Ksour Essef or Ksour Essaf () is a town and commune in the

Mahdia Governorate Mahdia Governorate () is in central-eastern Tunisia, named after its largest town and administrative centre. It comprises an area of coastal relative lowland, but extends further inland than its coastal length. It is one of the twenty-four govern ...

Tunisia ) , image_map = Tunisia location (orthographic projection).svg , map_caption = Location of Tunisia in northern Africa , image_map2 = , capital = Tunis , largest_city = capital , ...

, on the coast of the

Sahel The Sahel (; ar, ساحل ' , "coast, shore") is a region in North Africa. It is defined as the ecoclimatic and biogeographic realm of transition between the Sahara to the north and the Sudanian savanna to the south. Having a hot semi-arid c ...

, about 200 km south of

Tunis ''Tounsi'' french: Tunisois , population_note = , population_urban = , population_metro = 2658816 , population_density_km2 = , timezone1 = CET , utc_offset1 ...

. As of 2014 it had a population of 36,274.Recensement de 2004 (Institut national de la statistique)
Ksour Essef is noted as the birthplace of the

poet A poet is a person who studies and creates poetry. Poets may describe themselves as such or be described as such by others. A poet may simply be the creator ( thinker, songwriter, writer, or author) who creates (composes) poems (oral or writte ...

Youssef Rzouga.

Etymology

According to oral tradition, the site was occupied by a system of ruined Roman fortifications, which served as a refuge for

sparrowhawk Sparrowhawk (sometimes sparrow hawk) may refer to several species of small hawk in the genus ''Accipiter''. "Sparrow-hawk" or sparhawk originally referred to ''Eurasian sparrowhawk, Accipiter nisus'', now called "Eurasian" or "northern" sparrowha ...

s (''sâf''), whence it got the name "Sparrowhawk Castle". This legend contains a note of truth because a text attests that the aristocracy of Mahdia, located twelve kilometres from Ksour Essef, was accustomed to hunt sparrowhawks in the region of

Salakta Salakta is a small Tunisian village situated by the sea. Salakta has been occupied or ruled by many civilisations, including the Phoenicians, Byzantines, Romans, and Muslim Oubéidines. The attractions include a beach, catacombs, an ancient cem ...

and its environs.

Geography

Ksour Essef is divided into many suburbs, including El Baabouss, El Tafalla, Bab El Ksar and Mallaji city. There are several

beach A beach is a landform alongside a body of water which consists of loose particles. The particles composing a beach are typically made from rock, such as sand, gravel, shingle, pebbles, etc., or biological sources, such as mollusc shel ...

es near the village of

History

The creation of the city coincided with the arrival of

Banu Hilal The Banu Hilal ( ar, بنو هلال, translit=Banū Hilāl) was a confederation of Arabian tribes from the Hejaz and Najd regions of the Arabian Peninsula that emigrated to North Africa in the 11th century. Masters of the vast plateaux of th ...

in 1050. After the destruction of the city of

and the arrival of the Arabs, most of the

punic The Punic people, or western Phoenicians, were a Semitic people in the Western Mediterranean who migrated from Tyre, Phoenicia to North Africa during the Early Iron Age. In modern scholarship, the term ''Punic'' – the Latin equivalent of the ...

, Greek and Roman inhabitants converted to

Islam Islam (; ar, ۘالِإسلَام, , ) is an Abrahamic religions, Abrahamic Monotheism#Islam, monotheistic religion centred primarily around the Quran, a religious text considered by Muslims to be the direct word of God in Islam, God (or ...

. One of the must beautiful pieces in the

Bardo National Museum Bardo National Museum or Musée National du Bardo may refer to: * Bardo National Museum (Algiers) in Algeria * Bardo National Museum (Tunis) , logo = , image = Tunis, musée du Bardo, salle de Virgile 01.jpg , caption = Apartments of the Be ...

is a bronze

cuirass A cuirass (; french: cuirasse, la, coriaceus) is a piece of armour that covers the torso, formed of one or more pieces of metal or other rigid material. The word probably originates from the original material, leather, from the French '' cuira ...

found in a local sepulture, discovered in 1910. It is an import from Italy datable to c.300 BC. The deceased had been buried in a sarcophagus of

cypress Cypress is a common name for various coniferous trees or shrubs of northern temperate regions that belong to the family Cupressaceae. The word ''cypress'' is derived from Old French ''cipres'', which was imported from Latin ''cypressus'', the ...

wood which had traces of the ochre used at the funeral, as did the bones. This coffin is similar to that found at Gigthis with the following dimensions: 84 cm high, 180 cm long and 68 cm wide.

Economy

Ksour Essef's economy is based on

agriculture Agriculture or farming is the practice of cultivating plants and livestock. Agriculture was the key development in the rise of sedentary human civilization, whereby farming of domesticated species created food surpluses that enabled people to ...

fishing Fishing is the activity of trying to catch fish. Fish are often caught as wildlife from the natural environment, but may also be caught from stocked bodies of water such as ponds, canals, park wetlands and reservoirs. Fishing techniques inclu ...

commerce Commerce is the large-scale organized system of activities, functions, procedures and institutions directly and indirectly related to the exchange (buying and selling) of goods and services among two or more parties within local, regional, nation ...

and

emigration Emigration is the act of leaving a resident country or place of residence with the intent to settle elsewhere (to permanently leave a country). Conversely, immigration describes the movement of people into one country from another (to permanentl ...

. In fact, migrants participate directly in its economic development and invest in it, especially in the construction of houses and the establishment of commerce and

industry Industry may refer to: Economics * Industry (economics), a generally categorized branch of economic activity * Industry (manufacturing), a specific branch of economic activity, typically in factories with machinery * The wider industrial sector ...

. In addition, a

market Market is a term used to describe concepts such as: * Market (economics), system in which parties engage in transactions according to supply and demand * Market economy *Marketplace, a physical marketplace or public market Geography *Märket, a ...

occurs on Fridays in the central city. Further, in this region, part of the population also lives from the product of the

olive The olive, botanical name ''Olea europaea'', meaning 'European olive' in Latin, is a species of small tree or shrub in the family Oleaceae, found traditionally in the Mediterranean Basin. When in shrub form, it is known as ''Olea europaea'' ...

and has lately benefited from the supply of electricity and water in the ''zensfine'', groups of family houses which have cultivated olives together for many generations.

References

Populated places in Mahdia Governorate Communes of Tunisia {{Tunisia-geo-stub

Etymology

Geography

History

Economy

See also

References