MOULAY ABDALLAH , 11km from El Jadida, is a tiny fishing village, dominated by a large zaouia complex and partially enclosed by a circuit of walls in ruins. At the zaouia an important moussem is held towards the end of August, attracting tens of thousands of devotees - and almost as many horses in the parades and fantasias .

 

The village walls span the site of a twelfth-century ribat , or fortified monastery, known as Tit ("eyes" or "spring" in the local Berber dialect) and built, so it's thought, in preparation for a Norman invasion: a real threat at the time - the Normans having launched attacks on Tunisia - but one which never materialized. Today, there is little to see, though the minaret of the modern zaouia (prominent and whitewashed) is Almohad in origin; behind it, up through the graveyard, you can walk to a second, isolated minaret, which is thought to be even older. If it is, then it is perhaps the only one surviving from the Almoravid era - a claim considerably more impressive than its simple, block-like appearance might suggest.