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This place, favored
by writers, artists, poets, sought, by tourists that every
evening at sunset attracts a numerous crowd of Tunisians
on holiday, seems to have been nothing more than an 9th
century ribat that overlooked the tranquil Carthage bay
from above. Coming back from his pilgrimage, Abou Said
al-Baji, originally from Morocco, chose to live here.
He was not the only one to do so. Sidi Dhrif chose to
die in Sidi Bou Saïd as did a number of sufi, disciples
of the Moroccan Abou Mediane, ounder of Megrebian Sufism.
This blessed place has thus preserved its |
f calm and serene atmosphere
for at least five centuries, until the day that Tunisian
notables decided to build their summer homes her. The
zaouia and the mosque were reconstructed and probably
also the famous "cafés des Nattes".
It was to this lovely village with paved streets, flowering
gardens and nail-studded doors that the Baron Rodolphe
von Erlanger came at the beginning of the century. He
had the merit, not unimportant given the epoch, to have
catalogued the entire site (1915) and to have imposed
the blue color "Sidi Bou Saïd". The building
that he built in a moderate turn-of-the-century, half
Tunisian, half Andalusian styl was bought by the Tunisian
government as a sign of recognition of the work carried
on by the illustrious Baron. |
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