In addition to Meknes, Fés and Marrakesh, Morocco’s capital city of Rabat is one of the country’s historic four royal cities. Despite their differences, these cities share a common bond as they each contain the cultural and architectural treasures of a fascinating epoch. Rabat has a rich and colourful history and was first settled in the 8th century B.C. nearly two thousand years before the Hassan Tower was built. With its beautiful minaret, the 18th century Mosquée Es- Sounna is the most outstanding religious building in the centre of the city. The most architecturally impressive of the four royal cities is Meknès. In the 17th century Moulay Ismaíl made this city into his own and thus created several new buildings. In addition to the largest gate in the Maghreb, the Bab El-Mansour, the city’s former twenty kilometre long wall symbolises a further important legacy and highlights the wealth and flamboyance of the Alaouit sovereign. Although Meknès is one of the younger Moroccan royal cities it contains more than a thousand years of history and its fertile land was even much prized by the Romans. Fès is the oldest and, at the same time, liveliest of all four royal cities. Beyond its historic walls lies the origin of the Moroccan monarchy as well as numerous outstanding treasuries of the Islamic Middle Ages. Fès El-Jdid, an earlier section of the old town centre, is dominated by an immense palace, the Palais Royal. Beyond its gilded bronze gates is a small, luxurious world. Numerous architectural gems highlight the former incredible wealth of Fès. Marrakesh’s history began in the 11th century when the Berber tribe of the Almoravides first settled on the Haouz Plain. In the course of time the early caravan trade with Black Africa and Marrakesh’s southerly location transformed the city into what was the most African of Morocco’s four royal cities and although the legendary caravans have since been replaced by modern roads and motor vehicles both past and present continue to live side by side. Even today each of the Morocco’s four royal cities displays the former enormity, power and beauty of Maghreb culture in Morocco thus their historical monuments still manage to reflect the splendour of the country’s intriguing and glorious past.
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