MEQUINEZ (the

See also:

• SPANISH

Spanish

See also:

• FORM (Lat. forma)

form of the Arabic Miknasa)  , a city of Morocco, situated 160o ft. above the sea, about 70 M. from the west coast and 36 m . W.S.W. of Fez, on the road to Rabat, in 330 56' N., 5° 50' W . The town wall with its four-cornered towers is pierced by nine gates, one, the Bab Bardain, with fine tile-work . A lower wall of wider circuit protects the luxuriant gardens in the outskirts . Mequinez at a distance appears a city of palaces, but it possesses few buildings of any note except the palace and the mosque of Mulai Ismail, which serves as the royal burying-place . The palace, founded in 1634, was described in 1821 by John Windus in his Journey to Mequinez (London 1825) as " about 4 M. in circumference, the whole building exceeding massy, and the walls in every part very thick; the outward one about a mile long and 25 ft. thick." The interior is composed of oblong court-yards surrounded by buildings and arcades . These buildings are more or less square with pyramidal roofs ornamented outside with green glazed tiles, and inside with and tophel,liar(Faust, ed . 1886, i . 25), which is certainly supported by the fact that almost all the names of devils in the magic-books of the 16th century are derived from the Hebrew . 3 Alles was entsteht ist Werth class es zu Grunde geht . richly carved and painted woodwork in Mauresque style . The walls are tiled to a height of 4 or 5 ft., and above they are finished in plaster, whitewashed or carved into filigree work .

The

population numbers being between thirty and forty thousand . Idrisi, writing in A.D . 1100, calls the place Takarart, and describes it as an ordinary citadel, from which the town gradually developed, taking its name from the Miknasa Berbers .