Le fortificazioni di Mahdiya nel Kitab Ghara’ib al-funun wa-mulaḥ al-‘uyun (X-XII secolo)

The Arabic manuscript Kitab Ghara'ib al-funun wa-mulaḥ al-'uyun, i.e. The Book of Curiosities is a cosmographical treatise by an anonymous author probably produced in Egypt in the first half of the XIth century. The rare copy of the original, although incomplete and datable between the XIIth and XIIIth centuries, is preserved in the Bodleian Library in Oxford. The city of Mahdiya appears in Chapter 13 of the second book, consisting of a page of text and a colour miniature depicting the main monuments, which are confirmed both by the description given by the historian al-Bekri and by the architectural and archaeological realities still visible in the ancient capital of the Fatimid kingdom. In addition, in the Kitab Ghara'ib al-funun reports the land and sea connections from Mahdiya to the main destinations, expressed in miles, to Ifriqiya and the Mediterranean basin. Mahdiya was the work of the first Fatimid caliph 'Ubayd Allah al-Mahdi “The Rightly Guided One”, founder of the new Shiite movement of the Ismaili branch in Ifriqiya. Founded in 916, Mahdiya became the new capital of the Fatimid dynasty located in a strategic place by the sea, more suitable to control the territory and impose the Shia doctrine due to the problems that arose immediately after the assumption of power in Raqqada. The caliph chose his own name to give the city al-Mahdiya and settled there in 921. The city lies on the narrow rocky peninsula of Cape Afrique linked to the mainland by an isthmus of a few hundred metres. From the beginning of its foundation, the Fatimid capital consisted of a royal medina (al-Mahdiya) and a popular suburb located to the west, outside the walls, called Zawila. Mahdiya still preserves some monuments from the Fatimid era: remains of the city walls, a harbour, a mosque and vestiges of the palace complex.