page_title: Fortifications of Fez
section_title: Almoravid and Almohad era: the unification of the two cities
hierarchical_section_title: Fortifications of Fez / Historical evolution of the city walls / Almoravid and Almohad era: the unification of the two cities
caption_attribution_description: English: Bab Mahrouk, Fes. Built in 1204.
context_page_description: The Fortifications of Fez comprise a complex circuit of ramparts and gates surrounding Fes el-Bali and Fes el-Jdid, two urban agglomerations that compose the old "medina" of Fes, Morocco. They also include a number of kasbahs and forts which were built both to protect and to control the city. These fortifications have been built up over many centuries and the extensive remnants today date from many different periods.
context_section_description: In 1069, the Almoravid emir Yusuf ibn Tashin ordered the walls of the two cities to be demolished and for a new wall to be built around both cities, thus unifying them for the first time. Although the Almoravids made their capital at Marrakech, Fes was one of their most important cities. They constructed a fortified kasbah (citadel) in the eastern end of the city, likely on the same site as the later Kasbah Bou Jeloud.
  In 1145 the Almohad leader Abd al-Mu'min besieged and conquered the city during the Almohad overthrow of the Almoravids. Due to the ferocious resistance they encountered from the local population, the Almohads demolished the city's fortifications. However, due to Fes's continuing economic and military importance, the Almohad caliph Ya'qub al-Mansur ordered the reconstruction of the ramparts. The walls were completed by his successor Muhammad al-Nasir in 1204, giving them their definitive shape and establishing the perimeter of Fes el-Bali to this day. (Although according to another author, the reconstruction of the walls was ordered by Muhammad al-Nasir in 1212, following his defeat at Las Navas de Tolosa in Spain.) Many of the main gates of the city were built around this time. Since the city had grown in the meantime, the new Almohad perimeter of walls was larger than that of the former Almoravid ramparts. Like other Moroccan ramparts, it was built in rammed earth with stone foundations, and was reinforced with rectangular towers. The Almohads also built the Kasbah Bou Jeloud on the site of the former Almoravid kasbah in the western end of the city (just west of Bab Bou Jeloud today), and also built the initial kasbah occupying the site of the current Kasbah an-Nouar. Not all the land within the city walls was densely inhabited; much of it was still relatively open and was occupied by crops and gardens used by the inhabitants.
  
  Today, the northern sections of Fes el-Bali's city walls are believed to be the oldest remaining parts of the walls of Fes and are thought to date all the way back to this Almohad period. The fortified city gates of Bab Mahrouk and Bab Guissa also retain their forms from the Almohad period.
caption: Bab Mahrouk, the Almohad-era western gate of the city.
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