Here one experiences a strict fundamentalism, respecting tradition and safeguarding a long-established identity. However, the relationship with the outside world is loyal and unconditional. The Ibadis are proud people, self-confident, intellectually solid, who do not fear cultural contamination. The ancient Middle Eastern influence made them great merchants, open to exchange and dialogue with the world, while religious rigor, wisdom, and a strong sense of privacy protect them from any external “contamination”.
A valley loved by Le Corbusier and protected by UNESCO
Men of culture and very skilled architects, the Ibadis, today better known as Mozabites, have transformed over the centuries the arid hills hiding the M’Zab valley into an extraordinary microcosm. The structure of their cities has fascinated urban planners and architects of worldwide fame such as Le Corbusier and Ricardo Bofill, and the Holy City of the M’Zab valley, Beni Isguen, has been included in the UNESCO World Heritage.
The valley is located about 700 kilometers south of Algiers, in a harsh and hostile territory but safe from ancient persecutions. On the hills there are now 5 oases, built over the last thousand years. The first to be built was El Atteuf, the “Turning Point” dating back to 1013. Ghardaïa was founded in 1053 by the sheikh Sidi Bou-Gdemma and is the current administrative capital, and Melika, the “Queen”, was the ancient Holy City that lost its religious function after the construction in 1347 of Beni Isguen. Bou Nura, the “Bright One” dates back to 1046.
All five oases have a well-defined social function, are all fortified, and each has its mosque and minaret, from which every day, five times a day, the muezzin raises his religious call. Each has instead its own economy: ceramic and leather craftsmanship, livestock, but above all trade.
“Machine à habiter” and crossroads of the Great South
In recent decades, Mozabite merchants have created a very dense commercial network and are present throughout Algerian territory. Ghardaïa lies on the route to Niger and Mali and is a fundamental desert crossroads: it is the privileged interchange point between nomadic populations and merchants of the Maghreb, also being the departure station for the Great South. The market square of Ghardaïa comes alive and colors every day with carpets and spices, fabrics and animals, crafts, and, in October, dates.
But the market, an area designated for buying and selling products, is also a place for cultural exchange, thus a potential threat to its moral and spiritual integrity. The skillful Mozabite architects therefore structured their cities looking after the preservation of their culture, their caste, confining the spaces destined for merchants in the lower part of the hill. At the top instead is the mosque with its minaret, a sort of lookout and guard tower, often used as a grain storage. Then the residences of the notables and further down, towards the valley, the houses of professionals, following a terrace layout with narrow streets and corridors that cope with over 55° summer heat.
The elegant simplicity of the shapes and decorations of the houses, with proportions and measurements independent of economic wealth or social position, is in harmony with the principles of equality of the Mozabites; even the construction materials are equal for everyone: palm wood, stone, plaster, lime and sand.
Each city is then protected by walls and guard towers. It is possible to visit them all freely, except Beni Isguen, the Holy City with a large triangular square and all the streets converging towards the mosque, where foreigners are obliged to take a guide and photography is forbidden. The structure of the M’Zab valley cities coincides with the idea Le Corbusier had of urban architecture: a “machine à habiter,” without academism, human-sized, in which the entire city becomes a large home.
Enchanted gardens and bee-men
The Mozabite “pentapolis” also has a single, huge, immense date palm grove: 1,000,000 date palms, irrigated through a sophisticated system managing the waters of the underground river. It is a capillary system of dams, barriers, tunnels, and distributers that channel, sort, and dose the water, ensuring that the right quantity arrives in all gardens. It is an almost 900-year-old irrigation system composed of 7000 artesian wells that draw water up to 80 meters deep directly from the aquifer of the ancient oued.
The palm grove is an enchanted garden where forgotten rhythms are found, gently immersed in the cool and silent green of the trees and wrapped in the scent of jasmines and roses, dates and orange blossoms. A true oasis within the oasis. A magical place where the Mozabite man has a special task. He pollinates the female palm flowers: climbing each tree, one after another, he hand-fertilizes the flowers without relying on the wind. And before each pollination, there is a propitiatory prayer, a sort of nuptial rite marrying the two palms.
The whiteness of the haïk, the mosques, and the soul
Spirituality is very strong in the M’Zab. Here fundamentalism is not an exaggerated form of religion. It rather feels like being in a large monastery where everyone tries to earn their place in paradise. Besides those atop the cities, there are mosques here and there. They have no minaret and inside there is no decoration that might distract from meditation and prayer. The mosques are simple, white, with all uneven arches made from bent palm trunks, a semi-underground floor with multiple rooms and a prayer area outside or on the roof. Each room has small niches and there is a mihrâb, an apse facing Mecca from which the Imam leads the prayer. It is said that Le Corbusier was inspired by the simplicity and beauty of the Sidi Brahim mosque at the gates of El Ateuf when building the chapel of Ronchamp.
Forgotten rhythms
In the M’Zab time is marked by prayers and the height of the sun on the horizon. Everyone has their time. Women walk with natural lightness wrapped in their white haïks. They have only one eye uncovered, the left one, the one of the heart, and go to the cemetery to honor their loved ones or to offer food to some sheikh buried in his tomb monument as an ancient pre-Islamic custom demands.
Men are engaged in heated commercial negotiations. The “notables” instead, proud and austere in their elegant bùrnuš or with white gandura, calmly discuss business and politics. While dozens of children run and play entering and leaving the cool narrow streets. The wise old men sitting in the square or near the minaret watch and comment on the life flowing quietly, waiting.
