Nalut (sometimes Lalút) ( ar, نالوت) is the capital of the Nalut District in

Libya Libya (; ar, ليبيا, Lībiyā), officially the State of Libya ( ar, دولة ليبيا, Dawlat Lībiyā), is a country in the Maghreb region in North Africa. It is bordered by the Mediterranean Sea to the north, Egypt to the east, Suda ...

. Nalut lies approximately halfway between Tripoli and Ghadames, at the western end of the Nafusa Mountains coastal range, in the

Tripolitania Tripolitania ( ar, طرابلس '; ber, Ṭrables, script=Latn; from Vulgar Latin: , from la, Regio Tripolitana, from grc-gre, Τριπολιτάνια), historically known as the Tripoli region, is a historic region and former province o ...

region. The town is a long-time

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 ...

community and a cultural centre for them, with a festival held in the spring to revive and promote the local culture, traditions, industries and art of the

Amazigh , image = File:Berber_flag.svg , caption = The Berber ethnic flag , population = 36 million , region1 = Morocco , pop1 = 14 million to 18 million , region2 = Algeria , pop2 ...

people.

History

Name

The name Nalut and its alternate Lalut may derive from the pagan Berber goddess of springs, Tala. As Nalut is only 60 km from the Tunisian border and lies close to some

oases In ecology, an oasis (; ) is a fertile area of a desert or semi-desert environment'ksar''with its surrounding feeding source, the palm grove, within a relational and circulatory nomadic system.” The location of oases has been of critical im ...

it played an important part in the caravan trade.

Architecture

Nalut is home to the

Qasr Nalut Qasr ( ar, قصر, lit=palace/castle/fortress, plural ''qusur''), from Latin ''castrum'', may refer to: Individual ''qusur'' and places named after a ''qasr'' * * Particular types of ''qusur'' *Alcázar (cognate Spanish term; also ''Alcácer'' ...

ⵣⴰⵙⵔⵓ ⵏ ⵏⴰⵍⵓⵜ, which is a granary fortified by a ksour (castle). The facility has been abandoned but is a tourist destination. The fortress was a communal building where the local families could store their grain in times of conflict. The Alal'a

Mosque A mosque (; from ar, مَسْجِد, masjid, ; literally "place of ritual prostration"), also called masjid, is a place of prayer for Muslims. Mosques are usually covered buildings, but can be any place where prayers ( sujud) are performed, ...

– which is Nalut's oldest mosque – was rebuilt in 1312 CE.

Libyan civil war

A monument to

Muammar Gaddafi Muammar Muhammad Abu Minyar al-Gaddafi, . Due to the lack of standardization of transcribing written and regionally pronounced Arabic, Gaddafi's name has been romanized in various ways. A 1986 column by '' The Straight Dope'' lists 32 spellin ...

's ''Green Book'' in the town square was demolished during the

Libyan Civil War Demographics of Libya is the demography of Libya, specifically covering population density, ethnicity, education level, health of the populace, economic status, and religious affiliations, as well as other aspects of the Libyan population. The ...

. In late April 2011, "Radio Free Nalut" began broadcasting in the city. It was one of several rebel-controlled radio stations established during the civil war and conducted broadcasts in

. A national reconciliation conference for the factions in the Libyan Civil War was held in Nalut in September 2016.

Museum

Nalut contains the Nalut Dinosaur Museum, which exhibits fossil trees,

crocodile Crocodiles (family Crocodylidae) or true crocodiles are large semiaquatic reptiles that live throughout the tropics in Africa, Asia, the Americas and Australia. The term crocodile is sometimes used even more loosely to include all extant me ...

s and

dinosaur Dinosaurs are a diverse group of reptiles of the clade Dinosauria. They first appeared during the Triassic period, between 243 and 233.23 million years ago (mya), although the exact origin and timing of the evolution of dinosaurs is t ...

s which have been discovered in the vicinity of the town since the first find in 1998.

Notes and references

External links

{{District capitals of Libya Populated places in Nalut District Tripolitania Baladiyat of Libya