Tlemcen

Tlemcen began as the Roman garrison town of Pomaria, on the road along the edge of the mountains, and grew again in the Islamic period as Agadir, beside which the Almoravids founded Tagrart in the 11th century. The two settlements merged into one city, and the Almoravid ruler Yusuf ibn Tashfin's Great Mosque, later enlarged by his successors, dates from that time. Under the Almohads the city remained a regional centre on the route between Morocco and the central Maghreb.

Its great age began in 1236, when the Abd al-Wadid or Zayyanid dynasty made Tlemcen the capital of an independent kingdom. For nearly three centuries it controlled the western plains and the northern end of the trans-Saharan trade routes, trading gold, wool and grain with Genoa, Venice and Aragon, and it attracted scholars, Sufi masters and refugees from Muslim Spain, who shaped its architecture, music and crafts. The rival Marinids of Fez besieged the city several times and built the walled camp-town of Mansourah outside it around 1300, holding Tlemcen for periods in the 14th century.

The Ottomans absorbed the kingdom in the 16th century and the city became a provincial town of the Regency, whose western beylik was governed from Mascara and later from Oran. French forces entered the city in 1836, during the long campaign against Emir Abdelkader, who had used it as a base. Under colonial rule it kept its craft industries and gained a European quarter outside the walls. Since independence it has grown as a university and administrative city and has been promoted as a centre of Islamic heritage, including a year as capital of Islamic culture in 2011.

Tlemcen thinks of itself as the most Andalusian city in Algeria, and the claim is not empty. Families trace descent from refugees of Muslim Spain, and the city is a stronghold of Andalusian classical music in the gharnati style, played by amateur associations at concerts and weddings on the oud, the rebab and percussion. Sufi brotherhoods remain important, and the shrine of Sidi Boumediene draws visitors and pilgrims from across the region.

Its crafts are equally distinctive: carpets, brocade, leatherwork, and above all the gold-thread embroidery used on the chedda of Tlemcen, the heavy bridal costume whose wedding rites and craftsmanship UNESCO has listed as intangible cultural heritage since 2012. A Tlemcen wedding runs for days, with several changes of costume, henna evenings and a strict order of ceremonies that families take very seriously.

The city's manner is formal and reserved by Algerian standards, conscious of lineage and learning, and its dialect and cooking are closer to those of north-eastern Morocco than to the coast. Religious observance is visible, and the mosques and madrasas remain in daily use rather than being monuments only. Football, as everywhere in Algeria, is followed closely, and the university gives the old city a large student population.

The city itself had about 140,000 people at the 2008 census, with more in the surrounding communes that run up the slopes and along the plain. The provincial administration, the university, hospitals, textiles, leather and food processing provide most of the steady work, alongside construction, trade and the olive groves and orchards that surround the city.

Housing spreads outwards in low apartment blocks and villas, while the medina remains densely lived in, with restoration work on its older houses a constant subject of discussion. Many families have relatives in France, and money and visitors come back in summer. The closed border with Morocco, a short drive away, shapes the economy of the whole area: cross-border trade that was once ordinary is now smuggling, and the frontier is heavily policed.

Daily life is unhurried. Mornings are the busiest time in the markets, the middle of the day is quiet, and the cafés and pastry shops fill in the late afternoon. Evenings are family occasions rather than public ones, which makes the city seem to close early compared with Oran. Water supply, unemployment among graduates and the cost of housing are the recurring local concerns.

Tlemcen's cooking is the most refined in western Algeria, slow and lightly spiced, with clear Andalusian and Moroccan echoes. Lamb tajines cooked with prunes, quince or pears are the signature dishes, alongside chicken with olives and preserved lemon. Couscous appears in many forms, including a fine-grained version served with buttermilk and one made with barley in winter. Harira, a thick soup of lentils, chickpeas and tomato, is more common here than in eastern Algeria and breaks the fast in Ramadan.

Bread and pasta dishes matter: rechta, hand-cut semolina noodles served with chicken, chickpeas and turnips in a pale, lightly spiced sauce, is a dish for feasts and family occasions, and trida, small squares of pasta, is cooked in a similar way. Olive oil from the hills around Mansourah goes into everything, and local honey and figs appear on most tables.

The city's pastry is famous well beyond the region. Shops sell griwech soaked in honey, makroud of semolina and dates, ktaif, and a great range of almond sweets prepared for weddings, where trays of them are part of the ceremony. Mint tea is taken seriously and poured from a height, and strong coffee is drunk in the cafés of the boulevards outside the old walls.