they’re right for the past 5000 years. Equal parts entertaining, informative, and a little tiring.

We left the synagogue/museum, went to the one respite of air conditioning that was the bus very briefly, then got out again and went to a lecture in a marvelous courtyard by Dr. Said Chemlal about Moroccan history and culture. The history he gave was quite simple and easy to follow:  The region that today is Morocco was once ruled by the Carthaginians, then the Romans, then the Byzantines, and then Moroccan dynasties: the Idrisids (788-974) who were founded by Idris Ibn Abdallah who came from the Gulf area and traces his lineage to Mohammed (PBUH)’s wife Fatima’s husband. He lived in the North, his son Idris II moved to Fes and the dynasty ruled from there until the Almoravids (1040-1147), who named Fes as the capital, then the Almohads (1121-1269), whose name means “the unifiers” because they unified the tribes of Morocco, then the Marinids (1195-1465), the Wattasids (1472-1554), then the Saadi (1549-1659), then finally the Alaouites who ruled from 1666 up to today’s Mohammad VI. The Alaouites were based out of Marrakech, so that’s where their capital was after it was moved from Fes (and briefly the capital was in Meknes, when an Alaouite sultan Moulay Isma’il ibn Sharif built the city walls and the palace that we will see in a few days) to Marrakech, where it remained until Moroccan independence in 1955 when it moved to Rabat. The Alaouites created international relations with many countries like Sweden, Denmark, and England.  Then they allied with Spain to avoid Ottoman occupation.

In 1894, Abd al-Aziz bin Hassan became the ruler of Morocco at 16. As a teenager, he was fascinated by new western inventions like bicycles, cameras, etc. so he ordered many of these inventions and invited some technician from England to help him learn how it works. He also invited Louis and Auguste Lumiere, the French inventors of cinema, to Morocco to help him learn how cameras work. It is thought, according to the professor, that he was the first man to stand behind a film camera in Morocco. He filmed his harem, the film of which is lost, but we have some stills that were published in newspapers in 1905. He was deposed and succeeded by his brother in 1907, who himself abdicated in 1912 . This is also when France took Morocco as a protectorate, but it was a colony in all but name. Mohammad V, grandfather of the current king, took power in 1927 to 1961, when there was an intense colonial period met with fierce resistance from the Moroccans. Spain was in the north and south of the country while France had the center: Tangier remained an international city. Morocco gained independence in 1956, and the new king Hassan II faced many internal issues that required years of fierce reign. In 1999, the current king Muhammad VI took power. He wanted a freer, more open Morocco with more human rights.  In 2004 he opened the Equity and Reconciliation Commission and moved to acknowledge the suffering caused in the past. Muhammad VI also took the approach of promoting African-African cooperation; there is a distinction between Morocco (a North African Arab country) and the African countries south of the Sahara, who used to be called simply “African” countries but are now referred to as Sub-Saharan countries to promote a more united African narrative.  Easy to follow, right?

He then went on to talk about Moroccan culture; Morocco is seen as an exception in the European, Arab, and African worlds. There are many cultures in Morocco, notably the Amazigh cultures. The Amazigh people speak languages from the Tamazight language family, and originally they were completely unrelated to the Arabs who conquered their homelands. The term Amazigh itself means “free people” in Tamazight. They live in Morocco (which has the most), as well as many in Algeria, Tunisia, Libya, Mali, Niger, Burkina Faso, and several others. They were referred to as Berbers throughout history, but prefer to be called Amazigh (Berber comes from the Latin Barbar, or barbarian and is therefore seen as pejorative).  There are three main dialects: Tarifit in the north around Fez and Tangier, Tamazight in the center of Morocco around the Atlas mountains, and Tachelhit in the south around Marrakech. However, many of them speak Arabic now. In fact, there is no one who can say they are 100% of their Amazigh or Arab ancestry in Morocco, as there has been so much mixing between the two main groups that there are some Amazighs who now exclusively speak Arabic and Arabs who exclusively speak Tamazight. The first Amazigh association for cultural exchange and research was founded in 1967, but only in 1994 did Hassan II speak of the necessity to recognize and teach Tamazight as a language (2004 was when it started being taught in schools). Around the Arab Spring in 2011, a new constitution was introduced that considers Tamazight an official language of the country (while also paying attention to Jewish and Hassani groups like the Sahrawis, according to the professor) while also acknowledging more human rights more generally.

There were several other topics I couldn’t quite do justice with, like his talking quite a bit about Amazigh film and storytelling, as this is what we have been presently studying (at least the storytelling) or the brief delve into the “pagan” pre-islamic rituals still practiced by some Amazigh people. This mostly concludes the interesting part of the day for us. I must have eaten some fruit washed with Moroccan bacteria water or something, as while the rest of the class discussed some Moroccan stories, I was lying in bed praying to be put out of my misery. There was also a brief history lesson I was unable to attend, so that is why I’ve put you through all that ridiculous amount of history up above.  Although I personally would have liked even more time in the Jewish Quarter, it was still a very fun and informative day.