LARGE MOSQUE
Read moreBuilt by the Aghlabids and enlarged by the Hafsids, the Great Mosque of Gafsa is the third largest mosque in Tunisia. It would have seen the day between the year 800 and the year 909. As often in Tunisia, non-Muslims are only allowed to visit the courtyard. Its architecture is identical to that of Kairouan and the Zitouna mosque in Tunis. The court is surrounded by columns with capitals borrowed from other ancient monuments. Only the minaret is recent (and dates from the twentieth century), since the old minaret was in ruins.
MOSQUES AND MARABOUTS
Read moreNefta is distinguished from Tozeur by its major religious role. Second holy city of Tunisia after Kairouan, it welcomes since the ninth century Sufi pilgrimages. The city has many religious buildings: two mosques and more than a hundred marabouts punctuate its landscape with their white domes. The most famous, located at the edge of the Corbeille, is the marabout of Sidi Bou Ali, a Sufi saint of the XIIIth century. It is the oldest place of pilgrimage of the city. Pilgrims still come from all over the country to venerate him.
BLAD EL HADHAR MOSQUE (BLED EL-HADHAR)
Read moreThe mosque of Bled el-Hadhar (or Blad El Hadhar) is built on Roman vestiges which were used as a basis for the construction of the minaret, it was enlarged in the twelfth century, its official date of construction was set at 1193. Although smaller in size, its shape resembles the Okba Mosque in Kairouan. Its courtyard is framed by four galleries. A median nave shares the prayer room, going from the entrance to the mihrab.
LA MOSQUÉE DES SEPT DORMANTS
Read moreWith its leaning minaret, this austere mosque is dazzlingly white. The view is superb! A legend is attached to this troglodyte monument. This place would shelter the cave where took refuge a group of believers fleeing persecutions related to their faith. They would have woken up there after a sleep of... 309 years! The place presents another particularity just as enigmatic: the presence of several giant tombs of 5 meters whose origin remains to this day unexplained.