The Al-Anouar Mosque (; ), formerly also known as the Mosque of the Sheikhs (, "Mosque of the Chiefs"), was the oldest mosque in Fes,

Morocco Morocco (),, ) officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is the westernmost country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It overlooks the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria to A ...

. It was founded by

Idris I Idris (I) ibn Abd Allah ( ar, إدريس بن عبد الله, translit=Idrīs ibn ʿAbd Allāh), also known as Idris the Elder ( ar, إدريس الأكبر, translit=Idrīs al-Akbar), (d. 791) was an Arab Hasanid Sharif and the founder of the ...

at the same time as he founded the city itself, in the early 9th century. It was located slightly northeast of the current

Mosque of the Andalusians The Mosque of the Andalusians or Al-Andalusiyyin Mosque ( ar, جامع الأندلسيين, Jama' al-Andalusiyyin; ), sometimes also called the Andalusian Mosque, is a major historic mosque in Fes el Bali, the old medina quarter of Fez, Morocco ...

, which surpassed it as the main mosque of the area. Today only remnants of the mosque have survived.

History

The mosque was the first mosque founded by Idris I, in 808 CE, when he founded ''Madinat Fas'', the first city of what became Fes, centered on what is now the Andalous or 'Adoua quarter (on the eastern shore of the Bou Khrareb River). The mosque was built next to a

well A well is an excavation or structure created in the ground by digging, driving, or drilling to access liquid resources, usually water. The oldest and most common kind of well is a water well, to access groundwater in underground aquifers. The ...

where the

sheikh Sheikh (pronounced or ; ar, شيخ ' , mostly pronounced , plural ' )—also transliterated sheekh, sheyikh, shaykh, shayk, shekh, shaik and Shaikh, shak—is an honorific title in the Arabic language. It commonly designates a chief of a ...

s (chiefs) of the

Berber Berber or Berbers may refer to: Ethnic group * Berbers, an ethnic group native to Northern Africa * Berber languages, a family of Afro-Asiatic languages Places * Berber, Sudan, a town on the Nile People with the surname * Ady Berber (1913–19 ...

tribes allied to Idris held their meetings (hence the name "Mosque of the Sheikhs"). It had no

minaret A minaret (; ar, منارة, translit=manāra, or ar, مِئْذَنة, translit=miʾḏana, links=no; tr, minare; fa, گل‌دسته, translit=goldaste) is a type of tower typically built into or adjacent to mosques. Minarets are generall ...

and did not have a particularly monumental appearance. The name "Al-Anouar" or "Al-Anwar" was an

epithet An epithet (, ), also byname, is a descriptive term (word or phrase) known for accompanying or occurring in place of a name and having entered common usage. It has various shades of meaning when applied to seemingly real or fictitious people, di ...

sometimes given to Idris I, which is why the mosque also took on this name. The mosque was eventually overshadowed and eclipsed by the Mosque of the Andalusians, founded nearby in 859-860, which quickly grew larger than the relatively primitive early Idrisid mosque. In 933, on the order of Hamid ibn Hamdan al-Hamdani the governor of Fes on behalf of the

Fatimids The Fatimid Caliphate was an Isma'ilism, Ismaili Shia Islam, Shi'a caliphate extant from the tenth to the twelfth centuries AD. Spanning a large area of North Africa, it ranged from the Atlantic Ocean in the west to the Red Sea in the ea ...

, the ''

khutba ''Khutbah'' ( ar, خطبة ''khuṭbah'', tr, hutbe) serves as the primary formal occasion for public preaching in the Islamic tradition. Such sermons occur regularly, as prescribed by the teachings of all legal schools. The Islamic tradition ...

'' (Friday sermon) was transferred from the Mosque of the Sheikhs to the Andalusian Mosque, thus denoting the later as the main mosque of the district. (At the same time, on the opposite shore of the river, the ''khutba'' was transferred from the Mosque of the Sharifs, the later Zawiya of Idris II, to the

Qarawiyyin Mosque The University of al-Qarawiyyin ( ar, جامعة القرويين; ber, ⵜⴰⵙⴷⴰⵡⵉⵜ ⵏ ⵍⵇⴰⵕⴰⵡⵉⵢⵉⵏ; french: Université Al Quaraouiyine), also written Al-Karaouine or Al Quaraouiyine, is a university located in ...

.) In the centuries since then, the Mosque of the Sheikhs has survived only as a small prayer space which has been significantly changed by subsequent repairs. A minor structure still stands on the site today, but only vestiges and archaeological remains of the original mosque have survived.

Notes

References

{{Mosques in Morocco 9th-century establishments in Morocco 9th-century establishments in Africa Mosques in Fez, Morocco Former mosques