Azougui

Azougui was the first capital of the Almoravids, the movement that came out of the western Sahara in the eleventh century and went on to take Morocco and much of Spain, and the ruins of its fort stand on a low rise above a palm oasis northwest of Atar. Stone walls, foundations and a cemetery survive. The date grove below is still worked. Imam al-Hadrami, a scholar of the movement, is buried nearby.

Background

Azougui stood north-west of Atar on the Adrar Plateau. The chronicler al-Bakri, who lived from about 1040 to 1094, wrote that a fortress here was the work of Yannu ibn Umar, brother of the first Almoravid chiefs, and that 20,000 palms surrounded it. Both al-Bakri and al-Zuhri, writing in the 1150s, treated Azougui as the Almoravid capital. Al-Idrisi described the town as a stop that could not be avoided on the trans-Saharan route linking Morocco with Ghana, and noted that the people he called Guineans, probably the Soninke, knew it as Quqadam. Rock carvings from the seventh century show the site is older still. Parts of the citadel survive, along with the necropolis of al-Imam al-Hadrami.

Source: Wikipedia, "Azougui"

The main sights

• The fort ruins - stone walls and foundations of the Almoravid stronghold.
• The Almoravid origin - the first capital of a movement that reached Spain.
• The palm oasis - the date grove still worked below the ruins.
• The cemetery - the burial ground including a tomb attributed to al-Hadrami.

When to go

November to February is the cool season. Summer heat in the Adrar is extreme. Dates are harvested around July and August.

Things to know

Very little of the fort survives above foundation level. There is no interpretation on site and a guide is needed to make sense of it. The track in is rough.

Nearby

Atar is southeast, and Terjit is south.

Key facts