Medina

Lore & Background

Before the advent of Islam, the city was known as Yathrib, a name that appears in a 6th-century BCE inscription of the Babylonian king Nabonidus and in the Quran. Muhammad renamed the city Taybah and Tabah, and it later became known as al-Madinah al-Munawwarah. Medina served as the capital of the rapidly increasing Muslim caliphate under Muhammad's leadership, where his ummah—composed of Medinan citizens (Ansar) and those who immigrated with him (Muhajirun)—gained huge influence. The city is home to three prominent mosques: al-Masjid an-Nabawi, Quba Mosque (the oldest in Islam), and Masjid al-Qiblatayn. The majority of the Quran was revealed in Mecca, not in Medina.

Reader's Guide

Medina's significance in Islam is profound, as it was the base of operations for Muhammad's early community and the site where the first Muslim polity was established. Tourists visit for Ziyarah and to see landmarks such as Mount Uhud, Al-Baqi' cemetery, and the Seven Mosques. The Saudi government has carried out the destruction of several historical structures and archaeological sites in both Medina and Mecca.

Did You Know?

• Medina's original name before Islam was Yathrib, which appears in a 6th-century BCE inscription of the Babylonian king Nabonidus.
• The Quba Mosque in Medina is the oldest mosque in Islam.
• Around 58.5% of Medina's population are Saudi citizens, and 41.5% are foreigners.

The Word and the Walled City

A medina is, at its simplest, the Arabic word madīnah rendered into European languages—a term that literally means "city" or "town." In the context of North African urban history, however, it carries a much more specific weight. It designates the old, often walled core of a city, the district where generations of residents lived, traded, and governed long before European colonial powers reshaped the region's landscapes. Before the arrival of colonial rule, these centers served as hubs of culture, commerce, and political authority for centuries, forming the backbone of a richly interconnected urban civilization. The medina was not merely a neighborhood; it was the living heart of a city, a self-contained world of streets, markets, and institutions that sustained communities across the Maghreb and beyond. Understanding what a medina is—and what was lost when colonial forces dismantled or marginalized these spaces—provides the essential frame for appreciating both the destruction and the remarkable survival of North Africa's historic urban heritage.

Algeria's Fractured Urban Memory

Unlike their neighbors to the south, Algerian medinas suffered extensive physical destruction as colonial authorities tore down the urban fabric of old towns and remodeled them along European lines. Traditional institutions that had governed daily life were dismantled, local cultural practices were disrupted, and over time many communities experienced significant depopulation. The result is that far fewer Algerian cities retain their pre-colonial urban character compared to Tunisia or Morocco. In Algiers, the damage was nearly total in the lower town, which was demolished and rebuilt to European specifications. Only the upper town—home to the citadel, known as the qasaba, and the former residence of the rulers—escaped wholesale destruction, and it is this surviving quarter that is still called the Casbah. Elsewhere, cities like Tlemcen, Nedroma, Constantine, and various Saharan towns hold onto meaningful fragments of their older urban identities, standing as quiet testaments to what was lost.

The Protectorate Paradox: Preservation as Control

In Tunisia and Morocco, French colonial rule took a different form. Rather than demolishing old cities as in Algeria, French administrators—particularly under Resident General Hubert Lyautey in Morocco—chose to preserve the historic medinas as heritage sites while building entirely new planned towns, the Villes Nouvelles, outside their walls for European settlers. Lyautey's "policy of association" favored indirect rule, keeping local elites and institutions intact. In Tunis, the old city was physically linked to the European quarter for easier policing, yet its traditional economic and administrative systems were deliberately marginalized, making the medina dependent on the new districts. Scholar Janet Abu-Lughod has characterized this arrangement as a form of urban apartheid: indigenous areas were locked into stagnation while European towns expanded outward, absorbing rural lands once used by Moroccans. The policy was softened somewhat when wealthy Moroccans began relocating to the new cities during the colonial era.

A Living Map of the Old World

Today, the medinas of North Africa form a remarkable geographic tapestry stretching from the Atlantic coast to the Mediterranean and deep into the Sahara. In Morocco, the list is especially long: Asilah, Chefchaouen, Essaouira, Marrakesh, Meknes, Rabat, Salé, Tangier, Taroudant, Taza, and Tétouan all maintain their historic districts, alongside the twin medinas of Fes—Fes el Bali, the original and one of the largest car-free urban areas in the world, and Fes Jdid, its newer counterpart. Tunisia contributes Tunis, Kairouan, Monastir, Sfax, Sousse, Tozeur, Hammamet, Nabeul, Gafsa, El Kef, Béja, Mahdia, Bizerte, Gabès, and the island of Djerba. Libya's medinas include Ghadames, Tripoli, Benghazi, Derna, and others scattered across the interior. Algeria's surviving examples—Algiers' Casbah, Dellys, and Tlemcen—stand as rarer survivors. Together, these districts represent not just architectural relics but the enduring spatial memory of a civilization that built its cities around community, faith, and trade long before the modern state drew its borders.