Ben Youssef Mosque
Almoravid-founded congregational mosque rebuilt in the early nineteenth century, its green-tiled minaret marking the old medina skyline.
Location
About this audio guide
This guide to Ben Youssef Mosque in Marrakesh begins in 1137 Cordoba, where Andalusian craftsmen spent seven years carving a wooden pulpit for the grand mosque the Almoravid ruler Ali ibn Yusuf was building here. It follows the Almohad conquest of 1147 that toppled the Almoravids, the claim that the mosque faced the wrong way, and the exiled pulpit's strange afterlife on display at a nearby ruined palace. Notice the plain, undecorated interior around you — no marble basin, no ivory-inlaid pulpit.
This audio guide was created using AI.
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