medieval rural settlement in the spanish murcia and present

Transcription

EUROPEAN LANDSCAPES AND LIFESTYLES: THE MEDITERRANEAN AND BEYOND
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MEDIEVAL RURAL SETTLEMENT IN THE
SPANISH MURCIA AND PRESENT-DAY RURAL
SETTLEMENT IN THE MOROCCAN ATLAS
PHILIPPE MIGNOT
JOHNNY DE MEULEMEESTER
MORGAN DE DAPPER
MOHAMED BOUSSALH
MUSTAPHA JLOK
INTRODUCTION
A cooperative venture involving the Heritage Department of the Walloon Region (B),
the Casa de Velasquez (Madrid, F/E), the Unité Mixte de Recherche 5648 (Lyon II /
EHESS) of the CNRS (F), and the Departments of Archaeology and Geography of the
University of Ghent (B), has made possible the study of the medieval settlement of the
Valle de Ricote, a geographical and administrative centre on the Segura river in the
autonomous region of Murcia. This territory associates rural and defensive sites and
shows the presence, from the 9th century onwards, of a complex irrigation system.
Central element in the research was the excavation of a fortified granary of Berber type
of the 13th century. These granaries represent buildings where the Berbers store their
harvests and other goods. Irrigation patterns form part of the archaeological elements in
the rural landscape. From the river upwards to the line of the peaks, the valley is marked
by the succession of the following elements: irrigated fields, (Islamic) irrigation canals,
the habitats, dry culture lands, and finally pastures on the mountain slopes.
To get a better understanding of the key elements of this Murcian landscape, geoarchaeological research was started in the valley of the Awnil in the Atlas Mountains in
Morocco (Fig. 1). At the same time, this research made an ethno-archaeological link
towards the local granaries, the irrigation system, the settlement type and its historical
evolution
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Figure 1: General map.
STUDY AREA IN THE MURCIA REGION
A relatively extensive territory, measuring a little over eight hundred square kilometres,
the original hisn of Ricote, includes rural sites such as hamlets and villages, as well as
defensive sites and even a small town (Fig.2).
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Figure 2: Map of the Valle de Ricote.
Still discernible in the countryside are traces of medieval agrarian hydraulic systems.
The study investigated the structures surviving from two settlement periods: the first
period, corresponding to the Muslim and then mudejare presence, and the second,
corresponding to the series of changes that followed the Christian conquest.
The starting point for this project was the archaeological excavation of an elevated site
(Amigues, De Meulemeester & Matthys, 1992) (Fig. 3).
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Figure 3: View of the Cabezo de la Cobertera. Abaràn (Murcia) (photo: Philippe Mignot).
The summit of the Cabezo de la Cobertera, which towers some one hundred metres
above the Segura river, is approximately forty metres long by thirty metres wide and is
occupied by the remains of about thirty cells (Fig. 4), built each side of narrow lanes
along which the inhabitants would have moved around the settlement. These buildings
are mainly of rectangular plan, averaging four metres to five metres in length by one
and a half metres to two metres in width.
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Figure 4: General plan of the excavations. In black: the preserved walls made of “tapial” (adobe); 1. The water
storage tank; 2. Little mosque or oratory.
Two types have been identified. The structures in the first group have a single room, but
also have a silo – a sort of trough – which is located at the back of the building and is
separated from the rest of the interior. The cell is entered via a door of sixty
centimetres’ width. In this room are often to be found traces of a hearth, and of the
storage arrangements for earthenware jars. The second type consists of buildings
without the silo feature. They did not include any traces of hearth nor of jars.
Furthermore, they seem to have had neither staircases nor upper floors.
At the centre of the site, there was a water storage tank of approximately sixteen cubic
metres. The area to the west of the water storage tank had been thoroughly disturbed
before the start of the investigation. The discovery of a stucco sphere similar to those
found atop the cupolas of mosques and marabouts, together with the reconstruction of
the site plan, allows us to suggest that there was probably an oratory or marabout at this
location.
The occupation of this elevated site dates from the thirteenth century. An Arab coin – a
dinar which has been dated to 1247 – provides corroboration for the site chronology
which is based on Almohad pottery. The site had to be abandoned at the time of the
Castillian conquest (i.e., in around 1245) or at the time of the Mudejare revolt (i.e. in
about 1266). This type of settlement is related to the collective granaries of Berber
origin that are known as agadir in southern Morocco. The agadir is a building set apart
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from the village where the Berbers store their harvest and other goods. These granaries
are often also fortresses, and thus may be situated in steep-sided or other naturallydefensible locations. It seems that the natural environment and the economics of the
country necessitated storage; to these factors must be added the possibility of
devastation as a result of war and raids. The collective fortified granary was developed
in response to these considerations. For the moment, this archaeological site remains the
only one of its kind in the archaeology of Islamic Spain.
The other area of research is concerned with irrigation (Bazzana, De Meulemeester &
Matthys, 1997). Irrigation structures constitute an integral element of the archaeological
record, which is recognizable in the rural landscape of today. The area of the regadio is
clearly distinguishable, forming the huerta at the bottom of the valley, the fertile zone
dominated by orchards; higher up, in the secano, or dry agricultural area, cereal crops
and vines are traditionally grown. Thus, starting from the bottom, between the river and
the line of the peaks, the medieval land use structure of the valley consisted of the
irrigated areas, then the line of Islamic acequias, then the zone of human residential
accommodation, above which were the secano, and then, finally, pastures on the upper
slopes and in the mountains (Fig. 5).
Figure 5: View of the landscape of the Valle de Ricote (photo: Philippe Mignot).
In the Middle Ages, the Islamic farmers were using four different technological
approaches for the recovery of water. These arrangements were as follows:
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- ponds used for the storage of water from springs;
- wells from which water was drawn using a container – simply attached to a
rope, or perhaps strung over a beam;
- water wheels used for raising water, such as, for example, the noria, with its
vertical wheel installed on a canal, or on the river itself (Fig. 6);
- finally, various systems of acequias or channels which transported water
diverted from a river by means of a dam.
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Figure 6: The existing noria of Don Garcia dates from the 19th century – Valle de Ricote (photo: Philippe Mignot).
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According to the most recent historical research, most of the development of the
regadio took place at the height of the Islamic period, around the ninth and tenth
centuries. At a later stage, after the thirteenth century and during the Christian period, at
the end of the Middle Ages, there was a significant phase of expansion in Valencia and
Murcia, the nature and scale of which has led some authors to write of a “boom” in
hydraulic engineering works from 1480 onwards. The extensive networks of regadio,
which were built at that stage, are organised so as to cover the region and as such they
are rather different from the more locally-based systems which had been set up by the
Muslims.
There are two main points to be made in relation to these water management systems.
The first is in connection with the hydraulic engineering works: the dams, river
diversions, canalizations, local irrigation networks, channels and conduits. Once built,
these mark the countryside definitively, introducing what Miquel Barceló has described
as the “principle of rigidity”, by which he observed that the installation of such a
framework precludes modification of details of the landscape, or any other partial
transformation of the organisation of agrarian space (Barceló, 1989). Thus, in Cieza,
Abaràn/Blanca or Ricote, certain elements of the tenth to thirteenth century Islamic
hydraulic system remain recognisable in spite of the superimposition of another system
during the Christian period (Fig.7). Neither the feudal conquest of the thirteenth century
nor the successive phases of depopulation and recolonisation that took place in the
fourteenth and fifteenth centuries completely erased the traces of the earlier
arrangement. Secondly, it is important that one should be familiar with the basic
principles governing the organisation of irrigated areas in the medieval Islamic context.
Every means of securing access to water is exploited, and the technology used is
generally straightforward: it requires no major investment, and would not normally call
for specialist expertise. It is the product of generations of accumulated experience. One
of the simplest and most widely used techniques involves the diversion of some of the
water of a river into an irrigation canal by means of a dam upstream of the area to be
irrigated. The natural fall of the river being greater than that of the canal, the difference
in altitude is sufficient to bring the water via a series of connected channels, which are
often built of earth, towards the fields, where simple but effective systems of sluices
allow the selective watering of specific landholdings.
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Figure 7: Plan of the hydraulic net.
However, an even fuller appreciation of the two key elements of this Murcian landscape
may be obtained through ethnoarchaeological research. The remains that have been
identified in the Ricote valley were part of a system very similar to that which is still in
use in the High Atlas Mountains of Morocco.
TAZLAFT AND ITS GRANARIES
The investigation of collective granaries began in the province of Ouarzazate in 2000.1
The project brought together a geomorphologist for the study of the landscape,
archaeologists, and Moroccan anthropologists who carried out the oral element of the
research.
Some of these collective granaries remain in use. As well as the granaries, the
investigation is concerned with evidence regarding the socio-economic environment as
registered in the landscape. In fact, it is important to note that a granary will only exist
where complex and well-managed irrigation systems are functioning so as to allow
1
Since 2000, this project is a part of the bilateral agreement of cooperation between Morocco and Belgium,
involving the following institutions and people:
- Moroccan Kingdom: Ministry of Culture and Communication; Centre de Conservation et de Réhabilitation du
Patrimoine architectural des Zones atlasiques et subatlasiques (known as CERKAS, Ouarzazate); Institut National
des Sciences de l’Archéologie et du Patrimoine (INSAP, Rabat).
- Belgium: Ministry of the Walloon Region - Direction de l’Archéologie de la Division du Patrimoine (DGATLP,
Namur); Direction des Accords internationaux et des Affaires multilatérales de la Division des relations
internationales (DGRE, Bruxelles) and Délégation Wallonie-Bruxelles (Rabat).
The fieldwork took place from 21 st to 25 th of May 2002. The team was made up of Dominique Bossicard,
computer scientist-topographer, Direction de l’Archéologie, MRW; Morgan De Dapper, geomorphologist,
Université de Gand; Didier Dehon, archaeologist, Direction de l’Archéologie, MRW; Johnny De Meulemeester,
archaeologist, Division du Patrimoine, MRW; Larbi Erbati, archaeologist, INSAP; Amina Fadli, architect,
manager of the CERKAS; Guy Focant, photographer, Division du Patrimoine, MRW; Mustapha Jlok,
anthropologist, CERKAS; Philippe Mignot, archaeologist, Direction de l’Archéologie, MRW.
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arable farming. The village of Tazlaft, fifteen kilometres upstream of the ksar of Aït
Ben Adou, a UNESCO World Heritage Site, was chosen as the study area by reason of
its position at the junction of two valleys, the larger of which is on an old caravan route
connecting Marrakech to the desert.
The collective granary contributes in a very special way to the social bond which is at
the heart of the community, starting at the time of the harvest and continuing through
the year with the management and distribution of the grain.
Archaeologists working on earthen buildings have been interested in the typical
collective granaries of the Berber communities since the 1930s, as this approach to
construction is characteristic of the High Atlas region (Montagne, 1930) A large-scale
survey, which was certainly a remarkable undertaking in view of the period when it
took place and the limited means then available, was carried out by the archaeologist
Djamila Jacques-Meunié between 1941 and 1954 in the course of a number of long
stays in the area (Jacques-Meunié,1951).
Even at that stage Jacques-Meunié was anxious about the twin threats of abandonment
and destruction which weighed on these monuments. It was clear that their study would
become increasingly difficult as the collective granaries gradually lost their function.
Geomorphological studies and hydraulic networks
A first reconnaissance of the valley of the assifs Awnila and Marghane, to the north and
to the west of Tazlaft respectively, reveals settlement patterns similar to those of all the
valleys of the area. Differences emerge as a result of local topography, of course, but
more particularly they relate to the geomorphology which changes as one climbs up the
valley (Fig. 8).
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Figure 8: View of the valley with Tazlaft in front (photo: G. Focant).
To the north of Tazlaft, rocks eroded from the cliffs, which stand above the thirty-two
degree slopes of the steep-sided valley, fall to join the constantly-moving screen below.
The slopes and the cliffs serve only as rough grazing for herds of goats and flocks of
sheep; any attempt at improvement by humans is likely to be crushed in situ by rocks
falling from the cliff. At the foot of the slope, the bed of the assif is made up of three
parts: the river bed itself, then a lower terrace which floods each year and on which the
water table remains sufficiently high to allow an annual cycle of cultivation without
irrigation, and finally an upper terrace where perennial plants and trees are grown with
the help of an irrigation system.
The waters of the assif cut sinusoid furrows in the riverbed, eroding material from the
concave bank and depositing it on the convex bank. The main irrigation channel is cut
along the edge of the upper terrace nearest to the foot of the slope. The water supply for
this channel may be achieved via a sluice from the assif, by recovery of surface waters,
or through a combination of the two.
The hydraulic network at Tazlaft
The hydraulic network at Tazlaft begins with a sluice in the assif Awnila at the point
where it emerges from the village of Tassarda. A second canal of lesser importance
serves to water an area of ground on the inner bank of the curving assif. It also takes its
water by means of a sluice in the assif. It is located at the edge of the lower terrace and
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at the foot of the upper terrace. It was the result of a private initiative and responsibility
for its maintenance lies with the owner of the irrigated area. In contrast, the main canal
is managed by the village assembly; the assembly appoints a water guardian, whose role
it is to control all irrigation. Each landowner is entitled to open a sluice gate on the canal
in order to water his land; the length of time for which the sluice gate may remain open
is determined on the basis of the relative extent of the area to be irrigated. The water
guardian (in Arabic, amin) is informed of any infringements. The informer might, for
example, be a neighbour directly affected by the infringement. The village assembly has
the power to impose punishment for infringements, and this might take the form of a
fine, payable in silver. Before payment of the fine, the culprit might be required to
organise a full meal for the members of the assembly, which might actually prove to be
even more costly than the silver fine itself.
The main channel follows the right bank of the assif all the way to the marl platform on
which the village of Tazlaft is built. Here, it leaves the course of the assif Awnila and, in
the form of a qanat, it passes at a depth of about twenty metres under the present day
village (five to six metres towards the centre and approximately three metres where it
emerges from the ground). It re-emerges into the open air to the west of the village. At
intervals of about twenty metres, a maintenance and ventilation hatch provides access to
the canal. The diameter of the mouths of these hatches has been significantly widened
by the passage of rainwater. The canal serves to irrigate the terraces on the left bank of
the assif Marghane, to the west of the village. A series of secondary and tertiary canals
distribute water around the various parcels of land (Fig. 9). Finally, the remaining water
– which is almost stagnant by this stage – is returned to the assif Marghane.
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Figure 9: Tazlaft. Aerial view of the village, with the location of its 3 granaries.
The village community maintains the canal. Twice a year a list of repairs is drawn up,
and appropriate remedial work is assigned to each family. Special works may also be
required at times of flooding. The canal must be cleaned out twice a year. Thus, the time
devoted to the maintenance of the hydraulic system amounts to between fifteen days
and two months of every year.
In general, the water of the assif Marghane - a name that actually means “the salted
river” – is of a lower quality than that of the assif Awnila. This difference in quality is
the reason why water is brought from the Awnila for the irrigation of the land on the left
bank of the Marghane.
Despite the lack of direct proof, we consider it likely that the irrigation system was
originally made up of a number of channels that had been built as a result of private
initiatives. It is in fact possible that irrigation of the upper terrace was adopted over time
as improvements were made in the techniques of canal construction, improvements
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which made it possible to take water from much further upstream in the assif and to
calculate the requisite angle of slope for the canal, so that slope and bore together would
allow the provision of an adequate water supply even as far away as the other side of the
village of Tazlaft. It seems clear that a construction such as that of the Tazlaft canal
goes beyond the bounds of private initiative and can only have been managed at villagewide level. Every local farmer is entitled to put a few stones in the assif in order to
divert some of its water to irrigate the crops in his adjacent landholdings. The irrigation
of an extensive area, the construction of several kilometres of channels, the digging – as
in Tazlaft – of a part of the system in the form of a qanat in a tunnel passing under the
village, and the construction of a dam far upstream of the village: all imply a thorough
familiarity not only with the area but also with the principles of hydraulic engineering.
The agriculture and the traditional animal husbandry of Tazlaft
The produce of the irrigated land around the village of Tazlaft includes cereal crops
(corn, maize, and particularly barley), which are grown around fruit trees bearing
apricots, almonds, pomegranates, apples, and quinces. There are still a few fig trees, but,
for the most part, they have been left untended. Prickly pears or “barbary figs” are
gathered. The kitchen garden produces tomatoes, courgettes, pumpkins, and cucumbers.
Fodder for the animals is of great significance. There are donkeys, mules, jennets, and
horses. Cows are kept for milk production. There are, as is immediately obvious, flocks
of sheep and herds of goats. Hens, turkeys, and rabbits are all raised for the table. There
are dogs, but one sees even more cats, which are kept as a means of controlling mice
(particularly in and around the storage areas), but which are also very useful on hot
nights when one sleeps outside, as they keep the reptiles away.
The cliff granary
Before the settlement became permanent, semi-nomads inhabited the area. These seminomadic people left but few traces of their occupation and use of the land, but their
presence is demonstrated by the existence of several cliff granaries along the length of
the assif Marghane. Each of these consists of a series of cells, beside and / or above or
below one another, cut into the rock (Fig. 9 and Fig. 10). Access to these granaries is
extremely difficult. One of them is still accessible via a dangerous goat path. It is made
up of some sixty cells arranged in three galleries on two different levels.
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Figure 10: Interior view of the cliff granary (photo: G. Focant).
A rectilinear access passage, cut perpendicular to the cliff face and running horizontally,
serves an equal number of cells on each side. These cells are approximately oval in
plan, and they vary in size. Some contain compartments fashioned in mud bricks. A
well, square in plan, resembling a chimney, serves at the same time to light the galleries
and to provide a means of communication between the levels.
These granaries constituted a fixed point in the life of the semi-nomadic people to
whom they belonged. The reason why the construction of granaries was so important is
essentially related to the climate. In semi-arid regions, the cereal harvest is very
unpredictable. In a good year, there might be incredible abundance, but usually the
harvest is poor or even non-existent. It is thus essential that grain should be stored for
use in leaner years. For the semi-nomadic peoples, the issue of security was also
relevant: they kept a proportion of their stores in fortified granaries because they were
obliged to leave their usual settlement area when the surrounding pastures dried out to
such an extent that they became inadequate for the needs of their herds and flocks. To
these climatic factors must be added the constant threat of raiding by neighbours in
search of food, at least in times of poor harvests. Grain, as a source of life, had to be
protected.
The hilltop granary (Fig. 9)
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At the time when nomadism was giving way to the settled lifestyle, villages were built
around public spaces and facilities, among which the granary remained important.
Indeed, the collective granary came to be a relatively substantial building in which the
Berbers stored their agricultural produce as well as other goods. The ighremt (the
agadir, in the western part of the Moroccan Atlas Mountains) is a tribal or clan-based
arrangement whereby the head of each family has a safe in the building to which he
alone holds the key. The store and its related structures are guarded by a gatekeeper who
monitors the comings and goings of authorised users, and bars access to those who have
no right to be there.
This type of granary is often also a fortress, with walls spiked with watchtowers, and
sited at the top of a steep slope or cliff where access would be difficult, thus rendering it
suitable as a refuge in times of danger. Around the larger fortified granaries/refuges
there are generally associated buildings, which vary in number and in importance. As
well as accommodation for the gatekeeper, there might be one or two guardrooms, a
mill, a smithy, a stable-cum-cattle shed, an assembly room for the holding of meetings,
a water storage tank, and sometimes even a small mosque.
There would only be one entrance into the enclosure, and this would be arranged on a
zig-zag or would be otherwise fortified. Responsibility for the sections of the building
which are in common use falls to the community as a whole, and they are built and
maintained by teams which work in rotation, whereas the maintenance of each safe falls
to the family to which it belongs.
A first granary of this type was built a short distance from the village on a hillock that
overlooks the village and the assif Marghane. According to local oral tradition, this first
granary (ighrem) was destroyed by another tribe in the course of a war, some two
hundred or three hundred years ago. For the moment it has not been possible to fix the
date of this destruction with any greater degree of certainty. Of this first granary there
remain only a few fragments of walls. Archaeological analysis, without the benefit of
trial trenches – let alone full-scale excavations – suggests that the granary was divided
into cells measuring about five metres by two and a half metres, with corridors between
one metre and one and a half metres wide.
The granary of today (Fig. 9, Fig. 11, and Fig.12)
The granary that is now to be found at Tazlaft belongs to the most recent class of
collective granaries. It would have been built following the destruction of the high
granary. It is a four-sided structure which measures eighteen metres and eighty
centimetres by twenty-one metres, and which contains two storeys. On top of this
structure there is a terrace that allows the accommodation of some additional safes.
The granary contains about sixty safes.
17
Figure 11: Tazlaft, plan of the existing granary and three-dimensional view (M.-N. Rosière and A. Beff).
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Despite the survival of certain defensive features – for example, it has only one
entrance; the only other openings are a few small air vents; it is a more or less square
building with square angle towers – several aspects of its role as a place of refuge for
the village community have been lost, and its remaining function is merely that of a
collective storage facility. It has no water tank, no designated accommodation for its
guardian, no benches at the entrance, no religious installations, and no meeting rooms
for the village council.
The granary site is on an old alluvial terrace that is made up of water-rolled pebbles, and
which slopes slightly towards the north.
The three-storey granary was built using the traditional cob and casing technique (with
the walls between sixty and sixty-five centimetres thick) for the façades as well as for
the interior partition walls.
At some point, the uppermost part of the building was heightened using bricks, a piece
of work which represents either a repair or the addition of cells on the level of the
terrace.
Apart from a series of slits for the admission of light, only the northern and western
(and principal) façades of the building feature traces of decoration. These decorative
elements are at first floor level and they take the form of triangles and diamonds that are
picked out in the brickwork.
The sole entrance to the building is about half way along the western façade. The roundarched doorway has lost its decorative rim, which would almost certainly have been of
stuccowork.
Protruding from each face of the building there was at least one wooden pipe to drain
rainwater from the terrace.
The heavy single door has a wooden lock with two catches.
On entering through the door, one arrives in a corridor from which, to the left, one can
gain access to the staircase that leads up towards the terrace; a little further on, and also
to the left, is the doorway of a cell. The arrangement of this cell prompts the suggestion
that it may in fact represent part of a larger cell that has at some stage been subdivided.
If this is indeed the case, the original layout would have been more conventional, as
there would not usually be a way of getting into a cell from this part of the entrance
passageway. In the middle of the corridor stand the containers reserved for the guardian
of the granary. Having passed these containers one then reaches a cut-stone archway
that leads only to the cells.
The arrangement of the cells is centred around the square central well of the granary,
which serves at the same time as a source of light and an impluvium, here laid out in the
simplest possible way.
In the centre of the granary is a wooden pillar topped by a stepped capital, which
supports the beams of the corridors of the floor above. Four corridors, laid out in the
form of a cross, meet at this point, and each provides access to between four and six
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cells. The first floor has the same layout. The cells are long and narrow, each being of
almost the same dimensions (c. six and a half by one and a half metres). However, some
of the compartments are much smaller (that on the landing of the first floor, for
example, and that in the tower at the south-western angle). Every cell door is built up
against a dividing wall. Each doorway has a wooden lintel, above which is, in several
cases, a blind or relieving arch delineated by a moulding. Carved into the lintels are
small ‘x’s or small square notches. The doors are generally built of four boards and are
sometimes decorated with incised and painted geometric designs, although
unfortunately here, in Tazlaft, those that survive are in a very poor state of preservation.
Stuck to the lintel with cow dung there are still small bits of paper on which various
verses from the Koran can be read: for example, “Glory to God, who in his
magnanimity gave us the rain which saved us from drought”. A piece of paper is stuck
to the lintel each year while the harvest is being stored in the granary. Both the
decorations and the papers are regarded as talismans. Each door is furnished with a
wooden lock, for which the key has wooden teeth; in only one case is the key made of
iron.
The interior of the cell is divided into compartments using low walls built of mud
bricks. The compartments are sometimes serviced by means of a corridor which runs
straight down the cell from the door, and sometimes simply by climbing over the walls
from one compartment to the next. The size of the divisions varies from container to
container according to the needs and desires of each occupant. The height of the ceiling,
which is as tall as two metres and eighty centimetres on the first floor, allows for the
possibility of the installation of an extra storage level against the back wall of the cell.
20
Figure 12: View of the façade of the existing granary (photo: G. Focant).
As regards the date of construction of the building, a sample of wood from the floor of
the upper storey has been radiocarbon-dated to the first half of the seventeenth century
(C13/C12, Beta Analytic, Miami). The similar granary at N’Ougdal, some eighty
kilometres from Tazlaft, can be dated, to some extent, by the fact that its customary law
was written down in the sixteenth century. This dating provides corroboration for the
date proposed for the destruction of the high granary.
CONCLUSION
This comparison clearly demonstrates a transfer of technology between countries, but
also the transfer of a way of life between similar landscapes. The subject matter is
undoubtedly archaeological: in Spain, citrus fruit production on the plateaux has led to
the abandonment of the valley floors, and of the remains of secular irrigation systems.
In Morocco, for other reasons, the villages are losing their independent approach to
subsistence and to production, and with this loss the associated systems, described
above, are disappearing. This comparative study provides a means by which we can
more clearly understand the way in which this community might have functioned during
the medieval period.
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Klincksieck.
Montagne, R., (1930). Villages et kasbas berbères de l’Atlas et des oasis.
Paris: Alcan.
21

medieval rural settlement in the spanish murcia and present

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