Medina of Tunis
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How it came to be
The medina of Tunis grew around the Zaytuna Mosque. Sources disagree on when the mosque was first built, but its present overall form comes from an Aghlabid reconstruction completed in 864–865. Most of the columns in its prayer hall are reused antique pieces.
Earlier capitals had included Mahdia and Kairouan, but under the Almohads Tunis became the capital of Ifriqiya. From the 12th to the 16th century, under the Almohads and Hafsids, it was counted among the greatest and wealthiest cities of the Islamic world. The Kasbah Mosque for the rulers went up in 1231–1235, and the medina took its essential form in the Hafsid period.
In the 17th century the Muradid ruler Hammouda Pasha built souks and palaces, and in 1655 had Ottoman architects build a mosque with an octagonal minaret. In 1865 Muhammad III as-Sadiq began pulling down walls that threatened to collapse, along with several gates. Some 700 monuments, including palaces, mosques, mausoleums, madrasas and fountains, survive, and the medina was inscribed in 1979.
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