The End of Domestic Slavery in Fes, Morocco

R. David Goodman

Submitted to the faculty of the University Graduate School

in partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree
Doctor of Philosophy
in the Department History,
Indiana University
October, 2009

UMI Number: 3386679

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Accepted by the Graduate Faculty, Indiana University, in partial fulfillment of the requirements
for the degree of Doctor of Philosophy.

Doctoral Committee

John Hanson, Ph.D.

Claude Clegg, Ph.D.
Phyllis Martin, Ph.D.
Ruth Stone, Ph.D.

Date of Dissertation Defense November, 20th 2008

ii

 2009
R. David Goodman
ALL RIGHTS RESERVED

iii

In spite of all those who preserve benefits through double standards which degrade life and
obstruct peoples basis of well-beingyet far, far more so in honor of all those who somehow
create previously unavailable means to our greater humanity

iv

R. David Goodman
The End of Domestic Slavery in Fes, Morocco
This dissertation examines how the social institution of domestic slavery declined and ended in
Fes, Morocco. This very gradual and complex twentieth-century historical transformation is
approached through attention to the limited influence of French Protectorate (1912-1956) policy,
forms of economic and social change as experienced through Fasi household labor and family
life, and relevant personal registers within the lives of slaves and their children. The extensive
archival and field research which it is based upon (supported by a Fulbright-Hays doctoral
dissertation research fellowship, a grant from the American Institute of Maghribi Studies, and
several awards from Indiana University) assembles and analyzes a range of distinct original
sources, including colonial documents, Fasi court records, and oral interviews with former
slaves, slave owners and their descendants. The historical contours of this social change have
been reconstructed through a critical interpretation of French colonial documents, alongside a
careful consideration of the substantial detailed evidence of Islamic court records, and
compelling oral testimony representing intimate power relationships and their transformations
over time. This work is an effort to contribute an innovative and thorough case study of
relevance to Moroccan and North African history, as well as to the study of slavery within Arab
and Islamic contexts and beyond.

CHAPTER ONE: Introduction

Introduction 1
Introductory Historical Background 5
Questions, Approaches and Relevant Literature 11
Sources and Methods 31
Note on Organization of Chapters 37
Note on Language 38
CHAPTER TWO: The Contours of Protectorate Era Official Sources and the End of
Domestic Slavery 39
Protectorate Policies and Slavery 45
Fasi Families Use of Muslim Law and the Decline of Slavery 67
Protectorate Era Attitudes toward Slavery and Blackness 76
Conclusion: Limits of Formal Sources 102
CHAPTER THREE: Fasi Domestic Slave Labor and Beyond 107
Economic Change and Fasi Domestic Slavery 108
Protectorate Economic Policies and Slavery 108
Socioeconomic Changes in Fes 116
Fasi Socioeconomic Changes and Women 127
Post-Independence Changes and Continuities 130
Experiences of Fasi Domestic Slave Labor and Shifting Power Relations 134
Fasi Domestic Slavery and the Organization of Household Work 136
Work Conditions and Slaves Experiences 145
Controls and Punishments 153
Slaves Responses 162
Sources and Patterns of Household Change 176
Working Beyond Slavery 181
Socioeconomic Continuities and Changes 187
Struggles for Meaningful Freedom Beyond Slavery 195
Conclusion 200
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CHAPTER FOUR: Familial and Personal Changes in the Decline of Fasi Domestic Slavery
202
Social Changes and Slave Owning Fasi Families 203
Education, Nationalism and Elite Moroccan Women 205
Shifting Contexts of Material Culture 216
Reorganization in Patterns of Marriage and Family Life 223
Post-Independence Changes and Continuities 229
Fasi Family Legal Practices During the Decline of Domestic Slavery 236
Marriage, Concubinage and the Recognition of Children 240
Property and Inheritance 249
Housing 258
Continuities and Changes in Social Attitudes and Personal Relations 263
Slaves, Former Slaves and their Descendents: Experiences and Changes in Relations,
Recognition and Belonging 272
Slaves Experiences of Fasi Family Holidays 273
Marriages and Color 277
Familial Assimilation and Tensions 285
Power and Sexual Relationships 291
Children and Recognition 302
Childhood and Slaves Families 306
Dada 322
Old Age and Funerals 328
Meaningful Familial Relationships Beyond Slavery 331
Conclusion 342
CHAPTER FIVE: Conclusions 344
BIBLIOGRAPHY 350
APPENDIX 1 Selected Glossary 369-371
APPENDIX 2 Maps (Moroccan Cities, Fes Jdid and Fes El-Bali) 372

vii

FIGURES AND TABLES

Figure 1.
Figure 2.
Figure 3.
Figure 4.
Figure 5.
Figure 6.
Figure 7.
Figure 8.

References to Immediate Liberations. 70

References to Liberations Upon the Death of Owners. 71
Frequency of References to Slaves in Fasi Family Legal Documents. 75
Offical Annual Population of Fes 1921-1960. 115
References to Former Slave Wives and Concubines. 243
Legal Recognition of Children. 245
Housing Inheritance for Slaves and Former Slaves. 260
Frequency of References to Slaves from another Generation in Fasi
Family Legal Documents. 271

Table 1.
Table 2.

Official Annual Population of Morocco 1921-1960. 114

Official Estimates of the Working Population of Fes Medina Organized by
Class. 117
1938 Five Fasi Family Budgets. 122-124

Table 3.

viii

CHAPTER ONE
Introduction
The questions forming this PhD dissertation emerged from my long interest in and experiences
with Afro-Maghribi expressive culture and the historical construction of slavery in Morocco. In
the early nineteen-nineties I became enthralled by a particular form of Moroccan music
Gnawaand pursued information about its performers and practitioners, eventually writing an
MA thesis about the form. While undertaking this research, I came to increasingly question
historical assumptions and representations surrounding Gnawa music and its performers,
deciding to further explore Afro-Maghribi history in Morocco. My pursuit inevitably led to
historical questions of slavery and abolition, the focus of this PhD dissertation.
Gnawa music and related North African forms have long presented highly recognizable
examples of Afro-Maghribi culture. One popular myth or at least a distorted and incomplete
historical representation woven into the promotion, socialization and consumption of the
Gnawa form as it underwent expanded commoditization and festivalization, gaining wider
national and international recognition (particularly from the early nineteen-nineties onward), has
been the notion that the Gnawa were the descendents of slaves captured in the 1591 Saadian
transaharan military expedition. This historical account of the Gnawa form is readily disputed
by the various comparable North African forms beyond the plausible impact of Saadian
Moroccos imperial presence in West Africa. From the Fezzan in Libya to Tunisia and Algeria
there were and continue to be Afro-Maghribi-based forms and practioners of Gnawa musical
culture. While the history of these cultural forms and their particular relationship to slavery
remains unclear, durable and vague historical assumptions are maintained through a traditional

generalized intellectual de-emphasis reflected in a lack of scholarship from which to address the
significant reality of human geographical blackness in the Maghrib.
Though widely known of and readily conceded to have an historical role, my initial
investigations uncovered little conceptual or historical clarity concerning Afro-Maghribi
contributions to North African history. Well beyond the scope of any single event, the vast
temporal and geographic history of the trans-Saharan trade networks entail essential features of
Afro-Maghribi related migrations. Furthermore, blackness across the longue dure of North
African history encompasses even more complex dynamics than the challenges of retracing and
assessing the historical migrations of West African slaves and their descendents in the region. In
the longue dure of regional interaction and color, in addition to pre-Saharan population factors
are those of the Saharan world and its fringes, of which haratin communities within North
Africa comprise an important example.1 To be certain, multiple factors call for a more inclusive
and nuanced treatment of neglected and closely intertwined dimensions of North African history
otherwise dominated by attention to Arab and Berber peoples, rendering an insufficient
recognition and reconstruction of this regional and inter-regional heritage.
As my continued survey of this problematic area made me cognizant of its daunting
breadth, I sought to establish relevant questions with which I could undertake manageable
research. My pursuit of several ras lkhite (the loose head of threads) in this process led me to
the pivotal historical context of slavery, and very specifically a focus upon the end of domestic
slavery in the city of Fes. In the early nineteen-nineties I began traveling to Morocco as a
merchandise buyer for a London-based instrument manufacturer. Summertime travel and work
1

For a concise summary of the historical problems raised by the term Haratin, see Rita AouadBadoual, Esclavage et situation des Noirs au Maroc dans la premire moiti du XXe sicle
in Les relations transsahariennes l'poque contemporaine - un espace en constante mutation
(Paris: Karthala, 2004).
2

in several Moroccan locations gave me opportunities to pursue my interests in Gnawa music and
further my acquaintance with the countrys divergent socio-economic landscapes. Once during
lunch with a Professor from Meknes I accepted his invitation to visit Fes. That afternoon we
drove directly to the palatial Dar Mokri in the Fes medina. In retrospect, it is clear that my
entrance into the enormous, ornate, declining and outright empty interior implanted the space
within my larger curiosities. At the time I wondered how my observations of the power relations
among domestic servants and the nouveau riche Moroccan elite of Rabat connected to the
interior surroundings of zelij work and architectural detail which evoked historical differences
and uncertainty for me. My slow walk throughout the rambling rooms of the long structure
eventually translated into my questioning what the dynamics had been within slave owning Fasi
households, how the Fasi elite and the domestic slaves and servants who worked within such
houses had lived their lives, and what changes their descendants had lived through. I came to
wonder what historical forces had swept through what clearly had been until recently a way of
life which confidently projected itself as fully developed, all encompassing and stableWhat
happened to this internal world? How had this household functioned? Had slaves worked in the
household? Who were they and what were their experiences? Though at the outset such
questions seemed disparate from my Afro-Maghribi concerns, they nevertheless continued to
prove evocative and constructive points of return for approaching slavery in Morocco.
Several years later, with the generous support of a Fulbright-Hays doctoral dissertation
research award as well as a research grant from AIMS and various awards from Indiana
Universitys history department, I began to fully operationalize my research interests. My
preliminary bouquet of proposed questions stalwartly themed around furthering our
knowledge of Afro-Maghribi cultural production and the end of slavery again forced my

return to sorely needed foundational historical research. As I confronted the practical difficulties
and real complexities of reconstructing the end of domestic slavery in a single relatively small,
but truly dense urban location, Fes as a specific case study, posing great challenges yet offering
immense promise, was progressively settled upon and reckoned with. A schedule initially
budgeted for three months gathering data within Fes as one location among several others came
to require over two years of daily work.
An extended period of constant sustained efforts to track down archival and legal
documents eventually produced sources which were steadily relevant or even indispensable,
occasionally fascinating or even inspirational, and at times pierced into the heart of questions
propelling my research. Ultimately however, informants and their shared oral histories made the
most meaningful personal and intellectual impact of all the features and experiences of this
doctoral research. Perseverance and good fortune helped me through the arduous process of
developing interested and competent contacts. Acquiring useful interviews grounded my
understanding and approach to an interconnection of relevant topics in surprising and evermore
realistic ways. My efforts to reconstruct the end of the social institution of domestic slavery and
the slow and generally unclear forms of related social change that occurred were repeatedly
refuted, refined, thrust into perspective and enriched by my slowly growing relationships and
greater access to oral histories reflecting intimate personal perceptions and experiences. As great
as my initial attraction had been to sweeping, interdisciplinary and eventually comparative
scholarship, my certainty became even greater that advancement upon the kinds of research
questions which had long stirred and sustained my interests demanded highly original and
detailed foundational historical work.

I hope that any readers of this study might recognize ways in which larger research
interests I continue to share have been channeled into the present treatment of particular and
worthy questions within twentieth-century Fasi and Moroccan history. It is also my hope that
this study serve as a contribution to areas deserving further painstaking research including the
reconstruction of slavery along with its end and aftermath in North Africa, a more
comprehensive twentieth-century history of Fes and Morocco, the development of AfroMaghribi historical and social scientific concerns, and diverse comparative possibilities. Along
with my nod to the custom of an authors complete claim of responsibility for the doubtless
persistence of faults and shortcomings within their work, it must be duly acknowledged that full
credit for this dissertation extends far beyond myself. In addition to the abovementioned
institutional sources of financial support, I acknowledge my lifelong appreciation to all the
friends, associates, contacts, family and strangers within and beyond academia who contributed
to the formation, undertaking and completion of this study.
Introductory Historical Background
For many readers some broad relevant historical background will be useful at the outset of
considering the original historical detail developed throughout this dissertation. Contemporary
Morocco occupies the most western lands of North Africa, bordering the Mediterranean sea,
Atlantic ocean, and Sahara desert in an immediate geographical proximity to Iberia. The
complex long-term overlap and interaction among peoples within this area is often glossed over
with vague imagery of a crossroads producing a cultural and human geographical mosaic.
Indeed there are multiple dimensions to consider. In the larger Mediterranean world of North
Africa prior to Muslim presence, the control of Mediterranean cities and coastal plains from
Alexandria to the Straits of Gibraltar historically changed hands many times among Africans,

Middle Easterners and Europeans including Berbers, Phoenicians, Romans, Vandals, and
Byzantines. To the south, the Sahara was a well traveled sea of sand throughout and following
the gradual desiccation of its prehistoric pasturelands which culminated around 2000 B.C.E. In
the first centuries C.E., the well-suited camel became extensively used for Saharan trade
transport allowing for caravans and oases marketplaces to link settlements and cities across
North Africa with those throughout the sahel (Arabic for coast) region stretched along the
southern end of the desert from present day Senegal bordering the Atlantic Ocean to Sudan (from
the Arabic bilad al-sudan or land of the blacks) bordering the Red Sea.
A major organizing force within Moroccan history was initiated with the westward
Muslim expansion across North Africa. It is often noted that Islam moved westward across
North Africa at a remarkable pace, advancing into Spain by 711. A more inclusive description
takes into account that religious conversion and Arabization moved at a more gradual pace than
Islamic military and political control. Local non-Arab peoples were variously incorporated
throughout this expansion, the majority of which initially remained non-Muslim subjects. Fes
itself was founded in 789 by Middle-Eastern-Arab-in-exile Idris I, amid Arab military expansion
and Berber resistance and alliance, intermarriage and conflict. Though Arabization in North
Africa still continues to unfold in an historical patchwork of reciprocal adaptation, conformity
and contention, it can be broadly noted of this early period that sedentary coastal Christian
Berber peoples converted to Islam and adopted the Arabic language and Arab culture more
rapidly and thoroughly than traditionally resilient Berbers who were nomadic or lived in remote,
mountainous areas. It should also be noted that in its first centuries Islam spread throughout
North Africa in very different forms. The Sunni caliphs of the Umayyad dynasty (C.E. 661-750
centered in Damascus, then relocated and continued from C.E. 755 to 1042 in Cordoba, Spain)

and the Abbasid dynasty (C.E.750-1258 centered in Baghdad) were challenged by Khariji
Muslims who rejected the Middle Eastern caliphate entirely and Shii Muslims who sought to
reformulate the rightful basis of Muslim authority and leadership. In the eighth century Khariji
refugees from the Middle East aligned themselves with Berbers who resisted Arab dominance
and founded small communities in North African mountains and Saharan oases. A network of
Khariji merchants traded extensively across the Sahara desert and along the Sahel regions of
West Africa, often introducing Islam through their commercial contacts. By the eighth and ninth
centuries Muslim merchants from the Sahara were exposing and converting West Africans
through commercial interactions in the interregional trade in gold, slaves, salt, cloth, horses and
other goods.
A relevant middle historical period of North and West African Islam was initiated by
Western Saharan Berbers. With the influences from the Islamic presence in regional commercial
centers, religious pilgrims returning from Mecca, and North African Islamic scholars, they
became highly organized around a strict adherence to the Maliki Islamic legal school and
founded the Almoravid empire (1042-1148) stretching from Mauritania to central Spain and into
western Algeria. However, unyielding Almoravid doctrines along with military controls were
challenged by another Berber initiated movement from southern Morocco, the Almohads (11481269). The Almohads briefly controlled the entirety of Muslim Spain, Tunisia, Algeria and
Morocco, promoting a broad and influential Unitarian understanding of Islam across the region
which helped consolidate Sunni religious authority with strong local influences. By this time
period the Maliki legal school became the North African norm, and within societies of North
Africa, urban Islamic universities such as Al-Qarawiyyin in Fes, which were dedicated to the
study of Quranic scripture, Islamic law, the natural sciences, philosophy, history, and geography

co-existed alongside Islamic sufi associations (tariqas) often centered around rural lodges
(zawiyas) and the shrines of patron saints, as well as the predominate popular cultural traditions
and beliefs entailing local, regional, and pan-Islamic rituals and celebrations.
During the periods of these empires and of subsequent Moroccan states, domestic slavery
was integral to the ordinary functioning of Moroccan elites and fell heavily upon enslaved darkskinned and Sudanese-origin peasants. Though regional forms of slavery predated the Islamic
presence in North and West Africa, being of a non-Muslim status and the stipulations of Islamic
law came to have considerable and enduring meaning within the reproduction and social
organization of the institution. Enslavement and slavery long continued alongside the TransSaharan transmission of values and knowledge. West African Sunni legal thinking adapted
strong influences from the same Maliki school predominate in North Africa, developing local
legal traditions which combined community involvement and customary officials with the
concepts and administration of Islamic law. By the sixteenth century hand-written books, often
on paper from North Africa, were greatly valued trade items, with rare works being more
expensive than the average price of a slave. In 1594 leading Timbuktu scholar Ahmad Baba was
captured by Moroccan troops who had invaded the region and was forced into exile in Morocco
for over a decade. Ironically Ahmad Baba himself was a great advocate against the enslavement
of West Africans, arguing forcefully for the basis of their recognition and freedom as fellow
Muslims.
European-Moroccan involvements, both indirect and direct, define another complex and
extended layer of historical influence within Morocco. The geopolitical turns of the Reconquista
led to the migration of many Sephardi Jews from Portugal and Spain into Morocco, where they
rapidly established communities. Another byproduct of the European expansion of this era was

the establishment of various Iberian coastal colonial footholds such as Ceuta and Mellila. Yet, it
must be noted that despite the closeness to Europe, repeated military incursions remained of
limited impact. Rather, as experienced elsewhere, deepening Moroccan ties with and eventual
dependence upon expanding European economic interests led to the culmination of more
profound political consequences. When the current Alaouite monarchy consolidated political
control of the Moroccan state (Dar al-Makhzan) in the mid-seventeenth century with the initial
support of a black slave army (Abid El-Boukhari), trade with Europe remained restricted. By the
mid-eighteenth century commerce and finance had grown significantly, leading to the 1760
construction of the port city Mogador, and an overall increasing presence of commercial agents
and European consuls.
European imperial pressures became more dramatic over the course of the nineteenth
century. In 1830 when the French began decades of violent colonization in Algeria, the core of
Algerian self-defense was politically and militarily organized around a zawiya controlled by
Abd al-Qadir (d.1883). Official Alaouite support for the widely admired Abd al-Qadir ended
following a military excursion from the French in1844 at the Battle of Isly, after which the
Moroccan state re-charted its lasting course of self-preservation. While French colonists worked
systematically for much of the nineteenth-century to disintegrate the political potential of
Algerian tariqas, they remained popular and often transnational networks. One such tariqa, the
Tijaniyya, was founded by Ahmad al-Tijani (d.1815) of the western Algerian Sahara and
extended an influence far across West Africa; Al-Tijani was buried in Fes at what continues to be
a major center for pilgrimage from Tijaniyya Muslims.
Amid decades of Spanish, French and eventually German efforts to extend their
influences within Morocco, Alaouite monarchs preserved their political independence into the

twentieth century. The Dar al-Makhzan responded to combined external and internal pressures,
including fears of disgruntle Berber peoples, through costly attempts to modernize and reform
the military and economy while not altering the socio-political and religious basis of their power
within Morocco. In this context of limited reforms, there was no intension to dismantle the
ruling elites basis or symbols of power, and the slave trade and institution continued
unencumbered within Morocco. When economic and military dependence led to a formal
Protectorate relationship in 1912 with the lions share of Morocco falling under French authority
and a far smaller area ceded to Spain, domestic slavery remained an acknowledged and routine
feature of Fasi life.
Alongside the lofted principals of the French Revolution which led to the abolition of
slavery in 1794, nineteenth France remained divided and often officially accommodated slavery.
This is reflected in the legal reinstitution of slavery in 1802, followed decades later by the legal
emancipation of slaves in French colonies in 1848. To be certain French colonial expansion in
North and West Africa in the nineteenth century did not axiomatically end or even substantially
challenge slavery. In fact, in the nineteenth century and throughout the first decades of European
colonial rule increasing numbers of slaves labored within West Africa to produce the resources
and cash crops sought by industrial European powers that condemned though vastly expanded
the use of slave labor. Prior to the Protectorate, Moroccan merchants principally from Fes, took
advantage of expanded French controls within the Senegal River and Niger Valley to establish
coastal West African business networks. These limited channels of expanded North and West
African regional interconnections coincided with the late nineteenth century increase in slave
sales within Moroccan markets. Though it was a pillar of rationalization within the mission
civilisatrice and the Algeciras Conference (1906) referred to the need to end slavery within

10

Morocco, French colonial policies and practices of accommodating Islam and aligning with
elites fostered and supported an operational acceptance of domestic slavery.
The unheralded and dateless end of domestic slavery in Fes marks a major shift in
modern Moroccan history, one which remains to be fully conceptualized and recorded. Despite
historical assumptions and historiographic conventions, the end of this social institution was not
the direct legal byproduct of a colonial tutelage. In 1956 the Moroccan monarchy and the
national economic elite emerged reformulated from Protectorate colonialism with a stronger,
more centralized state and basis of economic power than prior. Within and surrounding the deep
continuities of power relations and identities comprising domestic slavery, there was also an
irrevocably reinvented world there amid multiple shifting dimensions of Moroccan social
change domestic slavery ended as an institution. In recent decades important efforts have been
made to overcome the tendency of Moroccan historiography to uncritically reflect elite Arab
historical dominance. Despite the a notable entrance of histories dedicated to emphasizing
Moroccan Jews, Berbers, women and peasants, as mentioned, many complex and important
contexts of the Moroccan past have yet to be historically synthesized and written. What follows
is an effort in that direction.
Questions, Approaches and Relevant Literature
The central question of this study how did domestic slavery end in Fes?, has been
approached through treating numerous related themes of inquiry including how did the
Moroccan encounter with Protectorate colonialism influence this social institution?, how were
forms of social, economic and legal change implicated in this historical shift?, and how was the
end of domestic slavery experienced by slaves and their children? In turn each of these themes
has entailed many further questions addressed and developed throughout the chapters of this

11

dissertation, which are outlined below. In order to further clarify the significance of the central
and subsidiary directions undertaken within this research, as well as how they have been
approached, it is useful to review relevant literature.
Amid Moroccos overlap of historiographic worlds including African, Arab, Berber,
Mediterranean, Muslim, and Saharanthe Atlantic border provides an ironic reminder of the
often arbitrary conceptual emphases and geographic practices among which regional and world
historical paradigms develop and function. Recent decades of growth in the historiography
addressing slavery and the African diaspora have been dominated by literature deemed to
comprise an Atlantic system or an Atlantic world, yet North African slavery and its related
contexts have remained scarcely integrated or investigated.2 In part this intellectual tendency

This underrepresentation is noted in Bernard Lewis Race and Slavery in the Middle East: an
Historical Enquiry (New York: Oxford University Press, 1990), which organized and narrated a
pioneering aggregate of primary sources within limited and problematic assumptions tied to a
grandiose scope and a full disengagement from historical constituencies. John Hunwicks
writings have brought similarly rigorous textual attention, contributing translations of relevant
texts focused on Islamic Africa. Hunwick has repeatedly asserted the import of color and slavery
in North Africa and published the call for further study of these themes within North African
history, most recently in a co-edited compilation of sources reflecting the Mediterranean lands
of Islam. Yet Hunwicks scholarship has focused neither on relevant in-depth case studies nor
upon developing the carefully grounded historical reconstruction and interpretation of these
concerns. See Black Africans in the Mediterranean World: Introduction to a Neglected Aspect
of the African Diaspora, in Elizabeth Savage ed., the Human Commodity: Perspectives on the
Trans-Saharan Slave Trade (London: Frank Cass, 1992), Islamic Law and Polemics over Race
and Slavery in North and West Africa (16th-19th Century) in Shaun E. Marmon ed. Slavery in
the Islamic Middle East (Princeton: Markus Wiener Publishers, 1999), and John Hunwick and
Eve Troutt Powell eds. The African Diaspora in the Mediterranean Lands of Islam (Princeton,
NJ: Markus Wiener Publishers, 2002). Indeed, a key point about the state of such broadly
relevant scholarship is that the prospering reiteration that, (f)or every gallon of ink that has been
spilt on the trans-Atlantic slave trade and its consequences, only one very small drop has been
spent on the study of the forced migration of black Africans into the Mediterranean world of
Islam, (Hunwick 2002, p.ix), has itself remained couched among generalized questions and
approaches. The lack of in-depth case studies has been consistently accompanied by a strong
tacit or direct tendency toward a sweeping frame of reference and/or a recurrent dominant
organizational feature which strives to examine and illuminate an assumed essentially Islamic
slavery. The relevance of this point has been recognized in a self-reflexive manner by William
12

was an unconscious or uncritical bequest of modern era European geopolitical and racial
approaches to slavery and sub- versus supra- Saharan Africa. Despite the fact that much of West
Africa shares greater direct historical connections and commonalities with the Kingdom of
Morocco than the Kingdom of Lesotho, ideological projections and excessive divisions have
rendered the rich intersections, multiplicities and contingencies of North African history
unnecessarily disconnected and betwixt and between. Throughout long periods of the expanding
and contracting reach of empires, systems of belief, and trade networks, slavery formed a
charged and complicated area of historical relations among and between North and West Africa.
Our fuller foundational understanding of such interactions and the character of their contexts and
consequences requires further specific reconstructions, resources and collaborative scholarly
interests needed for example, to produce a Braudelian quality of historiographic synthesis for the
Saharan world.3 While denoting grand requests, colossal authorities and teaming masses of
scholars might also exceed the limitations of Braudel and tendencies within large-brush-rendered
regional historical understandings through further establishing the undeniable basis of an
expanded representation of North African history within Mediterranean and early modern

Gervase Clarence-Smith who recently noted in the Envoi to his sweeping Islam and the Abolition
of Slavery (India: Oxford University Press, 2006), (d)eeper studies of religious attitudes towards
servitude and abolition are urgently needed, because the subject has generated so much vulgar
polemic, (p.233). In fact, serious case studies related to slavery, its end and aftermath in the
Arab and Islamic world have been slow to emerge amid the burgeoning early twenty-first
century vested political and military interests in Islam. Perhaps a recent book by Ehud Toledano
anticipates a shift in its effort to engage concerns of contemporary scholars working on slavery
within the history of Muslim communities through bringing detail and nuanced focus to the large
terrain of nineteenth-century Ottoman slavery intent to recover voice, As if Silent and Absent:
Bonds of Enslavement in the Islamic Middle East (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2007).
3
Drawing heavily on British archival sources John Wright has produced an ambitious
contribution, see The Trans-Saharan Slave Trade (London: Routledge, 2007). For a discussion
useful for comparing the development of the field relative to the Indian Ocean world see Gwyn
Campbell, The Structure of Slavery in Indian Ocean Africa and Asia (London: Frank Cass,
2004).
13

Atlantic worlds. Beyond representing a sheer fantastic wish list, these vast and at times complex
lacuni, areas of de-emphasis, and ambiguous boundaries form the world historical backdrop
against which the present study joins the relatively few historical studies of slavery in Morocco.
Proceeding from chronological and thematic interests periodized by the seventh-century
Islamic presence in North Africa onward we begin with the work of Fasi historian Abdelilah
Benmlih. Benmlihs pioneering doctoral research drew very heavily upon Islamic law in a fairly
straightforward manner to examine slavery in North Africa and Andalusia, particularly during
the eleventh to thirteenth-century period of the Almoravid dynasty, and became the basis of three
recent publications in Arabic.4 His first book provides a relatively brief overview of social
historical conditions of slavery within the Almoravid Empire. His second book is a similar
survey, with a somewhat widened period and themes, and his most recent related publication is
an extension of themes based upon his dissertation research. Benmlihs interpretative
approaches have steadily fused a range of concerns and insights culled from medievalist
scholarship in Europe and the Arab world with the broader conceptual and geographical studies
of slavery. For example, his interest in Charles Verlindens historical reconstruction of slavery
within Europe is paired with gleanings from Claude Meillasouxs anthropology of slavery based
in West Africa. His scholarly contributions to expanding the study of Moroccan and North
African slavery would be greatly complimented by a dialogue of further related study of this
time period as well as works which bridge the significant gaps prior and following his period of
interest.

Abdelilah Benmlih, Zahirat al-riqq fi al-Gharb al-Islami, (Rabat, Morocco: Manshurat alZaman, 2002), Al-Istirqaq fi al-gharb al-Islami bayna al-harb wa-al-tijarah (Oujda, Morocco:
Jamiat Muhammad al-Awwal, Kulliyat al-Adab wa-al-Ulum al-Insaniyah, 2003), Al-Riqq fi
bilad al-Maghrib wa-al-Andalus (Beirut, Lebanon: Muassasat al-Intishar al-Arabi, 2004).
14

Allen Meyers doctoral research on the Abid al-Bukhari produced another highly
innovative and provocative contribution to an underrepresented related area of study military
slavery in Morocco.5 Meyers examination of the history of Moulay Ismails 'Abid al-Bukhari
troops, formed in the later part of the seventeenth-century and remaining directly consequential
for the Maghzan until the mid-eighteenth-century, entails an important attention to ethnicity.
Using a core of evidence from Makhzan sources he establishes convincingly that these black
troops were enslaved from within Morocco, drawn particularly from haratin communities,
overturning assumptions that such slaves were Sudanese born.6 Along with ethnicity and color
within Moroccan history, his work also attempts to contextualize slave soldiers as a significant
variable within larger Moroccan political contexts during the seventeenth and eighteenth
centuries.
Several scholars deserve mention for their attention to sources reflecting the historical
contention stirred amongst Islamic religious authorities concerning Moroccan enslavement.
Arabist John Hunwick has examined in detail and published translations of broadly relevant
primary sources, for example concerning Ahmed Babas forced sojourn, and produced writings
which reflect a mixture of awareness, interest and caution concerning color and slavery in North

Allan R. Meyers "The 'Abid 'L Buhari: Slave Soldiers and Statecraft in Morocco,"
(Unpublished Ph.D. Dissertation, Cornell University, 1974). Also see Class, Ethnicity, and
Slavery: The Origins of the Moroccan 'Abid, The International Journal of African Historical
Studies, (Vol. 10, No. 3. 1977), Slave Soldiers and State Politics in Early 'Alawi Morocco, 1668
1727, The International Journal of African Historical Studies, (Vol. 16, No. 1. 1983).
6
Meyers analyzes European sources to suggest that 18th and 19th century writers embellished
earlier sources and provide our first record of the claim that the slaves of the Moroccan Abid
army were originally Bambareens or from the Coasts of Guinea. Such an embellishment
would coincide with these and other terms and categories circulating within the trans-Atlantic
system. 1977 (p.430-431). Elsewhere (2002) I have expanded upon this line of interpretation
positing Bambara as an historical continuum of varied identities and identifications in
Morocco concerning the Gnawa.
15

African history.7 Aziz Abdalla Batrn, wrote an essay in John Ralph Willis Slaves and Slavery
in Muslim Africa which addresses the issues confronting the ulama and haratin in Fes during the
Moulay Ismail period.8 More recently Moroccan-born American Professor Chouki El Hamel
has added awareness to these themes and drawn upon sources reflecting the religious debates and
the awkward social and legal status of the haratin during this time period and beyond.9 Another
notable feature of El Hamels ongoing research interests and interpretive orientation is the effort
to illuminate and widen connections among interest areas of color and social stratification in
Moroccan history through engagement with current dialogues within the African diaspora
literature. This has brought attention to Moroccan and North African experiences of internal
diaspora within the Atlantic-centered diaspora literature.10
The nineteenth-century has received the most well-known treatment of Moroccan slavery
in Mohamed Ennajis Soldats, Domestiques et Concubines.11 Ennajis pioneering contribution
draws upon a vast and rich selection of Moroccan and European archival materials, including
those gathered from his rural sociological background in collaboration with seminal scholar Paul
Pascon (a Fes-born Frenchman who adopted Moroccan nationality after Independence). The
central feature of the study is Ennajis effort to broadly survey how slaves were a part of

See 1.
"The 'Ulam of Fas, Mulay Isma'il, and the Issue of the Haratin of Fas," in John Ralph Willis,
ed., Slaves and Slavery in Muslim Africa, Vol.I: Islam and the Ideology of Enslavement,
(London: Frank Cass, 1985) pp.125-59.
9
`Race, Slavery and Islam in the Maghrebi Mediterranean Thought. The Question of the
Haratin in Morocco in Journal of North African Studies (London: Frank Cass, Vol. 7, No. 3,
2002) pp.29-52.
10
Michael Gomezs recently included Chouki El Hamels essay Blacks and slavery in
Morocco: the question of the Haratin at the end of the seventeenth century in his edited volume
Diasporic Africa: a Reader (New York: New York University Press, 2006) thus stretching the
dominant attentions of African Diaspora studies.
11
Mohammed Ennaji, Soldats, Domestiques et Concubines: l'esclavage au Maroc au XIXe sicle
(Casablanca, Maroc: Editions EDDIF, 1994).
8

16

nineteenth-century Moroccan life, noting a wide range of occupations. Although the work is
ostensibly about soldiers, servants and concubines, rural workers are also given considerable
mention. Numerous estates with dozens of slaves and several estates with hundreds are noted,
including the house of Iligh, near Tiznit in southern Morocco where seven-hundred slave
households were claimed by the family.12 In fact it is crucial to note of the period he covers, a
remarkable rise in world historical terms of the overall volume of slaves sold in Moroccan
markets in the early 1890's exceeded six thousand slaves annually, as corroborated by urban tax
records.13
This dissertation shares principal concerns with Ennajis work, but differs repeatedly in
approach, leading to particular differences in emphasis and interpretation. Ennajis
interpretations are consistently driven by an interest in contextualizing and illustrating the
variations of slavery throughout Morocco. In one example of an area of methodological and
interpretive difference, Ennaji shows how concubines have been treated well (m)any of these
women enjoyed love, admiration, and the highest consideration in their masters houses.14 This
enduring generalized image will be challenged and detailed in this study. In another theme in
which the present study differs in emphasis, the violence of slavery is situated amid broader
12

Ennaji, 1994 p.8. It should be noted that in addition to domestic labor in this region, an
enduring plantation system which once produced sugar through slave labor was located in
southern Morocco. See Paul Berthier, Un Episode de LHistoire de la Canne a Sucre: Les
Anciennes Sucreries du Maroc et leurs Reseaux Hydrauliques. Etude Archeologique et
d'Histoire Economique. (Rabat: Imprimeries Franaises et Marocaines, 1966). Paul Lovejoy
rightly suggests several regions where slavery appears to be have been linked to overall levels of
production in surveying the Frontiers of Islam, 1400-1600, pointing to the need for further
evidence. See Transformations in Slavery: A History of Slavery in Africa (Second Edition)
(U.S.A.: Cambridge University Press, 2000) p.24.
13
See Daniel Schroeter, "Slave Markets and Slavery in Moroccan Urban Society," in Slavery
and Abolition: The Human Commodity. Perspectives on the Trans-Saharan Slave Trade, edited
by Elizabeth Savage, (London: Frank Cass & Co. 1992).
14
Ennaji, 1994 p.25. Here he also notes in passing the extreme image of slaves having their
hands kissed, which risks distorting the accuracy of his survey.
17

social forms of abuse. As suggested, in 19th c. Morocco violence spared neither slave nor
free it was everywhere husbands mistreated wives, landlords sharecroppers and bosses
their employees.15 This line of argument culminates in the conceptualization that,
in nineteenth-century Morocco, no sharp line divided freedom and slavery. A fine set
of gradations marked the continuum running from one to the other even if they
theoretically remained polar opposites.16
This perspective is succinctly echoed through his sweeping generalization that liberty had its
slavish side.17 Interestingly, Ennaji also summarily deemphasizes the overall historical
significance of color in Moroccan slavery.18 Though it strongly seems that these interpretive
lines of emphasis are intended to distinguish the specific dynamics of Moroccan slavery from
dominant models of the Atlantic world, Ennaji does not directly engage this literature or fully
clarify an orientation. In the present case study of slavery within Morocco there has also been no
intention to directly develop a sustained engagement with the Atlantic literature, which has been
a function of the development of an analysis of this historical context based upon its own terms;
even so, the evidence and contexts considered in this research repeatedly resulted in analytical
differences. Where Ennaji works through a panorama of examples to confirm variations, a major
feature of this study is its effort to engage variation in order to describe dominant patterns and
experiences. An example of the consequences of Ennajis emphasis upon extreme
contextualization, or what is perhaps best understood as a deployment of relativity within his
analysis, he asserts a blanket rejection to any possibility of primitive rebels or organic
intellectuals among the former slaves turned bandits. He argues in fact that many times masters
can seem almost unfortunate, and reads bandit actions as personal matters,
15

Ibid. pp.28- 30.

Ibid. p.81.
17
Ibid. p.57.
18
Ibid.p.60.
16

18

It would be difficult to argue that all these individuals were really victims of society,
avenging the humiliation of their condition through crime, since neither poverty nor
consciousness of the inhumanity of their status grounded their career choice. Rather,
they were men at arms, accustomed to power and used to looking down on the masses
with the parvenu arrogance of the servant.19
The present study has approached the arrogance of the servant as a point of entry and inquiry
not as a conclusive distinction. Ennajis study represents a decisive though in some ways
inchoate turning point with major limitations regarding the fully detailed, clear historical
reconstruction of slavery and slaves lives within nineteenth-century Morocco. His contextual
approach often confronts and complicates reductive images and assumptions surrounding varied
forms and contexts of slavery throughout Morocco. However, his orientation is combined with
a broad survey approach, sparse sustain attention to relevant processes of historical change, and
deliberate commitment to outlining slaves roles in society and how slaves were understood by
non-slaves while not pursuing documentation and interpretations of nineteenth-century
Moroccan slaves experiences and perspectives, all of which represent areas of limitation.
Several historians have researched and addressed slavery in twentieth-century Morocco,
offering texts which have served as a reference point.20 Moroccan scholar Rita (Ghita) AouadBadouals graduate work in France included archival work in Aix-en-Provence and Nantes,
Morocco and Mali to produce a Memoire de Maitrise, on Moroccan slavery between 1880-1922,
and a dissertation on French colonization and Moroccan-West African relations. She has
published two important though brief essays outlining themes of the end of slavery in Morocco.
The first of these brings particular attention to the role of the Protectorate, while the more recent
represents widened interests including a cautious engagement with the historical consciousness

19

Ibid p.44.
Edouard Michaux-Bellaire, Lesclavage au Maroc. in Revue du Monde Musulman, Volume
IX, Paris: ditions E. Leroux, 1910.
20

19

of color in Morocco.21 Aouad-Badouals Moroccan-wide and often tentative interpretations have

increasingly found relevance in the questions posed within the wider literature concerning
slavery, and in articulating questions and areas of inquiry for further research. Several features
of her work, particularly her provocative essays have been expanded upon in this dissertation.
American Madia Thompson has represented her extensive doctoral research drawing upon
interviews and archival work related to slavery in Southern Morocco in a dissertation ostensibly
framed by modernization within the colonial period and attempting to address a complex
regional context of rural social transformations including the end of slavery.22 Sudan born
American Professor Ahmed Alawad Sikainga has published a brief article representing his
research into Moroccan legal archive sources concerning the end of the domestic slavery
nationally.23 Like Aouad-Badouals work his piece attests to the very gradual changes in slavery
in Morocco that occurred during and following the Protectorate. A distinguishing feature of his
piece which has been expanded upon here is his attempt to critically consider slave and
former slave womens expressions of historical agency in representing their own legal interests.
Canadian Ann McDougall has conducted oral historical research in southern Morocco and
published a path breaking article which examines identity and very personal meanings within the
transformations entailed beyond slavery in the postcolonial era.24 An overlap of provocative

21

Ghita Aouad, Lesclavage Tarid Au Maroc Sous Le Protectorat, Revue Maroc-Europe :

Histoire, Economies, Societes, vol.1 (Rabat, Maroc: 1991), Rita Aouad-Badoual, (Paris:
Karthala, 2004).
22
Madia Thompson, "Modernization, Slavery, and the Transformation of Social Hierarchy in
Southwestern Morocco, 1912-56." (Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Boston University, 2005).
23
Ahmed Alawad Sikainga, Slavery and Jurisprudence in Morocco, Slavery & Abolition
(19(2), 1998) pp.57-72.
24
E. Ann McDougall, A Sense of Self: The Life of Fatma Barka Canadian Journal of African
Studies / Revue Canadienne des tudes Africaines, (Vol. 32, No. 2, 1998) pp.285-315.
20

issues which McDougall has addressed repeatedly surfaced and developed through the ongoing
oral histories collected and analyzed in this study.
The relative paucity of literature addressing slavery in Morocco is underscored by the
vast and often rich literature concerning numerous other variously related contexts, as is given a
brief outline here. Throughout the research process and during the analysis and writing, such
works, however flawed, proved entirely invaluable for developing a thorough historical
framework with which to organize the gathering and interrogation of evidence. Before
considering wider areas of Moroccan scholarship and thematically relevant studies of slavery
including other locations, we first turn to pre-Protectorate and Protectorate era predominately
French writings focusing on Fes. As Edmund Burke has recently noted of francophone North
African intellectual history, In 1900, France possessed little reliable ethnographic knowledge
about Morocco other than elite gossip and anecdotal details. Thirty years later, an extensive
colonial archive on Moroccan society had been compiled.25 He rightly interprets that in the
process there was an invention or projection of traditional Morocco which had a pervasive
influence upon Protectorate era attitudes and the dialogical construction of a political and social
status quo, which in turn entailed Moroccan domestic slavery. Orientalist French scholars
dominant and calculated preoccupations with Islam, the elite, and amassing insights into political
and economic life facilitated a matter of fact acceptance of domestic slavery as an enduring and
embedded feature of the Moroccan social order. Joining the widening, ongoing stream of
travelers accounts were the academic writings to emerge from the 1903 founding of the Mission

25

Edmund Burke III, The Creation of the Moroccan Colonial Archive, 1880-1930, History and
Anthropology, (Volume 18, Issue 1 March 2007) p.1. For an earlier representation of some of
these ideas see Edmund Burke III, The Image of the Moroccan State in French Ethnological
Literature: A New Look at the Origin of Lyauteys Berber Policy. in Arabs and Berbers, ed.
Ernest Gellner and Charles Micaud (Lexington, Massachusetts: Lexington Books, 1972).
21

scientifique du Maroc, the Archives marocaines (1904), and the Revue du monde musulman
(1906), within which Fes became a focal site for varied European intellectual interests, resonant
across areas of mutual overlap among scholars, policy makers and inquisitive entrepreneurs.
Late nineteenth and early twentieth-century English and French pre-Protectorate era
travel writings and scholarship concerning Fes anticipated and shaped how slavery within Fes
and across Morocco would be approached, understood, responded to and represented in
specialized and popular writings of the Protectorate era.26 Certainly from the time of Pierre
Lotis highly descriptive account in Au Maroc (1890), recurrent orientalist attitudes toward
slavery in Fes can be found, appearing similarly in Eugne Aubins Le Maroc daujourdhui
(1904) and Gabriel Veyres Au Maroc. Dans lintimite du Sultan (1905).27 To the extent to
which travel writings were to remain distinct from the increased presence of systematic
scholarship such as undertaken by Edouard Micheaux-Bellaire, a shared feature can be found in
that any expected impulses toward an abolitionist condemnation of domestic slavery were muted
by the greater force and proximity of both general political concerns and specific ethnographic
details.28 It has been succinctly noted that, By 1912 the picture was all but complete: thereafter
the literature largely fills in the blanks, adding detail and colour, rather than developing new
categories of analysis.29 Thus in the heart of Protectorate era the brothers Jerme and Jean
Tharauds extended period of observations in Fes ou les bourgeois de lIslam produced
26

See for example P. D. Trotter, Our Mission to the Court of Morocco in 1880 under Sir John
Drummond Hay (Edinburgh, 1881) and Stephen Bonsal, Morocco as it is. With an Account of Sir
Charles Euan Smiths Recent Mission to Fez (London: Allen, 1893).
27
Pierre Loti, Au Maroc (Paris: Calmann-Levy, 1890), Eugne Aubin, Le Maroc daujourdhui
(Paris : A. Colin, 1904), Gabriel Veyre Au Maroc. Dans lintimite du Sultan (Paris: Librarie
Universelle, 1905).
28
See for example Edouard Micheaux-Bellaire, Description de la Ville de Fs (Paris: Leroux,
1907).
29
Edmund Burke III, Fes, the Setting Sun of Islam: a Study of the Politics of Colonial
Ethnography, Maghreb Review (Vol.2 IV, 1977).
22

extensive, matter of fact, even cynical passages about the centrality of domestic slavery.30
Likewise, slavery is again observed repeatedly from the vantage of a selective relativism in what
still remains the single most important and rigorous effort of Fasi history and urban studies
Fes avant le Protetorate was defended at the Sorbonne in 1949 by Roger Le Tourneau, some
four years after having joined the Centre des Hautes Etudes dAdministration Musulmane as an
administrator and researcher.31 A capstone to this tradition came after independence with the
German scholar Titus Burckhardts Fes, Stadt des Islam a work which marshaled an even greater
orientalist and ahistorical gilding of the medina, resonant within the ongoing campaign for the
preservation of the Fes and its traditions,
Historically, slavery can be explained by the law of war of nomadic and semi-nomadic
people, for whom it was not possible to keep prisoners in camps. When the prisoners
were not ransomed by their relatives, they remained slaves of their captors until they
could redeem themselves by their own work, or until their master accorded them their
freedom, an act which the Koran and the sunna declare to be particularly pleasing to God,
and which constitutes an expiatory sacrifice for a multitude of sins of omission. It was
only later, with the development of city culture that the obtaining of slaves in Black
Africa became an end in itself, while the struggle for the propagation of the faith served
as a pretext. Since, however, the Islamic perspective does not permit the despising of any
race, slavery in Islamic countries never assumed the brutal character which it had in
ancient Rome and, in the nineteenth century, in the southern states of America. The slave
was never considered as a mere object; if he were treated unjustly, he could ask the
judge to order his master to sell him. As a human being, he had a right to respect; the fact
that he was not free, did not itself contradict his humanity, since all men are the slaves of
God.32
This approach was an effective apology for full resignation from and thorough disengagement
with ongoing historical realities and lives, propagating a profound ignorance of and
disconnection from actual lived turbulent contemporary historical realities, deemed far less real
30

Jerme & Jean Tharaud, Fez, Ou les Bourgeois de lIslam (Paris: Librairie Plon, 1930).
Roger Le Tourneau, Fes Avant le Protectorat: Etude Economique et Sociale d'une Ville de
l'Occident Musulman (Casablanca: SMLE, 1949).
32
Titus Burckhardt, Fes, Stadt des Islam (Olten and Freiburg-im-Breisgau: Urs Graf Verlag,
1960), quoted from William Stoddart trans. Fez: City of Islam (Cambridge, U.K.England:
Islamic Texts Society, 1992) p.106.
31

23

or valuable than the pursuit of grand traditions. The lasting intensity of the historical force of
orientalist mystifications is registered through such literary and academic efforts in which
slavery was repeatedly obscured and rationalized while being plainly acknowledged.
Other Moroccanist urban and rural studies concerned with socio-economic changes in
various locations leading up to and during the colonial era have specifically informed the lines of
inquiry taken here concerning European involvements. Daniel Schroeter has provided a detailed
study of Essaouira covering four decades of the forces of nineteenth-century European expansion
with careful attention to the roles of Jewish merchants.33 Kenneth Browns study of the former
crafts center of Sale was innovative in its tracing the forces of change and perseverance among
both formal social and economic structures and identifiably distinct patterns of social
relationships throughout the nineteenth-century until the watershed Berber Dahir of 1930.34
Stacy Holden has advanced an important dissertation emphasizing issues of shifting socioeconomic formations and negotiations of power and tradition between Fasi tradesmen and the
monarchy, also considering the late nineteenth and early twentieth-century.35 Other scholarship
examining Protectorate urban development have proved highly informative. Yvette Katan has
studied the northern crossroads of Oujda specifically probing how its social formations were
recast during the Protectorate period.36 Janet Abu-lughods deeply penetrating and standard
setting work Rabat: Urban Apartheid in Morocco documents the politics of urban planning and
33

Daniel J. Schroeter, Merchants of Essaouira: Urban Society and Imperialism in Southwestern

Morocco, 1844-1886 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1987).
34
Kenneth L. Brown, People of Sale: Tradition and Change in a Morocco City 1830-1930
(Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1976).
35
Stacy Holden, Modernizing a Moroccan Medina: Commercial and Technological Innovations
at the Workplace of Millers and Butchers in Fez, 1878-1937, (Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation,
Boston University, 2005).
36
Yvette Katan, Oujda, une ville Frontire du Maroc (1907-1956): Musulmans, Juifs et
Chrtiens en milieu colonial. (Paris: Histoire et Perspectives Mditerranennes. Editions L
Harmattan, 1990).
24

development. Though her study examines colonial era transformations, her analysis so clearly
unveiled the ramifications of urban power relations so as to have undeniable significance for the
post-colonial Moroccan elite.37 Andre Adam sheds light upon Casablancas marginality prior to
the early twentieth-century, underscoring that contemporary Casablanca is inseparable from the
protectorate and Moroccan proletarianization.38 Such works aided in formulating an informed
examination of the multiple, complex dimensions of twentieth-century Moroccan urban
historical changes Fasis lived through.
Often directly and nearly always indirectly tied with urban transformations within
Morocco, many very outstanding rural cases studies have greatly increased our knowledge of
regional experiences and national-scale historical reconstructions. Several works have been
influential for connecting processes of urban change with larger regional and national forces. In
southern Morocco Protectorate era scholar Robert Montagne produced an influential, detailed
examination of socio-cultural contexts through which political power underwent
transformations.39 Paul Pascon also offered key contributions to the study of Moroccan
peasantry, with remarkable insight into the Haouz region.40 David M. Hart was another
exceptional scholar of rural Morocco, setting a significant standard with his rigorous analysis and

37

Janet L. Abu-Lughod, Rabat: Urban Apartheid in Morocco (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton

University Press, 1980).
38
Adam, Andr, Histoire de Casablanca, des origines 1914 (Aix-en-Provence, France: Gap,
ditions Ophrys, 1968). For a very different analysis of the city see Susan Ossman, Picturing
Casablanca: Portraits of Power in a Modern City (Berkeley: University of California Press,
1994). Also see Hassan Radoine, An Encompassing Madina: Toward New Definition of City in
Morocco, (Unpublished Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Pennsylvania, 2006).
39
Robert Montagne, /HV%HUEqUHVHWOH0DNK]HQGDQVOH6XGGX0DURF(VVDLVXUOD
7UDQVIRUPDWLRQ3ROLWLTXHGHV%HUEqUHV6pGHQWDLUHV(Groupe Chleuh) (Paris: F. Alcan, 1930).
40
Paul Pascon and Mohammed Ennaji, Les paysans sans terre au Maroc (Casablanca, Maroc:
Editions Toubkal, 1986), also see Paul Pascon, Ed. John Hall, Trans. C. Edwin Vaughan and
Veronique Ingman, Capitalism and Agriculture in the Haouz of Marrakesh (U.S.A.: Routledge:
1986).
25

ethnographical research examining Rifi and Southern Moroccan culture and history.41 Directly
focused on the national scope, Will Swearingens study of the history of water access, irrigation
and dam construction is particularly exciting due its interest in the continuities from the
Protectorate developmental policies to the first decades of independent Morocco.42 The temporal
focus of this study investigates a similar periodization spanning from the introduction of the
Protectorate era to the first decades following independence.
Acceptable surveys of Moroccan power relations broadly conceived, and their historical
changes within the twentieth-century, have been a major challenge for Moroccanist scholarship
within history and social sciences. Two major historigraphical reference points have been
provided by Abdallah Laroui and Jamil Abun-Nasr, both of whom are occupied with much
longer-term historical transformations.43 Laroui proposed challenging interpretations about the
nature of synthesis among Moroccos historical encounters with colonial forces, and provided a
very suggestive perspective for periodizing Moroccan nationalism within the nineteenth-century.
Perhaps balking at conceptual directions represented by Larouis scholarship for being an overly
Cartesian pursuit, by contrast Abun-Nasr stresses an entirely empirical, detailed approach
spanning across North Africa. In addition to their shared emphasis upon the state, there are
several highly notable complimentary studies to the extent of either scholars treatment of
twentieth-century history and the Protectorate period. Richly anecdotal and at times scathing of

41

David M. Hart, The Aith Waryaghar of the Moroccan Rif: an Ethnography and History
(Tucson: Published for the Wenner-Gren Foundation for Anthropological Research, University
of Arizona Press, 1976), The Ait 'Atta of Southern Morocco: Daily Life & Recent History
(Cambridge, U.K.: Middle East & North African Studies Press, 1984).
42
Will D. Swearingen, Moroccan Mirages: Agricultural Dreams and Deceptions, 1912-1986
(Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1987).
43
Abdallah Laroui, trans. Ralph Manheim, The History of the Maghrib: an Interpretive Essay
(Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1970, Jamil Abun-Nasr, A History of the Maghrib in the
Islamic Period (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1987).
26

French colonialism, Jacques Berques classic study of the interwar period is intimately well
informed about socio-political currents and shifts across the sweep of the Maghrib.44 Albert
Ayache contributed foundational studies of Moroccan labor history, and numerous scholars have
offered major works on Moroccan nationalism.45 More recently, indispensible works by Daniel
Rivet and C.R. Pennell each fuse their respective impressive archival experiences into
subsequent surveys, both of which strive toward a synthesis of a vast range of secondary sources
in an effort to further assemble and clarify challenging general features of modern Moroccan
historical transformations.46 While Rivets research focused initially on documenting and
interpreting with intense detail the historical role Resident-General Lyautey played within
Protectorate history, and followed with a thematically organized survey rich in interpretive
suggestions; Pennell initially focused upon the complex historical implications of a nationalist
movement and war in the Rif and followed with a remarkably lucid chronologically organized
survey. Though both historians concentrate upon political history they are fairly successful at
attempting to offer consistent wider insights into Moroccan social and cultural changes.
Adding to the disciplinary concerns of history many scholarly works have been
provocative for approaching power relations within the end of slavery in Fes and larger
Moroccan history. John Waterburys classic study of the Moroccan elite remains dated yet not
fully superseded, and contains many remarkable historical insights into the national role played

44

Jacques Berque, Le Maghreb Entre Deux Guerres (Paris: Ed. du Seuil, 1962).
See Albert Ayache, Le Mouvement Syndical au Maroc (Paris: L'Harmattan, 1982), Charles
Julien, Le Maroc Face aux Imperialisms: 1415-1956 (Paris: Editions J.A. 1978), John P.
Halstead, Rebirth of a Nation: the Origins and Rise of Moroccan nationalism, 1912-1944.
(Cambridge, Massachusetts: Harvard University Press, 1967).
46
Daniel Rivet, Le Maroc de Lyautey Mohammed V: le Double Visage du Protectorat (Paris:
Denol, 1999), C.R. Pennell, Morocco since 1830: A History (New York: New York University
Press, 2000).
45

27

by Fasis.47 Through distinct projects and approaches beyond the present scope of discussion
Abdellah Hammoudi, Dale Eickelman, Clifford Geertz, and Vincent Crapanano have presented
engaging conceptualizations of power relations in which attention to belief practices and sociopolitical order are mutually illuminating, and frequently suggestive for historical interpretation.48
Lawrence Rosen has offered another resonant anthropological contribution in considering the
social construction of kinship and other organizational elements of Moroccan realities.49 Also it
must be noted that a major shift away from the symbolic and semiotic interpretive lens has taken
place in the last two decades, bringing significant attention to women and gender.50 Stalwart
scholar and activist Fatima Mernissi has been generationally succeeded by a growing number of
critical scholars and women activists.51 Earlier straightforward feminist claims have been built

47

John Waterbury, The Commander of the Faithful: The Moroccan Political Elite. (New York:
Columbia University Press, 1970). Also see Pierre Vermerens inspired comparative history of
North African schooling and the elite, La Formation des lites Marocaines et Tunisiennes: des
Nationalistes aux Islamistes, 1920-2000 (Paris: Dcouverte, 2002).
48
See Abdellah Hammoudi, Master and Disciple: the Cultural Foundations of Moroccan
Authoritarianism (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1997), Dale F. Eickelman, Knowledge
and Power in Morocco: The Education of a Twentieth-Century Moroccan Notable (Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 1985), Clifford Geertz, Meaning and Order in Moroccan Society:
Three Essays in Cultural Analysis (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1979) and Islam
Observed: Religious Development in Morocco and Indonesia (Chicago: University of Chicago
Press, 1973), Vincent Crapanzano, The Hamadsha; a study in Moroccan Ethnopsychiatry
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1973) and Tuhami, Portrait of a Moroccan (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1980).
49
Lawrence Rosen, Bargaining for Reality: the Construction of Social Relations in a Muslim
Community (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1984), The Anthropology of Justice: Law as
Culture in Islamic Society (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1989), The Culture of Islam:
Changing aspects of Contemporary Muslim Life (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 2002).
50
See the overviews North Africa: Early 20th Century to Present, Donna Lee Bowen and
History Middle East and North Africa, Mary Ann Fay in the ambitious Encyclopedia of
Women & Islamic Cultures Joseph Suad, General Editor (Boston, Massachusetts: Brill, 2003-).
51
A leading scholar and activist based in Fes, who is representative of this generation and its
gendered turn is Fatima Sadiqi. For an example of her ranging work see Women, Gender, and
Language in Morocco (Boston: Brill, 2003). For an earlier perspective also see Amal Rassam,
Women and Domestic Power in Morocco, International Journal of Middle East Studies, (Vol.
12, No. 2., 1980). Some of the relevant contours of these debates are outlined by Alison Baker
28

upon by attention to the more multifaceted dynamics of gender within varied social and religious
movements, and their respective, collective interests and pursuits of influence upon laws and the
state, particularly concerning the Mudawana, or family code of Maliki law in Morocco.
Beyond scholarship directly addressing Morocco the most relevant literature influencing
the questions and approaches of this study directly concerns slavery. Several landmark African
historical studies have examined the roles played by colonial authorities in influencing
emancipation processes. Paul Lovejoy and Jan Hogendorn produced an important monograph
detailing the gradual twentieth-century end of slavery in Northern Nigeria.52 Their collaboration
represents both scholars long-term research, providing well conceived and detailed analysis,
particularly provocative for their engagement with issues of accommodation and social change
within colonial rule. More recently Martin Klein published the generous and in many regards
invitingly incomplete culmination of over two decades of research, examining colonialism and
the end of slavery in French West Africa.53 Benjamin Bowers doctoral dissertation drew upon
extended archival work in Aix-en-Provence to examine the theme of colonial policies and
practices toward slavery in Algeria.54 Frederick Coopers writings on East African plantation
slavery, slavery and Islam, and approached to slavery within African studies have formed
repeatedly useful reference points, helping frame and treat varied questions in the field, with

in Voices of Resistance: Oral Histories of Moroccan Women (Albany: State University of New
York Press, 1998).
52
Paul Lovejoy and Jan Hogendorn, Slow Death for Slavery: the Course of Abolition in Northern
Nigeria 18971936 (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1993).
53
Martin A. Klein, Slavery and Colonial Rule in Africa (New York: Cambridge University
Press, 1998). Also see Kleins volume co-edited with Suzanne Miers, Slavery and Colonial Rule
in Africa (Portland, OR: Frank Cass, 1999).
54
Benjamin Claude Brower, A Desert Named Peace: Violence and Empire in the Algerian
Sahara, 1844-1902, (Unpublished Ph.D. Dissertation, Cornell University, 2005).
29

particular nuance concerning labor.55 Also among the many important and helpful models for
addressing the end of slavery are volumes edited by Klein and Howard Temperley,56 and works
by Ehud Toledano and Y. Hakan Erdem concerning the Ottoman world,57 Sikaningas work on
colonial Sudan,58 and Urs Rufs impressive research in Mauritania.59 Where several of these
works have drawn variously upon colonial and European documentation, this study attempts to
push for further legal and oral historical evidence.
Finally, thematic attention to women, gender and marriage within slavery has been
suggestive for this study. For example, Sandra Lauderdale Grahams study of the transitional
lives of of slaves and servants and masters in late nineteenth-century Rio de Janeiro illuminates
awkward and unanticipated paths toward freedom.60 Elizabeth Fox-Genoveses classic
scholarship on plantation households in the southern United States offers an intimate and
suggestive consideration of various womens positions and psyches within complex domestic

55

See Frederick Cooper, Plantation Slavery on the East Coast of Africa (New Haven: Yale
University Press, 1977), Review: the Problem of Slavery in African Studies, The Journal of
African History (Vol. 20, No. 1, 1979), pp.103-125, From Slaves to Squatters: Plantation Labor
and Agriculture in Zanzibar and Coastal Kenya, 1890-1925. (New Haven: Yale University
Press, 1980), Islam and cultural hegemony: the ideology of slave-owners on the East African
coast, in Paul Lovejoy, Ed., The Ideology of Slavery in Africa, (Beverley Hills: Sage, 1981),
Co-author with Rebecca Scott and Thomas Holt, Beyond Slavery: Explorations of Race, Labor,
and Citizenship in Postemancipation Societies (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press,
2000).
56
Howard Temperley Ed., After Slavery: Emancipation and Its Discontents (London: Frank
Cass, 2000), Martin A. Klein Ed., Breaking the Chains: Slavery, Bondage, and Emancipation in
Modern Africa (Madison: University of Wisconsin Press, 1993).
57
Ehud R. Toledano, Slavery and Abolition in the Ottoman Middle East (Seattle: University of
Washington Press, 1998), Y. Hakan Erdem, Slavery in the Ottoman Empire and Its Demise,
1800-1909. (New York: St. Martin's Press, 1996).
58
Ahmad Sikainga, Slaves into Workers: Emancipation and Labor in Colonial Sudan (Austin:
University of Texas Press, 1996).
59
Urs Ruf, Ending Slavery: Hierarchy, Dependency and Gender in Central Mauritania
(Bielefeld: Transcript Verlag, 1999).
60
Sandra Lauderdale Graham, House and Street: the Domestic World of Servants and Masters in
Nineteenth-Century Rio de Janeiro (Austin: University of Texas Press, 1992).
30

spaces, identities and power relations.61 Verena Martinez-Aliers pioneering treatment of color
and class within Cuban marriage strategies and patterns, and Winthrop Wrights solid analysis of
the subtle historical dynamics of color in Venezuelan national identity offered useful reference
points.62 Also the well-conceived comparative scholarship on women and slavery in the New
World represented in the edited volume by David Barry Gaspar and Darlene Clark Hine served
as an initially useful orientation for posing questions and locating sifting patterns of AfroMaghribi domestic life, engendered social spaces, and engendered forms of labor.63
Sources and Methods
In further introducing this dissertation, it is useful to note the archival and oral sources it has
been based upon and how relevant research materials have been worked with in analyzing the
end of domestic slavery in Fes.64 Several archives were extensively consulted in France and
Morocco. The Centre des Archives Diplomatiques de Nantes (CADN) offered the most
abundant wealth of records in France for developing an overview of the Protectorate and served
as a major window into pertinent features of colonial encounter examined here. The Centre
d'tudes d'histoire de la Dfense (CEHD) at Chteau de Vincennes - Pavillon du Harnachement
held numerous helpful materials, particularly for shedding light on early Protectorate military
relations in Fes. Despite the ostensible advantages of official French archival holdings, greater
61

Elizabeth Fox-Genovese, Within the Plantation Household: Black and White Women of the
Old South within the Plantation Household (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press,
1988).
62
Verena Martinez-Alier, Marriage, Class and Colour in Nineteenth-Century Cuba: A Study of
Racial Attitudes and Sexual Values in a Slave Society (New York: Cambridge University Press,
1974), Winthrop R. Wright, Caf con Leche: Race, Class, and National Image in Venezuela
(Austin, TX: University of Texas Press, 1990).
63
David Barry Gaspar and Darlene Clark Hine Eds., More than Chattel: Black Women and
Slavery in the Americas (Bloomington, Ind.: Indiana University Press, 1996).
64
The Fes al-Bali and Fes Jadid areas of the medina were overwhelming organizational focus of
this study, with no considerable focus given to either the Palace or the Mellah (Jewish quarter) of
medina.
31

budgets and larger facilities and staff in no way superseded the accessibility and helpfulness of
the Bibliothque Gnrale et Archives du Maroc (BGAM) in Rabat for the end results of this
study. Ironically, the lions share of the documents which turned out to be the most valuable for
reconstructing the relationship between the Protectorate and slavery were found inadvertently in
my first afternoon working there. After having made myself a fixture there, several mornings I
helped cleaning women as they mopped, moving unmarked cardboard boxes filled with
Protectorate era documents out of their way, so they could clean without getting the boxes wet,
and I could then probed their contents. The labyrinthine process of getting access to historical
legal documents from Islamic courts in the Fes medina (principally Rcif and Smat) was
ultimately made possible by the dedication of an intrepid assistant and an intractable retired
notary who assisted me while these records underwent a major move to another location outside
the medina. Further access to many private and personal collections of family records,
documents, photos and material culture (often clothing), materialized and served as mnemonic
devices during the process of gathering oral historical interviews. These latter Fasi documents
proved an exciting compliment to Protectorate-sources and oral historical evidence.
The chief challenge of gathering oral historical data was to find and work with willing
and able informants. This was largely achieved through what then seemed endless social
interaction, waiting and visits to suggested friends and relatives who might offer further
suggested friends and relatives throughout the Fes medina. I almost always worked directly with
an assistant in setting up and conducting the body of the over one hundred and twenty semistructured open-ended interviews which this research is based upon. I am particularly grateful to
a loose network of interested, helpful and resourceful Fasi women who gradually generated
many useful contacts. In my research experience there were far more visits and conversations

32

than formal interviews and it became clear that many informants appreciated knowing that
someone had a sincere interest in connecting to their lives and stories. Repeated visits often
allowed for my questions, as well as forms of rapport to develop. The majority of informants
were paid for giving formal recorded interviews, which averaged one and a half hours. Further
background details about who informants were are addressed within the following chapters.
Before describing the methods followed to address important conceptual issues which
arose during archival and oral historical research it is necessary to explain how domestic
slavery has been understood within this study. Firstly, domestic slavery has been understood
here as a social institution. This is significant because in the historical absence of a tenable
moment or patent periodization based on an outstanding official authority from which to
reconstruct the end of slavery in Morocco it has been crucial to evaluate and temporalize
collective social patterns alongside nuanced consideration of individual cases.
To further specify how this social institution has been defined and approached, several
features of how slavery/slave are understood are useful to consider. During the Protectorate
the Tharaud brothers questioned the adequate use of the term slave, 65 a point recently
reiterated by contemporary scholar Aouad-Badoual.66 Despite drastic, perhaps diametric,
differences in their respective historical backgrounds, these authors share concerns with the
potential limitations which the term slave may impose upon the Moroccan domestic context,
yet ultimately proposed no substitution.67 To an extent their concerns stem from challenges to
meaningful comparative history due to the conceptual supremacy surrounding Western
plantation slavery, however even more important for the present study is the problematic entailed

65

Jerme & Jean Tharaud (1930) p.21.

Rita Aouad-Badoual (2004).
67
Toledano (2007) has recently advocated and employed the term enslaved.
66

33

in illuminating very specific details and contexts of Moroccan domestic slavery. The 1938
League of Nations definition of slavery as the status or condition of a person over whom any or
all the powers attaching to the right of ownership are exercised, is germane, though taken alone
overemphasizes property, which is not the only relevant feature of Fasi domestic slavery.68 In
addition to ownership, we can note three distinctive aspects of these relations of domination:
an extreme degree of power and claims to control from a master, with violence at the basis of
this power; a condition of otherness entailing natal alienation and/or deracination; and a
condition of dishonor entailing abuse and violations with impunity.69 This research endorses the
value of conceptualizing power within slavery as entailing an extreme degree within a
relationship, and was therefore potentially mutable, as opposed to an ideal form and legalistic
image of total control that either was or was not. Concerning the second aspect of these relations
of domination, the notion of slavery as social death is problematized by this research. Rather,
looking at specific degrees and changeable forms of natal and social alienation have provided
more practical concepts, themselves inviting and requiring further explicit refinement. Finally,
this third feature of extreme domination is particularly relevant concerning the nature of social
transformations through which Fasi domestic slavery ended. It should be recalled that these
aspects of domination transformed within historical tensions unfolding within peoples homes
and families, so that the basis of abuse and violation entailed highly charged personal and interpersonal meanings in addition to and inseparable from clear and certain legal and social
standards.

68

Orlando Pattersons article Slavery as social institution in N. J. Smelser and P. B. Baltes eds.
International Encyclopedia of the Social & Behavioral Sciences (Oxford: Elsevier, 2001)
pp.14146-14152, has been drawn from and amended here for the following discussion.
Patternson (2001) p.14146.
69
Ibid. p.14147.
34

The questions and methodology of this study address a common, complex tension across
all of the studies noted above, and of particular importance within the twentieth-century
literature. On the one hand synchronic analysis necessarily seeks to reconstruct and explain
slavery (either as trade or as institution) through addressing general norms and depicting clear
functions, thus entailing a possible historiographic pitfall in conveying an overemphasis of a
static, timeless, stable nature and risking an oversimplication of the lived dynamic relationships
and experiences comprising slavery. Another problem lies in a diachronic examination of
changes in slavery (in this case the radical changes marking the end of an enduring basic social
institution within the twentieth-century), attention to which may assume or overlook features of
the institution and therefore the detailed processes, motives, and agents of its actual change.
Thus interwoven along with this studys task of reconstructing, interpreting and explaining an
elusive and unclear institution is the inseparable challenge of assessing how it ended. Among the
overall strategies attempted here in practically reckoning with these pitfalls is an effort to balance
and interface the synchronic and diachronic discussions of this case study by emphasizing
several complimentary features: the varied, complex and often contingent relations within
practices and experiences of domestic slavery; historical contexts of transformation; and
recordable processes and experiences of change.
A consistent effort has been made to interpret oral data through stressing the personal
perspectives and sociocultural contexts (entailing prominent features of class and gender) in
which testimonies and experiences were recounted. Rather than simple initial acceptance or
rejection of the self-evident historical reality or non-reality of informants lived and remembered
struggles and ambiguities, whenever possible such personal struggles and ambiguities were
approached through sustained dialogue with informants, often becoming valuable referents in

35

ongoing conversations. In this way, previous conversations, statements, contexts and

experiences were frequently revisited. Sometimes ideas or images that initially appeared twisted,
tormented or idiosyncratic helped lead to personal catharsis and further important historical
testimonies. Numerous times interviewees who emotionally broke down during a stage of
conversation would eventually take the interview much further, and even return and seek out
other informants to bring along or refer. Throughout this practice expectations from the above
noted historical literature addressing slavery have guided my interview questions and research
process, shaping my interactions and interpretations through contrast and emulation at turns.70
If the evidence and interpretations presented within this study evoke Fasi domestic
slaves experiences and struggles amid the decline of this social institution as not at all dissimilar
from those of non-slaves in numerous contexts both near to and far beyond either slavery or
Morocco, it is hoped that this may serve as a means of connection to, rather than erasure of, the
distinct character of this history. That slaves lives often varied greatly and were perhaps other
than expected should not blur their historical existence beyond plausible reconstruction.
Attempting to clearly recover the relevant lived complexities of the decline of Fasi slavery has
necessarily meant giving attention to transformations and continuities which were experienced
very differently. Thus efforts to detail the lived experiences of Fasi slaves and their children
during the ending of the institution entailed working both from below and above, and required
interviewing and interpreting the experiences of elite slave owning families.
Finally, it should also be noted that among the greatest pitfalls in interpreting the
historical relations between slavery and Islamic law has been the resilient tendency to
70

Such fieldwork experiences gave me a fuller interest in works such as Joan Scott,
Experience, in Sidonie Smith and Julia Watson Eds., Women, Autobiography, Theory
(Madison: Univ. of Wisconsin Press, 1998) and Selma Leydesdorff , Luisa Passerini, Paul
Richard Eds. Gender and Memory (New York: Oxford University Press, 1996).
36

overshadow lived experiences with sweeping legal references and immutable ideals. Effectively
toppling such reductive images requires developing our engagement with the historical fluidity
of very specific historical legal contexts. Thus it is prudent to temper our valuation and use of
laws as historical evidence with the far larger and more important question of how societies
formal representations of what should take place are composite within the entirety of what
actually has occurred, including patterns of legal actions. This study has sought to work with
Fasi family records in an according way.
Note on Organization of Chapters
This dissertation is organized around the substantive discussions of three chapters. Chapter Two
begins with an analysis of the Protectorate in relationship to Moroccan domestic slavery,
followed by a survey of Fasi legal documents, and an examination of historical attitudes toward
slavery and blackness during the Protectorate period. A brief conclusion to Chapter Two
suggests an historical disglossia concerning the sources drawn upon in reconstructing this
history.
The first part of Chapter Three introduces relevant contexts of Moroccan economic
history during and following the Protectorate, dedicating particular attention to Fasi women. The
second part this chapter examines testimonies depicting the shifting relationships surrounding
Fasi domestic slave labor during the transformation and end of the institution. A conclusion
follows, summarizing and ending the chapter.
The first part of Chapter Four extends the prior analysis, addressing an interface of social
changes among Fasi families during and after the Protectorate. The second part of Chapter Four
returns to the legal material introduced in Chapter Two, providing further quantitative, as well as
qualitative discussion. The chapter then revisits oral historical testimonies organized and

37

analyzed around relevant life cycle themes in an extensive consideration of experiences and
changes entailed with relations, recognition and belonging. Following a summary discussion
completing Chapter Four, a concise global overview of the entire dissertation is presented in
Chapter Five.
Note on Language
The arbitrary romanization of darijah (Moroccan Arabic) terms has intended to place greater
interest upon consistency with the original language than adherence to familiar conventions in
either English or French, while making as few diacritical interventions as possible. Thus, the
place name Fes has been used rather than Fez, while for its inhabitants Fasi has been used rather
than Fesi. Wherever possible darijah terms within quoted texts have been left in their original
romanization, save instances of readily avoidable confusion. For example, kushinah has not
been rendered kitchen. Also, in limited instances, the plural s of English has been added to
Arabic terms such as with atk(s). All translations and the usage of all non-standard English
terms (which appear in italics) have been clarified either within the text or an immediate
footnote. A selected glossary has been added as well.

38

CHAPTER TWO
The Contours of Protectorate Era Official Sources and the End of Domestic Slavery
In 1900 the institution of domestic slavery was a basic feature of Fasi social order and its highly
distinct North African urban identity. For over a millennium slaves were a part of this intricate
and dynamic historical assemblage famed for its concentration of religious, intellectual and
political authorities who lived and worked beside the activities of an enduring regional center of
crafts production, trade and commerce.71 Throughout the continuities of its layered past Fes was
never a timeless geode of amethyst, particularly as it entered the twentieth century.72
Likewise, the image of a monolithic socio-economic rupture that those of and from the city
collectively found themselves within has become banal and an inadequate premise for advancing
our explanation of the range and detail of changes which dramatically reorganized life in Fes and
subsequent Moroccan history.73 What is far more challenging and important to discern is how
the various ensuing changes, including those which would bring the decline and transformations
ending slavery, were not of uniform character, pace, or consequence.
At the turn of the last century household slaves were a constant presence within spaces of
the Fes medina in several ways. Slave men frequently watched and awaited visitors at the
doorway of bourgeois and elite households. Slave women and men performed daily and special
errands in the marketplace and among households, with men often carrying heavy loads and
goods. Their public responsibilities, varied among the organization of households, routinely
71

See Abdelilah Benmlih (2002, 2004).

Titus Burckhardt (1992) p.3. While Burckhardts reverence, nostalgia and activism were
crucial to Unescos 1981 inscription of the Fes medina as a World Heritage Center, he remained
a self-muted witness to the twentieth-century transformations he sought to draw attention to the
consequences of.
73
For an example of this orientation see Larbi Kninah, Lvaluation des Structures conomiques
Sociales et Politiques du Maroc (Fs: 1820-1912): LOuverture au March Mondial et ses
Consquences (Fs: Imprimerie Info-Print, 2002).
72

39

included the transport of food and supplies, stores of water and charcoal, and the bringing of
loaves of dough to be baked and later retrieved from local ovens. Also, for many households
slaves were responsible for preparing and maintaining donkeys, and could be seen accompanying
their owners on foot or themselves riding or leading the animal used for transport throughout the
diverse passageways of the medina.
Within Fasi homes varying numbers of slaves participated in and performed all of the
visible and behind the scenes forms of work needed for the daily life and special occasions of
their households. Slaves greeted, attended, served, cooked, and cleaned after daily meals for
families and households frequent flows of guests. They maintained the material culture of Fasi
households through constant tasks, such as the cleaning of tile floors, gardening and the washing
of clothing; and cyclic tasks, such as preparations for Eid celebrations and weddings, and the
extracting and refilling of all household mattresses and pillows in combat against wool-eating
insects. The children in slaveholding households were often raised within the care, supervision
and confidence of maternal Dada figures. Domestic slave women frequently served as healers,
gynecologists, mid-wives, wet nurses and concubines. Slaves were also called upon as spiritual
workers and entertainers, particularly in association with the Gnawa form and its practices.74
Though early European sources addressing Fasi life consistently depict these roles and
note numerous slaves, and there are ample Moroccan legal references to Fasi slaves, it is difficult
to determine with certainty how many domestic slaves there were in Fes at this time.75 Part of

74

The relations between Moroccan slavery and the Gnawa form are too rarely historicized, to the
disadvantage of either subject area and of Afro-Maghribi history in general. Pierre-Alain
Claisses Les gnawa marocains de tradition loyaliste, (Paris: LHarmattan, 2003) fuses excessive
historical speculation and symbolic anthropology in a text representative of current limitations.
75
See for example Eugne Aubin, Le Maroc daujourdhui, (Paris: Librairie Armand Colin,
1904), Gabriel Veyre Au Maroc. Dans lintimite du Sultan Paris: Librarie Universelle, 1905) and
40

the problem lies in the difficulties of comprehensively reconstructing who owned slaves. It is
clear that the largest single slave owner was the monarchical state (the Makhzan); and it can be
presumed that the palace and Fasi households mirrored one another in many ways, so that slaves
were a generally valued and recognized means of representing and socializing prestige
throughout networks.76 Far less clear are a reliable breakdown of class structure and its
relationship to the numbers of slaveholding households, as well as the numbers of slaves within
households. In 1900 Fes was Moroccos most populous city, with approximately 100,000
inhabitants and 6,000 households.77 It has been suggested that as much as two-thirds of its male
population worked for wages.78 If we postulate that one third or more of its households may
have had slaves, we are still left without a clear and systematic basis to consider the numbers of
slaves within households. Taking into consideration all available sources, including the legal
records and oral history used in this study, it stands that there were well over 6,000 (and perhaps
as many as 10,000) domestic slaves in Fes in 1900, in addition to the sizable number of palace
slaves and slave soldiers.79
Our general knowledge of who slaves were and where they were from is posed with
fewer challenges. Following an apparent late nineteenth-century rise in slave sales, the
beginning of the twentieth century saw the definitive reduction of in-coming West African-born
G. Saint-Rene Taillandiers Les origins du Maroc francais. Recit dune mission 1901-1906
(Paris, Plon, VIII, 1930). Islamic legal records are discussed below.
76
This conception has been employed by Nicolas Michel, Une conomie de subsistances. Le
Maroc prcolonial, (Le Caire: Institut franais darchologie oriental, 1997) and Rita Aouad
Badoual (2004).
77
See the discussion of population and housing in Roger Le Tourneau (1949) pp.153-209. The
early twentieth-century demographic history of the city has remained an unresolved historical
issue, in which there is a far more accurate sense of the number of households than overall
inhabitants.
78
Stacy Holden (2005) p.5.
79
Jrme and Jean Tharaud (1930) estimate several thousand palace slaves and slave soldiers.
p.18.
41

slaves sold within Morocco via the trans-Saharan trade.80 However, the French occupation of
Timbuktu in 1894 and Touat in 1900 which prompted this decline did not lessen the Moroccan
demand for and usage of slaves. Rather there followed an early twentieth century shift of
emphasis in slave origins, during which enslavements increasingly occurred within Morocco and
the Sahara.
Prior to the Protectorate, in 1905 an indebted and politically vulnerable Makhzan
responded to foreign pressure by closing the public slave suq (market) in Fes.81 This closure
signaled a principal feature of the early twentieth century reorganization of the trade. The
gradual removal of slave sales from public display was accompanied by an adaptive modus
vivendi comprised of confidential and clandestine enslavements and exchanges. Initially after
this closure Fasi slave holders faced minor if any challenges to their capacities to purchase, own
and use slaves. No historically discernable legal, practical, or social constrictions of this time
significantly altered Fasi demands for and access to house slaves and concubines. In addition to
the widespread and long-established use of brokers and local private auctions, prior to the
political formalization of French interests and military presence through the Protectorate system
in 1912, other Moroccan slave markets still operated publicly, notably the Marrakech suq.
An element of continuity prior to and throughout these changes was that the vast majority
of Moroccan slaves remained black. In legal principal slavery was not related to color or
ethnicity, and in the multifaceted realities of Moroccan slavery there were for example lightskinned Berber and rare imported Circassian female slaves. Also crucial to this context, Fasi
Arab elites historical capacity to paternally claim and directly assimilate their children with nonArab and enslaved women was fundamental to their identity and unity. Clearly the well-worn
80
81

See Daniel J. Schroeter (1992) and Martin Klein (1998) p.122.

Rita Aouad Badoual (2004) p.345.
42

patterns of social values and practice were complex, so that along with the lived continuum of
color across the human geography of Fasi society, blackness and slavery were generally
associated with one another and amid ordinary exceptions black slaves remained at the bottom of
the social hierarchy.
It is important to clarify the several paths through which slavery continued to be
reproduced in the twentieth century. The diverse backgrounds of slaves living and working in
Fes in the first half of the twentieth century included West African, Saharan and Moroccan
origins. Some were bought in suqs or through private intermediates, some were given as gifts to
or from the Makhzan as well as among elite families, others were born of slave parents in the
households they themselves lived their lives within. The trafficking of this time was often
supplied from the Sahara and the Sous, as well as vulnerable haratin communities in numerous
rural locations throughout Morocco. Although light skinned slaves had always been
incorporated, particularly as concubines, dark skinned slaves remained the greatest demand
supplied through this informal trade. Their presence prefigured a major twentieth century shift
in Moroccan domestic economies, but did not mark the end of slavery or the slave trade.
Throughout and following the Protectorate period (1912-1956) there would be no
decisive end to domestic slavery within Fes, or elsewhere in Morocco. In Fes slavery was slowly
transformed and declined to the state of an anomaly without public ceremony, or a public sense
of emancipation. Moral conflicts, guilt and a sense of responsibility concerning slavery were not
articulated by a Moroccan social movement focused on abolition. Protectorate policy toward
slavery remained faithful to its initial design to satisfy anti-slavery expectations in France and
internationally, while locally demonstrating their Muslim policy of respect and non-

43

interference in Moroccan affairs.82 Protectorate Laws and Moroccan Dahirs periodically cited as
having ended slavery were not enforced to do so, or addressed the public and to a far lesser
extent the clandestine trade, or shifted the definition of slavery sufficiently so that as a
voluntary condition it no longer existed. Despite the absence of a clear historical movement
for or moment of emancipation, domestic slavery in Fes somehow did decline and end as a social
institution within the course of the century.
Scholars Mohammed Ennaji and Rita Aouad-Badoual follow the vague French colonial
assertion that Moroccan slavery ended naturally.83 Even if accepted metaphorically (as for
example the resultant bi-product of other changes), their resignation to a teleological explanation
of slaverys natural end does not resolve the basic historical concerns: what were the
mechanisms through which this transition occurred? What kinds of pertinent historical changes
occurred? Exactly how did slavery end? The discussion in this chapter assesses the formal and
official historical contours of this marginal past, alternating between Fes and wider Moroccan
contexts. It is focused from 1912 to the early post-colonial period and draws primarily on
Moroccan and French archival sources, informed by secondary literature and some oral historical
data. It first considers the slow decline of slavery and the slave trade through an examination of
Protectorate policy formation and practices. It then turns to a critical assessment of the declining
institution through the Islamic legal documents of Fasi families. A third section follows with an
analysis of relevant Protectorate era attitudes toward slavery and blackness here emphasizing the
French component of areas of confluence among formal authorities (such Moroccan attitudes are
examined in greater depth in subsequent chapters). It concludes with a critical assessment of the
character of these sources for reconstructing and interpreting this history.
82
83

Muslim policy will be further discussed below.

Mohammed Ennaji, (1999), Rita Aouad Badoual (2004).
44

Protectorate Policies and Slavery

In principal the Protectorate government was created to reform and preserve the existing
administrative structures of the Makhzan. Where Moulay el-Hassans (1873-94) late nineteenth
century reforms had concentrated Sultanate powers by regulating and curtailing vizirial power,
the Protectorate reorganization severely limited the powers of the Sultan, effectively eliminated
Moroccan ministries of war and finance, and created Moroccan ministries of Habous and State
Domain for dealing with colonial interests in land and property.84 The French Resident General
was directly responsible to the French Foreign Minister and had a sweeping range of powers
over internal and foreign affairs; in addition to being the commander in chief, this official was
the overall central administrator, and ultimate architect and decision-maker concerning
reforms.85 A Delegue to the Residence General was a second in command entrusted to serve as
an extension of and even substitute for the Resident General, while the Secretary General of the
Protectorate was a powerful hands-on officer charged with civil and municipal control including
all police.86 A key French administrative feature instituted in the functioning of this
asymmetrical partnership was the Direction des Affaires Chrifiennes, for which there was a
Conseiller du Gouvernement responsible with Muslim affairs.87 This officer acted as a
political intermediary between French administrative interests and their consequences for the

84

See Daniel Rivets Lyautey et l'institution du protectorat franaise au Maroc (Paris:

L'Harmattan, 1988), and Richard B. Lawson Administrative Patterns in Morocco before and
during the French Protectorate, International Review of Administrative Sciences, (Vol. 23, No.
2, 166-176 1957).
85
See Abdellah Ben Mlih, Structures Politiques Du Maroc Colonial (Paris: L'Harmattan, 1990),
Commandant Noel Masestracci, Le Maroc Contemporain: Guide A lusage de tous les Officiers
et particulirement lusage des Officiers des affaires indigenes et des Fonctionnaires du
protectorat (Paris: Charles-Lavauzelle, 1928).
86
See Ben Mlih (1990) p.181.
87
This office was charged with overseeing Moroccan justice, Education, and Relations with the
Makhzan.
45

Sultan, Vizirs, and ultimately for Moroccan judicial organizations which included a division
between sharia courts administered by a Cadi, Muslim customary or secular courts
administered by a Pacha or Caid, and Jewish courts. The Direction des Affaires Chrifiennes
was comprised of three principal sections (with varied subsections) concerned with matters of
State, Habous, and General Interpretations and Protocol, the latter of which particularly
concerned the palace. Also of note, the Residence General created directly accountable
Departments which over time grew from two to eight, the most relevant of which was the
Direction des Affaires Indignes et du Service des Renseignements with historical and
sociological sections modeled on the Bureau Arab in Algeria.88
The character and organization of Moroccan urban administration varied, and rural
Moroccan government (often encompassed as tribal administration) varied even more
widely.89 Throughout the Protectorate era alongside French government and military presence
there was general continuity within the local municipal structure of Fes. There was an historic
administrative division between Fes al-Bali often referred to as the medina, and Fes Jadid where
the Palace and the Mellah (Jewish quarter) were located. A Pacha of Fes al-Bali was a
representative (Khalifa) of the Makhzen, while for Fes Jadid there was another Pacha who was in
turn officially his Khalifa. Under the authority of each were municipal officials including a
Mohtaseb who regulated commerce, a Cadi under whom numerous notaries Adoul, were
employed and perennial appointed neighborhood authorities Mokadema.
The Moroccan Protectorate context of French colonial policy toward slavery and the
slave trade presents several points of similarity amid its historical particularities. At least three

88

See Ben Mlih (1990) p.262-263.

Robin Bidwell, Morocco Under Colonial Rule: French Administration of Tribal Areas 19121956 (London: Frank Cass, 1973).
89

46

aspects of prior French colonial experiences with slavery in Algeria and West Africa are similar
enough to suggest an influence upon, if not plain continuity with, the formulation and
development of Protectorate policies and practice.90 First, in strategy and practice slavery was
tolerated and accommodated for as part of the general politics to legitimize colonialism within
Morocco. Fundamental limitations to emancipation were reinforced through colonial political
interests in forming and maintaining alliances with the Makhzan and slave-holding Moroccan
elites; deemed indispensable to safeguard the stable, governable and productive quotidian
functioning of Moroccan social orders. Second, to promote and maintain political legitimacy in
face of potential metropolitan and international expectations and demands concerning ongoing
Moroccan slavery, a normal course of action across a range of colonial officials of differing
ranks and accountabilities was to control the official representations of slavery and the
circulation of information. Finally, the survival of the slave trade was asserted as a rationale
within the politics of colonial military expansion and pacification over an extended period.
The following correspondence between General Henri Joseph Eugne Gouraud
Commandant of the Region of Fes, and Commissar Resident General Louis Hubert Gonzales
Lyautey illustrates several features of the formation of Protectorate policy toward slavery. On
May 22, 1914 Gouraud wrote Lyautey requesting clarification of French policy toward slavery.91
Gouraud described two recent events in Fes, reporting that in April 1913 prominent Fasi Mfeddl
Bennani Smires sought the return of his negresse. The enslaved woman had left Bennani
Smires house to seek refuge with a brigadier of the Senegalese company stationed at Dar
Debibagh. The Bureau Chief of Fes-ville reported that the Senegalese soldier had sheltered the

90

See Martin Klein, (1998.), and Benjamin Claude Brower, (2005).

Correspondence from General Gouraud, Commandant of the Region of Fes, 5.22.1914, N 986.
Bibliothque Gnrale et Archives du Maroc, hereafter (BGAM).
91

47

woman by pretending that she was his sister-in-law stolen from the Sudan. Gouraud decided to
not intervene at the time. In a second event over a year later, in early May, the negress of
Mohammed Seghir upon learning that she would be sold or moved to Marrakesh, sought
refuge for herself and her two girls with a French officer who then employed her as a
domestique. Some days later one of the daughters, around age ten, returned to Seghirs house
where she was held. At this point Gouraud judged that he could not allow the return of
Mohammed Seghirs slave now in the refuge of a French officer. After noting that such events
had become more frequent he wrote,
In December of 1913 Through the Pacha I ordered the closure of all houses which sell
slaves, limiting myself to this sole measure to not simmer discontent in the spirit of the
Fasis. You know then that there is slavery here; the slaves, for the most part born in
Morocco, are in general very well treated; the negresses, in particular, live in the intimacy
of their masters and, being concubines in general, are treated on the same level as
legitimate women. It is certain that if they were offered the choice between their liberty
and the status quo, very few among them would abandon their masters who provide for
all their needs and treat them with kindness.
In this situation it is indispensable to find a formula which permits reconciling the actual
state of things with French legislation, in order to act with prudence and not disturb our
conciliatory politics and appeasement, or create a general malcontent which will become
more grave if it touches the masses of the Fasis concerning the greatest intimacies of their
life.
In waiting for your instructions on this subject, I will continue to recommend to my
officers not to intervene officially in any affairs which are related to the question of
slavery.
This direction seems to me for the instant, a sufficient solution to this question, but if, it
should become that the desertions of negresses take an epidemic character, it might be
necessary to move the Senegalese from urban barracks where they are at this time a
refuge and a center of attraction for negresses of cities.
Lyauteys response on June 4, 1914 further reveals the early priorities of the Protectorate
administration,
In answer to your letter I have the honor to make known to you that I estimate with you
that it is necessary to prohibit in an absolute way the open sale of slaves.
48

This measure, as well as the refusal of French authority to lend support when complaints
are directed against slaves who flee of the house of their masters will prove sufficiently
that we reject slavery.
An intervention more direct on our part in the repression of this trade would have, at
present, serious disadvantages from the political point of view. 92
The de facto acceptance of the social institution and the decision to oppose only the most glaring
representations of trade inaugurated a feeble and indirect effort against slavery. Here Lyauteys
calculated position deferred concerns about runaway slaves by emphasizing measures against the
open or public sale of slaves. This limiting of Protectorate policy to the prohibition of public
slave sales was an essentially political move, expressing an interest in maintaining evidence of
an internationally acceptable anti-slavery policy while not alienating slaveholding Moroccans.
In an important sense the Protectorate was formed through direct cooperation with Fasi
authorities and elites, and all levels of French administration were particularly cautious and
deliberate about interference in their lives. This initial position on slavery marked a profound
difference from a clear commitment to preparing for and enforcing an effective abolition,
necessarily entailing a systematic opposition to the ongoing informal trade. Slave owning
Moroccans anticipated and readily responded to this mutually convenient distinction between the
public slave trade and the normal functioning of domestic Moroccan affairs, in a perception of
slavery which would endure within Protectorate policies, practices and beyond.
In effect, Gouraud and local French administrators began with a remarkably vague antislavery program. Officially the Protectorate opposed the slave trade, yet practical terms
encouraged administrators to avoid involvements with slavery. In practice slaves challenging
their plight were far more often received by Fasi than French authorities, who served the interest

92

Correspondence from Resident General Louis-Hubert-Gonzales Lyautey, 6.4.1914. (BGAM).

49

of owners and wielded corporal punishments.93 The lack of official commitment was fused with
enduring official French attitudes toward slaves and their conditions. Romantic images such as
Gourauds assertion of slaves well-being and satisfaction, and the expressed fear of the
consequences of an epidemic of slaves seeking freedom through their liaisons with Senegalese
troops, reveal a core disinterest in supporting slaves agency in redefining their station in the
social order.
The Protectorate continued in this mode of ambiguity and calculated non-interference for
over a decade. In the early 1920s communications among officials reiterated the need to clarify
policy and practices concerning slavery. One case from this time stands out in particular. In
November 1922 a civil police officer from Mogador wrote the General Commandant for the
region of Marrakech concerning two children either retained or sold by an ex-Caid from
Mogador residing in Marrakech. The letter was written in response to the diligent and emotional
lobbying of Fathma Blal and her parents Blal and Djemaa (all former slaves of the ex-Caid Sidi
M. Ould Anflous), who sought custody of Fathmas two children.94
In January of 1923 Anflous gave a testimony explaining that a year and half earlier Blal
and Djemaa had sought and received their emancipation from the French office, but in seeking
their official recognition from the Mogador Caid found that the local Caid demanded that
Fathma remain with her owner. Anflous recounts,
I sought to sell her but without success. This slave refused to follow the purchasers
who presented themselves. Confronting her attitude I resigned myself to give up, and at
this time the authorities of Mogador started to engage in the continuations against me, for
the restitution of her two children.
93

Several elder informants recounted stories of Fasi Pacha Ben Bouchta Baghdadis (1912-1932)
severe punishment of escaped slaves. Interview with Khadija Sbai (Fes, June 5, 2004), Interview
with Azouz (Fes, March 27, 2004), Interview with Halima (Fes, January 27, 2004).
94
Correspondence from the Civil Control in Mogador 11.15.1922, NI 284, Centre des Archives
Diplomatique de Nantes hereafter (CADN).
50

She is not unaware however that her children were sold by me approximately four years
ago at the Sidi Ahmed moussem...
I sold them because my financial circumstances did not enable me to provide for their
needs anymore, under the legal terms conferred in Moslem law.95
The detailed machinations surrounding these events and their outcome for Fathmas family are
unknown, but the situation clearly assumed a larger resonance. Following Anflous testimony,
the head of the civil police in Mogador was stirred to present the case to the Plenipotentiary
Minister in Rabat. He expressed doubt that Anflous had sold the children and sought to clarify
the scope of his powers,
In view of the frequency of acts of this kind, slaves seeking refuge for themselves with
the French authorities make known to me the advisable attitude to observe, particularly
if it is possible to reject the claims generally made by fugitives owners.96
Two weeks later the Plenipotentiary Minister Urbain Blanc urgently sought the advice of the
Direction des Affaires Indignes in an attempt to define in precise terms the role and the limits
of intervention of the policing authorities in litigations of this kind.97 The response which
followed continued to articulate a perverse ethos of manipulating appearances whose realties
ultimately fell heaviest upon slaves:
If pressing considerations of Muslim policy prohibit us from officially abolishing slavery,
it rests with to us to practically reduce it to the degree of a state of ordinary domesticity
and consequently imply, for the individual fixed in this position, the faculty to leave at
any time.98
It was subsequently recommended that escaped male slaves and their children be immediately
freed by Caids, with a distinction for women and their children, whose freedom was qualified
95

Correspondence from the Chief of Municipal Services in Marrakech 1.13.1923, N222,

(CADN). Moussem here means a trade fair.
96
Correspondence from Chief of Police Mogador, 1.24.1923, (CADN).
97
Correspondence from the Plenipotentiary Minister 2.10.1923, SCC N. 381, (CADN).
98
Copy of correspondence from the Counselor to the Cherifien Government, 2.23.1923,
(BGAM).
51

upon paternity. It was also proposed to forbid the writing of any legal acts related to the sale of
slaves by an Adoul, or under the authority of a Cadi or Caid.
Later in 1923 M. Urbain Blanc (acting as Secretariat General) distributed a circular
throughout the Protectorate concerning slavery.99 The document intended to codify the
Protectorates local actions after a recent incident expressed that the controlling authorities were
dubious concerning the attitude which they were to adopt, about the question of freeing
slaves.100 The circular presented three points of instruction for local administrators to follow,
prefaced by an explanation of official perspective:
With an aim of avoiding any undulation and any discordant action in this delicate matter,
I have considered it necessary to make known, in a precise way, the methods, as well as
the limits of the intervention of these authorities in litigations of this kind.
By the fact of the establishment of French Protectorate, the free and public trade of the
slaves, which was exerted openly in Morocco under the terms of ancestral habits, was
abolished; but it continues in many Moroccan families as a rather important domestic
who, from this established fact, is attached to their masters by this old bond of serfdom.
Although, in an almost absolute way, the domestic does not protest against their state
because it offers them, in certain ways, rather serious advantages, among which the safety
of their existence is not the least, it is required of us, however, since it is impossible for
99

Circular 17 S.G.P. 10.21.1923, (BGAM). Handwritten drafts, copies of Circular 17, and the
list of the offices it was initially distributed to, all confirming this date are deposited at the
BGAM in Rabat. Perhaps due to a long compounded confusion caused by poor handwriting in
memos concerning the circular, it has persistently and erroneously been cited as 1922, both by
some subsequent Protectorate administrators and scholars in general. See for example Fatima
Mernissi, The Harem Within: Tales of a Moroccan Girlhood (Great Britain: Bantam, 1994)
p.175. Rita Aouad Badouals (Ghita Aouad) consistently meticulous research miscites Le Maroc
Contemporain: Guide a luasge de tous les Officiers et particulierement a lusage des Officiers
des affaires indigenes et des Fonctionnaires du protectorat Commandant Nol Maestracci (Paris,
Chares-Lavauzelle & Cie, 1928) p. 164 in her piece Lesclavage Tardif Au Maroc Sous Le
Protectorat in Revue Maroc-Europe; histoire, economies, societes (1, 1991) p.142 and
maintained this date in Esclavage et Situation des Noirs au Maroc dans la premire moiti
du XXe sicle, in Laurence Marfaing and Steffen Wippel, Les relations transsahariennes
l'poque contemporaine - un espace en constante mutation. (Paris: Karthala, 2004) p.347.
100
Correspondence from the Resident General to the Civil and Military Regions. Likely
intended to accompany and introduce Circular 17, the document is stamped Secret and is
undated (BGAM).
52

us through the most pressing considerations of Muslim policy, to penetrate in the internal
life of the families, to intervene in all the occasions which will arise, to allow the
domestic to leave their servile situation, at any time.
Among its greatest contradictions, the circular is was a patent effort to deny that slaves protesting
their condition had raised a core unresolved issue of accountability for French colonists. If
slaves (here termed domestic in a redefinition of status which became standard), remained in
the advantages of their conditions in an almost absolute way, what was presently being
clarified?
The toothless and impracticable circular instructed that escaped slaves encountered were
to be immediately freed through the office of the Caid, noting that this would be voluntary to
their owners (thus without the use of force). Another two significant points were included, the
first being a suggestion for distinguishing escapees sex and the paternity of their children, and
the other an extension of the interdiction of slave sales to forbid Caids, Cadis, and Adouls from
legally recognizing any acts related to slaves. In addition to the glaring omission of not actually
seeking to outlaw slavery, these latter contorted points reflect the selective and contradictory
character of the Protectorates Muslim policy. Targeting the role of Caids and Cadis was a
conscious effort to further delegitimize the trade, and to some extent a gesture of intervention
into Islamic legal practices. However such a measure had been long anticipated and undertaken
by Adouls in Fes who were already careful to control references to slaves, and all but completely
sustained the omission of references to slave purchases.101 The circulars concern with the
paternity of slave children has been interpreted as a strategy promoting recognition that
101

Following French reforms of the Islamic legal system in 1912, family records were
collected in Fasi courts from 1913. Though slaves are frequently mentioned in documents
concerning inheritance, inventories, and family contestations (See Chapter Four), there was an
almost hermeneutic seal on references to the slave purchases. Very rare examples appear in
reference to a post mortem debt (Smat 21.12.1335/ 10.8.1917), and in monies designated in an
inheritance (Smat 11.11.1333/ 9.21.1915).
53

concubinage with categorically non-slave women be forbidden by Maliki law as a form of

fornication.102 Ironically, this contradictory method of combating domestic slavery implicitly
promoted a substantial loop-hole through validating the formal legal status of slave and
concubine.
Residental Circular 17 did not have a clearly discernable impact upon the clandestine
trade or the institution of domestic slavery. Neither outlawing nor ending slavery, it became a
nebulous reference point within the administration and beyond. An example from southern
Morocco is illustrative. In June of 1924 two slaves who had fled from their owner were taken by
French authorities to the Cadi in Tamanar to receive declaration of their liberty as officially
prescribed.103 The Cadi refused to free them without receiving instructions to this effect from
the Visir of Justice. The officer interpreted the refusal as a personal pretext, however, the
situation revealed a more substantial issue. Three months later a brief discussion ensued
following a letter from a lieutenant intent to call attention to the difficulties of applying the
circular if these instructions have not been given to the Cadis who are presented with fugitive
slaves by local authorities.104 The Direction of Affaires Indigenes in Rabat responded that there
was no practical value in starting a discussion of principle with the Makhzan concerning slavery,
offering the iconic oblique advice that the circular be applied at all times when possible.105
External pressure to hold the Protectorate responsible for abolition does not appear to
have significantly influenced how slavery was treated through the Muslim policy of non-

102

Rita Aouad Badoual (2004) interprets this as a Protectorate strategy, yet this studys extensive
oral testimonies and life histories call into question the intended or realized impact of the circular
upon the Fasi traditions of concubinage (See Chapter Four).
103
Correspondence from the General Commander of Agadir, 6.2.1924, N1546 (BGAM).
104
Correspondence from the Counselor to the Cherifien Government, 9.11.1924, N4713
(BGAM).
105
Correspondence from the Director of Indigenous Affairs 9.24.1924, N2293 (BGAM).
54

interference in religion or tradition established during the Lyautey period (1912-1925). This
continuity is clear on two occasions in 1927 when the French League for the Defense of the
Rights of Man and Citizen (Ligue Francaise pour la defence des Droits lHomme et du Citoyen)
probed into slavery in Morocco and corresponded with Paris and Rabat. In early September of
1926 two members of the French League for the Defense of the Rights of Man and Citizen
attended the moussem at Bou-Enfir in Chichaoua in the region of Marrakech, where they
reported to have been offered the purchase of slaves. Later that month they wrote the head office
of the League in Paris, protesting the slave trade in Morocco.106 Their letter was sent within the
same week that France signed the International Slavery Convention outlawing the institution.107
In February of 1927 the President of the League wrote to Resident General Steeg in
Rabat raising the issue again, which prompted an internal inquiry. In March the Captain at
Chicahaoua reported on the matter, based on long yearslived in the tribe. He wrote to the
General in Command of the Marrakesh region:
It is not doubtful that the exchange of slaves still exists in Morocco, and no one is
unaware that all the chiefs and notable have slaves in their service, moreover we are not
armed to prohibit this traffic, which is not practiced in the auctions of the souks, or
Moussems, at least in the subjected zone.
This trade is made under the cloak, among confidants, and it appears unlikely to me that
spontaneous offers were made to Europeans...108
Steegs subsequent letter to the President of the League in Paris reports a meticulous
investigation by the regional authorities of Marrakech, in order to attempt to identify the natives
who had been able to quote slave prices. Having discovered no trace of the suspected traffic, he
106

Correspondence from Resident General Jules-Joseph-Thodore Steeg, 5.27.1927. (BGAM).

This letter to the President of the French League in Paris recounts many details of the affair, but
it is unclear when and how Protectorate authorities were first addressed by the French League.
107
The Hague Convention, September 26, 1926.
108
Correspondence from the Commander of the Annex of Indigenous Affairs, Chichaoua,
3.21.1927, N33 (BGAM).
55

expressed regret at the two observers failing to inform local authorities at the time. He then
amplified the imperial military reasoning that it is
appropriate to recognize that the clandestine slave traffic could not be easily detected
and repressed on the edge of areas which we do not control yet, but the progress of
pacification will allow the monitoring of the French authorities little by little to remove
the practice of slavery in Morocco, where only domestic slavery still exists in a
patriarchal and very attenuated form and a slave has only to present themselves to the
local French police to obtain their immediate freedom.109
It made full contemporary political sense to emphasize that ending slavery was integral to French
interests in pacification, given ongoing campaigns in southern Morocco and the recent
collaborative annihilation of the Riffian state.110 Yet it is doubtful that President of the League
would have passively accepted a clear statement of the Protectorates full awareness of
continuing domestic slavery. Predictably, the President of the League continued to pursue the
issue of the clandestine trade in Morocco, and retorted by involving the minister of Foreign
Affairs in Paris.111
Within a week of receiving notice of the minister of Foreign Affairs present concern
with Moroccan slavery, the Resident General took notable care in the handling of an incident
near Imintanout in which a Khalifa sought to reclaim his slaves from local authorities. He
responded in detail to local concerns about the matter:
This circular always fixes the Protectorate point of view of in the matter. If its
application comes to raise difficulties in particular cases, it would be enough to interpret
it based on the general principle which our entire colonial policy in Moslem countries
takes as a starting point.
France does not admit slavery and only knows free beings on all the territories of its
colonial domain. Consequently, not only could it not put the police force at the service of
109

See 27.
The Resident Generals letter was sent the same day that Abd-el-Krim surrendered to French
troops at Targuist and was subsequently exiled to Runion Island in the Indian Ocean.
111
Correspondence from the Minister of Foreign Affairs, French Republic, 5.24.1927, N998
(BGAM).
110

56

a master allegedly claiming for the arrest or the search for a so-called slave, but still, if
recourse to the police force were necessary, they could be exerted only in favor of the
native in escape.
Also respectful of the organization and the traditions of the Muslim family, France does
not want to penetrate in its intimacy and does not seek to specify up to which point the
black domestic of either sex, attached to a house, is or is not entirely free in their actions.
As long as these black servants do not assert the rupture of the bonds which link them to
the Muslim family, France is unaware of the nature of these bonds. On the other hand, as
soon as one of them is placed under its safeguard, it grants complete assistance and
protection to him.
In the case of the young man Ayad Ben Ali, the chief of the Office of Imintanout acted
perfectly in refusing to give this native to the agent of Khalifa of Mtougi and it rests with
to you to seek employment for him or he can freely, without being exposed to
molestation from anyone, live working for himself.112
Despite the bloated sense of France and her scruples, little had qualitatively changed. The entire
onus of liberation and what it would entail continued to be borne exclusively by slaves
themselves, with no further promotion or concern from the Protectorate. This passing instant of
charitable consideration for a boys possible livelihood beyond slavery was not programmatic,
and remained the unaddressed existential concern of all slaves. Later in the month Steeg further
displayed his heighten attention to slavery, writing a confidential complaint to the Commandant
General of Marrakesh about leaks to the press of confidential correspondence concerning
slavery, which resulted in the publication of document extracts including a circular related to
slavery.113
In October of 1927 the President of the League wrote the Resident General again,
observing the prior made point in their correspondence of the importance of colonial pacification
for abolition, and demanding inquiry into a new case within Marrakech itself. He related that on
that July 12th a woman named Aabla Tougia who had lived for 15 years in the household of Si

112
113

Correspondence from Resident General Steeg, 6.1.1927. N1233 (BGAM).

Correspondence from Resident General Steeg, 6.30.1927, N639 (BGAM).
57

Madani, brother of the Pacha of Marrakech, was abducted and taken to the local slave merchant
Bel Khait. Inquires were made, producing at least two secret reports. The most extensive
detailed that Bel Khait was indeed a well-known local slave trader, specializing in procuring
musicians, cooks, concubines and trained house slaves.114 In the other document, the General
Commandant of Marrakech was matter of fact in reporting that the clandestine traffic is found
in all large cities of Morocco and that all notables houses are full of slaves.115 Inquiry,
including the Generals interview with the Pacha, found that Aabla Tougia was now residing in
the care of an associate of the Pacha, and her personal statement was recorded.116
In early November a response was sent to the President of the League in Paris. It
studiously avoided use of the term slave, explaining that during a family disagreement
concerning succession, the maidservant Aabla El Touguia had been temporarily housed with
Bel Khiat. It selectively mentioned that the General of Marrakesh personally interviewed the
Pasha and intervened, excluding mention of the Pachas direct acknowledgement that Bel
Khiat had dealt slaves in the past, and effectively withheld the full findings of their
investigation. Aabla El Touguia, who is described as an already old, tubercular patient and
incompetent for any work, testified
I am nourished and I was never maltreated nor despoiled of my clothing. It is true that
when I left the Madani palace my trunk was removed from me by Rarc Ben Belkir, but it
was with an aim of checking it for fear I carried some jewels. It was returned to me a few
days later complete with all my affairs.117
Though the League had duly uncovered and reported a significant clandestine slave trader, the
Protectorate administration sought to thoroughly deflect this principal issue unto the details of
114

Report from the Chief Commissioner of Safety, Marrakesh Region, 10.30.1927, N177
(BGAM).
115
Report from the Commandant General, Marrakesh Region, 11.4.1927, N639 (BGAM).
116
Here when the Pacha was interviewed, the term sahab was used.
117
Correspondence from Resident General Steeg, 11.28.1927, N2977 (BGAM).
58

this individual incident. Soon afterword Steeg himself took the initiative to begin another round
of correspondence between Rabat and Paris concerning the affair. This time the Protectorate was
more emphatic to represent the political difficulties inherent in suppressing the trade given their
inabilities each time that it interests the principal Muslim characters, fundamentally the
Makhzan itself.118 This minor variation of the familiar ideology and logic reiterated that
Muslim policy prohibited any intervention, as long as these family servants do not wish to
leave and get employment allowing them to them to live with complete freedom.
The mixed message of official French tolerance toward the institution failed to reinforce
their prohibitions against the slave trade. In 1928 colonial officer and prolific scholar Edouard
Michaux-Bellaire wrote a well-informed report on the commerce of slaves in Morocco. His
note went further than contemporaries standard official repetitions. Where Muslim policy
often meant simply a convenient deferral to the traditions of the Makhzan and Moroccan elites,
thus providing a basis for tolerating slavery, Michaux-Bellaire promoted the 19th century
abolitionist writings of Moroccan scholar Ahmed Ben Khaled Naciri.119 Where the accustomed
mantra had become a restatement that the protectorate had outlawed the trade and that therefore
the institution was gradually dying, Michaux-Bellaire outlined the adaptability of contemporary
realities:
the establishment of the protectorate, the suppression in principal of the slave trade,
have obliged the merchants and buyers of slaves to create a new organization for
procuring their human merchandise for sale without risking administrative intervention
little by little they have created a sort of modus vivendi which has permitted this
profitable trade to be continued with the French administration seeming to be unaware of
it.

118
119

Correspondence from Resident General Steeg, 12.1.1927, N2170 (BGAM).

Edouard Michaux-Bellaire, Note Sur Le Commerce Des Esclaves, 10.20.1928 (BGAM).
59

Though it is impossible to accurately reconstruct the volume or the complete details of the
adaptive and temporary arrangements within the informal trade that Michaux-Bellaire and other
administrators encountered, evidence of some salient features can be noted.
Certain characteristic and contexts of Protectorate-era Moroccan military and economic
history that were ultimately involved in transformations concerning the decline of slavery, were
also closely intertwined with the lived realities of an ineffective anti-slavery policy and a
resilient clandestine trade these included colonial incursions, rural vulnerabilities, and ruralurban relations. In the largest sense the extended military pacification of the land of useful
Morocco paired with early to mid-twentieth century capitalist agricultural penetration into rural
Morocco to create complex consequences of widening and accelerating social vulnerabilities and
stratifications.120 Prior to the Protectorate, the 1906 Act of Algeciras enabled foreigners the legal
ownership of land for agriculture and the Service du Contrle de la Dette had begun to directly
administer Moroccan customs (aside from the Spanish Zones) from 1910 onward.121 Throughout
the Protectorate period Moroccans on the whole showed resilience in clinging to rural life, with
the total rural proportion of the population declining from 89% to 76% across the entire period
between 1914 to 1952.122 This resilience occurred amid several forces which coalesced into
mounting even existentialchallenges for millions of rural Moroccans. In 1913 the
Protectorate reintroduced the tertib tax which fell as a great burden upon Moroccan farmers.123

120

See Paul Pascon, Ed. John Hall, Trans. C. Edwin Vaughan and Veronique Ingman,
Capitalism and Agriculture in the Haouz of Marrakesh (U.S.A.: Routledge: 1986). Pascon has
shown the complex and far reaching results of colonial land for the Haouz region of Marrakesh,
acquisitions and subsequent occupations led to complex results Notes how some opportunities
were available.
121
Pennell (2000) pp.132-134, 147-148.
122
Paul Pascon and Mohammed Ennaji, Les paysans sans terre au Maroc (Casablanca,
Morocco: Les Editions Toubkal, 1986) p.23.
123
Pennell (2000) p.178. Tertib was a traditional system of agricultural taxation.
60

Agricultural modernization was accompanied by forced redistribution though which Europeans

and a minuscule Moroccan elite held complete control of water rights, the best lands, and access
to a growing abundance of rural labor for poorly regulated subsistence wages.124 Moroccan
farmers limited access to capital and improvements meant that for nearly everyone farming
techniques could change little, and as the relative value of their crops rapidly declined there were
increased displacements, growing communal and familial insecurities and deepening
dependencies upon wage labor and migration.125
It should be emphasized that Protectorate military presence did not equate to an end of
the slave trade. Reference to the sale of slave women centered in the Casba of Beni Mellal,
with correspondents in many cities, particularly Fes, was advanced in the argument for greater
military force.126 Michaux-Bellaire argued that the enslavement and trafficking of tribal
women benefited those who resent the Protectorate, both insiders and the dissidents. He urged
an examination,
of the necessary measures for closing the Casba de Beni Mellal which forms a part the
gravely disadvantageous criminal intrigues, not only authorizing the trade of free women
but prolonging the dissidence.127
Though pacification was completed in 1934 the clandestine trade continued. MichauxBellaires further policy suggestions for working closer with local leaders, and targeting suqs and
moussems with known slave sales, naively ignored or at least contradicted the very modus
vivendi he had described. Again, a fundamental transition of this period was that slave dealers
and elite slave holders anticipated and responded to colonial policies and the distinctions they

124

See Charles Stewart, Economic Change in a Plural Society: Morocco Since 1912
(Unpublished Ph.D. Dissertation, University of California, Berkeley, 1957) pp.137-145.
125
See Will D. Swearingen (1987) and Pascon (1986).
126
Michaux-Bellaire,1928 p.4 (BGAM).
127
Ibid.
61

involved, replacing public slave sales and their legal record, with a greater reliance upon the
established base of interpersonal trade.
Where Lyauteys economic policies had disfavored and sought to curtail the presence of
colons, after 1925 Steegs administration pursued an aggressive rural settlement and
development along the lines of Algeria.128 Several successful years of this legal displacement
was followed by the Great Depression.129 Rapid demographic growth, urbanization and
deracination paired with unemployment to form another crucial dimension at play. In 1929, on
the eve of an extended period of generalized decline, only 100,000 total Moroccans were
employed in all sectors of modernized economic activities both urban and rural.130 The
ostensible planning of colonial urban systems such as Casablanca and Rabat did far more to
contain and segregate than address and resolve the economic and social consequences their
demographic explosions.131 In the interwar years Fes as a whole bore the imprint of its
marginalization in the Atlantic-bound colonial economy, the Great Depression, and the swelling
arrivals of desperate rural poor. However, while Fes lost its rank as Moroccos economic and
political capital, wealthy Fasis capitalized upon these historical changes while maintaining and
in cases even expanding their distinct traditional identity, which included slave ownership.
Directly counter to the widespread and persistent myth that Moroccan slaves were
exclusively of Sudanese origin, this period clearly saw emphasis shifted nearly entirely to
enslaving within Morocco and the Sahara. As one officer recounted,
128

Swearingen (1987) p.51.

Pennell (2000) pp. 219-224.
130
Albert Ayache, Etudes dHistoire sociale marocaine (Rabat, Morocco: Editions Okad, 1997).
p.76.
131
Janet L. Abu-Lughod, Rabat: Urban Apartheid in Morocco (Princeton, New Jersey: Princeton
University Press, 1980). Abu-Lughod notes that fewer than 10 percent of Moroccan Muslims
lived in cities in the first decades of the Protectorat, with their total population shifting from
400,000 in 1921 to 1.5 million in 1951. p.206
129

62

it is certain that we can often see in Moroccan houses slave women who have
absolutely nothing to do with Sudan and that everyone knows are of origins from the sous
or berber tribes132
Though few specific regions were cited in rare Protectorate reports concerned with the public
sale of slaves, ongoing references to the widespread clandestine trade revealed the limitations of
Protectorate influence and to a lesser extent administrators knowledge.133 The majority of
informants of slave descendent in Fes had family origins in the Sous and Sahara.134 It was also
suggested by numerous sources that the ratio of females was far greater than males.
Clandestine slave prices are very difficult to gauge, in part because they varied depending
on individual slaves and the location of the sale, as well as personal connections and negations
with brokers. A 1915 report notes a Pacha receiving 100 pestas hasani per capita for slave
sales.135 A 1926 case noted that 2,500 francs was proposed for a 20 year old and her daughter,
and another for 3,500 francs with her child.136 On January 26, 1928 a slave was sold in
Marrakech for 4.000 francs.137 Put into context we find that family incomes averaged 10-25
francs per diem in the late 1920s, falling to 3 francs per diem by 1935.138 A woman was sold on
September 25th 1928 at Mtouga in Chichaoua for 520 douros.139 A year later, on November 8th

132

Correspondence from Commandant General, Marrakesh Region, 8.12.1928, N421 (BGAM).

Locations mentioned in various correspondence from the period as reputed to have public
slaves sales include the Mazagan and Chaouia regions, and the Mtouga moussum.
134
Discussed in Chapter 4.
135
Correspondence from Chief of Police, Marrakesh, N/A1915, (BGAM). C. R. Pennell, notes
that the hassani currency was removed from circulation and replaced by francs in 1920, see
Morocco since 1830: a history. (London: Hurst, 2001) p. 197.
136
Copy of letter from the French League for the Defense of the Rights of Man and Citizen,
Paris, 5.16.1927 (BGAM).
137
Correspondence from Chief Commissioner of Regional Police, Marrakesh, 1.26.1928, N.1282
(BGAM).
138
Pennell (2000) p. 222.
139
Copy of declaration of Si Abdesslem Ben Caid El Hadj Khoubban, Chief Commandant,
Annex of Native Affairs, 9.25.1928, (BGAM). The declaration explains that a woman was sold
for arguing with her owner.
133

63

1929 in the Sahara a price of 50 douros is noted for a slave.140 Oral historical recollection in Fes
repeatedly suggests that slave prices were inexpensive, often emphasizing that during times of
economic distress, children were readily offered in exchange for food.
Protectorate documents repeatedly refer to a variety of slave brokers, often with careful
attention to their background. The contexts in which slave dealers were punished warrant
scrutiny. For example, on June 21, 1915 when Hammad Ben Zacour of Marrakech was
imprisoned for six months, Zacour is described as having sold white girls and as being not
rich.141 In fact there would be particular official commendation of white slavery, and it can be
inferred that colonial authorities limited their interference with the wealthiest and most powerful
slave holders transactions. Slave dealers in Fes of prominent social standing were well known
to informed resident Europeans.142 Because the Makhzan and grand families were the largest
slave holders and were not to be alienated, the enforcement of measures against the clandestine
trade and elites offering and exchanging slaves among themselves remained cautious and
unenthusiastic.
Reports from the 1920s mention Caids acting as brokers, including one official sale as
late as 1928 which drew the attention of the Plenipotentiary Minister Urbain Blanc; he sought a
letter of reprimand from the Grand Vizir.143 One case mentioned in the correspondence between

140

Correspondence from the Regional Police of Marrakesh, 11.8.1929 (BGAM). The document
describes the kidnapping of children among neighbors, also mentioning a price of 45 douros
hassani and two camels.
141
Correspondence from Commandant Colonel, Marrakesh Region 6.21.1915,N4370 (BGAM).
As the machinations of Protectorate Berber politics developed, official references to white
slaves suggest an additional political resonance. See Gilles Lafuente, La politique brbere de la
France et le nationalisme marocain (Paris: LHarmattan, 1999).
142
For example see Tharaud (1930) and Le Tourneau (1949).
143
Correspondence from the Plenipotentiary Minister 10.19.1928,N3813 (BGAM). A deeply
cautious interest in curtailing Moroccan officials dealings with slavery would continue
throughout the Protectorate period. A 1935 letter from the Police Commissioner, Marrakesh
64

a Police Commissioner and the Chief of Security in Rabat, details Caid Ben Hamida of Gharbia
in passage from Mazagan, traveling to Fes by car. Ben Hamida was monitored carefully as he
apparently brought a number of domestics with him and set up four tents at Bab Segma in Fes.
The report mentions a dozen slaves from Souss and Haha, whom Ben Hamida proposed to sell in
Fes with Hafid Lalami who traveled with him.144
By contrast, in at least one other instance recorded from this period, a Caid actively
opposed a slave sale.145 In November 1923 the French became involved when the Caid of
Guercif had opposed the sale of a five year old girl. Police questioning revealed that the girl was
sold by her adopted mother Hadouma bent Abdalled from Haouara, who had not informed her
spouse of the action. The child was sold to the intermediary Allal Ben Djelloul of No. 1 Rue
Melhfia, Fes, for 325 francs. Ben Djelloul took 25 francs for brokering the sale to Charef Si
M., a Turkish subject resident in Fes. In Charef Si M.s statement, apparently in his defense, he
noted having requested a black girl, but nevertheless accepted the girl. Finally, the child was
returned to her parents and the Turk was penalized with a fine for carrying a revolver without a
permit. Also of great interest in the periods transitions are references to non-sanctioned
intermediaries serving as adouls to officially witness slave sales. In addition to indicating
the presence of fraud within the informal economy, as the legal basis of slavery was
delegitimized the development of such substitute adoul figures suggests a response to reassure

Region, 7.9.1935, N9867 (BGAM) reveals a concerned awareness of elite and Caid
involvements with slave trading.
144
Correspondence from the Police Commissioner, Mazagan, 9.12.1929 (BGAM),
correspondence from the Commandant General, Fes Region, 9.19.1929, N391 (BGAM).
145
Verbal Process, Occupation Troops, Fes Region, 10.9.1923 (BGAM), Correspondence from
Colonel Garcin, Occupation Troops, Fes Region, 11.20.1923, N2644 (BGAM).
65

buyers who sought traditional legal forms of guarantee and recourse for their purchases of
slaves.146
The clandestine slave trade continued delegitimized, declining, and in transformation
throughout and beyond the Protectorate period. Following the formation of the United
Nations as a forum for abolition, in 1950 J. Lapanne-Joinville wrote a report published by the
Centre de Haute Etudes DAdministration Musulmane examining slavery in Morocco. The
report reiterated the hackneyed position that the Protectorate had never recognized the legitimacy
of slavery or the slave trade and asserted the vacuous official mantra that the suppression of
public markets had been a final blow in the inevitable natural demise of slavery.147 The lack of
official legal opposition mirrored by the general tolerance of domestic slavery, along with the
failure to commit to any concerted efforts to combat the stubborn demand and durable informal
trade, represent the negligible impact of market closures and the very limited political will of
Protectorate efforts against slavery on the whole. Remarkably, Joinville acknowledged as much,
noting with regret that administrative prohibitions had failed to bring the complete disappearance
of the commerce in slaves, now comprised of brokers and intermediaries moving enslaved
females from the South.148 He writes,
We still note the existence of a slave broker in Fes from whom prospective buyers supply
themselves. The person in question moved their center of operations to their home at the
beginning of the Protectorate and continued to operate as a black market institution.149
The hesitations to recognize, define, and condemn domestic slavery, and the recurrent
redefinition of slave status reflected the ambivalence and inaction that endured throughout the

146

Correspondence from Civil Police, Mogador, 10.5.1928, N24 (BGAM).

J. Lapanne-Joinville, Note Sur LEsclavage au Maroc, (Paris: Centre de Haute Etudes
DAdministration Musulmane, 1950). p.13.
148
Ibid p.14.
149
Ibid.
147

66

Protectorate. In 1913, during the second year of the Protectorate a Lieutenant-Colonel in the
Doukkala-Abda region responded to Resident General Lyuatey concerning slavery in the region,
noting in his concluding remarks,
in Morocco, the word "slave" does not have the attributes that we generally designate
due to our mentality. It is a non-free servant who is part of the household and represents
valued merchandise for this reason.150
In 1955, one year before Moroccan independence, the Director of Cherifienne Affairs
extensively edited a report written by Lapanne-Joinville for the International Convention for the
Abolition of Slavery in 1956.151 In drafting the document a sentence originally written, It
hardly remains but in the great Moroccan families, in the form of domestic female slavery or
legal quasi-voluntary concubinage, was amended, replacing the words domestic female
slavery with domestic women.152

Fasi Families Use of Muslim Law and the Decline of Slavery

Though law and legal status concerning slavery often solicit expectations of clear, singular, and
linear historical evidence and outcomes, the historical realities of law and slavery in twentieth
century Fes demand further critical evaluation. Beginning in 1912 the Protectorate implemented
a French administrative umbrella over Moroccan Muslim judicial organization and initiated legal
reforms which observed careful limitations.153 A Ministry of Justice was created with the

150

Correspondence from Lieutenant-Colonel, Occupation Troops, Doukkala-Abda Region, 9.

22.1913 (BGAM).
151
Typed draft of report from J. Lapanne-Joinville for the Director of Cherifiennes Affairs,
Rabat, 7.9.1955. (CADN). Concerning the forum see Joyce A.C. Gutteridge, Supplementary
Slavery Convention, 1956 in International & Comparative Law Quarterly, (Oxford: 6: 1957)
pp.449-471.
152
Typed draft of report from J. Lapanne-Joinville for the Director of Cherifiennes Affairs,
Rabat, 7.9.1955. (CADN). pp.2,7.
153
See Ben Mlih (1990) pp.132-137, Maestracci (1928) pp.146-170.
67

interest of unifying the responsibilities for all institutions related to sharia. An immediate
primary aimwhich can be interpreted as a longer term and larger scale imperial tacticwas to
clarify and define Moroccan legal authority. For example, Dahirs addressing judicial personnel
required a formal accounting of their numbers and the public declaration of their positions, and
also established the qualifications for their appointment, procedures, and their available legal
means.154 Another component of these reforms, directly fortunate for our available historical
evidence, was the mandate for the increased standardization of notarized documents and their
record in court registers.
At the beginning of the Protectorate depositories of legal records were established for
each court of the two Cadis of Fes el-Bali: Mahkama Rcif and Mahkama Smat.155 These records
of Fes medina revealed a near complete omission of references to slave sales.156 This absence is
in itself worth consideration. While it is clear that the trade in Fes continued, the extremely rare
exceptions to this legal silence offer a further source of corroboration, and far more importantly
suggests the normalization of its extra-legal character. By the time of the 1905 public market
closure, those in Fasi society directly and indirectly concerned with reproducing slavery had
participated in an adaptation of the trade. This adaptation entailed Fasis closing ranks among
themselves and controlling how and what they legally sought to represent concerning slavery and
slaves. While in other Moroccan locations slaves continued to be purchased through legal
authorities with formal documentation, a consequence of these new arrangements in Fes meant
that slave purchases would take place outside of well-established legal protections and
154

See Alan Scham, Lyautey in Morocco: Protectorate Administration, 1912-1925 (Berkeley,

California: University of California Press, 1970) pp.177-186.
155
See Roger Le Tourneau, Fs avant le Protectorat: tude conomique dune ville de loccident
musulman (Casablanca, Morocco: ditions la Porte, 1949). The area of Fes Jdid maintained a
separate administration with its own legal records.
156
See 31.
68

recourse.157 It seems that the strong customary practices of Fasi business culture were
substituted for earlier norms and legal guarantees.158
Despite the absence of records of slave sales in Protectorate Fes, references to slaves
continued within many other forms of legal documents. The common references of abd (pl.
abid) literally meaning slave, and khadim which literally means servant (but is also used to refer
to slaves and carries a strong connotation of blackness)159 appear with other legal references used
to refer to slaves such as ama, mamluk(a), and less often wasefah(a) and raqeeq. Mustowleda
appears as another common reference, signifying a female slave who is recognized as having
given birth to her owners child.160 Other important forms of references are mowtek(a), a former
slave who has been immediately freed, and a mowdabir(a), who has been freed upon the death of
their owner. After being freed these former slaves continue to be referred to in legal documents
as having been freed with acknowledgement of whom they were freed by. Even after a former
slaves marriage she would remain legally known as zowj mustowleda or zowj mowteka of her
former owner, which often referred to an owner other than her husband.161
The documents which would seem most directly important for the end of slavery are atks
or acts of liberation. Rcif and Smat records revealed only 73 total immediate liberations and
liberations upon an owners death, the earliest of which was 1913, and the latest 1952.
157

The last instance of which was noted in1928.

For a study of Fasi business culture see Gabriel Pallez, Les Marchands Fassis (Memoire de
Stage, Ecole Nationale DAdministration, 1948) microfilm (CADN) pp.17-20.
159
A.J. Wensinck, "KHdim," Encyclopedia of Islam. Edited P.Bearman et al. Brill, 2007. Brill
Online. Accessed 14, April 2007.
160
Often referred to as umm al-walad (mother of children), this status meant that a child of a
female slave and her owner was recognized and born free, and that the female slave mother
would be freed upon the death of her owner. As noted by J. Schacht, umm al-walad is in
contrast to umm al-bann (mother of sons) as the name for a free woman. "Umm al-Walad,"
Encyclopaedia of Islam. Edited P.Bearman et al. Brill, 2007. Brill Online. Accessed 14, April
2007.
161
Zowj here means wife.
158

69

Figure 1.

70

7KHLPDJHSDUWZLWKUHODWLRQVKLS,'U,GZDVQRWIRXQGLQWKHILOH

Figure 2.
The fact that there were very few legal liberations of either variety is important because this
evidence should help dispel assumptions that legal liberations were a significant factor ending
this case of domestic slavery. It can be suggested that a frequency of retention increased in the
historical contexts in which slavery was ending. Yet at present without similar data from the
nineteenth century or prior, informed comparisons with previous rates of liberation cannot be
made. For the same reason, the issue of whether there were generally more immediate
liberations (41) than liberations upon death, as seen within this period (32), remains uncertain.162
In looking at the general shape of the decline in these references there appears to have
been a pause in liberations around the period of instabilities during the WWII era. Also earlier

162

Immediate liberations (atk), liberations upon death (tidbeer).

71

on there appears to have been a rise in immediate liberations from 3 during 1919-1922 to 13
during 1923-1926. This peak among relatively minor figures reveals that only a small handful of
Fasi slave owners freed their slaves in the period following the 1923 circular and demonstrates
the lack of any clear social trend prompted by official anti-slavery legal actions. Otherwise the
liberations across this long period of decline reveal no relation to specific historical legislation
and raise the fundamental question: what was the relationship between law and the end of
slavery in this context?
Scholars differ over the basic facts of relevant Moroccan legal history concerning the end
of slavery and no satisfactory analysis of law and the end of slavery has been advanced. Features
of the problem have been noted by several scholars. Aoud and El Hamel question any formal
abolition of the legal status of slavery.163 In contrast, Ahmad Alawad Sikainga points to the
precedent of a 1925 law explicitly prohibiting slavery, in which all clauses recognizing
servitude were removed from the personal matters code.164 Protectorate reports cite Moroccan
penal code articles 267, 282, and 289 as indirect references to the end of slavery.165 Ennaji
maintains that (f)rom a purely judicial point of view, no law ever abolished slavery once and for
all, and redirects our consideration of early twentieth-century policies to an 1863 official decree
from Sultan Muhammed ben Abd al-Rahman in which the state offered refuge to slaves who
163

See Rita Aouad Badoual (2004). In an interview concerning the history surrounding the
Gnawa, El Hamel responded to the question, How, ultimately, did slavery disappear from
Morocco? I don't know of any text that formerly and officially abolished slavery. Slavery
just went away with the coming of the colonization in 1912. Slowly, and gradually, slavery just
died. It stopped existing because it was no longer needed.
http://www.afropop.org/multi/feature/ID/618/The%20Gnawa%20Music%20of%20Morocco
viewed August 18, 2007.
164
Ahmad Alawad Sikainga,Slavery and Muslim Jurisprudence in Morocco, in Slavery and
Colonial Rule in Africa Eds. Suzanne Miers and Martin A. Klein (London: Routledge, 1999). p.
65.
165
A vague effort in the twilight of the Protectorate to consolidate such codes can be found in a
Note from Direction Des Affaires Chrifiennes Rabat, 12.7.1955 (CADN).
72

sought it.166 The actual impact of this precursor to French policy by half a century was of little if
any real consequence as Ennaji acknowledges. Yet his conclusion about the impact of the 1923
circular deserves to be further extended, (h)owever profound the effects of these measures, they
did not absolutely prohibit slavery, which continued to exist as a legal institution; the law did not
abolish it.167 The provocative conclusion that a law did not alter the legality of the institution
underscores the general challenge of reconstructing the relationship between the end of this
institution and law.
Scholars differences and their collective vagueness all stem from a common source
the unhurried fracture of the legal legitimacy of slavery. It would be a far overstated claim to
suggest that Protectorate era attention to slavery brought into question the accepted basis of
Moroccan legal authority. More accurately, consequential changes in the legal legitimacy of
slavery emerged among shifts and continuities in the lived realities of slavery within Moroccan
social and political relations.168 Overall the general influence of indirect, weak, ex post facto and
poorly enforced laws upon the history of the institution confirms that the sizable extent of
disinterest in ending the slave trade was even exceeded by a deeper and broader lack of political
will to directly confront, ban, and enforce a clear and absolute end to domestic slavery. Legal
contradictions of this situation abound and are best explained by reemphasizing that the
imperatives of the Protectorate and the Moroccan Muslim legal system concerning slavery were
fully dominated by broad political and legal accommodations for slave holding elites. The
166

Ennaji (1999) pp.113, 116.

Ibid p.114.
168
In this context see Lawrence Rosen Law and Custom in the Popular Legal Culture of North
Africa Islamic Law and Society, Vol. 2, No. 2. (1995), pp. 194-208, also Wael B. Hallaqs
interpretations of Islamic legal change and accommodation are broadly suggestive. See
Authority, Continuity, and Change in Islamic Law (New York: Cambridge University Press,
2001) and The Origins and Evolution of Islamic Law (New York: Cambridge University Press,
2005).
167

73

reality that Fasi slaves were being legally liberated long after they were ostensibly freed by the
Protectorate demonstrates that lawmaking was not an effective channel of abolitionist social
change in any meaningful sense. As has been documented, domestic slavery did not end through
masters legally liberating; moreover it did not end through official laws. As we cannot point to
coherent and verifiable evidence that Protectorate or Moroccan laws directly advanced slaves
liberation or the end of slavery, it must be concluded that in this historical context law did not
serve as a direct instrument of social change.
In contrast to the near complete absence of references to slave sales and the paucity of
liberations, far more references to slaves are found within various other kinds of Fasi family
legal documents, particularly including documents concerning inheritance and child custody.
Nevertheless it should be noted that in keeping with an overall tendency, the total of these
references remain low-bound. Examination of a variety of family legal documents from 1913 to
1971 in the two Moroccan controlled courts of Fes-al-Bali shows the shape of a decline across a
total of 1340 references to slaves and former slaves.

74

7KHLPDJHSDUWZLWKUHODWLRQVKLS,'U,GZDVQRWIRXQGLQWKHILOH

Figure 3.
Despite expectations, legal references to slaves do not reveal a simple long slow course of
decline across the Protectorate years. Following the initial eight year period of 1913-1920 the
figures show an increase of references between 1921 and 1930. Though there is a decline of
around 50 references for each ten year period after 1921-1930, the period 1941-1950 shows that
after over thirty years into the Protectorate there were nearly as many references to legal slaves
being recorded as when these depositories and the Protectorate itself began. By far the sharpest
decline in references to slaves occurred in the final years of the Protectorate and the decade
thereafter, clearly bringing into question the relevant influences upon the end of slavery.169 It is
also important to consider that in contrast to the assumption that domestic slavery simply

169

In 1957, one year after Moroccan Independence, the Rcif and Smat legal records were
merged.
75

disappeared during the Protectorate period due to slaves dying and not being replaced by further
slaves, remarkably few of these references involve slave or former slave deaths.
Rather than an historical shift in legal principals mandating the enforcement of law as a
direct instrument and intervention, bringing social changes and an end to slavery, Fasi families
usage of legal records provides a reflection of the outcomes of complex social changes
experienced within their households. Furthermore, in themselves these records cannot
adequately explain the relevant forces of change they reflect. For the moment, that is our point.
Further informative aspects of these documents will be discussed in Chapter Four.

Protectorate Era Attitudes toward Slavery and Blackness

The generalized lack of political will against slavery stemmed from and was reinforced by key
commonalities of attitude and belief in the relationships between the Protectorate and Moroccan
slave holders. Though French and Moroccan authorities were of unequal powers and frequently
divergent interests and spheres of influence, the areas of confluence within and among their
respective attitudes toward slavery and blackness are particularly important to our understanding
of the reluctant pace with which slavery in Fes declined. Shaped from its founding by the
precedence of several other colonial experiences and Lyauteys severe elitism, a dominant
French interest throughout the Protectorate period was to preserve and even strengthen Moroccan
socio-political hierarchies as a basis of maintaining and exercising indirect rule.170 There were

170

See Daniel R.Rivet, Lyautey et l'institution du Protectorat franais au Maroc, 1912-1925

(Paris: L'Harmattan, 1996), William A., Hoisington, Lyautey and the French conquest of
Morocco (New York : St. Martin's Press, 1995), Alan Scham, Lyautey in Morocco; Protectorate
administration, 1912-1925 (Berkeley, University of California Press, 1970). Lyautey drew from
a variety of French colonial formations (including Indochina, Madagascar and Algeria) to meld
military force with political means through fostering patron-clientage relations with local leaders
while selectively preserving precolonial society and culture.
76

inevitably wide implications of the core strategic interest of conserving and investing political
and military support to the institution of the Alaouite monarchycomprising the largest single
slave holder and practitioner of domestic slavery in the Maghrebwith its inextricable patronage
apparatus spanning across powerful and wealthy Moroccan families. One crucial implication
was the provision of an enduring basis of attitudes of acceptance toward domestic slavery on
political grounds.
Many Protectorate documents discussing slavery refer to the importance of Muslim
policy.171 In the early twentieth century Muslim policy was a malleable feature of French
imperialism used on a larger scale than the Moroccan Protectorate and defies simple definition.
It broadly refers to the French colonial policies informed by social scientific inquiry concerning
Muslims and has been described as having emerged as a new framework for implementing
the imperial project and putting it into practice.172 The likelihood of a more precise depiction of
what such a new and supposedly singular framework entailed across diverse French interests
(even across the Maghreb) remains questionable. Muslim policy simultaneously appeared in
theorizing assimilation for Algerians and in Lyauteys anti-assimilationist promotion of authentic
Moroccanness. Rather than pursue a missing internal coherence toward an ultimate definition, or
build comparisons drawing from beyond the context of this study, we can point to specific
pertinent appearances of Muslim policy with the well-established most common denominator
of fostering double standards and controlling Muslim French colonial subjects.
While European orientalist knowledge production repeatedly played an important role
within French imperial interests such as with Napoleon Bonapartes late eighteenth-century
171

Such references are concentrated in documents from the Direction des Affaires Chrifiennes,
but circulated more widely as well.
172
Valrie Amiraux, Considering Islam from the West Contemporary European History (15,
1 2006) p. 94.
77

invasion of Egypt, and the nineteenth-century Bureaux Arabes, it has been asserted that Muslim
policy was first officially articulated as an object of importance in French colonial praxis in the
early twentieth century.173 Beyond etymology or purist intellectual history, a relevant
institutional shift can be seen with the first systematic European efforts at knowledge production
about Morocco (begun in the 1890s) being represented by the Mission Scientifique du Maroc
founded in 1904.174 Amid an eclectic series of writings published by this Mission (including
coverage of pre-Islamic themes, Muslim dynasties, technical features of manufacturing, Jewish
history, Berber tribes, archeology, fully translated Arabic texts, and architecture) we find early
evidence of important attitudes toward slavery. A 1907 collection of documents examining
fatwa published by the Mission Scientifique du Maroc details legal views concerning slave sales,
liberations, and the rights and responsibilities of owners.175 More than a purely informative
scholarly exercise, this publication reveals a tactical and contingent level of acceptance through
its clear interest and respect for constructing and commanding an intimate knowledge of the legal
basis of slavery in Moroccan terms.
What was true for the largest contexts of the Protectorate itself was also the case for
slavery projecting ideologically-laden notions of Islam as the basis of Moroccan authority
could be used to obscure and rationalize arrangements of power both over and amongst
Moroccans. Distinctions made by European scholars and administrators became blurred as their
efforts to understand and respond to slavery revealed recurrent assumptions that slavery was an
173

See Henry Laurens, Orientales II. La IIIe Republique et lIslam (Paris: CNRS ditions,
2004).
174
See Edmund Burke III, Fez, the setting sun of Islam: a study of the politics of colonial
ethnography (Maghreb Review 2, iv 1977). and La Mission Scientifique au Maroc in Actes de
Durham: Recherches rcente sur le Maroc Moderne (Rabat: Publication of the Bulletin
Economique et Social du Maroc, 1978).
175
Ed. Michaux-Bellaire, Traduction de la fetoua du faqih Sidi Ali Et Tsouli in Archives
Marocaines: Mission Scientifique Maroc Volume XI (Paris: Ernest Leroux, 1907).
78

expression of Islam. A selective deference to Muslim law and Muslim policy was a recurrent
pattern both toward the trade and even more so for the institution of slavery. A 1927 letter from
Rsident General Steeg to the French Minister of Foreign Affrairs in Paris culminated by
reiterating the stock mantra that,
[I]f pressing considerations of Muslim policy prohibit any intervention from us, as long
as these family servants do not wish to leave their masters, those of them who request
their freedom are ensured to find assistance and protection from controlling authorities.176
In addition to this reference to Muslim policy serving to index the elephant in the room of the
fully deemed political necessity of Protectorate tolerance of domestic slavery, the linchpin of this
awkward official position statement is the important ideological message reassuring that slaves
(here termed family servants) were fully acting and living within their own agency and
choices. That there is no evidence and no reason to believe this attitude toward slaves and
slavery was anything but arbitrary, in no way based on any efforts at official or systematic nonbiased inquiries documenting slaves realities and voices brings into sharp relief the fully
contrived and expedient nature of Muslim policy.
To be certain the relationships among relevant attitudes to slavery and color held by
Moroccan and French authorities were far more complex than the French estimated. The extent
to which the Protectorate affiliated study of Islamic law and slavery was ever able to effectively
promote anti-slavery attitudes in Morocco is highly questionable. Lapanne-Joinvilles 1950
report for Centre de Haute Etudes DAdministration Musulmane, Note Sur LEsclavage au
Maroc, is comprised of four parts, three of which are dedicated to Islam and Islamic law. In
spite of the texts opening line: (t)oday slavery has practically disappeared from Morocco, the
report substantively reveals little not touched upon in the 1907 collection noted above. One

176

Correspondence from Resident General Steeg, 12.1.1927,N2170 (BGAM).

79

exception is a perfunctory section reviewing measures taken by the Protectorate, another

exception of more interest is found in the discussion of the conclusion titled the Current
Position of Chraa. Here several uncommon assertions are made:
The attitude of the fuqahas has been for a great part the success of our anti-slavery
position.
Many Muslims, prompted by the reasoning of jurists, have had scruples to protect their
slaves and returned their freedom, some without (legal) forms, others resorting to (legal)
proceeds of liberating.177
Despite the self-congratulatory claim, at present no available evidence confirms the direct
influence of anti-slavery positions through fuqahas, or substantiates the premise that there were
significant numbers of slaves informally freed due to changes in their owners legal and religious
views. Rather the overall negligible numbers of legal liberations in Fes casts great doubt upon
the likelihood of either case. Moreover, each of these scenarios fully mutes and excludes direct
consideration of slaves lives and relationships as well as relevant transformations they
underwent.
Though Fasi status quo attitudes toward slave ownership were intertwined with the
shifting history of their use of Islamic law and legal documentation, Protectorate authorities
persistently oversimplified how. A repeated tendency was to equate Moroccan slavery with
immutable and ahistorical conceptions of Islam and Islamic law. As has been shown, Fasi usage
of legal documentation referring to slaves reveals a measured overall decrease followed by a
rapid decline from the 1950s onward, a pattern which stands in complete contrast with the
recurrent colonial projections of a fixed and absolutist Muslim position or practices concerning
slavery. Thus it can be seen that the confluences of official attitudes toward slavery were at
times limited, superficial and even entailed contradictions. If elite Moroccan attitudes toward
177

Fuqahas are specialists in Islamic jurisprudence (fiqh).

80

slavery were changing, this was hardly due to their exposure to the official Protectorate antislavery position, which was far less directly consequential than the actions pursued by domestic
slaves and their descendents.
A further strong example of durable ambiguity in the relationship between Protectorate
positions toward Islam and slavery can be found in the internally circulated notes in preparation
for the 1956 International Convention for the Abolition of Slavery. After describing domestic
slavery as a quasi-voluntary form of female domesticity, legal concubinage, and semislaves, whose condition is in general rather soft, the argument is made that,
If slavery were legally abolished, the children born of concubines would be illegitimate
and even, most often of adultery. Reforms would thus be paradoxically to them, on this
point, unfavorable and it is probable that the traditional mediums, would formulate, this
objection if necessary.178
The attitude expressed here is in absolute support of the status quo Protectorate era practices of
Moroccan slaveholders. It effectively defends slavery by pointing to the primacy of Islamic
legal principals and practices, which by the mid-1950s had unquestionably entered an historical
transition concerning slavery. Again the wellbeing of slaves and their children are interpreted
with neither cogniscence nor inclusion of their actual conditions or their own articulations of
interest.
In addition to the historical patterns of attitudes toward domestic slavery in Morocco
being revealed by attention to consistent associations between slavery and Islam, further
evidence of Protectorate authorities attitudes can be found in combination with several other
secular configurations. Though secularized understandings of slavery were not necessarily
discrete and distinct from those ground in religious terms, they warrant consideration. Many

178

Notes for the Project de Convention Pour lAbolition de lEsclavage et de la Servitude, n/d
(Likely 1956) (GBAM) p.4.
81

Protectorate officials advanced the expectation that slavery would be slowly reformed out of
Moroccan society due to a natural course of social evolution.179 This belief was the clear
counterpart of the Protectorates greatly disproportionate focus upon the trade rather than the
institution, and as has been noted, this vague evolutionary perspective has endured amongst
Moroccan historians.
It is certain that evolutionary attitudes toward slavery were part of far larger colonial
attitudes. In illustrating this point it is useful to consider Michaux-Bellaires 1927 presentation
on Indigenous Policy for the preparatory course of the Service des Affaires Indignes.180 Acting
as Conseiller des Affaires Indignes Chef de la Section Sociologique he explains,
The great question is to know, that is to say to know the ground well and to avoid
imposing directives upon people that they do not understand. Our presence alone and our
interference in their business, by themselves already cause a very natural mistrust with
the natives: it is thus a question above all of taming them a bit and of inspiring
confidence in them: for that one needs a constant contact, patience and firmness. It is a
question of achieving a true moral conquest: it takes longer to realize, but is certainly less
expensive and more durable than the very short conquest.181
In the shift of imperial jargon to Indigenous policy, a deeply paternalistic and evolutionary
attitude is formulated toward all Moroccans. Despite an emphasis upon intimate knowledge, the
exact mechanisms and policies objectives through which constant contact, patience and
firmness, would bring moral conquest remained subdued and opaque, reflecting attitudes far

179

See ibid. In fact, the evolution of manners of the Moroccan population is such as the slave
practically disappeared today. p.4
180
After July 1926 the Service des Rensignements was reorganized and renamed the Service des
Affaires Indignes. Also see William A. Hoisington, France and Islam: The Haut Comite
Mediterraneen and French North Africa in George Joff ed. North Africa: nation, state, and
region (London: Routledge, 1993) for a brief, insightful discussion of French efforts to reconceive colonial policy in relation to interwar anxieties about nationalism in the Muslim world.
181
Ed. Michaux-Bellaire, Confrences Faites au Cours Prparatoire du Service des Affaires
Indignes, Conseiller des Affairs Indigenes, Chef de la Section Sociologique, published by the
Direction Generale des Affaires Indigenes (Section Sociologique) The Archives Marocaines,
Volume XXVII, (Paris: Librairie Ancienne Honore Champion, 1927) p. 262.
82

more so than policy objectives, not only within Michaux-Bellaires writings but also within a
wider colonial stewardship. Interestingly, the veteran self-trained scholars Note on the
Commerce in Slaves published the following year begins, (t)he question of slavery is one of
the most important and most delicate of our indigenous policy.182 In spite of and alongside its
enduring import and delicacy, no distinctions between Muslim policy and Indigenous policy
concerning attitudes or administrative programs responding to slavery were ever made coherent.
If paternalism was expressed in Protectorate correspondence less often than other themes,
it nevertheless formed a profound point of mutuality between slaveholders and the Protectorate.
To note one example, in reporting on an investigation into the abuse of a slave, the regional chief
of police offered the following well-rehearsed reassurances to his superior,
often enough slaves are very appreciated by their Masters, treated well, enjoying a
great confidence; are regarded as the "door of happiness" in a house, and it is common
that if they have children with them they become completely of the family.183
Here in addition to being very appreciated and treated well, as might be judged an honorable
form of conduct toward guests, profound levels of patronizing objectification are evident in
citing a callous metaphor which conceives of subordinated human beings as physical features of
households.
A direct extension of this form of objectification that authorities shared in was a
gratuitous sexism toward domestic slave women. A Protectorate report on slaves in the

182

Ed. Michaux-Bellaire, Note on the commerce in slaves sale, 10.20.1928 (BGAM).

Correspondence from Le Commissaire, Chef de la Sret rgionale to the General
Commandant of the Region of Marrakech. October 30, 1927 (BGAM). For an earlier similar
example see above correspondence from General Gouraud, Commandant of the Region of Fes,
5.22.1914, N 986. (BGAM), who wrote, It is certain that if they were offered the choice
between their liberty and the status quo, very few among them would abandon their masters who
provide for all their needs and treat them with kindness.

183

83

Moroccan family, which is unique in offering several well-informed points, further distinguishes
itself in its conclusion:
There is something larger than a principle, it is the natural or divine right which possesses
the greatest instruction to protect from all and oneself those of weak intelligence, which
is the case of the woman in general, the indigenous woman in particular, and the female
slave most fundamentally of all.184
This gallant departure posits a metaphysical patriarchal protection of slave women as a primal
and ecumenical bond and alternative basis of widely rationalizing domestic slavery. Though an
unusually statement, and one very unlikely to be overtly endorsed or directly promoted by
administrators, this transcendent sexist position reflected values which were mutually compatible
and recognized across the lines of the Protectorate.
In a convoluted manner, the same report offers evidence of another theme of relevant
attitudes toward slavery cultural relativism,
And all this leads to the reflection that it is necessary for us to prepare in all affairs that
have to do with slaves a careful circumspection not only guided by our European
judgment. It is also necessary to take care not to ignore others It is a commended
formula a negative formula that we are obliged to apply, I recognize it, very often. But
to employ it without understanding leads us to encourage immoral acts and has made us
the accomplices of crimes punished by our own laws.185
The final point made here offers a rare glimpse of French recognition of the core contradiction of
Protectorate policies and practices concerning slavery.
Intimately tied to official attitudes toward slavery were French and Moroccan
understandings and social attitudes connected to color. Earlier colonial experiences, particularly
in Algeria, informed the Protectorate importation of racial categories.186 Far from being abstract
and idle anthropological taxonomies, colonial notions of who Moroccans were and how their
184

Note Sur La Question Des Esclaves Dans La Famille Marocaine, n/d (BGAM) p.5.
Ibid. p.6.
186
See Brower (2005), Patricia M. E. Lorcin, Imperial Identities: Stereotyping, Prejudice and
Race in Colonial Algeria (London: I.B. Tauris,1995).
185

84

identities and social orders functioned repeatedly influenced Protectorate understandings,

policies and political manipulations. Academic and political attentions have long focused on the
issues and consequences of this period for Jewish and Berber history.187 Blackness and slavery
were and continue to be approached in a very different manner.
The dominant criteria employed by Protectorate officials, subsequent Moroccan officials,
and broader studies for measuring the diverse human geography of Moroccos population have
been religion (Muslim and Jewish) and language (Arabophone and Berberophone). The annual
population statistics throughout the Protectorate period were recorded for French, Foreign
(European), Muslim, and Jews.188 The norm has been to accept that although blacks and
blackness clearly exist and are of importance within Moroccan communities and social orders
they are of no collective political consequence and require no official recognition. It is necessary
to reconstruct that this normative formal denial of color emerged and has been maintained in
spite of history and empirical sociocultural realities, amid continued inconsistencies and
incoherence.
One French study published prior to the Protectorate, though grounded in the
assumptions of contemporary racist theories and drawing upon limited sources, raised
fundamental questions about blackness in Moroccan life:
In contact with Blacks (Negres) of the Saharan edge of the Atlas, or import of Sudan as
slaves or as janissaries of Khalifes, the races Jewish, Arab and Berber little by little, in
certain places, were tinted with black blood: Jews of the Merrakech region, of which
"some are slightly dyed" in consequence of mixtures prior to Islamization: Arabs of
187

For example see Thomas Kerlin.Park and Aomar Boum, Historical Dictionary of Morocco
Second Ed. (Lanham, MD: Scarecrow Press, 2006), the bibliography of which features a Judaic
Studies pp. 460-474 subheading within the category Culture and Religion and a Berber
Studies subheading under Science and Social Sciences pp. 590-592.
188
These categories were retained immediately following independence, at which time a notable
change was the omission officially published annual statistics for justice. See Chapter 3
(Figure 4).
85

Western Morocco or the crossings are particularly frequent, Berbres of the Rif or of the
Atlas or several tribes have black skin. 189
In this ahistorial paradigm blackness existed as a form of miscegenation into the discrete and
pure racial types of Jews, Arabs, and Berbers. However when the text actually addresses the
Moroccan population it is with a great measure of self-contradiction, as the categories which the
author chose to provide population approximations for prove more extensive than these pure
types, also including Maures, Blacks, and Haratin.
During the Protectorate period there were many notable published examples of empirical
observation and analyses of slavery and blackness within the social hierarchies of Fasi life. In
the Tharaud brothers Fs ou les bourgeois de lIslam many frank impressions about slavery and
blackness are offered. At the heart of their book is its concentrated expression of an oft repeated
orientalist European fantasy concerning Fes; despite their years invested as residents and
quotidian observers they retained an unalterable sense that entering a Fasi house was entering an
old civilization.190 They observe and variously depict Fasi power relations with a mixture of
naivety and cynicism, displaying a willful appreciation, an informed connoisseurship that an
indispensible part of being a good Fasi meant owning and being served by black slaves. This
aspect of their work raises the issue that during the Protectorate the social distance between
Europeans and Fasi slaves always remained far greater than between these slaves and their
owners. This distance was not the result of a complete seclusion which might offer an obvious
reason why domestic slavery was not socially condemned and rigidly opposed by Europeans.
Propinquity and even physical intimacy were basic recurrent features within this romantic

189

Gustave Jeannot, Etude Sociale, Politique et Economique Sur Le Maroc (Dijon, France:
Imprimerie Jacquot et Floret, 1907) p. 82.
190
Jerme Tharaud and Jean Tharaud, Fes ou les bourgeois de lIslam (Paris: Librairie Plon,
1930) p.20.
86

distance and apathetic dehumanization, as palace and domestic slaves served countless foreigners
who grew accustomed to enjoying the hospitality and grandeur of slaveholding households.
Where the form and content of the Tharaud brothers writings were excessive in their
subjectivities and elitist complicity, Roger Le Tourneaus magnum opus Fes Avant le
protectorate: Etude economique Etude Economique Et Sociale D'Une Ville De L'Occident
Musulman approached slavery and blackness in an ultimately similar manner within a far more
rigorous text.191 Among the relevant inclusions in Le Tourneaus study (which established and
remains the standard for an Annales school inspired history of Fes), a section of discussion is
dedicated to the qualitative and quantitative examination of black slaves in the population of the
medina. However, his analysis of slaves conditions is little more than an uncritical reiteration of
several other authors impressions and represents a core flaw within his sweeping and detailed
work. It can broadly be noted that received attitudes and authoritative conclusions which failed
to challenge domestic slavery remained more deeply engrained than scholarly efforts. Within his
writings and those he cited there was no compulsion to seriously address this dimension of Fasi
society in its own human terms and historical context, rather there were persistent unfounded
blanket rationalizations and anecdotal images of the benign nature of Fasi domestic slavery.192
In 1928 an official French guide was published to orientate and serve as a reference for
Protectorate officers.193 The cursory ethnography provided by the guide ordered Morocco into

191

Roger Le Tourneau, Fes Avant le Protectorate: Etude Economique et Sociale D'Une Ville De
L'Occident Musulman (Casablanca: Institut des Hautes Etudes Marocaines, 1949).
192
See Pierre Loti Au Maroc (Paris: 1890), Stephen Bonsal, Morocco as it is (London: W. H.
Allen & Co. 1893), Ch. Rene-Leclerc, Le Maroc septentrional, souvenirs et impressions (Alger,
1905), Gabriel Veyre, Au Maroc: Dans lintimit du Sultan, (Paris: 1905). A repeated theme is
the deliberate or implicit comparison to plantation slavery in the New World.
193
Maestracci (1928).
87

three population groups: Berbers (comprised of three principal races), Arabs, and Jews.194 The
only remote allusion to blackness which can be interpreted was through a verbatim reprinting of
Urbain Blancs 1923 Residental Circular 17 S.G.P., reiterating the ineffective official slavery
policy of the Protectorate.
In what initially appears to be a complete contrast, a 1937 extended ethnography of
indigenous North Africa described in its introduction as being a practical sociology, included a
significant thread of discussion of blackness. One passage explains:
In the population one also finds negres: abid or oucfane, more or less groups. They are in
general the descendants of former slaves freed by their masters or France. In some
centers, they are joined together in a district called Village Negre under the direction of
one as of their called Caid El Abid (Caid of Negres). Formerly they were launderers of
houses; now they are employed as sweepers or street cleaners.
They are Moslem; nevertheless, they have preserved of the fetishistic practices. Their
"owner" or marabout is Sidna Belal, negre muezzin of Mahomet.
Their naivety and their simplicity have generated, on their grounds, the spirit of begging:
this is why they benefit from all the European and Moslem Festivals to dance in the
streets with their tom-tom and their immense castanets out of wrought iron and so as to
ask a little money.195
The fleeting mention of the fascinating and important black villages that seem to have
developed within Protectorate era patterns of urbanization is overshadowed among other
problematic references.196 Despite the earlier published official guides complete denial of a

194

Ibid p.22
Mohammed Soulah, La Societe Indigene de lAfrique du Nord: Algerie, Tunisie, Maroc
Sahara (Alger, Jules Carbonel, 1937) p.114.
196
A reference to a makeshift black village in Rabat is made in Jacques Nouvel, Essai sur
lEnfance Musulmane a Rabat: Conditions dexistence Problmes Juridiques et Sociaux
Nantes Mmoire de fin de stage des Contrler Civil, n/d (not earlier than 1937) (CADN). In the
larger context of urbanization and bidonvilles in North Africa a reference is made to a 19th
century village negre at Stif in Moncer Rouissi, Population et Socit au Maghreb (Tunis:
Ceres Productions, 1977) p. 99 The publication reflects a much later orientation, but reprints the
data of categories musulman, Israelites, Franaise autres Europeans, p.81. Village Negre also
195

88

black population, how this second text recognizes color renders their perspectives and historical
impact inseparable. Even though the ethnography initially asserts three types of black
population (Gourari; Hartani; and le negre, loucif, or Abd described as
descendents of old slaves freed by France), its discussion supports at least two important
shared vague suppositions with the officers guide. First, the unexamined notion that slavery
somehow ended (or would end) due to French presence, and second, that color and social
stratification within Moroccan communities were rightfully subsumed into effective irrelevance
by the categories of religion and language.
Another official publication from the following year intended for a general and
commercial readership confirms the standard option and tendency of a complete omission of
blackness.197 The annual Protectorate population statistics featured categories for a nonMoroccan population of French and Foreigners, and a Moroccan population of Muslims and
Jews, sometimes with a brief discussion configured around a Muslim population subdivided with
Berberophones and Arabophones, an Israelite population, a population of diverse European
nationals, and French citizens. Varied historians have interrogated colonial knowledge
production for being biased and in the service of imperial attitudes and interests.198 In this case,
colonial knowledge functioned within a core disjuncture in which blackness as a lived category
existing in complex social realities and intellectual discussion was suitable for recurrent
ethnographic recognition but did not warrant official demographic or political recognition.
Powerful beliefs about blackness meant that although enslaved and free blacks were clearly
appears as a reference in an article, Edward A. Ackerman, An Algerian Oasis Community
Economic Geography, (Vol. 12, No. 3 July, 1936), pp. 250-258.
197
Institut Des Hautes Etudes Marocaines, Initiation Au Maroc: Collectif Editions D'Art Et
D'Histoire (1938) (BGAM).
198
See for example in the South Asian context Bernard S., Cohn, Colonialism and its forms of
knowledge: the British in India (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1996).
89

known to be a fundamental part of Moroccan history, human geography, and contemporary

social organization, their numbers and in many respects their conditions were deemed officially
invisible by the Protectorate and so remained. This pattern of recurrent observations of slavery
and blackness paired with the recurrent absence of formal recognition of slaves and blackness
within the Moroccan population offers an important example of deep vested political interests
trumping empiricism and subsequently distorting scholarship, such as that designed to inform
colonial policy.
An important part of this disjuncture and silence was that neither slavery nor blackness
became significant features of a Moroccan social movement and remained exceedingly marginal
references within nationalist discourse.199 An example of great contrast is shown in the dramatic
1930 Moroccan reaction to French manipulations of Berber ethnic identity and law, within which
elite Fasi nationalist leaders played the most consequential organizational roles.200 A lack of an
interest in ending slavery clearly crossed beyond varied lines of political contention.
The Protectorate interest in continuing to minimize Moroccan political interest in
blackness was expressed in refusing permission of the 1927 forth Pan-African Congress. The
following explanation, made in justification of the refusal, helps explicitly situate Protectorate
attitudes toward Moroccan blackness in relation to larger historical currents:
There was never a negro question in Morocco; it thus seems (at this time) useless
to create one by initiatives and demonstrations which would be explained by no claim.

199

Aoud (2004) has asserted a cursory examination of the Fasi-centered nationalist movement in
the context of the end of slavery, but the import of Moroccan elite commitments to abolition for
nationalist purposes remains questionable. In fact elite Fasi figures with highly differing
relations to the Moroccan nationalist movement (Allal El-Fassi, Mohamed Hassan Ouzzani,
Mohammed El-Mokri, Basha El-Baghdadi) maintained commonalities of domestic slavery
regardless of their conflicting political interests.
200
See Giles Lafuente, La politique berbre de la France et le nationalism marocain (Paris:
LHarmattan, 1999).
90

Morocco is not a people of negroes; thus one does not see why it is required to
authorize here the American organization which is interested in the development of the
black people.
What actually hides under the label of this Panafrican Congress seems to be quite
simply an investigation into slavery. It is the one of the most delicate questions and
requires to be handled with the greatest prudence.
In theory, even the fact of the establishment of the Protectorate, has removed
slavery from Morocco. In reality, there are still slaves and it is obviously not possible to
immediately remove an organization which plays a considerable part in the social state of
the country. That can be done only by successive stages.
One of the first stages was the suppression of the public and official sale of the
slaves: this trade which still exists is nothing any more but clandestine. As such, it would
be enough to allow an anti-slavery and pro-negro delegation to present itself with all the
humane demonstrations usual to these organizations. There could be a pretext of
blackmail which seems preferable to avoid.
Besides in Morocco one should not confuse the negro question with the slave
question nor with the Moslem question. Slavery existed in Morocco before Islam and
was exerted on populations which were not black.
As with every other primitive group slavery was a first step to make use of
(slaves) for work or even for pleasures rather than to massacre them purely and simply.
The Berber tribes reduced their conquered to slavery, sold the women and it is
not rare to find in harems Berber women slaves who are absolutely white.
Slavery in Morocco, is thus neither a question of race, nor a question of religion:
it is the survival of a former social organization prior to Islam and has arrived in Morocco
from the caravans of Sudan.
There are no comparison to establish between the negroes of Morocco and those
of America.
It being recognized that slavery was a Berber custom, there were religious
difficulties (concerning) slavery in the unification of Morocco and its complete
Islamisation under the Almohades. One of these was forcing from Sudan blacks who
were not Moslem and whose reduction into slavery was thus legitimate. After the
disappearance of Almohades and their religious intransigence, elsewhere the Berbers
partly returned to their old mistakes, reducing to slavery the women of their conquered.
But the great mass of slaves were black.
Later, at the beginning of the seventeenth century the Sultan Saadien Ahmed El
Mansour who had directed an attack against the King de Tombouctou, Ishaq Sokia
received from him a quantity of negro slaves which he wanted to form into a particular
guard. He could not carry out this project and at the end of the same century the Sultan
Alaouite Moulay Ismail sought all the negroes which were disperse in tribes and the
famous negro guard was formed by those who he (appointed) through the invocation of
the great traditionalist El Boukhari, from which they were named "Boukhari".
Though born Moslems Boukhari were always regard as slaves of the Sultan,
which does not otherwise prevent them from living life completely independent and even
from enjoying all the privileges of the members Makhzen.
Several among them are caids and the only difference in treatment that there is
between the caids of free race and the others, it is that the Sultan (addresses) the former
91

in writing: "Ila Khadimouna el caid etc..." our servant caid - and while writing the
latter, it notes: "Ila Ouasifouna el caid our slave the caid".
The fact of being not simply slave, but black in Morocco does not prevent (one)
from arriving at the highest situations. Not only a negro can be caid, but can be a vizier
and even grand vizier. The famous regent during the minority of Abdelaziz, his Ahmed,
who was negro, was a grand vizier and signed Ahmed Ben Moussa Ben Ahmed
proudly.
Besides in Morocco the black color does not have anything particularly
pejorative, famous figures are black.
Famous Cherif d' Ouazzan who, first received French protection, Sid El Hadj
Abdessalam had as a mother a bought negress from Tetouan, Salama, and was himself
almost black and had very pronounced negro features which did not (limit him) he was
the object of veneration...
Concerning this matter Elisee Reclus wrote a concise sentence: Sid el-hadj
Abdessalam el-ouazzani, Grand Master of Moulay Taieb, count among his ancestors
mulattos but not negroes. His small son, Moulay Taieb Ben El Arbi who is today Grand
Master of the Zaouia d' Ouazzan, where he resides, also had a negress mother from of
Medaghra in the North of Tafilalet, which had been given to his Father Moulay El Arbi
by Cherif Alaoui. The Chief of Zaouis Naciriya de Temegrout, Sidi Abdessalem is also
very coloured; finally there is a very prominent Moroccan personality, well known and
very appreciated in the most elegant Parisian circles, the Pasha de Marrakech. Certainly
Tahmi El Glaoui has undeniable signs of a negro origin, which does not prevent him from
being at the forefront of situations in Morocco, and everywhere enjoying very great
influence and consideration.
In summary color prejudice absolutely does not exist in Morocco, it can be seen
to be completely useless to create it by authorizing congresses, committees and other
demonstrations from which blacks would learn that they must be despised by whites and
from which whites would learn that they have the right to despise the blacks, whereas
until now all this world saw (has been) without worrying neither about their color nor
of others.201
The primary contradiction throughout the document is the simultaneous denial and recognition of
blackness for political interests. The groundless assertion that there has never been a black
question in Morocco, followed by the incomprehensible argument not to confound a black
question in Morocco with the slavery question or the Muslim question, reflect the larger political
concerns of the continued representational management of slavery amid the potential
transnational interests and influences of contemporary Pan-Africanism and Islamic nationalism.
201

Note concerning the request to hold a Pan-African Congress in Morocco (n/d, no author)
(BGAM). The five principal meetings of the congress were held in 1919, 1921, 1923, 1927, and
1945.
92

Interestingly the Pan-Africanist movement is reduced to an association with America and

slavery. Juxtaposed with these denials is recognition of blackness dominating the history of
slavery in Morocco, then an extended recognition of blackness in an effort to demonstrate that
color has not prevented Moroccans from greatness. Not only do these citations of the blackness
of Moroccans of great station verify their non-normality, these examples present no conceptual,
historical, sociological, or linguistic vocabulary other than the very blackness argued not to exist.
A final attempt to register a definitive negation is made in concluding that absolutely no
prejudice exists and therefore there should be a refusal of organizations and forums which would
teach blacks and whites to despise one another. In a capping irony use of the American
black and white racial dyad dominates the logic and framing of this parentalist call to preempt
the importation of outside racial categories and tensions.
There were other examples of the cautious monitoring of transnational movements which
included attention to slavery and blackness. Within the long term and general apprehension over
the birth of the Moroccan proletariat and the ongoing Moroccan labor movement, one
confidential Protectorate report notes that the Komintern had a centre negre in Paris.202 The
organization is noted by French authorities for its propaganda work in North Africa, but to be
precise the position of its weekly paper Gringoire was against imperialist slavery not a focus
upon domestic slavery.203 Far more important than there being no evidence of this organization

202

Robert Montagne, Dir. Naissance du Proltariat Marocain Cahiers de LAfrique et LAsie

(1948-1950) (CADN). Correspondence from Gnral de Division Marquis concerned with
Black and Arab Associations in Paris. 7.21.28 (CADN).
203
Ibid.
93

being involved in Moroccan slavery; it should be noted that domestic slavery was not a feature of
the political agenda of either the Moroccan or French left and labor movements.204
A further example is seen in French imperialisms lasting security interest in the politics
and movements of the Tijniyyah sufi brotherhoods throughout North and West Africa. This
was of particular salience for Fes as it is home to the burial place of Sd 'Ahmad al-Tijn and
the continual site for West African Tijanis pilgrimage, often preceding hadj. Throughout the
Protectorate era there was regular attention to the interactions of what was categorized as
Moroccan versus Sudanese, black, and moor Tidjani.205 In this vein it was sometimes
suggested that Moroccan Tidjani were hostile toward certain black Tidjani.206 Contradicting
and partially reducing any significance of these color divisions was a larger persistent fear of
Islamic propaganda being diffused through networks of Tidjani and other West and North
African brotherhoods. In response to an analysis which tied the Tidjani of Fes to the armed
resistance against the French military pacification of southern Morocco, Michaux-Bellaire
argued that it was an exaggeration of the Fasi brotherhoods influence.207 His alternative
proposition of yet another conceptual framework intent to facilitate French interests, termed the

204

An example of the dominant currents of labor history and historiography can be found in
Ayache (1997). A survey of its historical figures and their trajectories can be found in Albert
Ayache, Ren Gallissot, Georges Oved, Maroc: Dictionnaire Biographique du Mouvement
Ouvrier Maghreb (Casablanca, Morocco: Editions EDDIF, 1998).
205
For detailed examinations of French efforts to deploy manipulative policies involving color
and Islam in West Africa see Christopher Harrison, France and Islam in West Africa, 1860-1960
(New York: Cambridge University Press, 1988), David Robinson, French 'Islamic' Policy and
Practice in Late Nineteenth-Century Senegal, The Journal of African History, (Vol. 29, No. 3
1988) and France as a Muslim Power in West Africa, Africa Today (Volume 46, Number 3/4,
Summer/Autumn 1999).
206
Rapport Sur Les Tidjaniya Marocains (n/d, no author) p.10 (CADN).
207
Michaux-Bellaire, Note Sur le Rapport de M. Bonamy, Chef du Service des Affaires
Musulmanes Au Ministere des Colonies (n/d) (CADN) p.12.
94

Saharan policy, failed to alter or diminish either of these approaches to the order.208
Concerning slavery, during the Protectorate the Tidjani brotherhood in Fes appears to have been
an occasional source of aid for individuals but no organized opposition to the trade or institution.
A minor but important niche of evidence of attitudes toward color and slavery appears in
Protectorate efforts to control representations and the movement of ideas through the official
monitoring, censuring, and banning of films. Moroccan movie theatres were understood as
potentially dangerous socio-political spaces, and there was a concern that their content serve,
compliment, or at least not contradict Protectorate ideology and interests. Official concern and
censorship was applicable to both large-scale factors and minutia. In 1940 during the Vichy
period 1940-1942, the 1937 Hollywood production Slave Ship (re-titled Le Dernier Negrier)
attracted Moroccan police attention for the annoying influence it would bring to Moroccans
through its images of ill treatments, and the hard beatings of blacks on a boat several of which
are even thrown to sea.209 Gunga Din (another film for which Faulkner wrote), was flatly
banned in 1942 and then again in 1945 for its depictions of anti-British resistance against
slavery, for the homeland.210 In a bizarre turn, in 1942 following the American-lead conquest
and subsequent military presence in Morocco, a further Hollywood production, Road to
Morocco, featured Bob Hope as a slave. The comedy was emblematic of American channels for

208

Ibid. One can find in the report of Mr. Bonamy, the same concern which made me write a
few months ago, a note on the necessity for France, to have in her possessions of West and North
Africa, which I call a Saharan Policy I foresee that we could fear to find in the Sahara, the
same competitions as those which appeared in the MediterraneanItalians in Tripolitaines and
Lybie, English in Egyptian Sudan and even in gypt, Spaniards in Rio de Oro. (Italics added).
209
Correspondance from Le Commissaire de Police Chef de la Surete Regionale, to M. le
Directeur de la Securite Publique 1.29.1940 (CADN). In the film Barton Fink (1991) the
fictional writer "W.P. Mayhew" (modeled on William Faulkner) is shown working on a
frustrating project entitled "Slave Ship.
210
Correspondence from the Mobile Police of Mazagan, to Monsieur le Directeur des affaires
politiques in Rabat, 7.8.1945 (CADN).
95

internationalizing attitudes which trivialized Morocco and dismissed slavery.211 Egyptian films
in particular were a broad persistent focal area for French security interests, raising fears of the
implicit and explicit messages and readings of pan-Arabism and nationalism.212 Despite the
efforts of Moroccan entrepreneurs (particularly Fasis) to develop a Moroccan cinema, imported
films long continued to dominate theaters.213 While asserting very different representations and
visions of the importance of Morocco, attitudes fully compatible with Hollywood racism were
evidenced in the use of blackface in Serenade a Meryem (1947), which was filmed in Fes by a
Moroccan company and funded by bourgeoisie Fasi nationalists.214 The following year, the
script for a Moroccan film La Belle Captive attracted executive Protectorate concern for its
depictions of Christian slaves in Moroccan history.215
Along with Protectorate patterns of dismissal and concealment there were also very
important efforts to manipulate and deploy blackness. One of the most popular historical
representations of the Moroccan states traditional display of authority is the monarch in
procession on horseback dressed in a white robe and accompanied by a large umbrella held by
211

See Brian Thomas Edwards, Morocco bound: United States representations of North Africa,
1920-1998 (Unpublished Ph.D. Dissertation, Yale University, 1998), which helps contextualize
the ongoing isolation and social distance which has long beset Afro-Maghribi culture and history
as well as the lives of domestic slaves and their descendents despite forms of widened exposure
and cultural exchange.
212
Jean Mothes, Contrleur Civil, Le Film Egyptian Devant Le Public Marocain, (Rabat,
3.1951) (microfim) (CADN).
213
Savvy Fasis entrepreneurs such as M. Taieb Sebti sought to Protectorat permission to create a
Moroccan film industry (Correspondence from Le Commissaire du Gouvernement, Chef du
Service du Cinema, 5.18.1945 (CADN), likely playing against concerns that As long as Egypt
will base its policy on a xenophobe and panarabe mystique, its press, its radio and its
cinematographic production will be inevitably the instruments of a propaganda, from which we
have interests of preserving our nationals. Correspondence from the Minister of Foreign Affairs
to the French Resident General in Morocco, 4.4.1945 (CADN).
214
Moulay Driss Jadi, Histoire du Cinma au Maroc: le cinma colonial (Rabat: Almajal, 2001)
p.142.
215
Correspondance from Le Commissaire du Gouvernement Chef du Service du Cinema to M. le
Directeur de LInterieur 8.27.1948. (CADN). It is unclear if the film was ever produced.
96

one of the uniformed black male slaves who flanked him. This image was first iconized and
popularized by European visual artists with a lineage including Delacroix.216
The legacy of the Abd El Boukhari and the sultans black guard took on a special
significance through the French deployment of tirailleurs sngalais. Following and
manipulating the example of Moroccan tradition Lyautey formed his own personal black guard
thus attempting to present an explicit equation of himself as a French sultan. Indeed one
function of tirailleurs sngalais was to be paraded alongside the sultans black guard during
political pageantry.217 But far more important was their historical military presence and how it
was understood and responded to.
Prior to and throughout the Protectorate West African soldiers were consistently used at
the frontline of violent conflict and control. In the Fes medina the most common visible daily
human contacts with the Protectorate was the presence of armed tirailleurs sngalais stationed
and patrolling. As noted above in the initial years of the Protectorate some Fasi domestic slave
women formed relationships with these soldiers and fled their owners. Later, the Protectorate
shipped West African women from Dakar to become wives, and a village, complete with ill-

216

See Elie Lambert, Histoire dun Tableau: LAbd er Rahman, sultan du Maroc, Hesperis
(Tome XXXIX 1952), Jennifer W Olmsted, Reinventing the protagonist: Eugene Delacroix's
representations of Arab men (Unpublished Ph.D., Dissertation, Northwestern University, 2005),
and Cynthia Jeanne Becker, Arts, gender and changing constructions of Amazigh (Berber)
identity: The Ait Khabbash of southeastern Morocco, 1930-1999 (Unpublished Ph.D.,
Dissertation, University of Wisconsin, Madison, 2000).
217
Photos in the Fonds Iconographique (the French Protectorate in Morocco section) CADN
document military marching and musical processions displaying the royal and Protectorate usage
of black guards.
97

suited vernacular architecture, was built outside the medina.218 The following excerpt of a 1911
report is relevant:
The Senegalese (tirailleurs sngalais) live at odds with the other troops and the
Moroccan population... and prefer to confine themselves in their areas, half camps, half
villages. They find in their family life an escape from the vice of the country; this reason
itself would be enough to justify the presence of their wives and their children... Thus
they form a separate colony within Morocco, inassimilable and without contact with the
outside.219
Though further research should be conducted in this area, it is apparent that these troops and
those who were resident with their families lived within colonial manipulations of their
separateness that contributed to stigmatization and contention with Moroccans. For many
Moroccans the tirailleurs sngalais became and remained a deeply resented figure, the most
blatant representative and enforcer of French interests. The most well known related incident
erupted in 1947 following an argument between two tirailleurs sngalais and an Arab prostitute
in the Bousbir district of Casablanca.220 After the two soldiers were repelled by stones from a
Moroccan crowd, they returned with fifty other heavily armed tirailleurs sngalais; several
hundred Moroccans and three Senegalese died in the subsequent bloodshed.221 The popular
denunciation and violent rejection of tirailleurs sngalais lingered, as seen in the May 1957
kidnapping of a group of tirailleurs sngalais outside of Fes, over two months after official
Moroccan Independence began.222

218

Ibid. Further scattered references to these women appear in documents and reports
concerning the regiments of tirailleurs sngalais in the Ministry of Defense, Chteau de
Vincennes.
219
Rapport au ministre sur lutilisation des troupes noires en 1910-1911. Ministry of Defense,
Chteau de Vincennes.
220
See Jean Mathieu, P. H. Maury, Abdelmajid Arrif (Introduction) Bousbir: la prostitution
Casablanca (Paris: Mditerrane, 2003), and Christelle Taraud La prostitution coloniale:
Algrie, Tunisie, Maroc, 1830-1962 (Lausanne: Payot, 2003).
221
Pennell (2000) p. 270.
222
French Army Halts Operations at Fez, New York Times. 5.9.1956 p. 10.
98

A final relevant transnational dimension of attitudes is evidenced by the irregular and

shifting approaches to slavery within international forms and organizations.223 The import of
colonialism as a necessary means of abolishing African slavery was a far more prominent feature
of the Berlin Conferences of 1884 -85 than Morocco itself.224 As noted, while the protracted
Moroccan Question lingered among expansionist European states, slavery continued in
Morocco.225 At the 1906 Algeciras Conference, held to diffuse tensions between France and
Germany over competing interests in Morocco, an appeal to improve the conditions of prisoners
and to completely abolish slavery was advanced by Sir Arthur Nicolson.226 However no
substantive interest emerged in the inclusions of the general multiparty agreement which divvied
claims to resources and territories within and beyond the control of the Moroccan state. Slavery
was again not mentioned in the 1912 Treaty of Fes which established the Protectorate, though its
first article does state that the new regime will safeguard the respect and traditional prestige of
the Sultan, the consummation of which clearly entailed slaves.227
Among the most significant efforts of the League of Nations Slavery Commission was
the 1926 convention and treaty agreement International Convention with the Object of Security

223

See Suzanne Miers, Slavery in the Twentieth Century: The Evolution of a Global Problem.
(Walnut Creek, Calif.: AltaMira, 2003).
224
See the discussion in H. L. Wesseling, trans. Arnold J. Pomerans, Divide and Rule: the
partition of Africa, 1880-1914 (New York: Praeger, 1996).
225
See F. V. Parsons, the Proposed Madrid Conference on Morocco, 1887-88 The Historical
Journal (Vol. 8, No. 1, 1965), also see the General Act of the Brussels Conference of 1889-90.
226
Gustave Wolfrom, Le Maroc: Ce quil faut en connaitre (Paris: Comite du Maroc, 1906)
pp.2, 60-61, 64, 72, 99, 148, 150, 217, 229. An early passage (p.2) in the book recounts that
Slavery is flourishing; justice is venal; the ordinary prisoners or those of war endure all kinds of
sufferings or torments. Nicolson was a British Minister in Morocco, 1895-1904.
227
Ben Mlih, (1990) p.353, Also see Protectorate Treaty Between France and Morocco
The American Journal of International Law, Vol. 6, No. 3, Supplement: Official Documents
(Jul., 1912), pp. 207-209.
99

the Abolition of Slavery and the Slave Trade.228 The following excerpt from the preamble of the
treaty is particularly relevant:
Taking into consideration the report of the Temporary Slavery Commission appointed by
the Council of the League of Nations on the 12th June, 1924;
Desiring to complete and extend the work accomplished under the Brussels Act and to
find a means of giving practical effect throughout the world to such intentions as were
expressed in regard to the slave trade and slavery by the signatories of the Convention of
Saint-Germain-en-Laye, and recognizing that it is necessary to conclude to that end more
detailed arrangements than are contained in that convention;
Considering, moreover, that it is necessary to prevent forced labor from developing into
conditions analogous to slavery;229
In addition to this new fight plainly reinforcing and expanding earlier international agreements
against slavery, the mentioned here of concern about forced labor was greatly complicated by
the realities of colonial forced labor.230 The contradictions of colonialismsuch as concurrent
projects of forced labor and abolition sharpened the dissonance between diplomatic circles
discussions of slavery and colonized peoples changing labor conditions. As Lord Lugard later
noted, the contemporary definitions and approaches to slavery were necessarily expanded; what
could not have been fully anticipated at the time was that the raison dtre of colonialism was not
expanding proportionally.231 Representative of these contradictions, one argument in support of

228

International Convention with the Object of Security the Abolition of Slavery and
the Slave Trade The American Journal of International Law, Vol. 21, No. 4, Supplement:
Official Documents. (Oct., 1927), pp. 171-179. Signed at Geneva, September 15,1926; British
ratification deposited June IS, I927.
229
Ibid. p. 171
230
New York Times 6.6.1926 p.12. Also see Frederick Cooper, Decolonization and African
Society: the Labor Question in French and British Africa (New York: Cambridge University
Press, 1996) and Conditions Analogous to Slavery: Imperialism and Free Labor Ideology in
Africa in Beyond Slavery: Explorations of Race, Labor, and Citizenship in Postemancipation
Societies (Chapel Hill: University of North Carolina Press, 2000).
231
Lord Frederick John Dealtry Lugard Slavery in All its Forms, Africa: Journal of the
International African Institute Vol. 6, No. 1 (Jan., 1933).
100

the Italian invasion of Ethiopia was that it would free and improve the lives of slaves there.232
For Morocco the dominant assumptions and attitudes concerning colonialism and slavery were
as, if not more, perverse more so than tolerating colonization as a chivalrous precondition to
helping slaves, slavery was a tolerated feature of Protectorate colonialism.
An important trait of these international shifts in orientation was the recurrent attention to
white slavery. A1904 international agreement against white slavery became the direct
precedent for the 1949 United Nations adoption of The Convention for the Suppression of the
Traffic in Persons and the Exploitation of the Prostitution of Others.233 White slavery has been
generally understood as having two meanings: the first equating prostitution with slavery, and
second addressing the slavery of non-Africans. But in our context the term is more problematic
and the political transitions it appeared within raised further meanings.234 As a reference to color
it was historically resonate with enslaved Europeans and Christians, and signified a call for
updating and redirecting international attention against forms of exploitation with the implicit
idea that black slavery had been ended.
Discussions of white slavery in which the term became synonymous with human
trafficking and prostitution brought slavery into closer association with and absorption into a
widened focus upon slavery-like forms of exploitation.235 International forums continued to

232

See Miers (2003). Slavery in Ethiopia also figured into the debate over the countries
admission in the League of Nations prior to its membership in 1923. See New York Times
7.26.1923 p.E12.
233
A close reading of the preamble suggests that a change was made in which white slavery
was rephrased from a 1921 convention, and appears to have been left out in the 1949 document.
234
See Lafuente (1999).
235
For many the next step was historical focus upon colonialism itself. It is interesting to note
that Protectorate documents detailing attention to international activism against white slavery
mention for example the Movement for Colonial Freedom apparently founded at SOAS in 1954
to campaign in Britain for the freedom of colonial subjects from political and economic
domination. Note for General Leblanc, 7.30.1955 (CADN).
101

widen and reframe their attention to slavery. The 1926 convention was followed up with a 1953
ratification and then another United Nations convention on slavery in 1956.236 In the process
several additional complex, interrelated, and overlapping currents of international political
attention fanned out to address child marriage, debt servitude, womens rights, and human rights
among others. Protectorate administrators, Moroccan slaveholders, and slaves themselves rode
through waves of changing discourse and the shifting frameworks of international politics that
hovered at an enormous remove and social distance from Fasi domestic slaves and how their
lives and those of their children gradually changed. Over time the equally remote belief of
having entered a modernity in which slavery no longer existed became an increasingly
widespread and powerful national and international status quo. Though domestic slavery neither
remained fossilized nor naturally disappeared, throughout these and many other subsequent
changes both the end of the institution and Afro-Maghribi history in general remained obscure.
Conclusion: Limits of Formal Sources
In 1930, in the context of the segregationist politics of language education in colonial Algeria,
orientalist scholar and educational administrator William Marais advanced the notion of
diglossie in an effort to describe the lived differences between formal classical Arabic and the
dialects of its speech communities.237 Diglossia offers an evocative analogy for contextualizing
the formal historical sources which have been drawn upon in reconstructing the end of slavery in
Fes. That both French and Moroccan authorities were overwhelmingly uncritical and actively
duplicitous within the ambivalence, expediency, and inaction concerning domestic slavery yet
there somehow was gradual fundamental historical change reveals a notable disjuncture.
236

Joyce A. C. Gutteridge, Supplementary Slavery Convention, 1956 The International and

Comparative Law Quarterly (Vol. 6, No. 3 Jul., 1957).
237
William Marais, La Diglossie Arabe, LEnseignement public, Revue Pdagogique, (Tome
104, No 12, 1930) pp.401-409.
102

Interpreted solely in themselves, the formal sources which this discussion has been based upon
fail to provide us with an adequate vocabulary correspondent to the consideration of relevant
changes. Rather, a sort of historical disglossia has occurred in which official formal historical
records overlie another lived historical practice and experience in incongruence; with such
formal sources being so restricted that they do not form a readily intelligible or entirely coherent
representation of a distinct past in which domestic slavery declined and ended.
A widespread historical schema concerning the end of slavery posits an anti-slavery
struggle featuring acts and movements advocating universal principals and social ideals; an
official historical climax marked by a legal declaration of abolition; and thereafter a mandated
state intervention and enforced adherence to new standards which ostensibly establish and
require former slaves freedom and equality within a post-slavery order. In our context and in
very many others this historical schema is misconceived and inaccurate. In fact, a great
paradox lies at the heart of our assessment of the historical impact of Protectorate colonialism
upon the end of slavery. Viewed from the longue dure, it appears certain that it was amid the
transformations wrought during the relatively brief Protectorate period that the slave trade and
the social institution declined, morphed and ended. However upon close investigation the
anticipated relation amongst the policies and practices of the Protectorate and these historical
shifts becomes at the very least unclear, and in some regards highly questionable.
In his analysis of Protectorate era administrative history Abdellah Ben Mlih points to the
incoherent conservatism initiated by Lyautey.238 Far beyond a single French colonists cult of

238

Ben Mlih (1990) p.143. The larger politics of preservation have been considered elsewhere
as well, see Colette Denise Apelian, Negotiating the City: Conserving Fez, Morocco during the
French Protectorate (1912--1956) (Unpublished Ph.D. Dissertation, University of California,
Los Angeles, 2005).
103

personality, particular political approaches and manipulative relationships with Moroccan

traditions, Ben Mlih strikes upon a feature resonant throughout the Protectorate as evidenced by
the political contortions of policies, practices and attitudes toward slavery. In the absence of
direct institutional challenges to the institution, formal sources interpreted in themselves go
further to help us explain the endurance of domestic slavery and the political coherence of a
calculated tolerance and conservation of slavery, than to fully illuminate relevant forces of
change. It is clear from the evidence discussed here that by all accounts the French did not end
domestic slavery in Fes, which emerged from the Protectorate as a withering social institution.
It is important to bring the full intricacy of relevant factors into interpreting how the
French directly caused or influenced a great reduction in the public slave trade. As seen in the
first section of our discussion, the French military termination of the trans-Saharan sources of the
Moroccan slave trade did not provide an expected force with which the slave trade was brought
to its demise, let alone a reverberation ending the entire institution. Limitations to supply were
responded to through other sources and means, wholly challenging the frequent assumption of a
dependency on the trans-Saharan system or exclusively Sudanese supplies of slaves. The
closing of formal markets prior to and during the Protectorate was offset by the durable and
flexible informal market. Evidence of Protectorate attitudes within direct discussions concerning
singular incidents related to slavery as well as overarching policy considerations helps
reconstruct and explain the assumptions and beliefs that were at play within the modus vivendi
of the clandestine trade, the limited design and implementation of the 1923 circular, and the
overall endurance of the institution.
In the first and second section of this chapter laws promoting slaves liberation are shown
to have been fundamentally ambiguous and to have been given negligible enforcement. Aside

104

from the absence of legal records of sale, references to slaves in Fasi legal documents do not
reveal a simple gradual decline, or feature any prominent patterns of specific responses to the
Protectorate. In fact Fasi liberations were shown to have been of a very marginal impact,
comprising less than ten percent of the total references to slaves.
The final section of this chapter shows that far from demonstrating clear support for
abolishing slavery, the varied and combined attitudes that Protectorate and Moroccan elites
maintained toward slavery and blackness surrounded ineffective policies and a non-interfering
tolerance toward Moroccan domestic slavery. Along with vague beliefs that slavery would be
outmoded by the introduction and continued exposure to modernization or European
civilization, attitudes toward Moroccan slavery and blackness within and beyond the
Protectorate functioned in an overlap and interaction with the slaveholding Fasi status quo.
Pressures from international organizations were clearly too distant to be more than generally
non-effective. In fact, far more evident than their direct impact upon slavery, examination of
these historical forces illuminates Protectorate and Fasi management of the representation of
slavery amid their widely shared interests in maintaining traditional households and power
arrangements. The intangible influence of slavery being outlawed elsewhere in the world made
its clearest impact in how the agendas and lexicons of international organizations allowed for
Moroccan domestic slavery to be reframed into lessened significance.
Clearly the transformations evident among formal authorities official dealings offer us
an inadequate means of explanation, and Colonial documents and Moroccan legal records in
themselves offer no satisfactory means for directly reconstructing this history. Among the most
important conclusions to be drawn is that absences within the evidence examined point our
attention toward probing how domestic slavery ended as Fasi households, families, and slaves

105

lives changed. Therefore core strategies of the following chapters include the further historical
contextualization of such sites of change, and attention to the oral histories of slaves,
slaveholders, and their descendents in an effort to survey and historize the salient features and
patterns of their experiences, responses and perceptions.

106

CHAPTER THREE
Fasi Domestic Slave Labor and Beyond
Despite the various motives for which the Protectorate sought to preserve Fes as a city and as a
traditional way of life, the landscape and human geography throughout Morocco was undergoing
radical transformations. Beginning in the early twentieth-century a complex unfolding of
economic changes interfaced with and forced the way for varied social changes affecting all of
the relationships which comprised Fasi households, including domestic slavery. Along with
these changes were ongoing important forms and experiences of continuity amongst slaveowning
elites which reveal influences while plainly defying any reductive, or deterministic economic
interpretation of the end of domestic slavery in Fes.
The discussion in the first section of this chapter is based upon secondary and archival
sources and focuses on the relevant contours of Moroccan and specifically Fasi economic history
during the Protectorate period and afterwards, with particular emphasis from the nineteen thirties
onward. Attention is given to a combination of relevant economic forces including increased
rural vulnerabilities and migration, as well as gendered changes in wage earning and market
access. Also considered are intricate socio-economic currents which enabled the slaveowning
Fasi elite to occupy a privileged position within which their household changes related to slaves
were both mitigated by and gradually exposed to altered generational expectations.
The second section engages with a series of oral historical themes drawn from fieldwork
interviews in a detailed reconstruction of experiences of domestic slave labor and the related
lived power relations within and external to slaveowning Fasi households. It will be shown that
slaves worked in varied domains with diverse consequences, and that the treatment of domestic
slaves was far from benign. Also there will be an examination of the personal experiences and

107

understandings of the combined continuities and changes which help characterize some of the
ambiguities related to the decline of this institution. The chapter concludes with a brief
summary.
Economic Change and Fasi Domestic Slavery
A prominent feature of twentieth-century Moroccan economic history is the resiliency of great
disparities of distribution throughout many quantitative and qualitative transformations. Though
the colonial economy did not center in Fes, Fasi family business and political interests well
beyond Fes were consistently at the center of new and consequential economic developments.
Along with Fasi business communities established extensive international footing (ex. Cairo,
Dakar, Manchester), in the early twentieth century their national presence and networks were
growing. One Protectorate report for the newly emergent United Nations asserted that in large
Moroccan towns the presidents of the chambers of commerce were nearly always of Fasi
origin.239 We now consider the concurrent processes during which Fasis became nationally
synonymous with and formative to the modernized Moroccan business elite, while life within
Fes itself endured its own distinct complex combination of forces ultimately influential to the
decline of domestic slavery.
Protectorate Era Policies and Economic Changes
Well prior to the Protectorate era the course of relevant structural economic transformations had
been laid. The 1906 Act of Algeciras enabled foreigners to purchase and own Moroccan land,
thereafter pitting large European companies and smaller scale colonizers against the strict
traditional legal limitations upon land tenure. In addition to melk (private) lands, which were
legally required to remain in cultivation and which could be bought and sold, legal designations
239

Gabriel Pallez, Les Marchands Fassis, Memoire de Stage, Section Economique et Financiere
Ecole Nationale DAdministration March 1948, p.14 microfilm (CADN).
108

of inalienable land ownership also included guich (military), arch (collective), and habous (trust)
lands.240 Immediately prior to and following the Protectorate there was a push to use Makhzan
ownership as means of commodifying land for European expansion, and all Moroccan surface
water was placed in the public domain on the pretext that collective ownership was closer to the
spirit of Islam.241 Throughout the Protectorate period Moroccan land tenure and wider property
arrangements were dealt with as a challenge to capitalist agriculture and modernizing business
enterprises, hence an entire Protectorate administrative division was dedicated to overseeing
habous property matters.242 Various means typically through direct state coordinationwere
employed to persistently maneuver around these obstacles, and the brazen self-serving
ideology that taking land meant development for the greater good of Moroccans developed and
endured.243
The initial ambitious policy plans for modernizing agriculture focused on wheat
production and the emergent fantasy that French eagerness, methods, and machinery would
revive Morocco as the ancient imperial Granary of Rome. The policy of rapidly shifting
Moroccan farming from within its precarious ecological balance to the dedicated aggressive
production of annual cereal cash crops proved disastrous. The caprices of precipitation and
prices on the world market soon revealed that far more needed to be immediately considered and
overcome than perceived native backwardness. An effort was made to absorb the enormous
costs of this policy by maintaining French subsidized artificially low prices and international
240

Charles F. Stewart, The Economy of Morocco, 1912-1962, (Cambridge: Harvard University

Press, 1964) pp.17-20.
241
Pennell (2000) p.171.
242
Joseph Luccioni Les Fondations Pieuses Habous au Maroc depuis les origins jusqua 1956
(Rabat: Imprimerie Royale, 1982).
243
Swerington (1987) pp.86-87. As Pascon (1986) notes, The surest method for land purchases
consisted, after all, of bringing into indebtedness those caids capable of occupying entire
territories through violence. p.67.
109

trade barriers, used in repeated violation of the free-market promises of the Algeciras pact.244
Also a more general base of revenue was extracted from approximately two-thirds of the
population by reinstituting and modifying the tertib to serve as a cash tax on the revenues of
Moroccan farmers.245 Wheat policy took a fatal turn when an agricultural crisis ensued
following the 1929 record overproduction of wheat in France and the subsequent 1930 triple
plague of drought, locusts, and the beginning of the world economic crisis.246 After this early
period of enthusiasm for producing the newly introduced soft-wheat for cash, from the nineteen
thirties onward there came a long term decline in cereal production which would render Morocco
a net importer of cereals by the nineteen sixties.247 An outcome of these failed pursuits was an
ongoing process of incursion through which French businesses, colons, and Moroccan elites
expanded their controls of land, water, and labor.
For the vast majority of poor Moroccan peasants contact with the schemes and forces of
modernization came to represent miserable interwoven cyclical patterns of discriminatory
taxation (often ironically imposed for not improving their land), chronic indebtedness,
unprofitable parceling onto increasingly marginal farmlands (which in turn limited the
availability and quality of grazing lands), and simultaneous rapid population increases. These
pressures that created a growing vulnerable rural population were important for slavery in two
ways. Firstly, and most directly, these dire conditions produced social and familial
vulnerabilities and disorder in which enslavements and the slave trade were maintained through
kidnapping and trafficking, particularly of children and young women to be sold as domestic
244

Swerington (1987) pp.22-24. At this time France was torn between either underwriting
colonization or French farmers. Moroccan wheat proved too dear to produce for sale on the
world market and was directly absorbed by France.
245
Stewart (1964) p.82.
246
Swerington (1987) p.25.
247
Pennell (2000) p.325.
110

slaves in urban areas. Likely the most important single example of a regional political
organization within which the slave trade continued to function was represented by Thami el
Glaoui, whose family consolidated enormous power throughout southern Morocco in the
nineteenth and early twentieth century. While Pacha of Marrakesh (1918-1956) Glaoui proved
himself to be a consummate political manipulator. Throughout his career he succeeded
notoriously in maintaining Protectorate support and amassing a veritable harem of powerful
Western allies based on his reliable provision of copious supplies of forced labor, military
assistance, political order, and luxurious hospitality.248 For poor southern Moroccans who
suffered the consequences of his crushing authoritarian rule and extensive corrupt business
activities Glaoui became a legend widely synonymous with brutality, wealth, slavery,
prostitution, and having entertained rich and famous foreigners. Many of the descendents of Fasi
domestic slaves interviewed explained their family ties to kidnappings and previous periods of
work among the Glaoui family. In several of these cases the enslaved reported their southern
region of origin, and even specific village names.249
Secondly, increased rural instabilities formed a condition leading to the basis of a
significant shift in Fasi household laborthe increased presence of poor rural children who
could fulfill many of the roles of slaves, given to Fasi households by their own parents to work
as servants for food and shelter. Though light-skinned slaves were an existent and perennial
feature of the institution, particularly associated with concubinage, several narratives confirm
that by the 1930s an important shift was evident in the increased presence of light-skinned

248

See Gavin Maxwell, Lords of the Atlas: the rise and fall of the House of Glaoua, 1893-1956
(New York, Dutton, 1966).
249
Discussed in Chapter 4.
111

daughters of sharecroppers (khamas) given to landowning patron Fasi families as servants.250

This limited but important form of migration emerged with the growth and immizeration of a
rural proletariat amid Fasi families ongoing historical domination of regional landownership.251
In generalized periods and individual circumstances of crisis, these arrangements were typically
and ostensibly made in an effort to ensure childrens basic needs. Other situations often entailed
an element of calculated interest on the part of poor rural families from the greater region,
including the promotion of financial and political favors and the possibility of a solidified
channel of alliance through their daughters possible marriage into and recognized children
within an important Fasi family.252 These household additions often arrived as very young girls
who grew up working and socialized alongside slaves within their functions, relations, and
heritage, yet remained very clearly distinguished from slaves in legal terms. For many Fasi
households the presence of these servants prefigured shifts within their domestic organization
which led to the greater reliance upon the usage of domestic servants. As will be considered, a
notable but not dominant feature of these altered patterns of domestic labor arrangements was
their gradual coincidence over the course of generations with changes in the Fasi elites
250

Examples included: Interview with Hada Sousi (Fes, March 13, 2004), Interview with Naima
(Fes, February 10, 2004), Interview with Eliza (Fes, March 15, 2004),
Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 21, 2004), Interview with Kanata (Fes, March
16, 2004), Interview with Lhsan (Fes, March 24, 2004).
251
Jean Grapinet, Etude sur les relations socials et conomique entre fassis et gens du bled
Mmoires de stage des contrleurs civil stagiaires, micorfilm 1932 pp.7-16 (CADN). Also see
La Colonisation Citadine aux Environs de Fes in Bulletin Economique du Maroc, Societe
detudes economiques et statistiques vol. I, n3 Jan, 1934, pp. 181 -182. This map notes that
population movement to Fes and the surrounding region coincided with and entailed 50% or less
Fasis land ownership by the 1930s. However this would change dramatically as elite Fasis as a
group became better positioned to purchase various forms of European owned lands, many of
whom eventually re-emerged with larger overall land holdings than prior to the Protectorate.
Paul Pascon (1986) notes this phenomenon of consolidation in the Haouz lands, and its effects
upon rural Moroccans. Also see Ren Gallisot, Le patronat europen au Maroc: action sociale,
action politique 1931-1942. (Casablanca: Eddif, 1990).
252
See Grapinet (1932) pp. 91-121.
112

traditions of household organization, which selectively incorporated elements of

modernization.
Following wheat the next sprawling Protectorate vision for agricultural policy was
modeled directly after the success of citrus and vegetable growing in California. Though the
regions share remarkably comparable typography, among the important differences were
respective irrigation capabilities. This challenge was assaulted with the promotion of plans for
over seventy years worth of colossal-scaled water projects heralded with the mission of
preventing a single drop of water from reaching the Atlantic.253 While the global depression and
WWII slowed these initiatives, a continuing net economic shift was the creation of more
peasants without land. The consequences of the 1929 crash did not begin to seriously impact the
regional Moroccan economy of Fes until 1931.254 In 1936-37 there was a famine which caused a
particular impact on migration into Fes. At this time half of Moroccan livestock died and
widespread starvation ensued, with over 500,000 Moroccans living in dependency on
Protectorate food allocations.255 Several oral histories reiterated that during this famine people
were sold to Fasi households for bread.256
Occurring simultaneous alongside changes in the socio-economic conditions of the
countryside were great general demographic changes. Inevitably the expanding rural proletariat
begat city cousins in kind, so that along with the impressive resilience aimed at retaining control
over family lands, and maintaining traditional rural communities and lifestyles came increased

253

See Swearingen (1987).

Pennell (2000) p.211 Phosphates actually began their consequential decline in 1931. Also
see Stewart (1964).
255
See Sweringen (1987) p.97 During the period 1936-37 half of Moroccan livestock perished,
starvation was widespread, a quintal of wheat became equivalent to 2 hectares of land.(p.122)
256
Examples included: Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004), Interview with
Meghadouj (Fes, January 17, 2004), Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 25, 2004).
254

113

urbanization and Protectorate fears of deracination, paired with underemployment and

unemployment. The following charts delineate major national and Fasi demographic features:257

Official Annual Population of Morocco 1921-1960

1921

3,534,116

1926

4,933,000

1931

5,404,000

1935-36

6,296,000

1945-46

8,617,387

1951-52

8,003,985

1960

11,626,232

257

Several things must be qualified about Figure 4. This data has been drawn directly from the
Population Annuiares for 1925, 1935-36, 1945-46, 1955-56, and 1965. Most Annuairies refer to
earlier data, ex. 1925 contains data from 1921; 1926 and 1931 appear in 1935-36; 1955-56 cites
data from 1951-52; and 1965 cites data from 1960. Several instances can be noted in which the
data is inaccurate, in other instances the data is distorted: 1) the first figures from 1921, 1926,
and 1931 are likely well below the reality 2) after Independence the variable being measured was
apparently changed so that the prefecture of Fes was counted in 1955-56, and the cercle of Fes in
1965. These led to distortions for 1951-52 and 1960, including the total population dropping in
1951-1952. 3) the categories of European or French, and Foreigners have been combined here as
Non-Moroccan. 4) The categories of Muslim and Israelite were used in each of these
Annuaries and have been retained here. Where statistics have been modified without explanation
in subsequent references to earlier statistics, the initial data has been cited.
114

Figure 4.
Throughout this period Casablanca and Rabat-Sale continued to rapidly outgrow Fes. In the
citys decline from the premier position of relative economic importance, Fasis retained a
disproportionately great political and cultural influence, particularly as evidenced through the
formation of the Istaqlal nationalist movement. The European presence in Fes remained
relatively limited but came to play a durable and significant though indirect and in no way
decisive role in organizational changes related to slavery in Fasi households. In 1909 there
were only 64 Europeans resident in Fes, by 1936 the total of 9,523 Europeans housed in the new
European Fes-ville built outside the medina was less than one seventh of the European
population in Casablanca. Though there cannot be an absolute econometrics of their role and
influence, it is clear that their numbers alone were disproportionate to their impact; at its height
after World War II the resident European population did not reach fifteen percent of the total

115

urban population of Fes.258 Furthermore these populations remained systematically segregated,

with Europeans living and working outside of the medina, which ensured that the clear bulk of
the Protectorates municipal energies and resources for public works, maintenance and
improvements were dedicated to their own communities.
Socioeconomic Changes in Fes
The complexities of Fasi society render the early to middle twentieth-century history of class
divisions within Fes difficult to accurately reconstruct. Some efforts to categorize a pre-colonial
or a traditional class structure feature tajiro (wholesalers), beqqala (retailers), master artisans,
apprentices and unskilled laborers.259 A substantial problem has been raised with this division
due to the lack of a clear socially or sociologically recognized or recognizable qualitative
distinction between wholesale and retail merchant families.260 Commercial fortunes greatly
fluctuated within households and families and did not consistently reproduce such stable
divisions. Furthermore, though rare, it was certainly possible for highly successful artisan
families to enter into the same elite circles as wealthy merchants.261 Many dynamic and
contingent factors interfaced with wealth in the formulation and reproduction of social status
including family origins, the religious status of shorfa (descendents of the Prophet), affiliation
with the Makhzan, being greatly learned, as well as being endowed with baraka.262 While much

258

See Gallisot (1990).

See for example Stewart (1964).
260
See Norman Cigar, Socio-Economic Structures and the Development of an Urban
Bourgeoisie in Pre-Colonial Morocco, The Maghreb Review, (6, 3-4, 1981).
261
See Stacy E. Holden, Modernizing a Moroccan Medina: Commercial and technological
innovations at the workplace of millers and butchers in Fez, 18781937 (Unpublished Ph.D.
dissertation, Boston University, 2005). Holden examines several aspects of the Fasi commercial
interface with the colonial economy.
262
See the discussion La richesse et les categories socials in Roger Le Tourneau, Fs avant le
protectorat; tude conomique et sociale d'une ville de l'occident musulman (Casablanca:
SMLE, 1949) pp. 481-494. Baraka translates literally as blessedness.
259

116

has been made of the Fasi bourgeoisie, it appears that the full heterogeneity of this grouping
including the incongruence amongst Fasi forms of social, political and economic power has
yet to be adequately described.263 A Protectorate study published in 1934 advanced the
following official estimates of the working population of Fes medina organized by class:264

Rich Class:

High Officials
Large-scale Merchants
Large-scale Landlords

50
2,000
3,000
5,050

Middle Class:

Artisans
Shop Keepers
Minor Officials
Learned Professions

30,000
5,000
3,000
500
38,500

Working Class
& Domestics:

Workers
Domestics

15,000
1,000
16,000

Table 2.
Though these are rough estimates we can still extrapolate the most general economic and social
basis within which domestic slavery was a household norm, and at least one key historical
correlation can be surmised. Based upon social practices and related forms of household
organization all of those occupation groups here termed rich class would have owned slaves,
while based upon the same criteria of household organization an overall smaller percentage of
those occupation groups termed middle class were slave owners. Again, a problem in
clarifying the likely extent of middle class slave ownership concerns the potential income
differences among artisans and shop keepers. Further attention to the economic factors
263

The herculean task of writing a clear, synthetic and comprehensive sociological history of
twentieth century Fes has neither been undertaken nor accomplished.
264
Ren Hoffherr and Roger Moris, Revenus et Niveaux de vie Indignes au Maroc, (Paris:
Socit dEtudes Economiques et Statistiques du Maroc, Librairie du Recueil Sirey, 1934). It is
certain that those here termed domestics also included slaves and their descendents.
117

particularly influencing these respective households and their practices and organization will
help us to outline the patterns influencing their historical reorganization in more detail.
A sustained measure of permanent rural to urban migration and punctuated periods of en
masse movement into Fes and other growing Moroccan urban economies forever altered the
character of life in the medina. As the rural poor faced the mounting economic pressures of the
nineteen thirties, migration levels rose proportionally. Average Moroccan family incomes were
estimated at roughly 10-25 francs per day in the late nineteen twenties and until 1929 there were
colonial concerns about a labor shortage. By 1931 when phosphate prices entered freefall and all
regional Moroccan economies had been affected, work of any sort became scarce, so that in 1935
average family daily income levels were touching 3 francs.265 For many, in addition to
possessing little to lose amid generalized and unsustainable rural poverty there were hopes of
finding relatively improved economic conditions within cities. In the nineteen thirties the wages
that those living in bidonvilles managed to earn averaged twice as high as the wages earned by
those in the countryside.266
A gradual end result of poor migrants entering into the complex conditions within Fes
during the nineteen thirties were the absorption of many of their numbers into the medina and
forms of socio-economic and urban reorganization which occurred in the process. Though
during the previous decade the Protectorate had maintained stringent building controls designed
to preserve the historical architectural integrity of the medina, there had still been a building
response to the influx of refugees from the Rif war and a famine following drought in 1926.267

265

Pennell (2000) p.222.

Ibid p.223.
267
Holden (2005) p. 203. It is also noted that habus garden properties were being turned into
housing developments. See Service des Beaux Arts et Monuments Historiques, Historique de la
266

118

Holden has advanced an interesting political interpretation of building in this period making the
case that the Protectorate deliberately sided with non-elite Fasi interests by facilitating their
access to housing as well as employment in local construction jobs.268 If such earlier measures
had begun to catch up to housing needs, during the nineteen thirties and nineteen forties this was
no longer the case. The numbers of building permits dropped, largely due to a massive decline
in the value of returns on construction, while an ever greater demand arose for housing for the
incoming poor. In 1935 though Fes was third in electricity consumption it remained sixth in
building authorizations with a mere 208 compared to the 1000 allotted for Casablanca.269 At the
same time patterns of settlement in Fes continued to differ from those of many other Moroccan
cities. While it is always difficult to measure bidonville housing and populations, it is clear that
the total percentage of the Fasi population living in bidonvilles remained among the smallest of
Moroccan cities, ranking 12th in 1948 with only 5.6% while comparable populations in higher
ranking cities climbed far into double-digits.270 Likely a strong impetus for this ongoing
heightened concentration of settlement in the Fes medina was the enduring relative advantage in
annual per capita incoming of living in a medina versus a bidonville.271 In sum, while the
Protectorate and municipal Moroccan authorities could control building they were ineffective at

Direction Generale de lInstruction Publique, des Beaux Arts, et des Antiquites, 1912-1930
(Rabat: the Protectorate, 1931).
268
Ibid pp. 200-207. It was noted that Basha Baghdadi responded notoriously harsh to these
incoming peasants. p. 203.
269
Bulletin Economique du Maroc Societe detudes economiques et statistiques (vol. II, n8 avril
1935). It should be noted of the period that there was a generalized decline in value for
construction. Ibid. (vol II, n. 9 juillet 1935) p. 218.
270
Taoufik Agoumy and Abdellatif Bencherifa, La Grande Encyclopedie Du Maroc:
Geographie Humaine (Rabat: GEP, 1988) p. 155.
271
Stewart (1964) p.143. In 1956 there was 84 dollars a year per capita income and the standard
of medina living was better than in the bidonville. It should be noted that normally all bidonville
family members worked thus forcing a growing section of urban impoverished women into the
wage economy.
119

regulating the spreading phenomenon of subdividing and subletting within Fasi houses to meet
the growing demands to accommodate the influx of poor and extended families, who often
occupied a single room.
Even though conservative and elitist Fasi families and households were extremely
resistant to social integration with rural poor newcomers, the shifting socioeconomic realties
brought by their presence came to gradually influence profound changes throughout Fasi life.
One pattern of response led to elites physically divorcing themselves from the medina, which
necessarily brought new household influences even amid preservationist impulses. In addition to
those who had resettled to further their business opportunities on the Atlantic coast, it was
recorded that in 1940 a wave of wealthy Fasis purchased homes in Fes ville. During the
instabilities of the Second World War numerous Europeans began to sell their residential and
commercial properties to wealthy Fasis who were eager to take advantage of the opportunity to
relocate their families into the European neighborhoods of Fes.272 Though by 1947 the total
Moroccan property holdings within the ville amounted to less than 30%, this precedent
established the powerful post-colonial pattern of a modernized Moroccan elite assuming for
themselves the space and forms of power of the European elite.273
To be certain a combination of factors influenced Fasi elite interest in leaving the medina.
One egregious feature of Protectorate policies of preservation was that they assumed and
justified generalized double standards which doubtlessly frustrated the elite by grouping them
along with Moroccans of all backgrounds and station. Along these lines the sound point has
been offered that,
272

A 1941 Dahir was passed in an effort to curtail this phenomenon. See Gabriel Pallez, Les
Marchands Fassis, (Memoire de Stage, Section Economique et Financiere Ecole Nationale
DAdministration March 1948) microfilm (CADN) p.18.
273
Ibid p.14,19.
120

During the course of the protectorate, the diversion of fiscal and structural resources
away from the medina toward the French quarter of the city had left the former neglected.
Electricity was inconsistent, sanitation poor, and its infrastructure had deteriorated. In
comparison, the cities throughout Morocco that has been built by the protectorate
administration for its French colons were well developed and more appealing to the
former medina residents who had the economic means to move.274
Another more grasping form of empathy is offered in the following perspective on Protectorate
urban policies:
The Ville Nouvelle of Fes was originally isolated from the Arab quarter because of
Lyauteys wish not to tamper with Moslem life. What a mockery that wish has become!
The Medina walls built by Sultans to keep out the invader can now be used by the French
to contain a hostile Arab populace whose water supply and electricity can be cut from
outside. The town can be shelled (as the French shelled Damascus). The Arab
nationalist leaders are therefore moving toward Casablanca, where no sharp divisions
exist between Arab and French quarters.275
While it is inaccurate that Arab nationalists left Fes for these strategic reasons, the authors
exaggerated claim nevertheless offers an image which is resonate both with a generalized sense
of undesirable colonial controls which became a volatile source of contention throughout
colonial North African urban relations, as well as the subsequent military conflicts leading to
Moroccan and Algerian Independence.
As land tenure and housing practices remained highly discriminatory throughout the
Protectorate period so were the wages earned by Moroccans fortunate enough have formal
employment. In 1934 average incomes for Europeans in Morocco were over three times higher
than for their counterparts in France, while these same figures represented over ten times what

274

Geoff Porter, Unwitting Actors: The Preservation of Fez's Cultural Heritage, Radical
History Review (86, 2003). p.130 The passage and article draw constructively on Janet L. AbuLughod, Rabat: urban apartheid in Morocco (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1980).
275
Robin Maugham, North African Notebook (New York: Harcourt, Brace and Company,1949)
p.66. The same author provides the following graphic image of colonial attitudes toward
medinas, (t)hus the Arabs inhabit a square box of their own making into which they can be shut
and isolated from contact with the European town. p.65.
121

Moroccans earned.276 For comparable if not identical or more arduous jobs Moroccan daily
wages were less than those made by French workers in two hours.277 While Protectorate
economists were calculating the work hours entailed in purchasing a piece of camembert or a
kilo of ham they overlooked that the majority of Moroccans scratched at the margins of bare
necessity.278 Colonial and class differences were compounded by wages lagging behind broader
inflation. As Ayache has shown, the real purchasing power of unskilled laborers failed to
increase because housing and food prices rose 33% faster than wages.279
The July 1938 Bulletin Economique du Maroc published a study of Fasis family budgets
depicting five families:
Budget 1
The household is headed by two brothers who are cloth merchants. Their household of 50
people is comprised of their wives, children, babies, and domestics.280 They own their own
house and rental properties.
Annual revenue from selling cloth 73,000 francs281
Plus from rents 18,000
(Total 91,000)
Food 50,189.50
Housing (including lighting, heating, water) 2, 400
Clothing 9,000
Divers 16,160
Total Revue 91,000
Total Expenses 77,749.50
Savings 13,250.50
Budget 2
276

Hoffherr and Moris (1934), p.64.

Ibid.
278
Tableaux Economiques du Maroc: 1915-1959 (Rabat: Royaume du Maroc, 1960) p.220.
279
Albert Ayache, Maroc des origines 1956 (Paris: Editions de l'Atelier/Editions ouvrires,
1998) p. 68
280
Again the use of domestics is an ambiguous term which would have entailed domestic
slaves and their descendents.
281
Bulletin Economique du Maroc (Rabat: July 1938) All figures are in francs. pp. 185-189.
277

122

The head of the household is a master baboush282 maker, two of his children work with him. The
household of seven people includes his wife and five children.
Annual revenue (from 300 days work) 10,950
Food 8,752
Housing (including lighting, heating, water) 1,320
Clothing 800
Divers 830
Total Revue 10,950
Total Expenses 11,702
Debt 752
Budget 3
The head of the household is a shopkeeper. The household of six people includes his wife and
four children.
Annual revenue (working 300 days for 24 francs per day) 7,200
Food 5,299.95
Housing (including lighting, heating, water) 1,320
Clothing 500
Divers 730
Total revue 7,200
Total expenses 7,849.95
Debt 649.95
Budget 4
The head of the household is a zelij (tile) worker, two sons are apprentices. The household of
seven includes his wife and five children.
Annual revenue (working 300 days for 12.50 francs per day) 3,750
Sons (working 300 days for 1.25 francs per day) 750
Total 4,500
Food 3,382,40
Housing (including lighting, heating, water) 810
Clothing 350
Divers 250
Total revue 4,500
Total expenses 4,792.40

282

Baboush are traditional Moroccan shoes.

123

Debt 292.40
Budget 5
Head of household and his wife, three children Five people in the household.
The head of the family is a textile worker. The wife does piecework on clothing for meager
earnings toward her own her personal clothing.
Annual revenue (working 300 days for 5 francs per day) 1,500
Annual assistance from neighbors 547.50
(Total 2,047.50)
Food 1,833.75
Housing (including lighting, heating, water) 630
Clothing - only from charity
Divers 50
Total revue 2,047.50
Total expenses 2,513.75
Debt 466.25
Table 3.
This remarkable study captures the economic reality that by the late nineteen-thirties four out of
five fully employed Fasi households were living in perpetual debt.283 Taking these households
as types, it stands that households of the first type would have traditionally supported domestic
slaves, while households of the second could have very rarely had slaves, and the others would
not have. Furthermore this data is suggestive of the economic circumstances and great social and
familial vulnerabilities which drove the heightened importance of wages; conditions amid which
slave and non-slave dependent domestic workers endured, and rural migrants struggled. Very
notably at the lowest end of the economy women performed skilled labor to earn money from

283

Though in a very different context Lidwien Kapteijns detailed analysis of the economic
forces experienced by Somali pastoral society in confrontation with a capitalist colonial state are
suggestive for the focus upon gendered socioeconomic currents of change examined below. See
Gender Relations and the Transformation of the Northern Somali Pastoral Tradition, The
International Journal of African Historical Studies (Vol. 28, No. 2 1995) pp. 241-259. Also see
Gallisot (1990).
124

within their own households (see Budget 5), the next level of which (which is not represented in
the above study) would be to perform unskilled tasks in others homes.
Generally tough conditions worsened with the collapse of the French economy in WWII
and a severe famine in 1942.284 Wartime inflation was devastating. Between 1938 and 1947
daily rural wages increased tenfold, but basic commodities like olive oil increased over ten times
and wages could scarcely touch the fortyfold increase in meat prices. Shoes that were 15 francs
in 1938 were 350 francs, a djellaba of 50 francs became 1,000 francs.285 These increases
continued into the 1950s. A kg of tea that sold for 28 francs in 1928 had become 817 francs in
1952.286 For the same period a kg of flour rose from 3 to 67 francs, a kg of charcoal for cooking
went from .6 to 20 francs, and a 3rd class train fare from .24 to 2.85 francs.287
Meanwhile there was an ongoing decline of artisanal production which brought other
local changes as well. Fes proved to be a more resilient crafts center than areas such as Sale
where this traditional sector was fully and permanently overwhelmed.288 However, despite the
loyal support of Protectorate marketing promotions the net effect was that policies of
preservation which failed to provide artisans with investment capitalwere intertwined
with economic decline. In 1938 200,000 pairs of the traditional Fasi mainstay of baboush were
being exported, by 1948 the total had dropped to only 13,000.289 Domestic cotton work had not
been industrialized until after WWII, and when it was the first factory centers were begun in port
cities. Even prior to the war cheap imports and the loss of foreign markets dramatically reshaped
284

Pennell (2000) pp.54-61.

Stewart (1987) p.38. A djellaba is an iconic Moroccan garment, often worn over other
clothing.
286
Tableaux Economiques du Maroc:1915-1959 (Rabat: Royaume du Maroc, 1960) p.227.
287
Ibid p.228.
288
See Kenneth L Brown, People of Sal: Tradition and Change in a Moroccan city, 1830-1930
(Manchester: Manchester University Press, 1976).
289
Pallez, (1948) p.30.
285

125

Fasi commerce; by 1936 the rise of Japanese cloth imports had undermined the livelihood of the
long established Fasi community in Manchester England forcing their return.290 These
conditions found a parallel following the war when American entrepreneurs used the
comparative strength of the dollar to purchase and flood the market with cheap textiles from
Portugal, and used clothing from the U.S. (which rose from 3,136 tons in 1952 to 5,500 tons by
1954).291
Though it has made important political contributions to Moroccan history, in many
respects the urban Moroccan proletariat was born amid other complex and often overshadowing
transformations.292 Though there was a relative rise in the percentage of the economy
represented by the total grouping of mining, industry and handicrafts (from 12% in 1936 to 23%
in 1952), several factors mitigated against this change impacting advantageously for average
Moroccans.293 Unions had not been officially legal for Europeans until 1936, and it was not until
1950 that Moroccan membership was officially permitted.294 In an interesting prelude to the
limitations of post-independence political collations it has been pointed out that many of the elite
Fasi nationalists opposed mass labor mobilizations and trade unions. Further resistance to
industrialization came from French business interests who sought to stymie competition.295
In the post-war political changes Moroccan elites continued their relationships of shared
business interests with the French, so that while Casablanca continued to supplant Fes
290

Fred Halliday, The Millet of Manchester: Arab Merchants and Cotton Trade,
British Journal of Middle Eastern Studies, (Vol. 19, No. 2., 1992).
291
Stewart (1956) p.245.
292
See Jamal Eddine Benomar, Working Class, Trade Unionism and Nationalism in Colonial
Morocco, Unpublished Ph.D. Dissertation, Birkbeck College, University of London, 1992.
293
Stewart (1964) p.127.
294
The following summarizes how the colonial logic unfolded Imprison the Moroccans and
negotiate with the French. Recognize the French and ignore the Moroccans. Recognize the
Moroccans and leave.
295
Pennell (2000) pp.198-203. A core interest was to exclude non-French capital.
126

geographically and logically, Fasis were core partisans of key industrial and political
movements.296 Also the ultimately failed political interests of preventing a deracinated urban
class led to postwar programmatic efforts to keep peasants in the countryside, which were
unsuccessful at lessening the pace or scale of migration.297 Among the most emblematic of the
socio-cultural shifts occurring in the postwar period was an increased general Moroccan
consumption of white bread, which occurred with the rise of production of white flour within the
light industry of milling, which had once reflected only a European demand.
Fasi Socioeconomic Changes and Women
An area of economic change of consequence for domestic slavery was occurring with the rise of
Moroccan women driven by necessity to become wage earning workers. In 1952 there were no
Moroccan women working in the fishing or transport industries, and very few in the mining
industry but they held a significant share of the total artisanal and manufacturing jobs and they
comprised over half of all agricultural workers.298 Though Moroccan women were not entering
into the market as small scale traders (they held less than 3,000 of the nearly 300,000 jobs in
commerce), a radical precedent had occurred in the services sector where Moroccan women fully
dominated with nearly twice as many jobs as men.299 Unable to successfully integrate
themselves into male-controlled spheres of the economy, Moroccan women increasingly thrust
themselves into earning wages from domestic labor. This overall alteration in womens wage
earning reflected several relevant and inseparable reconfigurations which influenced the
conditions within which norms shifts across generations within slaveowning households. Along
296

This apropos phrase is taken from Jacques Berque, Trans. Jean Stewart French North Africa:
the Maghrib Between Two World Wars (New York: Frederick Praeger, 1967). p.172.
297
See Swearingen (1987). In 1921 the Moroccan population was 90% rural while in 1960 it
remained 70%, whereas by the early 1990s over half of the population had become urban.
298
Pennell (2000) pp.202-203.
299
Tableaux Economiques du Maroc: 1915-1959 (Rabat: Royaume du Maroc, 1960) p.28.
127

with the uneven and exceedingly slow increase of non-slave women working in various
arrangements as wage earning domestics within slaveowning and former slaveowning
Moroccan households, there was a heightened impetus to pursue wages experienced by slaves,
their children, and dependent domestic workers within Fasi homes.
A contradiction appeared in the economic reality that the household of a Fasi male
weaver needed another 1.5 francs daily to remain solvent, while the sociopolitical reality
remained intent to be based on traditions which placed important controls upon Fasi womens
movements and dealings.300 Gradually rising numbers of household servants who earned
nothing but their keep became transitional figures in the plural senses of their roles in
intermediary historical phases in Fasi family reorganization in which traditional slavery had been
disrupted while a significant standardization of the arrangements of wage earning domestic labor
had not yet followed; as well as transitional in the sense of the structural turn-over of workers
created in this process; and finally in that the vast majority of these workers eventually would
negotiate wages. Though servants previously co-existed with slaves in Fasi households, as their
numbers notably grew from the nineteen thirties onward the organization and arrangements
within which they were procured, or reproduced, as well as within which they labored shifted.
The new surplus of unskilled female servants often formed or joined informal networks
as they tenaciously entered the emergent formal and informal wage economies within male
dominated spaces. This change was particularly resented by established Fasis (both of the elite

300

Gallisot (1990) p. 240. For example, it is noted that Unlike Moulay Youssef, who invited
female members of his family to dine with French officers, this basha sought to restrict the
public presence of women. Thus, he banned Muslim women from leaving the medina, holding
male members of their family responsible for transgressions. Bouchta Baghdadi, Le Pacha
Soldat, Vie du Pacha Si Mohammed El Baghdadi (Paris: Larose, 1936) pp. 135,157. Also
Pennell (2000) notes that in 1937 the Fasi ulama demanded that women be prohibited from
walking in the streets only in a djellaba rather than a full veil p. 233.
128

as well as less wealthy and powerful Fasis who similarly opposed these channels of social
change), for many of whom the values invested in not hiring such paid servants were equal to or
greater than economic factors. On the whole elite Fasi households and those who shared their
views and attitudes sought to maintain social segregation, even pushing for separate buses for the
poorer classes in the interwar period.301 One Protectorate report on slaves in the Moroccan
family captures something of their sentiment albeit in an awkward orientalist fashion, (t)he
Moroccan has horror of the paid servant, free of foot. It is an open door to the street. It is the
intimacy of the harem delivered to the neighbors.302 The impact of the steady growing presence
of a surplus non-slave domestic labor force took a complex and often indirect course. While the
traditional Fasi attitude of distaste and distrust for local underclass girls and women formed a
barrier to their domestic employment due to the clear preference for slaves and country girls who
had been raised and trained within their houses, the initial suspicions and reservations amongst
the local and incoming poor about working for Europeans or cautiously Europeanized
Moroccans more rapidly become immaterial with the pressing need, standardized precedence and
infectious expectations promised by wage earning.303
Slowly an important new material culture was fused with an emerging consumer culture
in which the gender of the marketplace began to radically change and reveal household, and
often generational, adjustments and renegotiations. Where Moroccan economic reorganizations
might have once seemed remote and unlikely to impact the organization and functioning of Fasi
households, they eventually became an undeniable reality. In many ways despite their image as
conservative bastions of tradition, Fasi households rapidly and steadily responded to the

301

Berque (1967) p. 168.

Note Sur Le Question Des Esclaves Dans La Famille Marocaine, n/d (BGAM) p. 5.
303
Rivet (1986) vol. 2 p. 255 notes European usage of Spanish maids in the nineteen twenties.
302

129

changing marketplace. With the modernization of transport Fasi consumption of fish rose from
57,455 kilos in 1925 to 720,033 kilos by 1930.304 During a period of access to cheaper prices the
consumption of tea and sugar rose seven and four times respectively between 1918 and 1932.305
In the nineteen thirties the local popularity of Japanese shoes was so great as to affect the
baboush market.306 After WWII a 1949 survey found that 1/3rd of Moroccans wore western
shoes, 1/5th wore western clothing and 2/5ths wore a mixture.307 By the nineteen fifties long term
shifts in material and consumer culture became increasingly evident, as noted by informants
memories of the household arrival of pressure cookers, gas canisters, and later plastic tablecloths
and refrigerators. Along with these goods there came a break from the historical monopoly held
by Fasi men and slaves concerning household shopping and errands. Slave women who had
been mobile at the time now witnessed increasing numbers of servants and mothers, wives and
daughters shopping for their families and themselves. As women were more routinely drawn out
of the house both as earners and as consumers their local monetized movements and interactions
throughout the medina and ville opened new channels of information and influenced the
renegotiation of the gendered expectations and attitudes within Fasi households.308
Post-Independence Changes and Continuities

304

Hoffherr and Moris (1934). p. 62.

Ibid p.15. See Chapter 4 of Holden (2005) for a discussion of the social expansion of meat
consumption in late precolonial Fes.
306
While historians often interpret the rising presence of Japanese products as evidence of
economic dumping from an industrial market into a center of handicrafts production, it should be
noted that these shoes were quite popular among Fasis (alongside and in spite of their iconic
baboush), suggesting an additional more complex interpretive theme entailing modernization and
consumer culture. Suggestive of this point see Berque (1967) p.176.
307
Stewart (1964) p.136.
308
For anthropological discussion of gender dynamics and the marketplace in a rural Moroccan
context see Deborah Kapchan, Gender on the Market: Moroccan Women and the Revoicing of
Tradition (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania Press, 1996).
305

130

In the decades following Independence changes in the rural proletariat and the urban
lumpenproletariat remained more consequential than those of Moroccan industrial workers.
What came to be known as the informal economy employed 69% of the Moroccan urban
working population by 1971.309 As elsewhere, in Fes this shift was inextricable from the
economic and social realities brought by the successive waves of incoming new residents and it
created a vast opening for changes into which poor women rapidly entered. Historically the food
and personal goods market was a space dominated by men and slaves, by the end of the
Protectorate era non-slave women who earned wages were increasingly entering the marketplace.
This in turn led to acceleration in the patterns of Fasi families both anticipating and responding
to these social changes by moving out of the medina and out of Fes. Concerning this movement
it is important to note a pattern of elite Fasis slave owners retaining ownership of their traditional
family homes rather than selling or even renting. Few of the family histories from interviewees
directly refer to the political shift from Fes to Rabat after the Protectorate, but frequent general
references were made to Fasi families political importance and to their long-term commercial
migration to the Atlantic coast. Slaves and their descendents sometimes accompanied these
families, and over the decades frequently remained the resident caretakers of family homes.
The limited forms of modernization amid great inequalities which characterized the
Protectorate became a great continuity following independence. To the extent that this period of
Moroccan history had been dominated by external forces, actions and decisions Fasi elites
managed to develop among the least directly encumbered of possible positions. They
maneuvered themselves to ensure benefits both from the conservative upholding of traditional
social organization while simultaneously benefiting from economic and political modernization.

309

Pennell (2000) p.329.

131

The Fasi elite produced a disproportionate amount of nationalist leaders who managed to appeal
to a range of Moroccan sentiments reflecting that France neither respected their traditional
authority via the monarchy nor was sufficiently committed to modernizing their economy. It has
been convincingly argued that the dominant political outcome of the Protectorate was an
enhanced divine right monarchy rendered modern and absolutist.310 In this process the tools,
methods and organization of the colonial state were appropriated and assimilated.311 Indeed the
post-independence systematic repression of dissidents was begun by recruiting the assistance of
French military advisors.312
The Post-Independence years allowed for shifts in the basis and symbols of elite and
royal prestige, but this reinvention did not entail a clear break from the past concerning state and
elite domestic slavery. Though it has been suggested that prestige now focused upon being a
commander of modernization, this did not preclude slavery being maintained as the increasing
exception rather than the norm.313 The available and accessible post-independence archival data
on Moroccan state slavery is limited, yet it can be noted that the second itemization on a
document detailing the French approval of Mehdi Ben Barkas palace budgets (dated nine days
prior to Mohamed Vs return from exile) is the allocation for five palace eunuchs.314 In parallel
and overlap with the Dar Makhzan, the modernizing Moroccan elite assembled and maintained

310

See Abdellah Hammoudi, Master and Disciple: The Cultural Foundations of Moroccan
Authoritarianism (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1997).
311
Ibid p.23 and Pennell (2000) p.319.
312
Pennell (2000) p.300.
313
Ibid. p.299. As Pennell points out prestige remained important but the basis of prestige
shifted to being able to control and manipulate being a devout commander of the faithful along
with being a commander of modernization.
314
Empire Cherifien, Palais Imperial, Le Protocole Cherifien, 11.7.1955 (CADN).
132

its households amid many ongoing changes, which did not encompass any definitive prohibitions
or formal programmatic measures to end slavery.315
With the transference of power the Fasi elite demonstrated their continued importance in
the economy and government.316 In the mid 1960s 14 of 18 directors of public and semi-public
finance were Fasi, nearly half of the ambassadors, and of the 108 Moroccan medical doctors
between 1969-71 53 were Fasi.317 One of the key features in this period was the reproduction of
the Moroccan privileged classes through an elite French model school system.318 Moroccan
control of economy changed little, save that Moroccans were more frequently absentee
owners.319 Though colon businesses and landholders had been initially encouraged to remain,
the vast majority left within the first decade after Independence and over half of European owned
lands were acquired by the Moroccan elite.320 The principals and visions of French agricultural
policies endured in subsequent programs such operation plough and Hassan IIs deep passion
for dam construction which soon led to the economic watershed of World Bank loans, starting in
1964.321 The political patronage system organized around rural landlords with large holdings
preempted any significant redistribution of lands.322 Meanwhile the evolution of Moroccan
population growth showed the most dramatic per decade increases yet during and following the

315

Dar Makhzan is a popular reference to the Moroccan state.

Norman Cigar, Socio-economic Structures and the Development of an Urban Bourgeoisie in
Pre-Colonial Morocco, Maghreb Review (6, no. 3-4, 1981) p.55.
317
Mohamed Salahdine, Les petits mtiers clandestins. (Casablanca: Eddif. 1988) p.191.
318
See Pierre Vermeren, La formation des lites marocaines et tunisiennes: des nationalistes aux
islamistes, 1920-2000 (Paris: Dcouverte, 2002).
319
Pennell (2000) p.346.
320
Ibid p. 327.
321
Mark I. Cohen and Lorna Hahn, Morocco: Old Land, New Nation. (London: Pall Mall, 1966).
p.186.
322
See Swearingen (1987) pp.147-185.
316

133

1960s.323 This led to an accelerated urban expansion in which the urban rich pursued objectives
remarkably similar to those of the French, opting to distance and segregate themselves from the
incoming poor. Rather than fundamentally address the economic and social causes producing
these demographic explosions they resolved to not live next to them.324
Now openly referred to in the Moroccan press as annes de plomb (years of lead),
Hassan IIs modernized monarchical reign headed the maintenance and reproduction of a
conservative socio-cultural status quo critics characterized by citing violent political repression
and human rights abuses throughout decades of economic and political problems endured by
Moroccans.325 While established families retained their importance, the newer elite were coopted through marriage.326 New modes of production, consumption and politics brought the
powerful Fasi elites full exodus from the Fes medina. Throughout the pace of these processes,
viewed from a national vantage point, Moroccan social organization, including household
organization, changed more rapidly than its political and legal order.327 As gaps widened an area
of particular importance was the increasing number of women managing to support themselves
and their families this reality would have an impact upon the most conservative guardians and
vestiges of traditional prestige society and values.
Experiences of Fasi Domestic Slave Labor and Shifting Power Relations
The slaveowning Fasi elite was a complex composite of intersecting family lineages and varied
social elements including shorfa, political elites with local connections to municipal authorities
323

Agoumy and Bencherifa (1988), p.11.

No Author, Moroccos Expanding Towns The Geographical Journal (Vol. 130 No. 1
March 1964) p.53.
325
Sometimes period has been associated with former minister of the interior Driss Al Basri, but
the king and Moroccan elite must be called into historical consideration as well. See Ignace
Dalle, Hassan II, 1961-1999, lesprance trahie (Paris: Maisonneuve et Larose, 2001).
326
Pennell (2000) p.320.
327
Ibid. p.348.
324

134

and wider Moroccan connections through the Makhzan, and a national and international business
elite.328 Informants of all backgrounds, including the descendents of slaves, attest to a very
distinct Fasi elite way of life featuring quarters of closely-knit neighbors (lhouma) and
families.329 One clear theme across the frequent nostalgia is the impact of the presence of rural
migrants upon urban traditions in general. A faqh self-employed as a religious healer whose
grandfather worked for the Makhzan and owned a family home in the Rcif area of the medina
laments the loss of communities in which every family knew each other and mutually distributed
distilled orange blossoms from their gardens,
everything became damaged. Every house became sixty residences. The village
became empty and the city full. One day I went to dour (a village) and a man told me
that twenty five families were living there, but it became empty without a single family.
Look now at Sidi Boujida, Bab Ftouh and Jnanat there are like Tokyo.330
This elitist viewpoint overstates both its point of reference and the transformation thereof very
importantly this image of ahl Fes (Fasi folk) is an historical distortion which omits the lived
realities of the majority of Fasis who lacked household gardens or related social access.
However, his statement very adequately expresses a dominant construction of ahl Fes among
even the descendents of Fasi workers and slaves, let alone among the descendents of immigrants
to Fes and further across Moroccan national culture.331 While the resentment of the impact of

328

See Roger Le Tourneau, Fs avant le protectorat; tude conomique et sociale d'une ville de
l'occident musulman (Casablanca: SMLE, 1949), Titus Burkhardt, Fez: City of Islam.
(Cambridge, UK: Islamic Texts Society, 1992), and Atlas de la Mdina de Fs (Presses
Universitaires du Mirail, 1990).
329
Some very distinct examples of a Fasi related literature which addresses or embodies
nostalgia and commemoration include Naima Lahbil Tagemouati, Dialogue en Medina
(Casablanca: Editions Le Fennec, 2001), and Mohammed Benakour, Haj Driss Benzakour
Raconte Fes (Casablanca: Publiday-Multidia, 2003).
330
Interview with El Boukhari Tijani (Fes, December 16, 2003).
331
The Fes Sacred Music Festival has become a hallmark venue for maintaining and managing
the traditional mystique and branding of the city while ignoring and even obfuscating the forces
and lived consequences entailed in its contemporary and ongoing transformations. For one of
135

outsiders and the poor is a feature of this elite-centered understanding of the past, it is further
complicated by an even broader nostalgic sense of the Fasi social fabric and associated
transcendent values having been overwhelmed and lost. As a grade school history teacher and
part-time carpenter from a prominent Fasi merchant family which experienced a generation of
decline in their fortunes noted upon reflection, for him the greatest historical loss had been the
change from the common practice of feeding beggars within the house, to giving them something
to keep them outside.332
Informants understandings of how various economic forces were historically influential
to Fasi household organization and the demise of domestic slavery were never rendered as or
associated with specific static moments. Though their approaches to the past and their lives in
this context seldom lent themselves to the verification of a precise chronological order of
simultaneously shared events, their testimonies enable the following foundational historical
reconstruction both of how Fasi slaveowning household orders functioned within, and to a far
lesser extent following, the early and middle twentieth century, as well as the examination of
relevant ways in which these households changed. In addition to the varied character of
informants perceptions about the past, the range of changes within Fasi households comprising
the end of domestic slavery did not occur within a single neatly bounded time frame.
Nevertheless many patterns and experiences of change can be clearly identified.
Fasi Domestic Slavery and the Organization of Household Work
Oral histories confirm a range of assets and income levels, and many differences among
organization and the division of labor within slaveowning Fasi households. Slavery functioned

their publications see, Nathalie Calm ed. L'esprit de Fs: en qute de sens et de beaut... (Paris:
d. du Rocher, 2004).
332
Interview with Sidi Mohamed Bennani (Fes, April 19, 2004).
136

within the broader patriarchal gendered divisions of space and labor. The distinctions of
womens spaces and their usage of space featured prominently in memories. The daughter of a
Fasi slave who grew up working alongside her mother recounts,
on shaabana (the day preceding Ramadan) we used to wear tkacht (traditional
Moroccan clothes) to put on eye powder and henna and go to the roof. We saw friends
we knew only from the roof. Men used to lower their heads with respect and decency,
not like now. They used to call ahead for women to hide themselves if they wanted to
pass, and women used to lower the curtain for men to pass through the house333
Another pointed out that in numerous very large households such as those of the Iraqi or Glaoui
family,
one house was reserved for khadim because there were so many, and they used to
marry them and treat them according to their owners conditions. The big families used
to have many abid like Dar Makhzan.334
In fact the most extensive and complex division of slave labor was the Dar Makhzan,
encompassing multiple palaces within which slaves were organized into hierarchies of command
with many specializations.335 Several informants explained how in large households such as
Mokri, work groups were organized and a there was a rotation system both in the sense of
changing tasks and in fully training slaves to be relocated as gifts to other households including
Sidna and state officials.336 If less palatial homes with multiple slaves had a gendered division

333

Interview with Fatima (Fes, January 24, 2004).

Interview with Kanata (Fes, March 16, 2004). A further example of ten female slaves in Dar
Hayoun was also mentioned.
335
Again it should be noted that the multi-location palace was comprised of and
interconnected with various elite slave owning families and households, within and beyond
Alaoui lineage, among which slaves served and were exchanged.
336
Interview with Lala MaAziza, Makaylee and Marium (Fes, March 31, 2004). It was recalled
that annual gifts of ten female slaves were given to Sidna (literally our Sidi, or the King), and
three to ministers.
334

137

for slave housing, let alone a special concern for slave housing, it was rare. In such houses
slaves were often paired together, or married and slept together.337
Hierarchies of command nearly always referred directly to the male patriarch of the
household: Sidi, with important secondary figures included senior women of the house
addressed individually as Lala, and other male family members also addressed by slaves as
Sidi. The extent to which Sidi would directly participate or observe household labor varied
across families and generations. The current head of a merchant Fasi family characterized Sidis
work as follows, (he) did not clean dishes, floors, zelij, or carry anything heavy.338 It is a
notable image that in some slaveowning Fasi households the women of the families did no
household work at all, in others they were very active, sometimes directly overseeing all of the
food preparations and cooking and participating extensively in the household cleaning and
upkeep. A dominant figure in the history of Moroccan domestic slavery was Dada, a female
who was entrusted with raising children and who was sometimes given (or acquired) the
command of authority across all household work activities. Regularly in household matters there
would be a great amount of co-operation with, and even deference to Dada. As explained,
there was respect between the slave and Lalaha (her master), the master (Lala) gave
birth to babies, and the slave looked after them. In this respect, the kitchen and the
cooking, the bread making, everything was by permission. Before the master (Sidi) left,
he asked her, what will you cook today? and she answered, this is what you should
bring us. He went with his slave and they took the basket in which they would put these
supplies, not like now, we only use baskets made of plastic. So the slave held that basket
and returned and put it in the kitchen, and the slave woman took it as she started to cook
and make bread.339

337

One informant noted there were three women and three doormen in Ben Jalloun household.
Interview with Meghadouj (Fes, January 17, 2004). Another mentioned a similar arrangement in
a Tazi household. Interview with Adbelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).
338
Interview with Fasel Shawi (Fes, April 9, 2004).
339
Interview with Meghadouj (Fes, January 17, 2004).
138

As will be discussed in the following chapter, repeated tensions of authority were played out
among husbands, wives, and household slaves particularly regarding the relations between Sidi
and a young or new slave. An aging elite Fasi woman offered a familiar scenario for these
tensions,
The old khadim used to warn her, and her Lala used to watch the new khadim and her
husband to determine whether they had a relationship between them or not, whether he
brought her to work or because he had loved her. If the Lala felt something from her
husband, she used to call the khadim and to tell her if your master asks you to bring him
something, tell him I must first tell Lala. Why? Because the power is in my hand not
in the hand of your master.340
Such oft told and repeated possible configurations of alliances and outcomes shifted in a radical
manner as slavery ended and households and familial relationships were reorganized.
Across the various kinds of domestic slave labor there were persistent gendered and
spatial divisions. Tiskhr (to do errands) was the task most mobilizing directly outside of the
house. The most common tiskhr was shopping from neighborhood shops, either for principal or
supplementary items of meat, poultry, dairy, vegetables, and spices and was done alongside Sidi
or alone.341 While few elite Fasi women would not have ever shopped alone in the first half of
the twentieth century, both slave women and men performed quotidian and special errands in
marketplaces and among households, with men bearing responsibility for and carrying the
heaviest loads and goods, including charcoal.342 Another classic daily tiskhr that included slave
women, men and children was to bring loaves of dough to be baked and retrieved from the local
ovens throughout Fes. It is important to note that for many Fasi families there was a sense of
care and discretion which went along with shopping and revealing what goods were brought into

340

Interview with Khadija Sbai (Fes, June 3, 2004).

Depending on the Fasi family and their relationships to the countryside, they may have
storerooms of many goods such as cereals, beans, olives, olive oil and honey.
342
Burckhardt (1992) p.104, mentions the limited visibility of women within Fes.
341

139

their households. As one Fasi elite notes of his grandfather, in the past not a lot of provisions
were bought at once in front of the neighbors. Because it is haram. Grandfather used to not
want the neighbors to see what was bought.343 Thus slaves served in this capacity, as described
for example in several households in which provisions were brought into the house through a
separate entrance.
Other public responsibilities varied with the organization of households, routinely
included a doorman or guardian (ashash) who was posted in front of or behind the main
household entrance. This constant task was reserved for men, and often entailed trading shifts
and being combined with many other forms of daily in-house and external labor. In numerous
households male slaves were responsible for preparing and maintaining the horses, donkeys, and
mules used for regular transport. Another frequently unisex form of work outside of the house
entailed attending, generally helping, and accompanying Sidi or Lala, for males this sometimes
entailed helping with family business matters. Both men and women were noted to have
watched their owners clothing or cleaned their bodies in the hamam, and some male slaves were
noted to have attended their masters during their prayer at a mosque.344
Within the private or family spaces of households, varying numbers of slaves participated
in and performed all of the visible and behind the scenes forms of work needed for the daily life,
holidays and special occasions of their households.345 Men, women and children greeted the
household and guests at the door and would take any clothing they wished to remove (ex.
djellaba, balra) and provide a place to sit, while conveying their arrival and if necessary
343

Interview with Fasel Shawi (Fes, April 9, 2004).

Several bitter testimonies noted slaves having been expected to watch their masters shoes
during prayer. Ex. Interview with Nordine LHalou (Fes, January 9, 2004).
345
For further discussion of the legal and cultural ideals of the Fasi family unit see Etty Terem,
The New Mi'yar of Al-Mahdi Al-Wazzani: Local interpretation of family life in late nineteenthcentury Fez, (Unpublished Ph.D. Dissertation, Harvard University, 2007).
344

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informing and seeking out their masters within or outside of the house.346 A closely related task
was the serving of meals or tea for families and their frequent flow of guests amid social
networks. Serving entailed a careful display of a households decorum and hospitality, and in
wealthy households or on special occasions this could involve protocols such as special dress, as
was remembered for a wealthy household in which black and white clothes, white khizran,
tarbush, and balra zwania; and women in caftans, were used as uniforms.347
There were four principal areas of household work which typically involved working in
conjunction with others but did not center on directly serving masters face to face. Traditional
cooking was based on intensive preparations such as cleaning through wheat and beans,
preparing the charcoal fires for cooking, and preparing meats, vegetables and dough. It was
standard that a designated woman, trained and known for her abilities oversaw the cooking. The
daughter of multiple generations of slave women recounts her grandmother in such as a role,
my mother was her assistant. My grandmother was fat and black. She used to sit and my
mother brought her everything because when those khadim got old they couldnt stand up so the
others used to help them.348 The occupation of cooking was an important slave category and
identity,
they did not marry everyone they used to buy, they used to bring her from the suq and
give her to him (Sidi). If he did not want to made sadak with her they used to call her
khadim kouzina.349
In some of the largest slaveowning houses, several khadim kouzina were specialized in a
variety of dishes and cooking styles. With the new material culture introduced during and after
346

Balra is a Moroccan shoe similar to the baboush.

Interview with Said (Fes, January 13, 2004). Khizran is a traditional garment. Tarbush refers
to a popular Fesi hat. Balra zwania here indicates that the shoes were beautiful.
348
Interview with Kanata (Fes, March 16, 2004).
349
Interview with Sanae and Kenza (Fes, June 8, 2004). Kouzina refers to kitchen. Khadim
kouzina literally means kitchen slave.
347

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Protectorate colonization such households began to have a kouzina baladiya and kouzina
roumiya.350 Cleaning was another dominant activity the majority of which was performed by
women,
every piece of marble was polished with oranges and tadka. Three fountains were
cleaned with acid and files, nowadays these things are over. During the winter the
fountains become clogged, they used to bring hot water to melt that. They cleaned using
palm branches and all the tiles were shined.351
Slaveowning houses normally enjoyed household access to the cities ample supply of running
water, which was also used to for laundry, dishes and gardening. For the gardens within the
house or its walls men dominated their constant upkeep and seasonal tasks, often performing
household odd jobs, and errands as well. A final area of household work carried out by women
was sewing, embroidery and as mentioned the regular extraction and replacement of all woolfilled mattresses and pillows.
Of the other face to face forms of slave labor often the most intense and sustained
interactions between slaves and their owners took place through childcare. Many Dadas literally
raised households of children (both Fasi elites as well as slaves children in various
circumstances) far more so than their biological mothers, including sometimes serving as wetnurse.352 Domestic slave women were frequently involved in healthcare, becoming general
healers, gynecologists, and mid-wives. Also, Fasi women sometimes maintained a personal
assistant to maintain and accompany them for example in social functions outside of the house or
in maintaining their mobility and safety in old age. In what was often broadly understood as a
form of spiritual healing and a general overlap with household entertainment, slaves were also
350

Interview with Mbark (Fes, February 6, 2004). A Moroccan and European kitchen
respectively.
351
Interview with Lala MaAziza (Fes, March 30, 2004).
352
In such situations there was an important prohibition of siblings of milk, those who had shared
a wet-nurse, later marrying.
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called upon as spiritual workers, particularly in association with the Gnawa form and its
practices. Another form of slave intimacy with their masters bodies, experienced almost
exclusively by slave women occurred through sexual relationships.353 Occasionally there were
dedicated slave chiefs whose principal functions were to boss and oversee work, but more often
such as role along with the role of training slaves was interfaced across all the above described
kinds of work. For example an obeyed Dada figure or an older preferred slave would train
younger or more recent arrivals in everything, particularly politeness while they both were
working.354
Depending on the size of a household the organization of labor could be simple, as a son
of slaves who grew up working with stated, father did the shopping as a slave, he carried the
basket. If they needed something he went and brought it for themand my mother worked
inside the house, doing the washing and housework.355 Even within clear household orders,
tasks were seldom assigned and completed discrete from one another allowing for slaves to only
be accountable for their functions alone; typically one job followed another throughout waking
hours. In this way learning all particulars of how to best serve a household frequently was a
primary socialization of children. Finally, on this subject it must be noted that in households
possessing a single slave, that soul would have faced an enormous range and burden of tasks.
The daily and weekly routines within households varied widely with their size and
character. In some Fasi homes slaves days began with waking well before dawn to light the
charcoal for heating water for Sidi and other men of the house to make their ablutions before fajr
(the first prayer). An elderly man who had spent his youth in the palace of Mohammed V noted

353

This theme is considered in Chapter 4.

Interview with Khadija Sbai (Fes, June 3, 2004).
355
Interview with Adbelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).
354

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the use of slaves as a sort of alarm clock, who would repeat Allah bless the life of Sidi while
he was sleeping until he woke from sleeping.356 In a strongly contrasting image a Fasi elite
recounts the morning particulars of the Shawi household,
In general I knew some families that when the master of the house went to pray fajr it
was the khadim who heated water for his abolition and who gave him the towel and did
everything for him, we didnt have such things in our house. My grandmother used to
wake up early in the morning, to wake all her daughters, her daughters-in-law,
everybody. She told everyone of them what she had to do, other families used to have
the khadim cook for them but not our family.357
Soon after the time of fajr breakfast and daily food preparations, particularly of bread would
begin. As the daughter of a slave recalls from her childhood,
they used to wake up at 6 am because they had to prepare harira (a traditional soup)
for breakfast, so she didnt have the time or ability to come see me, because when she
went to the kitchen she couldnt get out until she made the breakfast, the lunch and the
dinner, because the coal oven used to take a long time. So she could see you after
preparing all of the meals.358
In households with several slaves the sequence of daily errands and housework such as taking
bread to the oven, buying milk, and cleaning floors would often ensue contemporaneously with
the family being served breakfast, lunch (which was traditionally the largest meal), and lighter
evening meals. When there were few slaves or a single slave the routine pace and workload was
intensive. The daughter of a slave recounts the jugglery of her mothers daily routine,
She used to cook, make bread, clean, wash and she used to watch over the children. She
washed their bodies, changed their clothes and gave them naps, then she went to the wife
of El Caid and helped her to with her a shower and to change her clothes, and then she
went to prepare the harira, as people used to eat that a lot in those days.359
Other activities revolved around weekly schedules for example taking children to school, or
helping with the regularly running of the weeks labor within family businesses outside of the
356

Interview with Sidi Brahim (Fes, March 17, 2004).

Interview with Fasel Shawi (Fes, April 9, 2004).
358
Interview with Kanata (Fes, March 16, 2004).
359
Interview with Lala Zahra (Fes, February 7, 2004).
357

144

house (ex. as for cloth merchants), or performing special cleaning and the lighting of incense
within the house on Fridays.360
Work Conditions and Slaves Experiences
Slaves experiences and opportunities varied greatly across the range of their tasks within
daily and weekly work routines. All activities outside of the house enabled forms of social
interaction throughout the medina. Running errands and particularly shopping demanded
knowledge of various goods and standards of quality, as well as the ability to negotiate prices.
Being a guardian or doorman could allow for an awareness of neighbors lives and neighborhood
affairs, in much the same way as caring for transport animals. Slave women who accompanied
their Lala to the hamam or to another household would have had a relatively narrower scope of
external social opportunities, which nevertheless could be taken advantage of. As will be
discussed, the kinds of work within the household which slaves performed were transferred into
wage earning activities after formal and practiced slave relations had ended. For many women
who lacked external mobility during slavery the work experiences in which they acquired a
sanae (a skill or trade) within the household proved very helpful for navigating their lives
beyond slavery. Among the most highly remunerated skills was expertise and even reputation in
cooking, particularly of sought after traditional Fasi dishes. Also, having mastery of embroidery
work could provide important supplementary income as well.361 Finally, nearly all of the other
forms of regularly household labor continued to be in demand, albeit with little compensation
and growing competition.
Several forms of cyclical and periodic social events interrupted regular household
rhythms. These included feasts held during religious holidays, personal parties, weddings, and
360
361

Interview with Makaylee and Marium (Fes, April 12, 2004).

Two names of embroidery noted were elgzir and elmrama.
145

service to guests and additional family members during their extended visits. While these
changes in work patterns occasionally brought new opportunities to slaves, much more
fundamentally they meant an increase in both their workloads and the observers and evaluators
of their work and general actions. Testimonies reveal an important tension during such
occasions regarding the extent to which slaves were included as participants.362 Religious
holidays such as Eid Al Adha (Eid Kbir), Eid al Fitr (Eid Seghir), and large nightly meals during
Ramadan all demanded work which gave slaves little recognition or enjoyment and made them
particularly sensitive to the conditions of their existence. One man who grew up working in such
occasions remembers, in their feasts they bought very big sheep and enjoyed themselves eating
barbeque, and they gave us what they left behind, saying that we are just slaves.363 In other
kinds of festivities such as weddings or parities slaves participated with the permission, and
sometimes the prompting of Sidi and Lala. For example, during a party organized around a
Gnawa lila slaves might both serve and be watched dancing and during trance. During
household social events that were very lengthy, all night long, and over multiple days slaves
would often find time to communicate with one another, which could be particularly interesting
if guests were accompanied with their own slaves. A woman who grew up working in Dar
Makhzan evokes the situation,
during festivals when people were dancing and already served, we can steal a few
minutes to speak to one another, and in that time everybody can speak about his problems
if he has, or dance if he hasnt, everybody approaches this differently. For example, if I
had a problem and I met you there, I will tell you about my problem and you will tell me
yours in order to gain from our experiences, but we find two other people who were
dancing.364

362

Discussed further in Chapter 4.

Interview with Adbelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).
364
Interview with Halima (Fes, February 10, 2004).
363

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Fasi entertainingwhich some critical informants from varied backgrounds summarily

dismissed as ostentationwas a high priority, a social necessity among Fasi networks of families
closely associated with one another, or even intermarried. Mutually hosting one anothers
families for religious and non-religious occasions normally followed in informal rotation.
Weddings were major productions in themselves (entailing multiple outside professionals) and
brought many additional guests before and after.365
Another very distinct form of party in which slaves worked and were sometimes present
occurred among Fasi men only. Two women who served for and attended such occasions,
termed them parties when the wife was not home, describing there were night time parties
with wine and women.366 One informant recalled of working in these contexts in his boyhood,
slaves were not allowed to move around, only to serve and wait at the doorThere
was always wine, dancing, singing and food. They danced together with food and wine.
(Asked if he joined them?)
No. I couldnt even think about that, I didnt know how, I am telling you that we were
working and we didnt stop. I told you all that I could see from the window, I couldnt
go and stay near them or see all that dancing and how those people were sitting and
enjoying themselves.367
Interestingly, it was asserted by an older elite Fasi woman that beginning in the Protectorate era
wealthy and ambitious Fasis real obsession was how to welcome guests from foreign
countries.368 One apparent solution to entertaining foreigners was to have them served by
young slaves which could become an ambiguous offering of sexual access.369

365

Interview with Yousef (Fes, March 24, 2004). See Le Tourneaus description of neggafas
based on a spring 1945 Fasi wedding (1949).
366
Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 21, 2004).
367
Interview with Adbelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).
368
Interview with Lala Zineb (Fes, April 15, 2004).
369
Interview with Khadija Sbai (Fes, June 3, 2004).
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Throughout each of these functions guests brought changes to household dynamics and
slaves lives. The greatest opportunities for slaves that evolved from these occasions were for
cooks. For the majority of slaves these concentrated periods dealing with outsiders meant having
to work more and repeat Yes Sidi and Yes Lala to more authorities. Slaves knew that they
were under scrutiny and worked in stress we were upset during parties because there was a
lot of housework to do and we should bring everything to Sidi as quick as possible.370 Another
important aspect of what transpired in these occasions was the effort to limit the exposure of Fasi
families private matters. It was recounted that Fasi family secrets were often passed through
slaves, particularly women, thus in these occasions Fasi families watched each others slaves and
discussed their observations.371 A woman who had grown up working alongside her slave
mother and then was married to the son of a wealthy neighbor, then becoming Lala of the house
next door had seen both sides of this situation of control and noted that slaves of other
households were constantly being observed and overheard by each others masters.372
Though slaves worked and nearly always lived within the best Fasi homes, this was a
limited and uncertain reflection upon the material conditions they experienced. Very rarely
within the walls of Fasi properties there were small simple houses designated for groups of
female slaves or slave families to live in. Far lesser levels of accommodation were more
frequently experienced, such as small shared rooms including storerooms, ex. a bnika (a
storeroom for wheat).373 Sometimes such rooms that slaves occupied were intentionally isolated
and removed from main household living areas and activities. Perhaps the most repeated space
in which slaves slept was within a kitchen. Beyond this, there were a smaller number of slaves
370

Interview with Lala Zahra (Fes, Feburary 7, 2004).

Interview with Fasel Shawi (Fes, April 9, 2004).
372
Interview with Maghdouj (Fes, January 14, 2004).
373
Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).
371

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who lacked any such space at all and slept wherever they were allowed on floors, in household
corners, and by doors.
Slaves access to food and eating arrangements varied widely. As one informant
summed,
there were some with happy lives whose masters allowed them to eat in the kitchen
and they called them when they needed something. But some (slaves) stood behind them
(during their meals), and then were allowed to eat what was left leave behind.374
However, it seems that the clear dominant experience was that slaves were intended to eat the
remains from family meals. Another dominant feature of slaves related experiences concerned
the controls surrounding food access and the use of food as a control mechanism. The extent of
such efforts understandably made great impressions upon slaves. As recounted,
they didnt eat enough food, even though there was enough food. They worked and
the payment was only food, thats all Even though there was a lot of food they
preferred to throw it away over giving it to them Those people (slave owners) thought
that if we gave slaves enough food they would protest against us, so let them always be
hungry, all the time lacking everything. They thought (slave owners) that if they behave
kindly with them (slaves) and gave them enough to eat and drink they may become
powerful The slaves no, they hoped to eat and feel fine, if they slept only one night
they felt a release, since there was only suffering and hardship.375
Although such a daily management mechanism seems notably to not have been practiced in
houses with numerous exclusively female slaves or in the palace, keeping track of food and
slaves relations to it was a fundamental activity of slaveowning household management.
Within households with numerous slaves, special responsibilities over food were given to slaves.
As one perverse image illustrates,
there were slave spies reserved to watch food. They used to even watch the crumbs of
cakes or remains of meat. They stood up watching. They (owners) sent him to do that
when they wanted to laugh, or do something (in private).376
374

Interview with Halima (Fes, February 8, 2004).

Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).
376
Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 25, 2004).
375

149

In a more common situation, a Dada figure would be given the keys to a food storeroom and was
held responsible.377
While for many elite Fasi women clothing was a feature of spectacle in which they
wielded demarcations of their class status and express their personalities, for slaves in general
the sheer contrast of their clothing inscribed upon them their status. In addition to its visual
feature, aural differences ranged the span of Lalas efforts with perfume to hard working slaves
habitual body odors. Slaves access to washing their own clothes and bodies varied. Though
certain wealthy homes had hamams inside their house, slaves normally had access to these
through the same channel that they had for public baths when accompanying and helping Lala
or Sidi. In some houses, and during special events, slaves might be expected to be bathed and
provided the clothing to be well dressed, including men who served guests wearing uniformed
outfits with hats and vests.378 The daily clothing of most household slaves was hand-me-downs
and clothes of notably cheaper quality than those worn by family members. As explained from
within a relatively privileged situation,
you cant buy the clothes that you like and they brought us many clothes that we did
not like and we were obliged to wear them even if they are not our sizes. So you had to
search for someone with whom you could change your clothes to find the right size, and
sometimes they gave us old fashioned clothes and we had to take it without objection.379
Though concern with fashion and the social meanings of clothing played an important role in
slaves lives, an even more primary and persistent concern was with the bare adequacies and
cleanliness of their clothing. As was told of a slave mother, I still have that image between my

377

Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 27, 2004). Azouz mentioned a Dada figure,
possessing the most information about the household, who always ate alone.
378
Ibid. Azouz mentioned a short djellaba called djellaba makzaniya which was worn on
special occasions.
379
Interview with Halima (Fes, January 27, 2004).
150

eyes, she was wearing her clothes until they became dirty and torn.380 Similarly a childhood
experience with inadequate clothing endured across a mans life, if you had to go out in the rain
it was in that state. In that suffering I used to go out, without shoes and with ragged clothes.381
Another notable dimension of slaves relationship to clothing concerned the gifts of expensive
clothing and jewelry, particularly to women with whom there were sexual relations.382 However
normal gifts of clothes were of a far simpler nature, they gave some old clothes. You know
about the poor man, if you give him pajamas or something, he considers it a big gesture.383
Slaves and their children were well aware and frequently critical of this symbolic means of
ordering social relations,
Am I going to wear a new jabadour? I can wear only an old fashioned one which he had
thrown away because we are the children of the slaves. Or do you think that the daughter
of a slave can a wear silky dress? The female slaves who were trusted were given a
simple clothing and the slave saw her (a jairia) wearing a different quality and types of
garments because those people had no religion even if they are shorfa Alawin.384
For most slaves clothing was an inescapable and humiliating representation of the value of living
their lives in dedication to maintain the finest of Fasi households.
Beyond performed tasks and their material circumstances, many other not directly
material and non-material aspects of slaves experiences and lack thereof, defined their
conditions. Testimonies repeatedly bemoan a lack of relaxation and severe sleep deprivation, if
you sleep three nights of the week you have slept well, but you shouldnt go totally to sleep
because if you are called, then you should answer or you will be hit385 Despite common

380

Interview with Hachouma (Fes, February 9, 2004).

Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).
382
Discussed in Chapter 4.
383
Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 21, 2004).
384
Interview with Mohammed Mufid (Fes, February 15, 2004). Jabadour is a long traditional
garment.
385
Interview with Halima (Fes, January 27, 2004).
381

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expectations, during the last generations of slavery in learned or pious households slaves Islamic
training was often nominal and typically of their own initiative. As an aged slave for Dar Mokri
recounted,
I only prayed with Al-Fatiha. I cannot lie to you and say that Im not illiterateAllah
knows Mimouna and Mimouna knows Allah Si Hmad Allah bless him his soul was a
paradise in this world. He was a fair man, and didnt ever harm anyone. You know at his
death he died on the prayer carpet. He prayed, and died. He wasnt ill and he never
tortured anyone. He was good, believing in this world. I took the prayer beads from his
hand when he died.386
Informants described that slaves who prayed typically did so in the house and not next to Sidi
when he prayed in the house or when he went to a mosque. In addition to simple prayers there
was a frequent interest in pilgrimage to zawiya (Islamic schools) of the area.
Slaves seldom received any formal education, and as the importance attached to new
European-based education models grew, the chances for their children to have access did not
keep apace. In general there was a complex relationship to these new modes of learning, and
slave parents often shared in larger apprehensive social attitudes. As one woman recalls,
they used to hide us. The women would say, take my daughter to study no no. I
went to hide, hachak (excuse me) in the toilet because of the fear we used to feel. School
seemed to us like falling down a shaft, we were unable to understand and to know the
value of studies and what these studies were, when we became old we started to regret
not studying and becoming educated. We are speaking wishes. I only wish that we could
write our names387
When slaves children were able to begin their studies they faced varied challenges and seldom
could continue for long. A slaves son who briefly studied in a free French school recalled his
amazement and joy at being provided his own pencil, and his experience of disapproval from his
father who asked him if he wanted to become like the Nazareens, to which he replied the

386
387

Interview with Mimouna LMokri (Fes, April 4, 2004). Al-Fatiha

Interview with Hachouma (Fes, February 9, 2004).
152

Nazareens are human beings like us.388 Likely the most common denominator which prevented
slaves children from studying was sheer lack of support. When elite Fasi families choose to
encourage slaves children in their studies it made a great impact, however few experienced such
support. As was summed up, I didnt study and who would teach you? We didnt have even
trousers so how could they teach us? And spend money for that? And buy a book for us and
a school bag? We were living like that.389 Though far more emphasis was placed on learning
trades, few children of slaves were able to learn these, and work within the household and the
routines of slavery dominated income earning patterns after slavery. One informants mother
begged permission for her son to be able to work outside of the house to learn shoemaking, a
trade which he ironically was never able to earn an adequate living with.390
Controls and Punishments
Accounts of slaves experiences of controls and punishments offer a striking contrast to
Protectorate and patriarchal Moroccan images of a benign, voluntary, and even charitable
institution. Several informants from slaveowning families offered their knowledge of household
slave labor management philosophies and practices. These included recurring themes of paternal
manipulation, and detailed interest in monitoring slave behavior and the means and effectiveness
of physical punishments. Testimonies from former slaves and their descendents confirm these
systems of control, and their depth of impact upon lives. Informants repeatedly presented their
facial scars during explanations of household physical punishments. Painful memories of
violence, fear, and insult were often understood in the context of their depravity, vulnerability,
and dependency.

388

Interview with Mohammed Mufeed (Fes, February 15, 2004). Nazareens refer to Christians.
Interview with Ma Majoubah (Fes, January 23, 2004).
390
Interview with Sidi Mohammed (Of Moulay Abdellah) (Fes, March 22, 2004).
389

153

Slaves received many forms of reinforcement socializing them into household orders. As
one man summarized his childhood, I learned respect, to be trustworthy, and suffering.391
Strong traditions of patriarchal paternalism depicted relations with slaves as being family or
family-like. Most slaves were projected as being like children, though a notable exception was
Dada who was mother-like. Paternalist thinking downplayed abuse and fear by emphasizing
traditional norms and emotional and material bonds. The irony that in such orders gaining trust
did not ensure greater benefits was not concealed from slaves; as noted, they (slaves) were
trusted to look after his children and even wife, but they (the family) made them (slaves)
suffer.392 The general manipulative logic within these paternalist orders is given voice in the
following testimony,
they beat only those who did something bad and of course they punished the ones they
caught (escaping). They asked him why he escaped. From hunger? From nudity? Why
did he escape? It was explained to him that he was beaten for what he did. So why did
you want to escape, just to roam outside or to look for something that youre in need of.
However, you dont need anything. You have food, water, and everything good so why
escape you see?393
Slaves lived the daily reinforcement and consummation of these power relations in many ways,
among which common expectations were to kiss the hands of old, young, and even children,
and we were not allowed to call them by their names, but we were obliged to call them Lala and
Sidi.394
The dominant experiences of stress and fear emerged from many sources. Heightened
expectations within the pace, intensity, and duration of work due to a masters dissatisfaction or
a busier flow of people and activities, were described as continually stressful. Understaffed
391

Ibid. Another informant emphasized how similar values were a part of his upbringing and
sense of family. Interview with Mbark (Moulay Abdellah) (Fes, February 6, 2004).
392
Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).
393
Interview with MaAziza Mokri (Fes, April 6, 2004).
394
Interview with Mohammed Mufeed (Fes, January 6, 2004).
154

ongoing major workloads were frequently dealt with by coercing slaves to work more and for
longer hours, in describing his reasons for fleeing, the son of a slave recounts,
No I couldnt see my mother. She was still working after they went to sleep Do this,
do that. Washing A real tragedy. I am telling you that if someones heart is weak
they will not be able to see how those people were living in suffering and hardship.395
For Sidi and Lala the work demands deemed necessary for normal and special family functions
were not a site for open negotiations. While this kind authority may have been true across a
traditional hierarchy for family members in general, it was more consequential for slaves.
Though widely varied, the control of noise or all sources of sound within households are
featured in several personal narratives. This appears in a description of the daily slave life in Dar
Halou, heat the water for him to do ablution for his prayers, prepare the lunch and keep silent,
not to make noise, they always ask you to go work in the kitchen,396 and similarly with another
Sidi, he disliked noise, he disliked coming home and finding a mess, and when he used to
speak, no one could add anything, or protest against what he said, when the master spoke
everybody kept quiet, thats all.397
Threats of physical violence were another great source of daily stress and disease during
slaves work. In this regard it was noted of a slave that he, worked quickly and with fear, afraid
that something could fall down from his hands or that his master could tell him you were late or
you put it the wrong place, it means he remained afraid.398 Living and working in regular if not
constant fear often made a profound impact upon slaves mental health, a point for which the
following statement is useful for considering,

395

Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).

Interview with Rakeeah (Fes, March 22, 2004).
397
Interview with Zahra (Fes, February 7, 2004).
398
Interview with Hachouma (Fes, February 9, 2004).
396

155

I have never felt fine. I always felt fear to drop a glass, because she will slap your face,
and if you drop a spoon and pick it up quickly she will slap you She tells hey you
in the kitchen you will see what will happen to you. And even if she wont punish you,
you wait for her to hit you after or forbid you to eat dinner, or tell you that you wont
sleep in that room. But even if she wants to pardon you, I say to myself if she doesnt
punish me today she will tomorrow or the next day, and when she calls for me I feel
frightened. If some of the washing falls down she forces you to do it all again, in spite of
cold and rain, and they dont care that five women and children are doing their
washing399
Even amid forgiveness or the lack of punishment from Lala an enduring psychological and
emotional burden is present. Persistent fear led to expectations of abuse and self-policing. It is
ironic that a common rationale for intimidating and threaten slaves was to offset their supposed
tendencies toward disobedience and poor work, because the continual compacting and reliving of
daily abuse in itself became a source of distraction and absent mindedness. Stress could
contribute to accidents in kitchens causing permanent bodily damage, particularly for young
children. One informant had a large facial scar and eye damage from falling face forward into
burning coals while running too rapidly through a kitchen to serve guests as a young girl.400
Another way in which slaves children internalized fear was from repeatedly witnessing their
parents daily stress and occasions of physical punishment. As is recounted on this topic,
Listen without asking me this question Youre eating and I am standing near you.
Humans are blood and flesh, and being a slave does not mean having no feeling, no heart.
Youre eating and when you need some water you wont tell it to me directly but you will
only use a signal, and if I make any mistake you will hit me. I cant support that.
Imagine if your mother is hit in front of you, you show her using signals that you want to
speak with her but she wont answer you, she wont greet you normally and goes as
quickly as possible to do her housework. Or goes without putting her shoes or still
wearing her sleeping clothes, and she cannot rest if she does her day will be black.401

399

Interview with Halima (Fes, January 27, 2004).

Ibid.
401
Interview with Halima (Fes, February 10, 2004).
400

156

This statement is particularly revealing of how a child had been socialized into learning the fear
which determined the relative importance and reception of signals both from Sidi and herself in
the order of the household.
Another common form of control was the restriction of movement. While it can be noted
that some slave women enjoyed greater mobility outside of the house than any non-slave Fasi
elite women, all slaves mobility depended on the views and practices of their household. One
woman who continues to live in Dar Mokri where she was brought after kidnapped as a young
girl, recalls the women guardians within the house and male guardians at the door monitoring
movements in and out, I used to look out the window and speak my wishes I envied those
woman who were walking. I hoped to wear lkhancha and the kmiss and lfarajia, and I remained
hidden.402 Slaves lack of mobility was compounded by factors in addition to guardians.
Shopping and errands for those who were given such tasks, typically were expected within time
limits designed to serve the masters needs and to prevent socialization in place of household
work. Lateness in such errands was a frequent source of physical punishment. Another
limitation existed in the external social factors which slaves faced when leaving the house, as
explained based on his childhood, when a person is bought he has nowhere to go It is right
that we hoped to be free, but my father couldnt go out because he was known as a slave.403
While slaves experiences within the medina doubtlessly varied and came to have increasingly
greater consequences for their mobility, slave ownership was socially reinforced through
municipal and elite family recognition of slaves status and affiliation with a known household.

402

Interview with Makhlee (Fes, April 24, 2004). Lkhancha, kmiss and lfarajia all refer to
traditional garments.
403
Interview with Said (Fes, January 15, 2004).
157

Fear along with real and perceived threats were amplified by and based on a clear
constant monopoly of legitimate physical punishments and arbitrary violence. It should not be
assumed that there were always reasons for punishments directly related to slaves wrongdoings.
As one man noted of his childhood, we were beaten regardless, and of course sometimes we
worked badly, and sometimes things were going alright.404 Though patterns of occurrence for
violence and punishments varied highly, several historical contours can be described. Minor and
brief beatings as well as explosive acts of violence erupted within the course of daily functioning
and varied enormously. These normal acts of violence generally caused little interruption of
work or household activities and were attributed to myriad infractions or sources of displeasure.
Severe beatings and imprisonments followed what were interpreted as grave transgressions and
typically were the source of sustained displays and could create significant adjustments to
household routines. An example of when lesser beatings occurred would be when a slave was
late or met with another slave and kept talking,405 and as was explained, if he (Sidi) sent them
(slaves) to shop and they came back late, he would hit him, if his Lala asked him to do
something and he refused, she would hit him, and if the slave didnt perform their housework in
the best way, they would be beaten.406 In another personal explanation,
they hit them for nothing, you know slaves If they didnt do some housework they
would hit them and make them suffer. They hit me with different objects, they grabbed
whatever they found near them and hit me with it. I was only 13 or 14 years old a
glass, a tumbler, a bowl whatever they found they hit me with it407

404

Interview with Sidi Mohammed Marakeshi (Fes, March 18, 2004).

Interview with Fatima (Fes, January 15, 2004).
406
Interview with Meghdouj (Fes, January 17, 2004).
407
Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).
405

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While there were expectations among many informants that males received the worst forms of
beating, it is not clear from the frequency of testimonies about physical punishments of female
slaves that they received any fewer such acts of violence.
The most severe beatings and punishments followed several traditional means and were
of wider application than for slaves solely. For example, multiple beatings to the feet with the
falaka (a stick) were well known by disobedient madrasa students and many children.408 It
seems that falaka beatings, along with all beatings for slaves were often upgraded significantly in
their severity with the intension of rendering the beaten unable to walk, and thereafter to walk
and work with great pain. Other common objects used to beat slaves included camels tails,
belts, and wet ropes. There were often groups of witnesses for these beatings and slaves were
tied to ladders, the metalwork of windows, and trees for periods of time before, during, and after.
There were many personal stories of having received and witnessed such beatings and the mental
and physical damage they produced.409 Imprisonment was another very common punishment
used alone or in combination with beatings. One female informant was eager to express herself
on this matter,
Lets come back to the pain and other sufferings. One day they surprised us in the
kitchen, there were three of us eating a special food of theirs. They imprisoned us for
two days until lhadj freed us. Another day she sent me to bring her something and I lost
the money, when I returned back she beat me and it was a very hot day so I looked

408

Also noted was the use of the leather from a camels tail.
Some examples include: one informant recalled witnessing one hundred blows with to a
slaves body, who was doused with saltwater afterwards for an attempted escape. Interview with
Kanata (Fes, April 13, 2004). A descendent of slaves recounted receiving fifty hits with a rod for
being late, and one hundred hits with a wet rope for stealing money from an errand. Interview
with Sidi Mohammed (Of Moulay Abdellah) (Fes, March 22, 2004). Another noted watching
his enslaved mother beaten with a rod and a belt Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18,
2004) A son of slave owners recalled witnessing a slave punished for stealing was tied to a tree
overnight then beating with a rope that was left soaking overnight, his master then shaved his
head and rubbed salt into his scalp. Interview with Fasel Shawy (Fes, June 2, 2004).

409

159

burned because she beat me so much, my mother kept saying to my father that we had to
leave that house that she and her children couldnt keep suffering. 410
One form of imprisonment was to bind slaves, as with beatings, and a more common
imprisonment was to lock them in storerooms for long periods of time.411
Another form of physical violence to slaves bodies that was noted was burning.412
Beatings were given by slaves masters, but also by other slaves, including slaves of the
Basha who specialized in beatings.413 In addition to physical punishments, insults and
humiliations within their household, slaves were also regularly punished and beaten for
infractions by the Fes Basha.414 Severe physical punishments marked a dramatic extreme along
a continuum that was very much a part of Fasi social fabric. The logic of such beatings was
explained as follows,
you couldnt be master and not be severe if you wanted them to respect you and
execute your orders You must make others see that you can keep your respect and your
power then they will surely respect you. Honestly if you want to be a master you must,
even in spite of you, be severe. Everyone knows their limits, but the majority who dont
know their limits are khadim415
The claim and enforcement of household authority through such means, in itself reveals to the
careful observer that slaves who were seen as requiring continual severe beatings in order to

410

Interview with Mimouna (Fes, March 21, 2004).

It was mentioned that such imprisoned slaves might be given limited sustenance or
intentionally feed heavily salted food.
412
Interview with Nordine LHalou (Fes, January 9, 2004).
413
Basha Tazi and Basha Baghdadi were noted, including a slave of the latter named Atrous
who punished slaves. Interview with Khadija Sbai (Fes, June 5, 2004). Atrous was said to have
been able to render two falaka beatings simultaneously. Interview with Azouz (Fes, March 27,
2004). Other informant working for the palace noted a chief of slaves figure, responsible for
punishing groups of slaves. Interview with Halima (Fes, January 27, 2004).
El Makadem Boujamae a Rabat Makhzan slave chief.
414
One informant noted a common sentence of one hundred blows. Interview with Abdelmalik
(Fes, January 18, 2004).
415
Interview with Fasel Shawi (Fes, June 2, 2004).
411

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ensure their respect and thorough obedience were more than human historical repositories of
abuse and degradation.
It is worth noting here three other sorts of controls of slaves bodies which were also
frequently mentioned. The first was the scaring of slaves cheeks.416 The second was the usage
of a khersa (an earring) to demarcate slave status. One informant who has worn a khersa since
his infancy joked that,
the carte nationale (identity card) of those black people was al khersa. They were
obliged to wear these khersa and when we asked about the cause of wearing this thing,
they (his parents owners) told us that it is a part of our customs. But when we grew up
and left, then we started to know why417
A third form of control that introduces topics beyond our present discussion is sterilization.418
This punishment marked a persistent fear among male slaves far beyond the scope of its practice.
This research suggests that contrary to widespread belief, most acts of male slave sterilization
were not intent to produce eunuchs with the principal aim of ensuring the sexual control of
groups of women. Among most slave owners with sizable numbers of sexually separated female
slaves, trusted and powerful older slave women presided as authorities more often than eunuchs.
As one man recounts,
they cauterized the slave and made him unable to inseminate. They worried about a
relationship between him and the wife of his master. So they killed his capillary the
owner of the house could marry his khadim, that was normal. Whenever you enter into
any house you would find that Sidi could marry his khadim, but the male slave could not
marry his Lala and if there were any doubts about it they burned him.419

416

Most informants maintained that an important historical demarcation identifying slaves was
facial scaring. This topic remains unclear. Some maintain that facial scaring revealed Sudanic
origins, others hold that it was also performed by Moroccan slave owners.
417
Interview with Mohammed Mufeed (Fes, February 15, 2004).
418
Many informants note this as a well known occurrence. Three male informants maintained
that they had been sterilized, including two eunuchs who had served for Mohammed V. One
female informant testified that she had been sterilized.
419
Interview with Said (Fes, January 15, 2004).
161

This historical context suggests that the sexual control of specific slave men, as well as a more
generalized function of intimidation were the principal motives for cauterization.420
Slaves Responses
Domestic slaves responses to their conditions within household power relations concerning
work revealed their complex and varied historical agency. In this context it is particularly
important to try to understand slaves values, and to consider slaves understandings of their
lives and relationships as actions in themselves. Slaves understandings of their personal
histories, familial life histories as well as those of others reveal a deep consciousness of a
constant burden of double standards. This area of consciousness was certainly not restricted to
material conditions,
we were living in violence and fear, you are afraid to do anything. Because everybody
controls you and looks at you, so you cannot speak because your small master (the
daughter of a master) or elder master is there. Be careful because your master can come.
They control you even in the toilette, as if you have a weapon and they are afraid that
youll throw it421
Another important way in which understandings were actions and even sources of moral
empowerment concerns slaves judgments about their masters hypocrisy. As slaves were often
enlisted into the personal and illicit dealings of their masters they became observers and
participant-observersin revealing activities. As questioned, they were living in entertainment,
wine, food and enjoyment, the khadim and abd remained in hunger, but they used to eat
delights.422 In particular masters sexual activities raised criticism, speaking of childhood

420

This topic deserves further investigation, particularly concerning the largest Caids and the
Palace.
421
Interview with Lala Zohra (Fes, February 7, 2004).
422
Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 25, 2004). This interview mentioned a double
life slaves often were forced into entailing, for example eating on Ramadan and illicit affairs.
162

occasions serving jairiats at during parties, they were neither slaves nor from the family. So
why bring them there? They came and sat423
To be certain a great proportion of slaves consciousness and values were ground in
struggling with personal combinations of fear and self-control. Significantly, slaves fears could
be related to values outside of, and larger than the household domain. When asked about the
limitations of his willingness for subversion growing up working with his slave mother, we
couldnt spit or urinate in their tea and give it to them. We feared Allah and we didnt do these
bad things to them even though they were cruel to us.424 Fear was also associated with
dominant Fasi social values. As the daughter of a slave succinctly stated in explaining why she
never escaped, I couldnt, it was a big shame to escape in that period.425 Restraint and its
explanation was given great significance within the socialization of values in slaves relations
among themselves and their families. As was recounted of a fathers role,
we were not living a wonderful life. To be frank, we saw clothes that we didnt wear,
and we saw a bathroom which we didnt useWe didnt wear nice clothes or eat good
food, or have a nice life We used to sleep on the ground, we put only a lashsaira (a
simple carpet) and when they were sleeping comfortably, we were feeling very cold. We
didnt eat or live well, and when we used to see something and want it, my father used to
tell us, I am only a slave, I cant take something from his assets and give it to you. We
should keep our dignity. Sometimes we ate beans, sometimes we used to eat only
bread which they used to leave on the table. We used to steal everything we wanted and
we ran away, but our father told us that he disliked what we did because they would beat
us, and when my mother saw us in that situation she regretted being the wife of a slave.426
The tenuousness of slaves claims to a higher moral order as a form of empowerment is revealed
in this complex situation. Though his children do not obey him in his wish that they to not
disobey their master, and his wife blames her condition upon her marriage to him, this fathers

423

Interview with Hechuma (Fes, February 9, 2004).

Interview with Said (Fes, January 15, 2004).
425
Interview with Ma Mahjoubah (Fes, January 23, 2004).
426
Interview with Eliza (Fes, March 15, 2004).
424

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assertions and intentions endured as important memories and personal references beyond slavery.
More than a simple act of fear, claiming the authority of explanation why things were or were
not done was a meaningful transmission of values.
How fears were articulated and what they focused upon are revealing in and of
themselves. Often lying near the surface of apparent statements of resignation were the seeds of
complaint. When asked why her parents had not escaped, one women explained, no, though
they felt tired, were poor, and got angry because of misery and exhaustion, they had no choice,
no alternative.427 And in another contemplation of previous complacency, we were living.
We had food and water, but it was not a good thing. It was a complicated life, because the abd
remained always abd, he would be manipulated by his master because he had no ability to
speak.428 Paradoxically the recognition and mention of suffering and anger, the lack of
alternatives, and basic disempowerment were vitally important for the formulation of slaves
interests.429 Annihilating the vague, dominant images and self-images of slaves as fearful, weak
minded and ultimately existentially obedient, required overcoming fears patterned around the
lived details of household and personal orders and correspondent possible consequences. One
such element demanding recognition of and struggle with was the intimate social hierarchy
within which domestic slavery was reproduced. When asked if food could be eaten without
permission an informant noted, if I am only bringing the tray and it must be done politely, how
can I take something of theirs and eat it? Putting myself on the same level as them, Im just
abda. When asked about the meaning of level, she responded he had more money, power,

427

Interview with Hachouma (Fes, February 9, 2004).

Interview with Kanata (Fes, March 16, 2004).
429
This is not to suggest an anachronism of slaves consciousness, or to elide between slaves and
their children, but rather to assert a fuller historical recognition of a highly marginal
consciousness.
428

164

and prestige.430 In another interpretation of why parents remained in their owners house until
their death,
because there was violence and people were afraid and they could do nothing.
Because they didnt have anywhere to go, and if you went out you would be hungry and
die and you would have no clothes and they would cut your throat and no one would
know you.431
Indeed, psychologically removing enormous projections of Sidi and Lala from the center of
slaves world view and future plans required a demanding transformation.
Fears functioned with several patterns of reinforcements. Actually one of the most
powerful incarnations of slaves fears was the lack of material resources. Not having access to a
home or a sense of belonging to a home, however brutalizing it may have been was a recurrent
monumental challenge. As was recounted of parents lives,
why didnt they escape? They couldnt find anywhere to go, They didnt have anywhere
to go, only the place where they were working. They were working and the payment was
only food, no clothes, no money, nothing. They gave them only the old clothes which
their children and wives had left, and they continued living with them.432
And again in a similar context, if slaves disliked their life they couldnt say it, because they had
nowhere to live, they had no house, where could they live? Even if they went out they had
nowhere to go just to the street.433 Another aspect of the deepest fears that slaves harbored
about escape surfaced when they had no reliable source of income and no knowledge of how to
enter the economy, and even if they did, fear was entirely rational given the challenges of living
on meager wages. The daughter of a Fasi elite who owned numerous slaves explained the logic
of control that was used in this regard; asked if her father paid his slaves, she responded, they
were living in that house, they had everything they needed, clothes and food, so why will they
430

Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 25, 2004).

Interview with Lala Zohra (Fes, February 7, 2004).
432
Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).
433
Interview with Hachuma (Fes, February 9, 2004).
431

165

need money? No one used to care about money.434 In some cases, as slavery was declining the
concern with keeping money from slaves increased as a means of retention. Slaves of very
different material circumstances faced similar dependencies. In describing the regular rations
to the female slaves of Dar Mokri it was noted,
they have nothing to do with money, he used to distribute clothes, wash cloths for
bathing , herbal soaps, everything absolutely: thread, muddle. Eight kaftans, four
tchamirat, trousers and for the bathroom, used to bring it from Medina from Saudi
perfumes, toothpicks, and the eye powder, they needed absolutely nothing.435
Another woman who was raised in the same house as a child then was later freed and married,
explained, everything existed without money that is why I tell you that we dont know how to
live now.436 As was summed from the other end of the extreme, among those who had received
the least of their bare needs, I cannot lie, we ate, drank and got clothes thats all.437 Another
informant from such a background offered the philosophical consideration that, such poverty
produced ignorance and men ignored their lives and their futures.438 Interestingly, though
economic dependency remained a significant and recurrent feature in the slow pace of slaverys
decline, it was seldom, if ever, a clear isolated cause.
Other deeply related sources of reinforcement for slaves fears included perceptions of
the experiences of other slaves and their children, and varied forms of manipulation. As slavery
was in decline freedom was used to reinforce fears and dependency. As explained, some slaves
were sent out go your free but when he became hungry he said to himself I wished that I
had stayed with them.439 Similarly, even if they were beaten they used to return in spite of

434

Interview with Lala Zineb (Fes, April 15, 2004).

Interview with Mekahlee (Fes, April 12, 2004). Tchamirat are traditional garments.
436
Interview with Ma Aziza (Fes, March 30, 2004).
437
Interview with Maghdouj (Fes, January 17, 2004).
438
Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 25, 2004).
439
Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 27, 2004).
435

166

themselves, because no one would help them and let them in their house in the winter and the
cold.440 In another variation on this theme, she escaped then they brought her and beat her
like a dog and told her now go wherever you want.441 Emotional and psychological abuses and
manipulations played a prominent role in slaves lives often in combination with their intimate
and sexual relations. The scenario as explained of a slave mother, she used to do the housework
the in day and the night work in the bed of her master, was a common example.442 Silence was
an essential component in reinforcing slaves fears. When asked who had helped her throughout
her life when she had faced problems, no one directly, nobody gave me their opinion, I was just
asking my own self.443 In much the same way, when asked about coping with fear it was noted,
we lived always in fear, always Sidi or Lala called. We had to always be ready if they called
us, and replying when asked if you could speak back, no we couldnt just if we said it inside
ourselves without being heard by anyone.444 The need to overcome isolation and internalized
abuse and manipulations formed major points of struggle for slaves and their children.
Dependencies ran personally deep and temporally long, often giving the appearance and
sometimes and reality of resignation In spite of tiredness, violence and insult we used to
leave it to Allah.445 Religion aside, relationships between masters and slaves often lingered
beyond the initial parting of ways. An example is found in the following episode from the
daughter of a slaves childhood,
I fell in the gardenmy mother was in the bath and their big brothers they didnt protect
me but beat me because I was unveiled. They shouted at me and beat me and put red
pepper in my wounds... Thats all And one day I was beaten by one of them. I went
440

Interview with Fatima (Fes, January 15, 2004).

Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 25, 2004).
442
See Chapter 4.
443
Interview with Mimouna (Fes, April 4, 2004).
444
Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 25, 2004).
445
Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 27, 2004).
441

167

shopping. I was late because I stayed watching some procession and they sent a young
khadima to call me and she told them that I was watching. When I returned he took my
head and hit it against a wall. That was the reason my mother left the house, for that
event she left them
(Asked why she returned?)
She (Lala) came beseeching she told her give her to me just until my khadim returns
shes traveling I returned to her but in less than a year I went home.446
In another situation, a former slave father had transitioned to work in a local oven but left the job
to return to his former master, his son explained, they asked him to work with them once again
because they needed him to be the boss of the slaves, because he knew the strategy for the
kitchen, they wanted him to be their Caid.447
Slaves assertions of self-interest and the relevant changes among which they participated
as actors in general must be evaluated in context of the decline of slavery within an absence of
formal emancipation. No informant believed that there had been legal recourse for slaves during
its decline and transformation.448 The result of the lack of a resolute commitment among either
the Protectorate or Moroccan elites meant that in the absence of either French or sharia laws,
slaves and their children were forced to seek clear and assessable tools for their selfimprovement and liberation through other routes. It is crucial to note that while these were not
the only outcomes of slaves actions, the transformation of fears and dependencies within lives
and across generations, cumulatively and profoundly impacted social norms and the household
power relations of domestic slavery in Fes.

446

Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 25, 2004).

Interview with Mohammed Mufeed (Fes, January 6, 2004).
448
There were cases of slaves in court, particularly concerning paternity, as will be discussed in
the following chapter.
447

168

In many cases forms of disobedience became components of recurrent interactions and

changes. One woman who was the daughter of a slave and spent most of her life working in the
house where she grew up describes her refusals to work,
I was beaten for refusing to go shopping Of course I refused to do things for them
When I brought a pillow she asked me to come and put the TV in this place and then to
do the opposite. So I became tired and I refused to work, for example she asked me to
return, I need you just for two minutes, but when I came there I stayed two years! So
when she asked me to bring her pillow and come I refused and they beat me I escaped
but came backSince they used to come to me and ask me to forgive them... This is why
I used to go back with them449
A similar common way in which orders and authority were subverted was adad, doing the
opposite or contrary. As explained, yes I used to do adad to her (Lala), for example this meal
needs saffron, and I put cumin to change the flavor of the food.450 These dialogical
interactions also took place within literal conversations. A slave father was described as having
lived his life working as a slave but having grown to categorically refuse to be talked to with
bad language or to be insulted.451 Another relevant and strong ethos of survival within the
relations of household slavery was clearly stated, what is helpful there is to tell lies, you should
have neither a heart nor blood.452 Along these lines, a common form of claim-staking
disobedience which had varied results was feigned or self-induced illness, if I wanted to cheat
him I would pretend to be ill.453 But this was limited by the fact that in many households slaves
and their children were forced to work in spite of their health. Lying and the selective control of
information were similar actions to refusing work in that if perceived as deliberate and recurrent

449

Interview with Ma Mahjouba (Fes, January 20, 2004).

Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 25, 2004).
451
Ibid.
452
Interview with Halima (Fes, January 27, 2004).
453
Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 25, 2004).
450

169

they would become general sources of stigmatization and punishment, however these
consequences did not lessen their degree of incidence.
Among informants from several slaveowning families and children of slaves there was a
term and a category which described uncontrollable and gratuitously disobedient slaves Abd
Jahl.454 One elite Fasi woman defined Abd Jahl as, it is not like when we hold a grudge; it is
like a rebel camel.455 The wild and apparently mentally insane behavior of a slave described as
Abd Jahl seems to have had complex causes and results, which were not always channeled into
self-assertive disobedience; self-abuse was also a prominent feature. It is difficult to historically
interrogate this figure and related actions as purely resistance. Slaves mental health was
sometimes compromised from specific causes and incidents which they themselves strove to
identify. The daughter of a slave who have inflicted several visible knife wounds to her scalp
and arms at different points in her life explored her patterns of damage and self-damage,
a problem happened to me which I can never forget. She (Lala) gave me some
underwear and clothes to wash, and I washed them but it was raining and I left them out
and she told me I will wash you instead of the clothes. She brought a hedora (a sheep
skin rug) for me to clean the wool from, and I passed the whole night out in the corridor,
and I dont know what happened to me in that time. I cant forget that. I was still a child,
and when I ask myself why I was mentally ill? They considered me as important as a
piece of cloth, and I think that a human being has value456
One of the most widespread lens through which slaves mental health was cultural represented
and personally understood was in religious terms of spiritual possession. Though understanding
behavior as jinn possession was a phenomenon reaching across society there remains a
particularly strong connection made between black slaves and an intimacy with spirits as well as
a cultural prowess with containing and exorcising them. In a more mundane sense, these
454

Interview with Lala Zenib (Fes, April 15, 2004). For many Abd Jahl was contrasted with Abd
Tayea.
455
Interview with Khadjia Sbai (Fes, June 3, 2004).
456
Interview with Halima (Fes, January 27, 2004).
170

understandings and related coping mechanisms were historically inseparable from the controls
and stressful repetitions of slaves lives and work which doubtlessly took a great physiological
toll.
Another aspect was that slaves faced generally severe limitations in their formal religious
claims. One womans comment was emblematic of the limitations of slaves formal religious
training, they used to teach us to read Allah the merciful but I forgot that, because of
beating and shouting it ran away from my mind.457 Informants were frequently matter of fact in
understanding and sympathizing with slaves actions due to jinn. A son of slave parents
recounted from his experiences, those slaves were haunted and the majority of them were
abnormal. For example you could find one of them who always wanted to tiskhr, as if they were
the Cheik of the house.458 Another man explained of his Dada, she used to sit, Allah rest her
soul, and say Sidi but in a very rough voice and kept murmuring, I used to laugh because of
that, because she couldnt speak, then she would tell him (Sidi) what she wanted.459 And as the
daughter of a slave noted of her life,
Im mryaha (haunted) if I dont make henna from one year to another, catastrophes could
happen to me. I get nervous and feel suffocated I am not at rest in any place. Sometimes
I just want to keep wandering and if I was in a trance.460
Jinn informed repeated themes in the interpretation of slaves conditions and responses.
Particularly as slaves aged their actions were understood and sometimes tolerated as jinn
induced. Dada Zid Lkhir is among those described as old, possessed, and religiously devout,

457

Interview with Rkiah Halou (Fes, March 22, 2004).

Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 25, 2004).
459
Interview with Fasel Shawi (Fes, June 2, 2004).
460
Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 21, 2004). Henna is used here to refer to
protection rites, such as applying henna to the hands and feet but also including clothing and
other activites.
458

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she was always praying at Moulaay Idriss. She often used to burn the foodshe was sent on
pilgrimage and disappeared.461 Yet dramatic and violent expressions of either self-assertion or
self-abuse certainly did not ensure freedom. This point is well illustrated by an extreme and
perverse case in which a young abda who in attempting to kill herself was stopped by her Lala,
and in the ensuing aftermath the abda was punished and threatened to the point that she begged
Lala not to tell Sidi of her suicide attempt for fear that he would kill her.462
Escapes and what over the course of internal and external changes to slaveowning
households might best be termed final departures were nearly always of individuals, who in
some cases established themselves and returned for family members. A prototypical example is
as follows, I escaped because I got fed up with those people, I was living with them in very bad
conditions. I used to work night and day looking after their children and when got tired I
escaped from their villa while they were sleeping.463 It is significant to note that while escapes
and final departures likely increased as slavery declined, slave escapes were as old as the
institution. Escapees ranged across ages, genders, and conditions. It was recalled how for some
newly enslaved children the initiative for change was taken personally and immediately,
They used to bring them from the Souss. They stole them from their parents still young
and they to offer them as a gift to Caids and Bashas and the King. When they entered
into the Bashas house they used to feel suffocated and they couldnt be assimilated
quickly. There were those who used to stay until she found out how to escape and there
were those who were satisfied, who stayed as they became familiarized464
In one case a woman also of Sousi origins explained how a grandmother had endured tamara
until she at last escaped.465 Apparently her grandmothers work experiences outside of the house

461

Interview with Ma Aziza (Fes, March 30, 2004).

I Interview with Rkiah Halou (Fes, April 14, 2004).
463
Interview with Eliza (Fes, March 15, 2004).
464
Interview with Mekhlee (Fes, April 12, 2004).
465
Interview with Hada Sousi (Fes, March 13, 2004).
462

172

had sufficiently encouraged her through her contacts with people and general knowledge of how
things worked. She left the house, then later got married to a donut seller and was able to find
work housecleaning with a foreign family.466 Having family members establish the precedent of
escaping set patterns of other family members following in their lead. The son of a slave
recalled how several of his brothers had successfully fled Dar Halou, and he followed suit,
eventually finding his way into the military. He noted of their escapes, when we grew up and
became more knowledgeable we left and then brought our father with us.467 The period of time
between such transitions could be lengthy and very difficult, as explained from the following
narrative featuring an escape and the retrieval of a parent,
They were really busy. It was extremely hard. I was born and remained like that, my
brother had left. I couldnt bear that hard life, all that suffering and hardship. I was
living in very bad conditions. My family too. You work as hard as you can and you are
living without any purpose. You work only to get some food, you have neither money
nor clothes and their children were brought new clothes and I was without shoes or
clothing, only with ragged clothes This was all we had I dont want another human
being to live in the same conditions in which I lived I stayed fifteen or sixteen years in
that misery, then I left and my mother stayed there. I went to see her and I found her in
that hardship, she and my father were suffering, they gave them only the food which they
left, they considered them as dogs. They considered them as things, and they continued
living there as slaves. I left and I continued to see them from time to time and when I
was 27 years old I found out that my father had died and my mother was still alive. They
made her suffer, she became an old woman and I took her with me I was working
wherever I could I carried things, in building construction. I remained in suffering and
time passed I took my mother and rented a small place
(Asked if his visits to his mother were known and permitted by the family?)
No when I went to see my mother they didnt see me. I entered quickly, I saw her and I
went out, until I was 27 years old by then she had no health, she couldnt work, she
became an old woman, she couldnt do housework
(Asked if she was given to him voluntarily?)

466
467

Ibid. at Dar Dbibr.

Interview with Nordine Halou (Fes, January 9, 2004).
173

They refused so I went at quarter to four in the morning when they were sleeping. I
took her and I went, I had already rented a place for her, so we went to our home and
continued to live.
Asked if she was then happy, she was living in El Khir (ease and luxury) even if it is a small
one, you feel that living in calm, nobody insults you or hits you or orders you to do something,
nothing.468
An important aspect of the decline of slavery was that slave owners came to vary
significantly in how proactive they were and eventually could be, in seeking the return of their
escaped slaves.469 Thousands of Fasi domestic slaves found themselves in the enduring
historical transition in which bureaucrats in Paris or Rabat asserted their supposed rights to
demand their freedom and that their slavery was voluntary, yet in the lived realities of slaves
and their children any knowledge of such reforms was extraordinarily rare, and in practice
escaped slaves could be actively pursued and severely punished by Fasi elite families and the
closely tied municipal authorities. As was pointed out, characteristic of the maintenance of
slavery throughout this transition, if an escaped slave was known to be working for another
family, formal legal recourse through law and courts would be highly unlikely, however formal
legal figures and powerful Fasi men could be involved, and to some extent as a matter of pride,
very likely the family employing the former slave would be asked to compensate the escaped
slaves owners.470 Many slaves and their children were sensitive to these factors in addition to
household conditions in executing their escapes and final departures.
Oral research revealed one apparently exceptional instance repeated by several children
of slaves, of a group of slave men acting collectively to leave their owners households and move
468

Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).

Both Bacha Baddadi and Tazi were described as being very strict in punishing runaway
slaves.
470
Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).
469

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into makeshift or inexpensive housing outside the medina. In keeping with the often ambiguous
world of power relations within which slaves had to assert themselves there are two very
distinction versions of what might be called the escape to Bab el Ftouh.471 An example of the
first version is as follows:
A group of slaves gathered and escaped to Bab el Ftouh because they were fed up with
being beaten and tortured. They took some bread and El Khlia with them and they
decided that if someone would come to them they would kill him. But they started to feel
hungry and they gave up and they turned back to their masters. Nearly eighty years
ago
(Asked if they were forced to return by being beaten?)
No. A Fasi man went to those slaves and told them that he wanted to speak to his slaves.
At that moment some of them said that they would kill him and that others said that they
would beat him, but one of them told them, we wouldnt kill him or beat him but we
wouldnt let him speak to his slave. And when his slave went to the Fasi man he was
asked, Have I ever done something bad to you? He answered him no. So he took him
with him and then each Fasi (owner) went there and brought his slave without any use of
violence.472
In the second version, there were many slaves and a small household of masters:
and when the slaves protested they left and went to Bab el Ftouh where there were
some brarek (small rental rooms). So they lived there, according to what was said they
paid 1000 franc (10 dirhams) per month and they went and continued living there. Those
people said it is better to be under the rain and become wet sitting in the street than to
stay in that place with those people, where they were living
(When asked about the other version of the story?)
No they didnt turn back or return There was nearly twenty or twenty five people and
they ran away and rented brarek in Bab El Ftouh.
(Again asked about the other version?)
No I am telling you what my parents told me about them They left without returning
They said it was better for them to stay in those brarek than living in that hardship with
those people, since now they work and get money. But they gave them nothing they
471

It is unclear when the collective action took place. No verifying records were found in the
course of this research.
472
Interview with Said (Fes, January 15, 2004).
175

worked and the payment was only food thats all working for food, only to eat and drink.
And a small quantity of food.. even though there was a lot of food, they preferred
throwing it away than giving it to them473
Despite their great differences, both versions reflect historical shifts that were occurring in
slaves abilities to negotiation the power relations of Fasi households. In fact these opposed
versions illustrate a core tension regarding the expectations and limitations of control slaves
encountered throughout the decline of the slavery.
Sources and Patterns of Household Change
An important pattern of an awkward status came to emerge as a dominant experience for the
majority of children of slaves. Though its periodization was related to individual personal and
family histories and not a singularly identifiable social historical moment, the cumulative picture
derived from all sources suggests that after independence the scale of Fasi household changes
was sufficient to have become a major social force in itself through which the children of slaves
were generally exposed to strong sources of encouragement to change their conditions. Many
informants suggest that they entered lives beyond their parents owners households feeling
neither enslaved nor free. In an expression of this status, a son of slaves shared in the
consequences of his escape when he was still a young man. He explained of his ability to
voluntarily return,
because I was not sold to them, but it was my mother and my father who were sold to
them. And during the period in which I was with them, there were no slave suq
Because I was their son and I was obliged to obey them (his parents), and their children
(the owners) grew up and became open-minded... But when I returned there and I didnt
find my mother I went away.474

473

Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).

Interview with Said (Fes, January 15, 2004). Other informants also discuss their non-free
social status, Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 27, 2004).

474

176

Upon his return he was pained to learn that his mother had remained working there until her
death during his absence.
A source producing major changes in household organization, including the influencing
of shifts in which the children of slaves grew up and lived in a transitional non-free status
occurred with elite Fasi moves to greater economic centers. Such reorganizations often occurred
following deaths and sometimes marriages. The most frequent locations were Casablanca and
Rabat, although Europe was often noted.475 One Fasi elite woman who had spent her life
involved with and observing consequences of such transitions noted that Fasi families were often
reluctant to sell family homes and suggested that in major household transitions which effected
slaves, personal bonds rather than those of property shaped how relocations occurred. Along
these lines it was suggested that a Dada may be taken to live with those she raised.476 These
transitions produced a tradition of having slaves and their children live continue to live in a large
unoccupied home as resident caretakers. Even in these situations many Fasi families would
attempt to prohibit, with limited effectiveness, the children of slaves working outside of the
house.477 Patterns of contention could arise when Fasi families sought to impose what they
viewed as customary duties of cooking and serving them when they visited, sent guests, or even
expected travel to and work during family functions outside of Fes. In some situations slaves
and their children who had remained in Fes were no longer in contact with the current owners,
now there are only their grandsons who have studied and live far from here. Now the house is
empty and closedThe old ones died and the younger ones who took over the responsibilities

475

Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 25, 2004), Interview with Kanata (Fes, March
16, 2004).
476
Interview with Khadija Sbai (Fes, June 5, 2004). Dadas are further discussed in Chapter 4.
477
Interview with Rachida (Fes, January 3, 2004).
177

did nothing.478 Even more dramatically, family houses were sold and full breaks were made
from earlier ways of life. One daughter of slaves explained of her relations with her parents
owners, the majority of them are abroadthe old ones have died and Dar Makaren the house
was bought by Ben Jalloun to make a building, but the Makhzan forbade him, and when
asked if she still meet the other children of slaves from the household, Yes I still meet them,
they are married too and Allah is merciful and generous.479
Another major source of household reorganization affecting the lives of slaves and their
children was changes in values and attitudes across generations. When an owner died his son
might offer his fathers slaves their freedom,480 or the child of slaveowning parents might be
found to be less violent and insulting.481 However, the continuities within these changes
should not be deemphasized. The social distances of slavery were generally preserved. One
woman gives her impression of meeting and serving the modernized wives of nephews who
inherited control of the house her slave mother and her lived in, those who had that arrogance
and that pride of origin No one can touch her Cigarettes, elegance, and pride. A very high
style. If you want to greet them you cant touch their faces only their hands.482 One woman
explains how the transformations affected her family life,
those old rich people died. Their nephews became modern people so they didnt want
the abid and the young girls anymore They used to laugh at us, they used to tell from
time to time you have to go to Rabat you have to go to Casablanca You have to work
with these people My grandmother and mother had become old and I was pregnant so
we left that house and took our gold with us. At that time the gold didnt have a big
importance for us, we sold it all and spent all of it We made no future for our lives
She (her daughter) is khadim of some people of that family. They took her I have no

478

Interview with Ma Mahjouba (Fes, January 23, 2004).

Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 25, 2004).
480
Interview with Rkiah (Fes, January 11, 2004).
481
Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 27, 2004).
482
Interview with Fatima (Fes, February 8, 2004).
479

178

money for her to study. Better to give her as khadim than to be lost, both her and me, in
the street483
In another very different situation a slave decided to continue living in her masters house,
when Hadj Mokri died then his sons offered to help us get married I told him that I
didnt want to get married and so I remained jaria with his son We were in Rabat or
Tanga or in Fes. We had food. We used to laugh to enjoy ourselves thanks to Allah. I
was never in need until this day. They died, there only remains me Im waiting for my
hour484
Though both of the previous testimonies represent exceptional extremes, they mutually share in
representing the experiences of continuities beyond slavery took many very distinct forms.
Generational changes among slaves were directly consequential as well. A slaves son
challenged the limitations of his fathers life,
I ran away because I wanted to be free and see the beauty of the world around me. I did
not like to grow old there like them, I mean not to know anything about what is
happening in the streets even what they looked like. For example like my father who had
not seen Boujloud in 4 years because he went out only to do some shopping485
A man who lost his mother while he had fled, was asked which he resented more his suffering
following slavery or his life with the son of his parents owner. He responded, I could bear the
hardships of the street but not of El Iraqi. I hated him because he burnt and beat me. I was
rudely controlled.486 With generational changes parents lives were not always static and could
change beyond previous limitations as well. In one case the daughter of a slave married into the
elite Fasi family next door and requested that her mother be allowed to come as well. Using the
opportunity to pursue her own life the mother left either family and rented a small room
eventually becoming a professional midwife, healer, and washer of dead bodies, it was said that,

483

Interview with Kanata (Fes, March 16, 2004).

Interview with Om Kalthum Mokri (Fes, April 19, 2004).
485
Interview with Mohammed Mufeed (Fes, January 6, 2004).
486
Interview with Said (Fes, January 15, 2004).
484

179

she was better off alone because she did no house work, no washing, no hardship, no cooking,
or making bread, she ate what she gained, in the peace of Allah.487
Within these transitions the numbers of slaves formally given their legal freedom were
lower than those who escaped or died within their owners households.488 When asked about the
conditions through which slaves were freed, it was held for example that, if the Basha felt pity
on you he would tell you goodbye no money, no papers, thats all.489 Similarly the idea was
repeated that freedom might be granted, if they were working for kind people.490 In a rare
example within this research an elite Fasi woman noted a slave who had been freed following
hadj.491
Beginning long prior to Independence a feature of the household economic changes that
increasing numbers of Fasi slaveowning families of lesser prominence and wealth faced was
reformulating their prestige through the use of servants, which required locating, supplying and
organizing their work. Though some elite informants assert the view that most slaves (as well as
the rural and urban poor in some minds), offered their children to work without wages for the
opportunity of serving important Fasi masters, this historical image was incomplete and
misleading.492 One elite current head of a Fasi household suggested that many families let their
slaves go in the nineteen fifties and nineteen sixties when they lacked the means to support
them.493 Also the children of slaves repeatedly noted that was large Fasi families who sought out
the best help, even involving their slaves in recruiting former slave cooks, and in the case of
487

Interview with Meghdouj (Fes, January 17, 2004).

See Chapter 2 and Chapter 4.
489
Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).
490
Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 25, 2004).
491
Interview with Fatima Beez (Fes, May 24, 2004). Also concerning the Makhzan five slaves
were recalled as being freed after pilgrimage, Interview with Halima (Fes, January 27, 2004).
492
Interview with Khadija Sbai (Fes, June 3, 2004).
493
Interview with Fasel Shawi (Fes, June 2, 2004).
488

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one khadim hadga (skillful slave) she was solicited directly to work in the house of an
impressed household guest.494 In this context the impoverished daughter of a slave who is now a
grandmother with the custody of her grandson recounts her apprehensions,
nowadays some people ask me for my grandson. They tell me give him to me just to
play with our son in the garden. This is the way they adopt nowadays to take him and
destroying his health by hardship and hes still young only thirteen years old. I tell them,
for what did I endure, did I suffer for a long time?495
While all Fasi households gradually reorganized through one means or another, for an
exceptional few this meant refusing any changes to their family and household traditions and
expressions of the social institution of slavery. An elderly slave now living in an omara in Dar
Mokri emphasized this point, when asked what she thought about the differences between slaves
and servants she began by qualifying her comments with the fact that she had never seen a
servant.496
Working Beyond Slavery
The work experiences of domestic slaves and their children, both outside and inside of their
owners house played an important role in their economic and social transitions. A particularly
important example was when slaves children were permitted or somehow managed to work for
wages outside of the house while living in a slaveowning household. One man who wanted to
become a shoemaking apprentice explained how delicate the subject of slaves children working
outside of the house could be, when asked why his mother begged her owner and promised to
remain there, he responded those are shorfa so it was important to do that. You spent a period of
years with them, you eat their food and you wanted to leave them. You needed something to let

494

Interview with Lhsan (Fes, March 24, 2004), Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes,
March 21, 2004).
495
Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 25, 2004).
496
Interview with Om Kalthum Mokri (Fes, April 19, 2004). The term used was matalma.
181

you go.497 Many men worked as freelance hamale (porter) during and after slavery as a part of
their immediate family life.498 In an interesting case, the daughter of a slave took advantage of
the increased openings of low wage earning industrial jobs for young women, and worked in a
Fasi sewing factory for six years while still living in her mothers owners home where her
mother continued working.499 It should be noted that being able to save even a small sum of
money was rare, but would have allowed for many possibilities in the informal economy.
Establishing contacts, networks of support, and lasting, trusted relations were essential in
these changes. The following description was offered:
when khadim first finished (living and working) in their masters houses, there were
among them, those whose masters provided them a place to live. And the abd continued
to stay at the houses door, to sit and tiskhr for people of the neighborhood. For example
to take and bring back the bread from the public oven Everyone used to give him
something. Those who didnt find anything to do went to the public bath working as a
scrubber or a porter in the suq. You cant leave, only if Allah wants you to leave. You
cant eat only what Allah wants you to eat.500
Though far less common than this kind of meager support from neighborhood members known
throughout a lifetime, informants occasionally mentioned the benefits of their social interactions
through religious brotherhoods, including Tijniyyah.501 Far more common than contacts
through Islamic religious associations were various cultivations of personal contacts and
assistance. In one example a woman noted her contact with an entrepreneurial Fasi Jewish
family through which she found occasional employment in their carpet making company.502

497

Interview with Rkiah (Fes, January 11, 2004).

Interview with Said (Fes, January 15, 2004).
499
Interview with Fatima (Fes, January 15, 2004).
500
Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 21, 2004).
501
Interview with Hachuma (Fes, February 9, 2004).
502
Interview with Lala Zohra (Fes, February 7, 2004). She noted making three to four thousand
rials per month with this, periodic work.
498

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There were several common ways in which unskilled slaves and their children entered
into the informal economy. Men drew upon their connections and their varied household
experiences to sell their services in performing odd jobs in the medina and increasingly in Fes
Ville. A son of slaves describes the work he has performed in Fes since leaving his home,
sometimes I go the leather market and carry and arrange leather. Sometimes I help
people by carrying their things. Sometimes I go and stay in Bab Lahild and people give
me some money because they know me, this is what I do during the whole day.503
Another man with a similar life explained that he worked, without a sanae (a skill), I carried
goods for some Baraka. Sometimes they let you enter their house and eat something. I worked
as hamal, sometimes on my shoulder, and sometimes in building construction.504 In contrast to
many market cultures throughout Africa, one relevant line of informal income earning clearly
dominated by men is fresh vegetable selling along a passage way or a road.505 The largest form
of informal income earning for unskilled female former slaves and their daughters was
housework. When asked if she had acquired a skill that was useful in her work life after slavery,
one informant responded yes, I learned housework, and cooking, and moreover to be polite with
those who are bigger than you.506 The next more prominent informal option pursued by
unskilled former slaves and their daughters (often for transitory periods of life) was
prostitution.507 Again, such womens activities became notably self-promoted in Fes ville were
women would congregate at a muqaf (standing place) and wait to sell their labor, and, or sexual
services.508 Other examples of informal sector positions mentioned which both men and women

503

Interview with Said (Fes, January 15, 2004).

Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).
505
Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 25, 2004). Azouz now he sells vegetables, as
does another informant, Interview with Yousef (Fes, March, 2004).
506
Interview with Mekhlee (Fes, April 12, 2004).
507
See Chapter 4.
508
One such labor market is centered behind March Central in Fes Ville.
504

183

could seek out included working in a hamam and smuggling consumer goods from Northern
Spanish markets.509
There were three principal areas of skill which women acquired within the work orders of
slaveowning households that allowed them to earn a supplementary or full living beyond slavery.
The son of a slave who had spent his entire life in the medina noted of elite Fasi womens
supposed frequent lack of cooking knowledge, some of those slaves got their freedom thanks to
Fasi women.510 Several elite Fasi women maintained that certain traditional Fasi dishes could
only be properly cooked by slave women, one noting a Dada whose excellence at cooking khalia
and sman led to her being able to earn a good living cooking for Europeans.511 Embroidery,
needlework, sewing with machines, and general repairs were another source of income many
women acquired skills for within slavery. The earnings possible from these skills fluctuated and
the great rise of industrially manufactured cloth and the flood of relatively inexpensive factory
produced clothing did not improve the return on labor time. Though some maintained that
traditional styled piecework for weddings continued to be remunerative, it appears that a strong
integral element of this labor was the interpersonal transmission of traditional arts, representative
of many resilient personal meanings.512 Another persistent area of professional skill beyond

509

Interview with Fatima (Fes, February 8, 2004), Interview with Kanata (Fes, March 16, 2004).
Interview with Mohammed Mufeed (Fes, February 15, 2004).
511
Interview with Khadija Sbai (Fes, June 3, 2004). Khalia is a traditional Fasi pot of cooked
meat, sman is a yellow colored cooking grease.
512
One informant noted 120 rials as their best earning, Interview with Lala Zineb (Fes, April 15,
2004). Another mentioned being taught after leaving a household she grew up in, Interview with
Ma Aziza Mokri (Fes, March 31, 2004). Specific skills included trzrabati (a kind of
embroidery), Interview with Hada Sousi (Fes, March 13, 2004). Sewing and repairing clothes,
clothes sewing pillows, Interview with Mekhele (Fes, April 12, 2004). Hbik (a traditional
embroidery), Interview with Om Kalthum Mokri (Fes, April 19, 2004). Also it was mentioned
that an informant learned sewing on the sewing machine Interview with Fatima (Fes, February
8, 2004). Many felt that traditional Fasi embroidery had died, considering it a lost art.
Interestingly, this decline has can been used to add to its value, as bourgeoisie and elite wedding
510

184

slavery was of an experienced healer and mid-wife. Demand for such a figures multiple skills
with a closely related culturally-charged conception of a black slave woman as the penultimate
caregiver continued in spite of and alongside European modeled medical modernization and
institutional controls.513 When asked if a slave mother and grandmother had only cared for slave
women, one informant quickly corrected,
No. For free women. Everyone. Shorfa and common women. Whenever a woman felt
the pain of pregnancy they knocked at her door and asked her to come help her and she
went She learned that helping women in the house until she became professional.514
Another skill in this context which was noted far less often was working with wool and carpets.
Changes in work experiences led to changes in expectations and greater assertions of
interest. One daughter of a slave recounted how working for a foreign household guest surprised
her because, even if I did not know how to do something she told me no problem without
shouting.515 When such experiences were analyzed and appreciated, they could lead to a
bolstering of personal confidence for seeking and even demanding better treatment and working
conditions. The son of a slave whos father worked in an oven while their family lived in a
habous home with the deceased slave owners heirs was forever changed by the example of
seeing his fathers hard work earn him wages.516 During the first decades of the Protectorate

culture has produced tailors and boutiques based on these traditions, in some cases studiously
fused with an haute couture sensibility.
513
Reflective of the ongoing import and popularity of these (sage-femme) and other nonEuropean medical practices, a note from the Rsidence Gnrale de la Rpublique Franaise au
Maroc addresses secret professional medical practices, as targeted by Article 378 of the Penal
Code. (December 16, 1930, CADN).
514
Interview with Maghdouj (Fes, January 17, 2004).
515
Interview with Halima (Fes, February 10, 2004).
516
Interview with Mohammed Mufeed (Fes, January 6, 2004). The amount and denomination of
wages were noted as, if a man worked the whole day he could get three gersh. Habous, refers
to an Islamic tradition of inalienable property, elsewhere in the Arab world referred to Waqf.
185

among some slave families there were strong values of apprehension about working for
Europeans. It is noted of a slave father that he refused,
a wonderful opportunity during the days of colonization. This chance was to be a
guardian in chateau deux in Trek Mouzar. There were no Muslims only Nazarenes.
They gave him that chance to live and work there only because he was from the Sahara.
Saharawi were known to be trustworthy.517
However with the massive economic changes, particularly across the middle decades of the
twentieth century working for foreigners and tourists became more trusted, and an increasingly
desirable and sought after employment. For example, a former slave father who ended his
relationship with the inheritors of his owners house thereafter began working for tips from
tourists and cleaning their cars in a hotel parking area.518 As suggested, cooking provides a good
example of how female slaves and their daughters used their work experiences within slavery to
increase the scope of their employers, mobility, and possible relationships.519 As explained for
one family,
for once masters laugh with you and you did something and they did thank you. You
feel a little bit at peace. My mother was a good cook, they used to bring a good cook
solely for an important wedding party. They hosted the Glaoui children and brought my
mother and asked her to put the salt, because she had delight in her hand. I did inherit
that from her.520
Similarly, it was noted of a slave mother who had gone on to cook for foreigners and rich
people they do not care if the cook is black or white or with scared cheeks, all that they want is
good work.521 A Fasi elite offered his interpretation, yes they could find work even in
restaurants especially for the foreign tourists because they like Moroccan food. And those old
517

Ibid.
Interview with Lala Zohra (Fes, February 7, 2004). This would have been in the nineteen
seventies.
519
It should be noted that apparently some slave males were recognized good cooks, but the field
was overwhelmingly dominated by women.
520
Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 25, 2004).
521
Interview with Hachuma (Fes, February 9, 2004).
518

186

meals cant be made. Only by an old khadim or old man who knows what he is doing.522 The
daughter of one former slave mother who was employed chiefly as a cook for weddings, even
attributed her mothers marriage to her cooking skills.523 Importantly, the transitions brought
through this skill, which frequently formed the rightful basis of personal and family pride, should
not be historically romanticized, as working and social conditions for such women cooks
associated with domestic slavery did entail a heritage of the attitudes and relationships
underpinning the institution.
Socio-economic Changes and Continuities
Fasi domestic slaverys slow decline and transformation occurred in an inextricable interrelation
with numerous social changes. Among the most significant for our present discussion are
experiences of the increased visible presence of Fasi women of all backgrounds shopping
throughout the medina and Ville. Temporal and historic perceptions of womens increased
shopping presence varied significantly. Few associated this change with the Protectorate period.
A woman who had lived her long life in Dar Mokri believed that until the nineteen forties this
phenomenon had been only the crowd, for us it was a shame.524 While most interpreted this
change as having followed independence, informants span of perceptions revealed highly
personalized experiences, in which there were several common themes, for example following
a masters death, we started to meet people and go out, we started to know people.525 It was
recounted of a mother who first began shopping as an older woman due to parallel
circumstances,
522

Interview with Fasel Shawi (Fes, April 9, 2004). This was also discussed by a daughter of a
Fesi slave who now cooks for tourists in Marrakesh, Interview with Zahrah (Fes, February 7,
2004).
523
Interview with Lala Zineb (Fes, April 15, 2004).
524
Interview with Mekalee (Fes, April 12, 2004).
525
Interview with Mimouna Mokri (Fes, April 4, 2004).
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my mother didnt use to know how to buy even a half kilo of meat. When my father died
and left us young she went out to buy doughnuts and because she felt very shy she put
that slad (string) of doughnuts under her clothes which caused a big spot of oil to appear.
My aunt happened to meet her and asked her what is wrong, she told her, I cant find my
house. Im lost. That happened because she had never been outside alone before.526
A woman who was orphaned, given to be raised by a surrogate mother who was herself a slave,
then married to a much older Fasi elite explains her integration and adjustments into the
economy:
I was among those who gave all the money to the seller. He took all he wanted and gave
me the rest. I didnt know how to use money. In the past Si Hamid used to bring the
provisions himself in the pannier, but under the djellaba. Why? Because he was afraid
that a woman among one of the neighbors could be in longing, or a child could desire
something that their parents were unable to buy. Women didnt use to go out, except to
the public bath My mother in law used to go to the public bath at night after the final
prayer, certainly wearing hayek (large overgarment) Shopping is now done with
vanity. People ask you with vanity what are you buying? When Moulay lkbir (her
deceased husband) got old I started to go with him in case he would fight the vegetable
seller or the butcher I stood up behind him and asked the vegetable seller with signs to
keep quiet and to tell him the price that he wanted. Moulay lkbir suspected this. When
he finished shopping he tried to find a pretext to start fighting and told me you were
looking at them so go to them. But I was helping him to calm the others. After, I found
a pretext to go out and I went to ask pardon from them. They used to tell me, Allah
bless you, you always save us from him. When he died we went out to lifes domain,
thus women started to go shopping like I was doing too. But when I wanted to pay the
seller, I didnt know how to count money. I used to give the seller all of my money in his
hand, nowadays I became intelligent. I began going to the souk frequently. In the past I
couldnt because I was afraid that people could see me.527
Interestingly, the same woman repeatedly explains how she is fond of the past, when things
were tranquil.528 Others share this nostalgia and hold the more extreme position of refusing to
accept women shopping. A son of slaves articulated this attitude as follows, the old life is
better for her and her husband. The free woman had more value when she stayed at home.529
The daughter of a slave who married a Fasi elite notes the changes in her shopping following her
526

Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 21, 2004).

Interview with Ma Aziza Mokri (Fes, March 31, 2004).
528
Ibid.
529
Interview with Said (Fes, January 15, 2004).
527

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husbands death, before he used to send me shopping according to his tastes Now you can go
and shop according to your own tastes It is better to go out by yourself and buy all you like
and eat as you like.530 In fact most female informants shared such attitudes and clearly claimed
greater mobility in the marketplace than their parents generation. One woman marveled at how
recent and dramatic this change had been, (until) after the death of Mohamed V(1961) my
mother didnt used to even go to the bath, some women used to be paid to take them to the bath
and bring them back. When my mother wanted to bring her mother, some zarzay (porters) used
to carry my sister and my mother went behind him.531 For another, fully representative of
younger generations, yes my mother went out, it was normal to me Women went out from the
time that abid ceased to exist They started to go shopping instead of them.532 Many women
understood these changes as related to material culture,
there were no modern clothes. I didnt used to wear djellaba and heels In the past the
hair style appeared, and the hair dryer, the hair softener for curly hard. We didnt used to
bath only if our master took us a big difference between us and this generation.533
And finally, after a long quiet pause for reflection over the question of what had happened one
woman began, soap has changed534
The major social changes through which Fasi households of the medina increasingly
relied upon wage earning non-slave labor were accompanied by enduring struggles and
enormous ambiguities. When asked at what point did the majority of Fasi households come to
not use slaves, informants views varied along much the same pattern as noted above for women
shopping. This question repeatedly brought responses which focused upon the historical

530

Interview with Maghdouj (Fes, January 17, 2004).

Interview with Hada Sousi (Fes, March 13, 2004).
532
Interview with Fatima (Fes, February 8, 2004).
533
Interview with Hachuma (Fes, February 9, 2004).
534
Interview with Drissia (Fes, February 10, 2004).
531

189

differences of their conditions and characters. A recurrent theme was that contemporary
domestic workers were expected to earn wages, with attention to their evolution, before women
used to get one or two hundred rials when Moulay Lkbir (her husband) was alive, nowadays no
less than one thousand rials with food, provisions and more money.535 A comparison was
offered between day domestic workers and civil servants, and for those of rural village origins
who were resident in the household it was noted that since the advent of grand taxis (shared
cars supplementing bus and train lines by traveling regional routes) they could and did visit their
families.536 A topic which most Fasi elites and far fewer children of slaves discussed in depth
was how contemporary domestic workers were generally less honest and far more inclined to
perform a poorer standard of housework cooking and childcare than slaves had. One elite Fasi
woman explained her perspective:
the domestic worker (matalma) has her house and her children. Sometimes she is
married and only needs money. You know the domestic workers (khadimat) are not
honest The slave (khadim) that is her house she doesnt have another house. He
bought her so she cant go anywhere. If she escaped she would go the Makhzan and be
returned in spite of herself. She had nowhere to go she had food and water so why
should she escape. However the domestic worker (matalmat) works in this house for a
day, and goes working in another house, they go all around Morocco they dont care.537
Another summarized, no domestic servant khadim depends on their master. The abda does the
work one hundred percent except if there was a quarrel between her and her master (Sidha).538
Origins figured into these characterizations domestic servants from the Sahara and the distant
countries are poor but honest. They are guileless not like these girls of the town, who are clever

535

Interview with Ma Aziza (Fes, March 30, 2004).

Interview with Sidi Mohammed Bennani (Fes, April 19, 2004), Interview with Kabira (Fes,
January 12, 2004).
537
Interview with Fatima Beez (Fes, May 24, 2004).
538
Interview with Fasel Shawi (Fes, April 9, 2004).
536

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and cunning, they steal539 Among the daughters of slaves who had done housework their
entire lives, one woman noted, nowadays you see her (a domestic servant) working and you
should realize that she is working only two days with the help of machines and when she starts to
dislike the work conditions, she leaves540
Nearly every informant reflected on and provided evidence of the heritage of slave labor
relations in some way. One comment cut to the heart of the ambiguities of historical transitions
in many Fasi households there are many domestics working as slaves.541 An important
popular expression and image which is in direct contrast, is of being treated as a servant, not as
a slave bought from a suq542 Often contentious rejections of the basis of domestic slavery and
its heritage in household practices, produced these differences and distinctions. Both slaves
conditions and their responses to such conditions continue to be a part of domestic work
experiences.
One Fasi elite man suggested that domestics (matalmat) inherited the work and the
tiredness.543 However, ways in which domestic slaves were controlled and abused continued to
recur as features of Fasi household management and domestic workers lived realities. As was
insisted,

539

Interview with Fatima Beez (Fes, May 24, 2004). Many informants shared or were familiar
with attitudes that for domestic labor the azab are good, those of the town are bad.
540
Interview with Hachuma (Fes, February 9, 2004).
541
Interview with Zahra (Fes, February 7, 2004).
542
Interview with Kanata (Fes, March 16, 2004). Now they are civilized and developed, they
treat her as matalma, khadima and not abid bought from a suq, she now has rights and
everything.
543
Interview with Fasel Shawi (Fes, June 2, 2004). When asked about respecting Sidi, the
response was, not in the same way. When asked if present day servants could protest more, it
was said, No cat can escape from the house of the wedding party. When further pressed on
this point, Now people become awake, the khadim and matalma has her rights, surely she will
respect her master with the same way as the son of the khadm is doing, because she has her
rights, there are some matlamat who say only Sidi and Lala.
191

slavery is not over. There still a system of slavery from the past. The domestic
(matalmat) is still sleeping on the floor, is still beaten, they still shave their head. The
difference is now the possibility to leave and go home if you are suffering. In the past
you couldnt escape. I saw how a matalma was cauterized by her Lala for a banana she
took from the refrigerator544
Informants recounted many examples of such experiences which range well beyond any clear
boundaries with the aftermath of slavery, often reflecting a basic feature economic life familiar
to the Moroccan poor. As was told of another wealthy, traditional Fasi home which was
grappling with its chronic labor problems with young girls:
.one of the matalmat who was beaten often then ran away She was gone for a few
days then the Makhzan brought her and asked is this your abda? Zineb beseeched her,
(but) he came back like a demon, he and said I wont let her today. She kept crying and
he put her in a small room, we begged them to free her but in vain. They said that was
done to correct her so that she would not do it again. They left her there, the poor thing
with hunger and thirst. In secret and we used to give her bread and water. He did beat
her severely, you cant imagine that. He gave her falaka on her feet and beat her with a
beltand asked her to go out She couldnt even walk because of the hard beating. She
felt pain and cried and I asked her if she wanted water for her legs, she said no water
cant do anything for my pain. He beat her so that she would not repeat what she did, but
she needed help eating food for three days. Due to fear when she got ill, they took her to
the hospital and gave her medicine for her feet. They asked the master what happened to
her, he told them shed just fallen down. They didnt believe him, they gave her a stick
to help her to walk. When they came home he brought her as an animal and put her on
the blanket, he said to Hadja Here you are I brought her. She asked him what did the
doctor say about her, he answered that he gave her some simple medicine and gave her
socks, shes lying downstairs No cure could ever help her.545
In addition to violent incidents, and humiliating treatments it is important to mention the
psychological inheritance of those who were abused in their experiences during the decline and
personal aftermath of slavery. When the daughter of a slave noted that while working for a
foreign woman, she has never shouted at me, she also revealed her lasting fears, due to which
she stated, I do everything perfect to not let her shout at me.546

544

Interview with Kanta (Fes, March 16, 2004).

Interview with Rkiah Halou (Fes, April 14, 2004).
546
Interview with Zahrah (Fes, February 7, 2004).
545

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The labor relations beyond domestic slavery also reveal a strong heritage, if not a very
direct continuation, of the values through which slaves pushed back, refused, and claimed more
and better for themselves. One woman narrated:
one day a woman came and asked my mother please give me Mimouna and my
mother accepted. So I went with her to her villa, so huge in Aladarissa. They had a
cellar, the reception, the sleeping rooms. She had two sons and two daughters, one
daughter was young and still studying. The two sons were doctors. She was a teacher,
but retired Because she had an operation in her head They had removed half of her
brain- Allah preserve you She was taking medicines. When she didnt take them she
couldnt remember anything Her oldest daughter was a doctor married to a doctor in
the army. When she had an argument with him she removed some gold and diamonds
which she was wearing and threw it to him and asked him to leave her. Her mother took
these and hid them. I was khadim for her, me and a black girl of a neighbor of ours called
Nezha, she was too an abda. So her daughter came to ask her about the gold and that day
her mother was ill I took her to Louima (a health facility). She told me come with me I
need you and when I went out I saw the other abda Nezha. She was black but became
green547 because it was she who had brought her to our homes When we came to the
villa she asked me to bring the gold I took. I told her Lala Fatima I didnt take any gold
and I wont move from this place in the kitchen until you find your gold. And when she
took her medicine she started to search for it and at last she found it. So she came to me
and the other abda and told us forgive me my daughters I found it. I got nervous and told
her I would go home. You see Allah causes everything. I wanted to go home because she
would make me guilty of theft just her false accusations, which is how people go to jail
wrongly. One day the gasa (large flat platter) where I knead the flour for bread fell down
from my hand and she asked me to buy it. So I went out and searched for one like it until
I came to Dar Mal. I found one like hers. She told that she bought it from Marrakech.
When I returned back with the gasa I set it down and I took off my clothes until I became
totally nude and told her, look at me. Here I am, I am not taking anything with me, so
let me go home, She did beg me, but it was the last time for me. Enough. And I
decided to never work for any woman.548
Though such a depiction of abuse and refusal is extreme, it well represents the all too familiar
extremes within which most informants reflected upon experiences they considered to be of a
heritage of slavery.
Currents of deep personal and social conflict underlie the changes in household orders at
the end of slavery. For many the lack of a clear demarcation produced anxieties,
547
548

The expression means that she became extremely afraid.

Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 25, 2004).
193

I feel deeply inside me that Im still abda, from my grandmother and my mother, now
Im still abda. People still control me. For example here in the hamam if someone asks
me to serve her, I will even though I dont want to The hour (free) is someone who
works and who feels free in spite of working with people549
This lingering unease is mirrored in radically different views of domestic servants, often
representing social and class divisions. One Fasi elite woman offers her view that,
now people are aware that you can make your khadim sleep in the kitchen if your house
is a bit small so your obliged to make her sleep there. But if you have other free rooms,
why have her sleep in the kitchen? Now matalmat have their own rooms with their TV,
blankets. They eat in their room and sleep in their room, and if she brings up kids they
have her sleep with them550
Representing a radically different worldview and condition, the daughter of a slave who has
spent her life doing housework within Fasi homes complains of a constant conflict when working
in households, nowadays if you just move this or that a little, theyll make a process verbal of
theft.551 These disparities of world view have often been the source of conflicts within families
and households. One Fasi elite noted a violent parting of ways and an enduring grudge between
him and his sister which began after he discovered that she severely abusing her domestic
servant,
she said, But she stole from me! I used to tell her, Of course she will steal from you
because she hates you, you beat her, so how can she love you. Before you asked about
if women used to kill khadim if she got pregnant with her master its normal behavior
for those who have such a mentality. They dont have awareness. They beat matalmat.
The same problem They consider her a rival There are herbs which people use when
they want to kill someone, they used to go the achab (herbiest) and buy this herbage and
put it in food. She steals and goes home It is normal because of a grudge, people
have honor and when you insult their honor, even if their uneducated they feel injustice
and will confront you. And if they doesnt have the energy and power to face you they
burgum or curse his master in order to exteriorize the anger inside him552

549

Interview with Kanata (Fes, March 16, 2004). there is still slavery, how?
Interview with Fatima Beez (Fes, May 24, 2004).
551
Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 25, 2004).
552
Interview with Sidi Mohammed Benani (Fes, April 19, 2004). Tburgum is a description of
mumbling and defiance associated with slaves.
550

194

Clearly for many Fasis such household conflicts become larger symbolic causes for their
participants, definitional of broader principals and wider contexts representing what kinds of
power relations they sought to be acceptable.
Struggles for Meaningful Freedom Beyond Slavery
Applicable to a broader domain than solely labor relations are the ways in which experiences of
the ambiguous shifting of power relations during the decline of slavery informed understandings
and practices of freedom. For many children of slaves who freed themselves there was a strong
sense of freedom as the meaningful negation and rejection of experiences and elements within
slavery. One man made the point that, they said slaves had no value. Like something forgotten,
neglected. All that, it cannot be. Impossible.553 He went further in noting slaves fears which
represented for him what freedom was not, they couldnt gather and protest No one could
speak, even a simple response to save himself from being hit554 Another woman asserted
similar negations, reality for a person who has become free is that nobody gives them orders
and they are reasonable and know the difference between positive and negative things.555
Significantly, the last component of her statement can be seen as a negation of the moral and
psychological ambivalence of the paternalistic household orders within which slaveowning
lingered throughout its decline.
In the context of the generally obscure end of the institution and the ambiguous historical
relations with the state and law concerning domestic slaves and their childrens lack of a welldefined basis of, and enforcement of emancipation, understandings of freedom have not been
dominated by legal rights and their validations of claims. However, formal political discourse

553

Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).

Ibid.
555
Interview with Lala Zohra (Fes, February 7, 2004).
554

195

figured into informants understandings of freedom in numerous significant ways. One of its
expressions was through focusing a criticism against the network of traditional Fasi elites.
Asked about slaves access to rights, the daughter of a slave stated,
no they (slaves) didnt have any rights, no Mahkzan nothing, there was only a shame in
everythingThey (Fasis) were themselves the Mahkzan. Merchants who used to control
them (slaves) they had authority, they had money. Those ahl Fes had everything and
authority, no one could control them.556
A man of similar personal history also felt that there no relations with the Basha had been
possible, Who could take you? How can you claim your rights?557 Interestingly, one Fasi elite
woman suggested that Fasi slave owners were apprehensive about their slaves appearing before
the Basha Tazi at his home which also served as a court saying, they wouldnt bring their slaves
to be judged there because their slaves could be taken from them, who had been bought with
their own money.558 Both slave and elite perspectives confirm the great social distances and
practical remove from the legal processes within which slavery declined.
Broader understandings of French and Moroccan formal political authorities also
informed those who emerged from slaverys notions of power and freedom. Some held positive,
though vague and nostalgic views about the French impact upon the Moroccan social order and
infrastructure. However, what is presently most significant to note in this regard is the repeated
idiomatic usage of colonization in understanding and rejecting configurations of power
associated with slavery. The following statement is good example,
I find my hard work better than anything I found thereWhy? Because now I can stay
calm, free. If I work I will earn enough to buy food, if not I go home and sleep. Nobody
is colonizing me in my house. There I was young, controlled and beaten559
556

Interview with Fatima (Fes, January 15, 2004).

Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).
558
Interview with Fatima Beez (Fes, May 24, 2004). Importantly her comment does not
mention, liberation, but suggests a changing of hands.
559
Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).
557

196

An informant with a similar background and attitudes toward the colonial period responded.
when pressed as to whether there could have been freedom within the limitations imposed by
colonization, but shorfa were able to go wherever they wanted, while the slaves could only go
out when masters went to a party, going with them to hold their things.560 Though an historical
caricature, this statement expresses a sense of the double standards reinforced within the
Protectorate and the Fasi elite.561 In another fascinating example of the ongoing borrowing and
melding of official political discourses within personalized understandings, it was quipped
Do this! And dont do that! We were always in that terrorism562
A related discussion concerned whether freedom could to be struggled for or was only
given. This topic brought basic variations of views. At the one extreme it was felt that, if it
could have been attained my parents would have taken it before me Freedom is given not
taken.563 Similarly, it was thought that:
freedom is given. If they dont give you freedom you wont get it... Those who got their
freedom are brave men. For example, once black men started to marry free woman and
when marriages started to be mixed between two types- the abd and the free women, and
the abda and the free man, the children started to get their freedom564

560

Interview with Mohammed Mufeed (Fes, January 6, 2004).

One interview detailed interesting images about how children experienced the war time or a
curfew in the nineteen fifties even in the big families they could put on neither the light nor
the radio, nothing except the kids, even that Senegalese (soldier) was standing up at the door he
used to let you go out tsskhr and to kiss him but the old people couldnt go out, Interview with
Fatima and Maghdouj (Fes, January 24, 2004).
562
Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 25, 2004).
563
Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 27, 2004).
564
Interview with Sidi Mohammed Marrakechi (Fes, March 18, 2004).
561

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Others were far more philosophical, houria (freedom) isnt received or taken, it is in the blood
of Ibad Allah (human beings) does anyone give you freedom? They cant take it from me or
give it to anyone.565 Elaborating along the same orientation,
it is neither given nor received. It depends on your mentality, how to deal with freedom.
To be free you have to be reasonable it means you have a mind, a tongue and money
and you should know how to use them to enjoy yourself. That is freedom if you dont
know what freedom is you cant enjoy yourself566
At the far opposite end of this range of views, it was held by a woman who had fled the
household she was raised to work within that freedom is through your own hands you take it
yourself567 The range of points of view on this question further reflect a range of experiences
which collectively underscore the socially ambivalent and interpersonal nature of the
reorganization of household power relations in the decline and aftermath of domestic slavery.
Another dominant theme in how freedom was conceptualized was in relation to the
marketplace, financial independence, and related social status. A daughter of slaves explains of
her parents views,
they used to say, Please Allah we want to be free and to be like other people. It meant
to behave as we desire and to have money to buy whatever we want we want dont
want to live under authority, we want to cook and eat like people. We dont want to eat
peoples crumbswe want to be rid of fears from our masters.568
In a comparable vein, a woman with a similar life offered,
freedom is a big thing. I did hope, me too, to own my own house have my own house,
well equipped. That was the freedom I used to wish... Even if you dreamt and wished
for that, what for? There were no wings only the lack of things Freedom was riches,
and dreaming that we would not need those dogs who tortured us Imagine if you are
asleep and you suddenly are called. You get up shocked just to execute her order. Is this

565

Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 25, 2004).

Interview with Kanata (Fes, March 16, 2004).
567
Interview with Zahia (Fes, March 23, 2004).
568
Interview with Hachuma (Fes, February 9, 2004).
566

198

an acceptable? I was dreaming of building my own home to get married and have
children569
While few categorically rejected the importance of money, not thinking of freedom in terms of
the problem of food, clothes and medicines, because nothing is better than freedom even with
hunger.570 For most, money figured to varied extents within their larger equations of security
and independence. One woman sufficiently defined this sentiment by contrasting with the past,
at that time we didnt used to eat well, to dress well, to say whatever we wanted, to go
outside or to come whenever we wanted. Not like now. We are living well
Alhumduallah and no one can control us Freedom is, thank Allah to be free to go
outside and come whenever you want to behave as you like, not to feel any fear, to relax
in your house that no one can take you out of. There is a big difference between that time
and this one571
Inseparably tied to such conceptions were notions of social recognition and inclusion. As was
related, for bourgeoisie people you reserve their places at a party and if youre sitting in her
place, she tells you go away and leave this place But I dont leave my place because I have my
freedom so I can do whatever I want.572 Such views suggest that wealth in itself was far
secondary to the role it was perceived to play within accessing and living freedom.
For many informants questions of freedom, and their freedom raised the most unsettling
personal experiences and struggles of their lives. The loss of years and hopes, memories of
loved ones, and recognitions of the consequences of abuse and self-abuse combined throughout
testimonies as bitter and nostalgic moments at turns. An elderly slave recounted, what is
freedom? The freedom from pain. Freedom is like fleeting momentselusivepassing like
spring.573 A son of slaves also offered his poetic considerations, freedom is life To walk

569

Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 25, 2004).

Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 27, 2004).
571
Interview with Hachuma (Fes, February 9, 2004).
572
Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 25, 2004).
573
Interview with Ma Aziza (Fes, June 6, 2004).
570

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freely When you are owned by somebody you cant walk freely or stay in gardens or in a caf
or have a picnic Slavery is over and not over574 A son of slaves who had led a long hard
life searched himself calmly then explained that freedom is our aim in life. A very good thing
which is given by Allah, but Allah had not given it to us and we stayed in that state.575 A
woman, who continues to struggle to make a respectable working life beyond slavery for herself
attempted to articulated the great disconnect within her concerning freedom,
Now I can understand nothing. I dont know right from wrong. We lived in richness
with those people, but we didnt know how to protect ourselves. If only one of us was
aware and awake she could save us but we kept living in fear, control and slavery. We
kept living miserably. Yes the right exists, but where is it? And who can give it to you?
Because the master bought you so there is nothing you can do There are really painful
storiesWho could hate freedom? But there were few people to protect you576
Of course such sentiments and struggles were well beyond personal, they collectively comprised
the heart of the difficult historical transition out of domestic slavery in Fes.
Conclusion
The historical factors of economic change, often summed as the forces of modernization, were
highly influential to the contexts of household changes examined here, but did not determine the
paths and patterns through which slavery declined in Fes. There were several important ways in
which the economic reshaping of Fes (seen from the beginning of the Protectorate period until
the first decades following) was connected to how slaveowning households were reorganized,
increasingly without domestic slaves. These transitions and reorganizations were often with
continued reliance upon dependent domestics who did not experience a clear and certain sense of
a demarcation opposed to slavery. Noting three distinct currents of socio-economic change helps
summarize the multiple overlapping consequences examined in this chapter.
574

Interview with LHsan (Fes, March 24, 2004).

Interview with Yusef (Fes, March 24, 2004).
576
Interview with Kanata (Fes, March 16, 2004).
575

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First, numerous slaveowning Fasi families who were active and powerful in their city
responded to Protectorate era forces and agents, participating and notably leading much to
their sustained and expanded benefit varied movements which ultimately produced a definitive
shift of the center of Moroccan political and economic life away from Fes. While the
conservative Fasi elite retained protective social distance from lower classes and Europeans,
their slaveowning households were slowly, and often indirectly, influenced by both groups. An
important area of the hesitant absorption of their combined influences included European
domestic practices and the increased availabilities of rural and newly urban poor domestic
workers.
Secondly, thousands of newly urbanized and established urban poor families who had
responded to rural immiseration, also responded to national and local economic challenges, by
seeking to create new modes of economic survival and social organization within and
surrounding the medina. Though rural migration and wage labor were not the sole determinant
ending Fasi domestic slavery, they formed a significant context of changes shaping household
orders through the decisions and pursuits of slave owners, slaves and their respective
descendents. Particularly important among these combined forces was a gendered shift in which
poor urban females increasingly sought wages for performing domestic labor.
Third, thousands of domestic slaves and even more so their children who grew up within
the power relations and traditions of slavery, responded to life within the center of a radically
destabilized traditional world by overcoming fears and controls to progressively enter the wage
earning labor market and to claim and build working lives beyond slavery. Their resolve to
pursue their interests outside the received arrangements of slavery was often realized within
generational shifts of elite Fasi families, and the ongoing social changes in Fes.

201

CHAPTER FOUR
Familial and Personal Changes in the Decline of Fasi Domestic Slavery
This discussion will extend our examination of points of rupture and transformations in Fasi
domestic contexts through focusing upon more intimate registers of relevant social change.
Socioeconomic reorganizations across Fasi slaveowning households were intimately interwoven
with changes within Fasi families and individual lives. The power relations of domestic work
and cohabitation were distinct from yet consistently blurred with those of sexuality, kinship,
and other domestic interpersonal relations fundamental to identity in assertions of self and family
beyond slavery. The three primary sections of this chapter are organized around the Protectorate
era and the immediate decades thereafter; first considering several pertinent dimensions of
Moroccan and Fasi social history, followed by a detailed examination of directly related Fasi
legal practices, and concluding with an extended discussion of lived experiences during the slow
demise of the institution. A brief summary concludes the chapter.
The first section of discussion examines secondary sources often of a national scope, but
consistently and intimately bound to Fes. Attention is given to the confluence of gendered
changes embedded within elite educational trends and nationalist politics, the shifting currents of
personal and household material culture, and altered patterns of marriage and family life. These
topic areas collectively convey a series of interlinked influences within which the values,
assumptions and expectations of elite Fasi families very graduallyand with a significant degree
of ambiguitymoved away from slave ownership.
Discussion in the second section encompasses some secondary literature but draws
intensively upon the primary sources of Fasi legal records. Beyond touting or condemning legal
and religious ideals, this section pursues actual historical legal practices related to marriage,

202

concubinage and the recognition of children, property and inheritance, housing, and forms of
continuity and change in social attitudes. The body of legal evidence of historical practices
related to slaves presents decisive substantiation, linking the consideration of elite-based social
change advanced in the prior section of this chapter with the intensely personal narrative themes
centered upon slaves and their descendents which follow.
A third substantive section of discussion based on extensive fieldwork interviews reflects
upon courses of familial and personal experience and transition. The discussion here is framed
by contours and events of the life cycle as experienced among Fasi slaves and slave owning
families. It probes several kinds and patterns of experiences registering interpersonal, physical
and psychological dimensions of power relations within the reproduction, transformation and
complete break from domestic slavery.
Social Changes and Slave Owning Fasi Families
From the Protectorates perspective it was expected that after 1912 there was a continuity of
most pre-protectorate features of Fasi family life, including slavery. Despite provocative
counterfactual reflections as to whether and how the French might have mustered their capacities
to more directly alter these relations, or the likely political and social course that would have
otherwise emerged without colonialism, a defining historical feature of the Protectorate was their
interest in reinforcing tradition.577 The ideological principal evidenced within this facet of the

577

It remains open for consideration how Larouis thesis concerning nationalism and the altered
basis of a democratic turn might be extended to the pace of relevant forms of social change
directly applicable to domestic slavery. In a surprising counterpoint to dominant views on
Moroccan nationalism, a notable number of underclass Fasi interviewees who lived under the
Proctorate believed that greater and more direct French commitments to social reform would
have benefited them. See Abdullah Laroui, Les origines sociales et culturelles du nationalisme
Marocain (Paris: Maspero, 1977), also see Edmund Burke III, Theorizing the histories of
colonialism and nationalism in the Arab Maghrib - Beyond Colonialism and Nationalism in
North Africa, Arab Studies Quarterly (Spring, 1998).
203

French imperial project emphasizing the intent to preserve rather than disrupt was at very least a
selective representation and program, if not a supremely ironic one. The particular interest taken
in endorsing the authority of the Muslim family was well-attuned to political relations with
Fasi elites and the monarchy.578 While political indistinctions between the state, Islam, family
were variously expedient such as in offering an elegant deflective approach to slavery by
reinforcing and politicizing this continuum, the definition and direction of changes related to
family and women were impregnated with a national level of unfolding significance.579
Changes in the basis of the claims and validations entailed in purchasing slaves during
the clandestine trade of the Protectorate period were tied to various gradual adjustments to the
conditions within which slaves were owed, controlled and used by Fasi families.580 Fasi
domestic slaves continued to be part of elite households within which patriarchy, arranged
marriages, polygamy, concubinage, servants, and the maintenance of destitute and elder family
members were normal features of family life.581 Throughout most of the Protectorate period the
majority of slaveowning Fasi elites continued to practice domestic slavery, but their attitudes
toward slave ownership placed increasing emphasis upon discretion, maintaining the institution
of slavery within the respected realm of family affairs. Not until the 1950s was there a
significant overall decline in the routine references to slaves in notarized Fasi family legal
documents.582 The decline in legal references confirms that basic social changes were

578

See Note sur la Question des Esclaves dans la Famille Marocaine, n/d (BGAM), J.
Lapanne Joinville, Notes sur Lesclavage au Maroc, 3.11.1950 (BGAM).
579
Implications of this point are given a brief but suggestive overview in Jamila Bargachs entry
Social Hierarchies: Modern, North Africa, in the Encyclopedia of Women & Islamic Cultures
General Editor, Suad Joseph (Leiden: Brill, 2003) Vol. 2 pp.749-751.
580
See Chapter 2.
581
Alison Baker, Voices of Resistance: Oral Histories of Moroccan Women (Albany: State
University of New York Press, 1998) p. 43.
582
See Figure 3 in Chapter 2.
204

occurring.583 So it is essential to reconstruct and consider the decline in Fasi slave ownership
through attention to family relationships within the Fasi social order as practices among which
the basis and available means of expressing ownership were slowly altered. To do so we begin
by examining several themes comprised of relevant elements of Protectorate era social change
alternating between Morocco and Fes, in an effort to unravel some of the charged political and
socio-cultural contexts among which the norm of slavery was reframed and overshadowed,
leaving its historical decline to remain obscure. Subsequent discussion turns to an overview of
post-Protectorate forms of social continuity and change.
Education, Nationalism and Elite Moroccan Women
The various efforts at reform undertaken by the Moroccan state prior to the Protectorate centered
upon military and economic forms of modernization.584 The Protectorate continued and greatly
extended these veins of reform through pursuing public works projects envisioned to create
infrastructural linkage between ports and nodes of a national market system. But where previous
reforms did not directly or significantly address the Makhzan administration itself or larger
Moroccan social contexts, the Protectorates interests in preserving appointed traditions
thereafter greatly widened the scope of the states political agenda. Family became a de facto
centerpiece within a cluster of such Moroccan traditions. Protectorate interest in reorganizing
the Moroccan state clearly and repeatedly recognized that state ownership of concubines and
slaves were sine qua non conditions for not compromising the prestige of the cherifienne

583

Pennell (2000) p. 348 has rightly generalized of the period that Moroccan social change
unfolded more rapidly than the countrys political or legal system.
584
See Jean-Louis Miege, Le Maroc et LEurope (1830-1894), 4 vols. (Paris: Presses
Universitaires de France, 1961) for the fullest available discussion of the social and political
economic context of nineteenth-century Morocco. Some discussion of early royal reforms
(including currency, technological and administration) is given with particular attention to the
interests of the elite and socio-economic changes.
205

family.585 Other arenas of colonial manipulations and inventions surrounding Moroccan

traditions were significant for Fasi and wider Moroccan families. Neo-moorish architecture and
the colonial urbanization schemes it accompanied were designed to flank and refer to traditional
housing arrangements without overtly causingor recognizinga disruption of the lives of
medina-dwelling families.586 A parallel line of policy and a generalized romantic attitude
encouraged the preservation and promotion of non-industrial traditional means of Fasi
handicrafts even in face of impoverished artisan families Sisyphean confrontation with the
overpowering and volatile forces of industrial capitalist production.587 Also, the colonial
invention of traditional Islamic education was imbricated with intricate, far-reaching, and
long-term historical consequences for family and women.588
There was an important precedent to the politicization of womens status which emerged
with the Moroccan nationalist movements mid-nineteen twenties birth amongst educated Fasi
elites.589 Impoverished rural Rifi women were mobilized into becoming resistance supporters

585

Henri Gaillard, La Rorganization du Gouvernement Marocain (Paris: Comit de LAfrique

Franaise, 1916) pp. 16-17. The descriptive text mentions: The imperial harem itself is
composed of the legitimate women of the sultan and of a certain number of concubines, its
children, some close relations such as his mother and some aunts and of a personnel of negresses
directs by the "arifa", an aged maidservant who enjoys the confidence of the sultan, and to which
is added a certain number of abid-ed-dar or eunuques and young slave males not having reached
the age of puberty.
586
See Janet Abu-Lughod, Rabat: Urban Apartheid in Morocco (Princeton, N.J. : Princeton
University Press, 1980), and Gwendolyn Wright, The Politics of Design in French Colonial
Urbanism (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1991).
587
For an example of the legacy of these policies see Lartisanant de production dans la medina
de Fs, (Fs: Royaume du Maroc, 1991) (BGAM).
588
For an examination of the implications of the colonial construction of Islamic education see
Spencer David Segalla, Teaching Colonialism, Learning Nationalism: French Education and
Ethnology in Morocco, 19121956 (Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, State University of New
York at Stony Brook, 2003).
589
For an enduring examination of this movement see John P.Halstead, Rebirth of a Nation; the
Origins and Rise of Moroccan Nationalism, 1912-1944 (Cambridge, Mass., Distributed for the
206

and guerrilla fighters, some of whom became refugees who migrated into Fes.590 Muhammad
bin Abd el-Karims surrender to the French resonated beyond the infanticide of an independent
Rif Republic or the squashing of an armed struggle in order to reinforce European claims to
hegemony in North Africa. Abd el-Karim was deeply influenced by Salafi Islamic reformist
thought, his exposure to which included his education at Qarawiyyin University in the heart of
Fes.591 This defeat signaled an important occasion for reappraisal of the relative importance of
the tactics of Fasi intellectuals engaged with Salafi reforms, a key expression of which occurred
in education.
From 1921 Moroccan Salafiyya activists founded Free Schools, which sought to
develop an educational system that would remain independent from French and state controls.592
These schools were not free (fees were still required, and their chief constituency in Fes
remained elite families wanting this orientation of religious studies, history, geography, and
arithmetic in the Arabic language for their sons. It was not until the late nineteen thirties that
Fasi girls from elite families studied in the Free Schools, and their subsequent ranks included
many prominent nationalist women.593 The Salafiyya or Neo- Salafiyya movement sought to
strengthen the basic structures of the old society, especially the bourgeois family, not to change
Center for Middle Eastern Studies of Harvard University by Harvard University Press, 1967).
For a contribution toward writing women into this period see Baker (1998).
590
C. R. Pennell, Women and Resistance to Colonialism in Morocco: the Rif 1916-1926,
Journal of African History (28, 1987). Pennell notes that the Confederal Republic of the Tribes
of the Rif made efforts to educate young Rifi girls. Also see Holden (2005).
591
For other contexts of Salafi Islamic reformers see Albert Hourani, Arabic Thought in the
Liberal Age, 17981939 (Cambridge, U.K.: Cambridge University Press, 1993),
Itzchak Weismann, Taste of Modernity: Sufism, Salafiyya, and Arabism in Late Ottoman
Damascus (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 2001), Quintan Wiktorowicz, The Management of Islamic
Activism: Salafis, The Muslim Brotherhood, and State Power in Jordan (Albany: State
University of New York Press, 2001).
592
John P. Halstead, The Changing Character of Moroccan Reformism, 1921-1934,
The Journal of African History, (Vol. 5, No. 3., 1964).
593
Baker (1998) p. 48.
207

them.594 This manner of responding through preservation and socially conservative adjustments
entailed a furtive though seminal political and generational shift that would eventually lead to
overt Fasi nationalist organization, as well as the gradual yet profound reshaping of Fasi family
life and the politicization of womens status. The Free School movement marked an educated
Fasi elite strategic social response to the Protectorate in connection or least parallel with larger
dimensions of Arab and African nationalism.595 Many Free School students who there
underwent a primary political socialization, went on to further studies elsewhere, such as the
Ecoles des Fils de Notables and Colleges Musulmans; this base thus contributed to French
education and France herself becoming sites of anti-colonialism.596
In its initial period the Protectorate practiced and encountered great limitations in
educating Moroccan girls.597 One scholars extended research into nineteen twenties Fes
depicted middle class women as having a vast oral cultural and religious ritual heritage but
being highly uneducated in formal lettered terms, suggesting that only the largest and most
powerful families were then educating their daughters with formal tutors at home.598 The vast
majority of daughters from Fasi households of means went to a maalema (literally master) to
learn needlework. This significant phenomenon was recognized and reified as a social fact of
Moroccan girlhood by French administrators who conveniently maintained that one must not
lose sight of the fact that Muslim girls will never enter into school until they have first crossed
594

Ibid. p. 22.
Pennell (2000) p. 233.
596
With relevance beyond strictly the Francophone context Pennell (2000) p. 205 notes that
Omar Abdeljalil was forced to become an agronomist, echo the educational and political paths of
figures such as Kwame Nkrumah of Ghana, and more recently Haitian Jean Dominique. Also
Cohen and Hahn (1966) p. 43 note Ouazzanis founding of Laction du Peuple.
597
Segalla (2003) terms the period between 1912-1919 the improvisational years.
598
A.M. Goichon, La femme de la moyenne bourgeoisie fasiya, Revue des Etudes Islamiques
(3:1929) pp. 15,25. Goichon notes repeatedly the mallema as an important figure important in
the socialization of young Fasi girls.
595

208

the threshold of the workshop.599 Keeping with Protectorate interests in drawing upon and
maintaining traditions, efforts were made to formalize and institutionalize girls embroidery
apprenticeships in workshops within Fes and throughout Morocco.600 While these experiences
formed important opportunities for social interaction in relatively privileged young Fasi girls
lives; such chances typically faded as they approached puberty, when there would be a familyimposed social control and a young girl would no longer be allowed to continue to leave her
parents house. In subsequent decades of the Protectorate though increasing numbers of girls
began primary school, the pattern of their removal from school upon pubescence continued.601
As has been noted, by the 1920s George Hardy, the leading educational administrator of
Protectorate, found that,
the difficulty of recruiting Muslim students was so severe that accommodating the
desires of Muslim families preceded all other considerations. Hardys 1920 curricular
circular made no mention of the schooling of Muslim girls at all: girls schooling was a
political problem and a matter of the evolution of Muslim society, not a curricular
problem.602
In a contrast which underscores an enduring consciousness of the profound social inequalities
within the policies and thinking of Protectorate colonialism, as well as an irony about gendered
social change within Fes and beyond, interviews of Fasi nationalist women seven decades later
showed a common perception that the French feared the threat of educated Muslim women and

599

Seagalla (2003) p. 62 citing Loth, Rapport a Monsieur le Resident General, pp. 55-56.
Khadidja Nouacer Changing Status of Women and Employment of Women in Morocco,
International Social Science Journal (14: 1962). Also see D. Rivet, Le Maroc de Lyautey
Mohamed V.Le Double Visage du Protectorat (Paris: Denol, 1999) for mention of an effort to
prohibit innovation in embroidery.
601
Baker (1998) p. 48. Although more and more girls started primary school relatively few got
to or beyond the level of 5th year, as many parents thereafter kept them home maintaining that it
was hshouma (shameful) for a girl who had reached puberty to leave the house.
602
Seagalla (2003) p. 228.
600

209

thus opposed their education.603 Another French traditional educational project which was
developed in the 1920s was a series of coles de filles designed to,
inculcate clean, orderly, economical household habits and to provide, for those obliged to
support themselves, a more honorable means of livelihood than is customary among too
many unmarried Moroccan women.604
This quote from a Fasi newspaper demonstrates that such an agenda found some degree of
concurrence amongst the male Fasi elite. In developing educational practices based on an
approximation of Muslim families attitudes, there was a strong preoccupation with insuring that
these institutions would present nothing to shock the traditions of their protgs.605 This
principal intended to intimately shape the potential exchanges and areas of exposure to differing
values that could occur within the French administered educational system, effectively muzzling
any challenges to the most conservative elements of the Moroccan elites social order. Hardy
wrote in a 1920 guide for incoming French teachers,
Anti-clericalism is not an article to be exportedwe do not speak of the emancipation
of the citizen, not the liberation of the slave, not of the liberty of the woman; these
questions are not to be discussed in school.606
In this context the penetrating nationalist critique, that Protectorate policies provided the
traditional power structure of the Makhzan with a modernized administration employed in the
transformation into an absolute monarchy, is highly suggestive of the kind of changes which
such domestic training brought to Fasi slaveowning households. Particularly during the first
decades of the Protectorate, new household management techniques would have been absorbed
into the existing regime, perhaps redecorating the slaveowning Fasi household order but not

603

Baker (1998) p. 7. These interviews sample a wider grouping than Fasi women alone, also
notably including voices from the Casablanca working class.
604
Pennell (2000) p. 228.
605
Seagalla (2003) p. 228.
606
Ibid p. 229.
210

offering a basis for a principled or attitudinal reorganization without slaves. For example,
mastering the role of a capable supervisor of a negress or a maid in the kitchen was understood
as the most important formative feature of middle class Fasi girls education.607
The numbers of Moroccan girls who attended schools of any kind in the interwar period
were low by all accounts. In the mid-nineteen thirties there were an estimated 110 Free Schools
educating about 5,000 students.608 The available figures for this period show a slow overall
increase, though difficult to interpret in relation to contemporary demographic shifts. In 1926
there were only 850 Muslim girls in all French schools.609 By 1931 about 2,000 girls attended
girls schools concerned with household management.610 These low figures were ironically
higher than the total Muslim population directly enrolled within the French educational system in
Morocco which rose from 144 out of 22,770 in 1930-1931 to 450 out of 30,648 during 19381939.611

607

Goichon (1929) p. 26.

Until this time these institutions had been tolerated but not officially authorized as legal. See
Halstead (1967) pp. 110, 137, 162. and Jamil M. Abun-Nasr, A history of the Maghrib in the
Islamic Period (New York: Cambridge University Press, 1987) p. 383.
609
Seagalla (2003) p. 230.
610
Halstead (1967) p. 109.
611
Ibid. p. 102, Abun-Nasr (1987) p.383. Another important Fasi institution should be noted
College Moulay Idris. As Clifford Geertz explains, College Moulay Idris was one of those
institutions found in a number of colonial territoriesAchimota in the Gold Coast, the
Presidency Colleges in Calcutta, Madras, and Bombay an elite academy set up to form a
select, cultivated, school-loyal (and, of course, all male) cadre of western-educated natives
who could mediate between, in this case, the higher reaches of French and Muslim civilization.
And, as with most such enterprises, it was not unsuccessful, though, as with most, the mediation
turned out to be of a rather different sort than those who designed it had in mind. The College
became, as one writer has called it the Eton of the Moroccan political elite: a forcing ground
for turning a hundred or two of the children of traditional Fes notables into ardent nationalists.
Today it not only continues, somewhat Arabized, a little bit democratized, as a cultural
stronghold for the socially advantaged, but its old-boy alumni remain a cohesive and powerful
group within the city: Fassi squared as they like to put it. After the Fact: Two Countries,
Four Decades, One Anthropologist (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1995).
608

211

Education in the interwar period became politicized on many levels. The investment that
went into the modern education of sons frequently was not producing the expected returns of
salary levels or employment at all within the Protectorate administration, creating disgruntled
fathers and underemployed young male school-leavers.612 An often noted exception to the male
domination of early Moroccan lettered feminist discourse came from Malika el Fassi, who was
educated in her Fasi home beginning in the late nineteen twenties. In mid-nineteen thirties, by
the age of fifteen she was publishing writings (signed the young woman) through the Arabic
language press emphasizing the importance of education for the nation.613 In 1933 the French
interceded against Istiqlal (Independence) party founder Mohamed Allal Al-Fassis nationalist
lectures and removed him and his colleagues from their position as ulema in Qarawin
university.614 In early 1934, following a riot in Fes which was sparked by the French
cancellation of the kings attendance at Friday prayer, due to fears of the consequences of Fasi
popular enthusiasm, a committee of nationalists met in Fes to formalize and present their reform
plan to the Makhzan and Protectorate.615 Historically significant among its catalogue of
articulated interests were free compulsory primary and secondary education for boys and girls,
as well as an appeal for the legal abolition of slavery and the slave trade.616

612

See Jacques Berque, French North Africa; the Maghrib Between Two World Wars (New
York: Praeger, 1967) pp. 164-184.
613
Baker (1998) pp. 47-48 Malika el Fassis writings in the nineteen forties assumed the
pseudonym the scrutinizer of civilization.
614
Douglas Ashford, Political Change in Morocco (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press,
1961) p. 36.
615
Ibid p. 37.
616
Pennell (2000) p. 232, Rita Aouad Badoual, Esclavage et situation des Noirs au Maroc
dans la premire moiti du XX sicle, in Eds. Laurence Marfaing and Stephen Wippel, Les
relations transahariennes l'poque contemporaine. Un espace en constante mutation. (Paris:
Karthala,2004) p. 349.
212

In Fes on January 11, 1944 Malika el-Fassi became the sole woman among fifty-nine
total signatories of the Istiqlal manifesto, which was sent to France and England and with
some prescience the U.S.S.R. and the U.S. as well.617 In the post-war Protectorate period
relevant political interests in women expanded and education continued to play a key role. Elite
nationalists attention to the import of educating Moroccan women prepared an attractive
symbolic opportunity which King Mohamed V benefited from. Mohamed V displayed his favor
of womens education in 1945 when he founded a school for Rabat notables. It has been
suggested that the first leaders of the feminist movement in Morocco were to be found in the
royal family Mohammed V initiated this emancipation by encouraging his daughters (although
not his wives or concubines) to adopt western ways.618 Indeed his daughter Princess Lalla
Aicha, who was educated by the renowned Salafi Si Mohammed bel-Arabi el-Alaoui, and
received her primary school certificate in 1943, became a national representation of a new vision
of Moroccan womanhood.619 In 1947 she secured her heroine status through an appearance on
the national political stage via an iconic speech in Tangier. The moment had been set by the
April 1947 massacre of Moroccans in Casablanca by Senegalese troops, which occurred one day
prior to Mohamed Vs scheduled trip to the international zone of Tangier. The King did
subsequently travel to Tangier where he along with his son Prince Hassan II and daughter
Princess Lalla Aicha gave speeches which collectively marked the Makhzans formal affiliation

617

Rivet (1999) p. 373.

Cohen and Hahn (1966) p. 203.
619
Zakya Daoud, Fminisme et politique au Maghreb (Casablanca: Eddif, 1993) pp. 244-245.
618

213

with the Isliqlal party and the independence movement.620 This act was widely interpreted by a
generation of Moroccans as part of a notable and exciting expansion in womens potentials.621
Throughout the independence movement womens education continued to have a
political role resonant with their status while it also continued to be the general reserve of elite
Moroccan women. Privileged and educated nationalist women in the 1940s began to express
interest in reforming the Mudawana.622 In 1948 an Istiqlal womens association, the Sisters of
Purity, held a congress in which many topics of future significance concerning women and the
family were discussed, including unequal treatment in marriage, infanticide, polygamy and
divorce.623 In 1949, four years after French women first voted, Moroccan women began
studying at Qaraouine University and the first Moroccan woman received her baccalaureate.624
Beyond their symbolic importance these gains were more of a well-managed trickle than an
insubordinate deluge. In the decade between 1943 and 1953 only fifty-two Moroccan girls
earned their primary school certificate.625 Though elite Moroccan women continued to play
acknowledgeable and frequently visible roles in the independence movement, in the 1950s
radicalization and armed struggle, during what was by far the most aggressive period of colonial
settlement and international investment, the greatest sacrifices and practical contributions came

620

E. G. H. Joffe, The Moroccan Nationalist Movement: Istiqlal, the Sultan, and the Country,
The Journal of African History (Vol. 26, No. 4, World War II and Africa, 1985).
621
Cohen and Hahn (1966) p. 202.
622
Zakia Salime, Between Islam and Feminism: New Political Transformations and Movements
in Morocco (Unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign, 2005)
p. 3.
623
Pennell (2000) p. 275. Also see Baker (1998) p. 54.
624
Ibid., Also see Baker (1998) p. 56.
625
Albert Ayache, Maroc des origines 1956 (Paris: Editions de l'Atelier/Editions ouvrires,
1998) p. 321.
214

from unheralded non-elite Moroccan women. One such example occurred in a 1952 general
strike in Casablanca in which several demonstrating women were killed.626
Ironically similar to the Protectorate, the nationalists avoided directly pursuing and
developing slavery as an important issue in their complex agenda referring to emancipation,
empowerment, modernization and independence.627 An overwhelming reason for the deemphasis or depoliticization of slavery was that the Fasi elite nationalist men and women who
shaped and sought reforms and independence did not seek to abandon their economic and social
class privileges within which slavery was a standard family institution.628 Along with
representing reform, it has been noted that Mohamed V maintained two wives and over forty
concubines, with his youngest child being born in 1954 to a girl who had been given to him by
El-Glaoui.629 In Fes the assumed and maintained power relations entailed in slave ownership
transcended contention over national and local political controls. The class privilege of Fasi elite
political figures with radically differing orientations meant that they lived in slave owning
families. For municipal authorities such as Basha Baghdadi and Basha Tazi, as well as the
nationalists they monitored and detained, slaves were basic part of their intimate family lives.630
A subtle but decipherable and highly consequential social change was slowly occurring
across generational differences within Fasi slave owning families. Those who grew up within
the Protectorate were often forced to evaluate and respond to challenges both from the social
order inherited from their parents and elders as well as the imposition of an European colonial

626

Baker (1998) p. 27.

Aouad Badoual (2004) p. 349.
628
Baker (1998) p. 23.
629
Cohen and Hahn (1969) p. 43.
630
For example, the will of Caid Ben Assia notes his mowteka. (Rcif July 3, 1922). Also see
Fatima Mernissi, Doing Daily Battle: Interviews with Moroccan Women (London: Women's
Press, 1988) p. 30.
627

215

order upon Morocco. It has been suggested that these generational changes of attitude and
behavior could eventually influence Fasi patriarchs decisions as well, and that some grew to
consider ending slavery a revolutionary and, or modern gesture.631 Yet it is important to make
clear that to the extent that elite sons and daughters formed their expectations and identities in
distinction from and occasionally against their parents ways and wishes, the patrimony and the
benefits of being a Fasi elite within which slavery was practiced were not rejected.632 The end of
Fasi domestic slavery as a social institution was inextricable from a slow underlying change of
the available means and modes of articulating and protecting this patrimony within Fasi families,
which were themselves being reformulated in the process. Newly acquired skills and ways of
thinking became important beyond their specific intended functions, and developed a feedback
of social influence with family structures.633
Shifting Contexts of Material Culture
In addition to the political forces involved in nationalism and education, women and families
shaped and were shaped by multiple currents of socio-cultural change. Such currents were
reflected in the modifications of Fasi material culture. Throughout the Protectorate period there
were several notable changes in clothing, the major themes of which were European influences
and the shifting boundaries of acceptable piety. The implications and meanings of these changes
were complex. The gradual and selective appearance and utilization of European dress was not

631

Mernissi (1988) and Aouad Badoual (2004) briefly consider nationalist slaveowning elites in
this capacity. Rivet (1999) p. 256 makes the more general point that foreign educated elites saw
slavery as old fashioned and an obstacle to modernity. Neither scholarly point of emphasis
considers what forms of household and family reorganization were sought.
632
Abun-Nasr (1987) p. 129. Fasi scholar Abdelkrim Ghallab details this generation with
attention to a slave figure in his novel Le Passe Enterre (Maroc: Editions Okad, 1987).
633
Thought inspired by John Waterbury, The Commander of the Faithful; the Moroccan
Political Elite - a study in Segmented Politics (New York: Columbia University Press, 1970) p.
101.
216

always a clear demarcation of specific European attitudessuch as had come to be the

association with Algerian volusand traditional clothing was not a glacial monolith; to the
contrary Moroccan fabrics, clothing styles and designs and were constantly responsive and
dynamic, though not necessarily in European terms.
Again, generational differences formed a crucial dimension of this context. From the
vantage point of the nineteen forties it was held that no Fasi of a certain age would give up the
clothing of their parents.634 This generational factor influenced how European clothing figured
into Fasi dress and social life in interesting ways. European dress was generally abandoned for
what was deemed more appropriate Moroccan clothing during religious and familial functions.
Elite women established trends of accessorizing their traditional clothing with imported
European scarves, handbags and perfumes. Also of note, some Fasi women began to wear
European and European-styled heeled shoes, which suggest their determination to master such
symbolic capital due to the immense impracticality and likelihood of discomfort these would
present if worn when required to be ambulatory within challenging or steep arteries of the
medina such as talaa kbir.635 Elite men were no less sophisticated in their consciousness and
deliberate employment of European clothing. What has been noted of Mohamed V and the Fasi
nationalist was true for an expansive range of their contemporary Fasi patriarchs styles
developed based on combining elements of European and Moroccan clothing.636 The wearing of
a djellaba over a tailored European or European-styled suit was a ripe metaphor for the ways in

634

Roger Le Tourneau, Fs avant le protectorat; tude conomique et sociale d'une ville de

l'occident musulman (Casablanca: SMLE, 1949) p. 192.
635
Rivet (1999) p.335 notes a doctor in Fes writing about the urgent problem of Moroccan
womens interests and evolution.
636
Cohen and Hahn (1969) p. 43.
217

which a sophisticated mtissage of values and symbols were being claimed and commanded by
powerful Fasis.637
Fes and Fasis occupied a particularly meaningful and far-reaching juncture concerning
changes related to clothing due to the citys dense concentration both of influential textile
businesses and religious authorities. Throughout the Protectorate period and beyond, Fasis
maintained very powerful and close-knit family and interfamily business relations.638 Though
Fasis were very socially conservative, in allegiance with their historical sources of benefit, they
also were the leaders in maintaining and innovating traditional textile and garment production, as
well as in efforts to eventually modernize all features related to these businesses. The amalgam
of Fasi claims and pursuits fashioned urban contradictions and social tensions slowly evident as
more women earned wages and as consumer culture shifted toward women. In 1937 the same
Fasi community that was profiting from the production, import, and distribution of fashionable
materials which would be made into womens djellabas had an ulama which demanded that
women be prohibited from walking outside their homes dressed only in a djellabas rather than a
haik (a long body-covering garment) and litham (a thick, full white veil).639 Members of the
same communities and families which held conservative and critical attitudes about these and
other changes related to French colonialism and Nazarenes also persistently sought advantages
from these changes. Fasi cloth merchants mastered the incubation of trends in womens modern,
637

Pennell (2000) p. 239.

Gabriel Pallez, Les Marchands Fassis, Memoire de Stage, Section Economique et Financiere
Ecole Nationale DAdministration March 1948, p. 17 microfilm (CADN),
also see Norman Cigar, Socio-Economic Structures and the Development of an Urban
Bourgeoisie in Pre-Colonial Morocco, The Maghreb Review, (6, 3-4, 1981). Such authors argue
or assume that the conservative Fasi social system mitigated the flourishing of urban finance, and
thus capitalism within the medina.
639
Moulay Abdelhadi Alaoui, Le Maroc du trait de Fs la liberation 1912-1956 (Rabat: Les
Editions A.P.I., 1980) p.77, Baker (1998) p.321, Paul Decroux, Fminisme et islam: la femme
dans l'Islam moderne (microform), 1947 p.11 (CADN)
638

218

traditional, and what would become traditional clothing starting at the level of the cloth itself.
Some of the current styles noted in 1942 included wool shawls named Kepi of Marechal
Petain, Axe in the Head of the Mother-in-Law, Posterior of Rami, Feet of the Cuckold in the
Stairway, and featured titles of muslin cloth Snow on the Mountain, O Nice Pigeon, Far from
Me, and Wear Me and Forget Me.640 Distinct from previous periods in the lengthy history of
Fasi international business dealings, these imports were no longer the exclusive reserve of
wealthy Fasis, rather wealthy Fasi merchant families were at the center of a radical popular shift
in the movement of goods.
One of the most important ways in which power relations were involved in the changes in
Fasi dress concerned women and their relative amount of seclusion.641 As the complete or near
complete seclusion of women increasingly became a luxury with an eroding demand, urban
Moroccan women in general, including elite Fasi women from slaveowning families increasingly
dressed for functions outside their homes. The decision making concerning the purchasing and
wearing of clothing revealed anticipatory changes in how families functioned. It was noted in
the nineteen twenties, at a time in which elite women were normally secluded and were at most a
rudimentary presence in the marketplace, that mothers were influencing and deciding what
family clothing fathers should purchase.642 Though men were most directly involved in these
commercial exchanges, they could not define, manage or seclude changes in the personal, social
and gendered meanings of clothing. In part these changes were influenced by women across
social and economic stratifications pursuing their versions of modernity and the shifts in
expectations that this entailed for them. Though the most luxurious households had the greatest

640

Pallez (1948) p. 47.

Le Tourneau (1949) p. 544.
642
Goichon (1929) p. 17.
641

219

likelihood of access European influences, European was not the only relevant means or measure.
In addition to Europe, the often cited example of Japanese imported shoes became a noted trend
in nineteen thirties Fes; and in another example, about 1932, the Iraqi bonnet made a fury
among the young nationalists; and most importantly, in many related economic areas local
artisans persevered in their non-industrial struggle to remain adaptive and competitive.643
Though the consequences differed across classes and families, changes in the marketplace
related to clothing were significant among the ways young Fasi elite girls and boys of this period
were socialized into different expectations and relationships, both political and personal. After
the 1937 move to ban women from wearing djellabas the garment thereafter became a symbol
of protest and emancipation.644 This tension was not only directed at Fasi conservatism, as was
recounted for example by a Fasi woman in the nationalist movement during a period of martial
law controlling all movement in the medina, a group of Fasi women wore djellabas in order to
convince the police that they needed to return home, so as to pass through blockades and
circulate a petition.645
Among the significant changes in Fasi material culture during the Protectorate, changes
in household items were often reflective of shifting status symbols and the reorganization of
prestige among Fais families. By the late nineteen forties a small number of elite Fasi kitchens,
both in the medina and among those who moved into European residential areas, had undergone
piecemeal and full-scale expressions of modernization.646 While some of the economic
realization of Fasi profits during WWII went into repairing and aggrandizing traditional homes

643

Berque (1967) pp. 92,176.

Baker (1998) p. 321. Also see Decroux (1947).
645
Le Toureanu (1949) p. 192, Baker (1989) p. 89.
646
Jean dEtienne, Une famille marocaine, in Cahiers LAfrique et LAsie: LEvolution sociale
du Maroc (Paris: Peyronnet, 1951). p. 70.
644

220

and traditional status symbols, social and economic pioneers invested outside of the medina and
its traditions in what would become the norms of new ways of Fasi life.647 The move away from
charcoal cooking fuel and to household refrigeration was accompanied by the dramatic scale
adoption of aluminum cooking wear. It seems that with the decline of imports during the war,
locally manufactured heavy terra cotta was given a temporary monopoly, but with the postwar
resumption of imported goods the use of traditional pottery for cooking and serving was rapidly
outmoded.648
During this period there were telling changes in the exterior of Fasi houses as well. The
traditional mounting block for mules and the stone benches of gatekeepers once employed to
regulated neighborhoods and commercial areas throughout the city were noted to be
disappearing.649 Urban spaces outside of Fes medina were being rebranded and developed with
new constructions for new families with the new materials of iron and concrete. Though the
planning and design of such new homes entailed certain traditional features such as dedicating a
considerable ratio of the entire space to rooms for receiving and entertaining guests, and in cases
the deliberate consideration of a small space or room for domestics, these new households
were also distinct in that they were fused with the contemporary European urban values of
apartments and were thus not intended to be inhabited by polynuclear families.650
Integral with these changes in material culture were new media, new urban spaces, and
new kinds of experiences and meanings related to Fasi women and families. During the
647

Ibid p. 74.
Ibid.
649
Ibid p. 75.
650
Ibid. For a brilliant examination of these traditional spaces see Ali Amahan and Lucien
Golvin; Jacques Revault Ed. Palais et demeures de Fes III: Epoque 'A lawite XIX sicle XX
sicles Bilan des recherches sur l'architecture domestique Fes Institut de Recherches et
Detudes sur Le Monde Arabe et Musulman Universite DAix en Provence (Paris: CNRS, 1992)
p. 80.
648

221

Protectorate period cafes and cinemas were absorbed into the fabric of changing Fasi life.651 In
these clearly male dominated spaces, the exchanges of information and ideas that occurred
within and surrounding these venues was seminal in the generational shifts of Fasi values. Elite
women were typically chaperone to and from these spaces, as well as to the ville for a
promenade on the boulevard and shopping on Friday afternoons.652 New forms of leisure
produced innovative opportunities for social interaction, heavily curtailed by class and
nationality, gender. By the nineteen forties wealthy Fasis had cars and access to sports clubs and
a swimming pool; some working class Fasi males might have enjoyed the latter two, but females
access to all of these realms would have been far more limited in general.653
For the literate there were decades of cheap remaindered novels, including erotic and
political books perhaps read in private, as well as the quotidian public reading of advertising,
newspaper headlines and magazine covers with texts and images reaching out to the illiterate
majority.654 Again, the flow of modernity did not only emanate solely from Europe Egyptian
films and radio from Cairo changed ideas, identifications and even influenced Moroccan
surnames.655 Also, the American military presence during and following WWII, and the
American-centered post-war commodity culture became increasingly important. Products
associated with America like Coca-cola and chewing gum penetrated deeply into the domestic
Fasi market and for some proclaimed the utility and the desirability of freedom.656 These new

651

Pennell (2000) p. 207, Le Tourneau (1949) notes two cinemas in the medina by the nineteen
forties. p. 554.
652
Goichon (1929) p. 86.
653
Le Tourneau (1949) pp. 554, 548.
654
Goichon (1929) p. 72.
655
Baker (1998) p. 47, Rivet (1999) p. 322.
656
Pennell (2000) pp. 261,294. Also see Fatima.Mernissi, The Harem Within (London:
Doubleday, 1994). Houcine Slaouis 1942 popular song "Ok Ok Come On Bye Bye,"
222

channels of social life and socialization helped to further shape and articulate changes in personal
desires and expectations, including those concerning marriage and family life.657
Living and working with and around Europeans brought a slow but steady interest in, and
channel of information about, their norms and family lives.658 However, all was not en rose with
the family of the other. French colons in Morocco were themselves confronted with the changes
and breakdowns within their own families.659 Interestingly, colons rising rates of divorce and
juvenile delinquency were associated with urban changes and labor issues comparable, if not
indistinguishable forces to those also confronting many Moroccan families. Despite degrees of
ongoing propinquity with the multifaceted basis of changes within Moroccan families and their
own familial problems, Europeans continued to think of polygamy and concubinage as
unacceptable barriers to their efforts to model a more evolved love marriage and nuclear family,
while the patriarchal ethos of Protectorate policy remained intent to leave the Muslim man to
control his domestic and personal relations including those with his women and slaves.660
Reorganization in Patterns of Marriage and Family Life
Along with generational changes in ideas, interests and expectations were changes in marriage
patterns. The principal aspects of these changes concerned the reduction of polygamy, the

(featuring the lyric give me dollar near the end of the piece) marked a widely recognized oral
historical reference in this context.
657
Pennell (2000) p. 261. Again Mernissi (1994) describes in a fascinating personal light the
way in which commodities entered into the meanings of daily lives in Fasi households.
658
Baker (1998) p. 21.
659
Rapport sur Lorientation de la Politque Familiale, (Federation des Associations Familiales
Francaises du Maroc, 1945) (CADN).
660
Goichon (1929) p. 73, Rivet (1999) p. 324. Further genealogical inquiry should be given to
Protectorate understandings and policies concerning family and Moroccan political history
deeply staked images of the oppression of Muslim women coincided with carefully maintained
cross-cultural patriarchal policies amid the apparent historical incongruity of numerous actual
and consequential, though slow and socially uneven, gendered currents of changing political
claims.
223

increase in marriage ages (particularly for young women), and lessening numbers of children.661
It has been suggested that in particular the generation born during the Protectorate steadily gave
up polygamy and moved away from the model and practice of the polynuclear family.662 Amid
these forces Fasi concubinage declined while the collective use of non-slave domestic labor rose,
though at an uneven pace varied across households.663 An important variable in this gradual
social mutation remains a question of historical sociology. It may have been that the largest,
wealthiest and most elite slaveowning families, formed the most likely centers within which the
reception and internalization of Protectorate era education, reform interests and market changes
ultimately altered family life, due to the greater access and mobility of their youth in reinventing
themselves which accompanied the nature of their privileges. However, though such polynuclear
families had the greatest numbers of concubines and slaves per household, the majority of total
Fasi slaveowning families was comprised of less wealthy ranks with what was likely weaker, or
at least different access to these sources of generational influence and family change. In either
case, marriages and family life were slowly and persistently morphing from within traditions
throughout the Fasi elite.
Wedding arrangements and wedding culture marked an important site and consummation
of shifting Fasi family values. The means and degree to which courtship and marriages were
arranged among Fasi families were variously and irrevocably altered.664 Along with a social
current which brought a greater if not nouveau-riche investment and quality of display to
661

See dEtienne (1951).

See Aouad Badoual (2004), also Rivet (1999) p. 319 and Le Tourneau (1949) p. 524 for
mentions of the Fasi elite turning to increasing disfavor of polygamy.
663
Another related feature was the gradual rise of wage earning as noted in Chapter 3.
664
Paul Marty, Le Maroc de Demain (Paris: Comite de l'Afrique francaise,
1925) pp. 286-287. Also see Edward Westermarck, Les crmonies du mariage au Maroc
(Paris: E. Leroux, 1921), Jrme et Jean Tharaud, Fs ou les bourgeois de Islam (Paris: Plon,
1930).
662

224

dowries, was a turn of emphasis upon other values.665 It has been noted that after 1944 the
bourgeoisie lent unreserved support to the nationalist movement, and thus elite Fasi fathers
were open to validating new ideas in marriage partners.666 Photographs had entered into the
courtship process and European and European inspired clothing began to be showcased among
brides many outfit changes during weddings.667 An area of relevant change for this study was in
the role of neggafas. Along with mothers, Dadas, interested relatives and neighbors, neggafas
formed a formal and powerful association of black women in Fes who were professional
matchmakers, wedding arrangers and masters of ceremony for Fasi marriages.668 In addition to
the practical details of arranging the loan or rent of expensive clothing, during the first half of the
twentieth-century they gained great influence as a network of liaisons amid the economic,
political, social and personal interests of elite Fasi intermarriages.669 By the nineteen forties their
role as matchmakers was beginning to decline with the rise of the importance and capabilities of
emerging social networks which Fasi marriageable youth began to develop, to be involved in and
to be effected through.670 It should also be noted that as elite Fasi girls expected age for
marriage and expected access to and level of education and social exposure increased, internal
family politics in the dyad between a fathers authority and a young womans consent concerning
marriage shifted away from the fathers assumed total monopoly.671

665

See K. Benabdeljelil, Les crmonies du mariage a Fs (Arch. Ined. Des Amis de Fs) 1939,
Rivet (1999) p. 257.
666
John Waterbury, The Commander of the Faithful; the Moroccan Political Elite- a study in
Segmented Politics (New York: Columbia University Press, 1970) p. 102.
667
Le Tourneau (1949) p. 504. Le Tourneau also noted European clothing at a wedding attended
by students from girls schools run by the Protectorate. p. 519.
668
Tharaud (1930) pp. 79-80.
669
Marty (1925) p. 272.
670
See Le Tourneau (1949) p. 533.
671
Ibid. pp. 505,508.
225

Changes within and surrounding marriage and family were registered among the Fasi
household politics of family roles and relationships. In polynuclear slaveowning families slow
shifts in the patterns of relations between husbands and wives entailed multiple dimensions.672
One effort to describe the observed subtle changes in spousal relations during the nineteen
twenties was that Fasi middle class wives may have been disobedient, but there was an unmoved
respect for parents and husbands as part of the authority claims and validations of the basic
institution of family life.673 It was also noted of these wives that they were active interlocutors
and decision makers with their husbands on certain matters while not on others.674 One of the
most important dimensions in these changes concerned perennial tensions between mothers and
daughter in laws, expressed through varied identifications in varied waysacross generations.
675

In addition to the quotidian interpersonal features of these family power relations,

widespread identifications and intimate psychological associations were informed by mass

mediated Arab female figures. As described,
young women aspire to change, strictly controlled throughout the house by the
presence of a guard (bawab). Singers such as Oum Kalthoum or the Lebanese Princess
Asmahan on the radio (through Saout Al Qahira, "the Voice of Cairo"), and the actresses
of the cinema Egyptien playing femmes fatale, such as Leila Munad, form an Eastern
version of the model of the emancipated woman and romantic love and touch an
imaginary mark through the desire of escape. On the terraces, which are the lungs of the
Fasi house and the pressure valve for confined women, passionate discussion unfolds on
the condition of the Moslem woman.676
The propagation of such symbols, and far more importantly their socialization, came to be a
distinguishing generational feature of Moroccan women and families, which helped them both to
672

One example concerned the marriage tradition of a slave or servant being brought with a wife,
or promised to a wife, whose presence sometimes led to her concubinage with a husband. See
Tharaud (1930) p. 122.
673
Goichon (1929) p. 32.
674
Ibid.
675
Rivet (1999) p. 257.
676
Ibid
226

differentiate themselves from their elders and to sow the seeds of post-independence identities
and gender politics.
The relationships involved with concubines added a further ornate level of complexity to
slaveowning Fasi families. Again in the nineteen twenties, it was observed that a,
Madam (Lala) asks for her children and those of the other legitimate women, for herself,
for the maid, slaves, concubines and their children. A daring concubine sometimes
claims for herself and her children, it would never be allowed to deliver an opinion with
regard to others or the house. The first woman is only maitress of house677
In addition to the hierarchy and contention among free women, concubines, and concubines with
recognized children, among slaves themselves a concubine (popularly termed a jaria or slave of
the bed) would have far more ability to directly claim power than house slaves. The only
possible exception might be a Dada figure, who would accumulate respect through generations
of dedicated childcare and her privy to household intimacies. However, because their was not
necessarily any difference between a concubine and a house slave, due to the perpetual
possibility of sexual relations with Sidi, the dynamics of possible competitions and conflicts
were thus expanded.678 Domestic slavery was at the core of these polynuclear dynamics
surrounding Sidi, and in this sense the decline of this institution would necessarily entail a
holistic familial transformation.
At the core of the Fasi institution of concubinage was a male sensualization of black
slave women. Orientalist European male sensibilities echoed if not amplified with
distortions these sexual power relations.679 Aside from their excessive depictions and the
colonial politics within which they were inscribed, Fasi concubinage did entail important social

677

Goichon (1929) p. 34.

Tharaud (1930) pp. 21-22, also see p. 106.
679
Ibid. pp. 21,107,109,145,216.
678

227

constructions concerning color and sexuality.680 One of the most important features was a
general awareness of the contingencies of color and power within families. Another related
feature was the stereotypical perception of white Fasi women as being lacking compared with
black women in terms of their sexuality and fertility681 In this scenario, where elite women Fasi
womans proper upbringing stereotypically rendered them cold, frigid, confined, and promising
little sexual expressiveness, the bodies of hard working and approachable black slave women
who were physically self aware and mobile outside the house were mythically eroticized as
inherent sources of heat and sexual vigor in spite of the generalized reality of their conditions of
stress and exhaustion. Experiences and social values related to these themes will discussed
further below.
Elite Fasi childhood within slave owning families was another crucial area to undergo
changes.682 The Dada of a household, along with other slave women, typically exposed young
Fasi children and household women to Afro-Maghribi folklore creating a heightened sensitivity
to a spiritual order in which slaves and their descendents found a validation of social assertions
and claims to forms of knowledge and power they dominated.683 From the first decades of the
twentieth century elite Fasi children began to experience many new forms of early stimulation.
Along with special worlds animated through bonds to Dadas care and storytelling, by the
nineteen twenties European toys rapidly entered family life, and also noted of young Fasi
children the gramophone was a source of early captivation for which a six year old

680

See Mohammed Ennaji, Young Slaves and Servants in Nineteenth-Century Morocco,

Critical Quarterly (Vol. 39 Issue 3, 1997).
681
Tharaud (1930) p. 23.
682
Le Tourneau (1949) p. 534.
683
R. David Goodman, The Space of Africanness: Using Gnawa Music in Morocco as Evidence
of North African Slavery and Slave Culture, Journal of Asian and African Studies (No.64,
2002), Tharaud (1930) pp. 106,126, Le Tourneau (1949) pp. 534-535,546,610-612.
228

canchange the disc and install the needle.684 In large elite households children would have
formed multiple relations including with their mothers, grandmothers, aunts and slaves, while
for those of lesser means children would have greater primary socialization among their
neighbors.685 Within these extended constellations children learned to explore their potential
access to cakes, candies, refined sweets, and European manufactured toys.686
In the nineteen forties it was rightly asserted that the elite Fasi family normally
considered itself completed by servants or slaves, in a variable number according to their
comfort.687 Fasi domestic slavery would end amid historical changes in which elite Fasi
families would rarely, and not dramatically, alter this image. Throughout the Protectorate period
shifting values and experiences related to marriages had implications for elite Fasi families
relationships to slaves and servants; but as family was reformulated the roles and functions of
slaves and servants often without full and clear distinctions continued to be a perceived
necessity. As various sources influenced Sidi and Lalas reordering of the family, perhaps along
a more modernized or French model of using the domestic labor of bonnes, this change did not
necessarily lead to radically reordering slaves and servants functions or familial affiliations,
either symbolic or literal. In one reflection of the continued family-like sensibility, the rising
presence of young non-slave female servants living as dependants of Fasi families instilled hopes
and expectations of their marriage either into Fasi families or through the direct assistance of
their patronage.688
Post-Independence Changes and Continuities
684

Goichon (1929) p. 21, Le Tourneau (1949) p. 556.

Le Tourneau (1949) p. 537.
686
Goichon (1929) p. 35.
687
Le Tourneau (1949) p. 549.
688
Jean Grapinet, Etude sur les relations sociales et conomique entre fassis et gens du bled
Mmoires de stage des contrleurs civil stagiaires, microfilm 1932 (CADN).
685

229

Following independence, several notable currents of political and social change involved and
effected Fasi slave owning families. Perhaps the most significant overarching area of relevant
control was the post-independence depoliticization of Moroccan womens status. From within
the most powerful and politically symbolic space of Moroccan tradition and family, the royal
Princess Lalla Aicha moved from symbolizing and openly promoting womens equality toward
evasive and cautious positions after Independence.689 She eventually became an Ambassador,
her royal sisters Lalla Malika and Lalla Muzna became no longer publicly active.690
As the once Fes based Istiqlal leadership took over the reigns of national power in Rabat,
their male-centered feminist agenda and investment in elite female representation declined to
minor adornments for political purposes and national holidays.691 At Independence all fiftytwo of the womens centers which had been developed nationally continued to be administrated
by French women directors, with Moroccan replacements being appointed some two years later.
This low order of prioritization was indicative of the non-committal state, and of a correspondent
lack of trained and capable personal which could launch purported national literacy and feminist
groups.692 Privileged pioneering feminist Malika al-Fassis symbolic and literal leadership of
Istiqlals feminist wing, saw her presided over a period of atrophy during which the nationalist
force of a feminist agenda was eclipsed and laid to waste by the greater political forces
surrounding the claims to power and privilege among an established and emerging elite.693 In

689

Douglas Ashford, Political Change in Morocco (Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press,
1961) p. 402.
690
Mark I. Cohen and Lorna Hahn, Morocco: Old Land, New Nation. (London: Pall Mall, 1966).
691
Ashford (1961) p. 402.
692
Ibid. pp. 220, 401-402.
693
Waterbury (1970) p. 125 Here the author conveys a convoluted, assumption-ridden
comparative assertion: So far Moroccan women have made little effort to assert themselves, and
230

this reorganization of the articulations of power and prestige her husband, Muhammed al-Fassi,
the head of Istqlal, would see the democratic potential of the partys entire earlier agenda and
base of support overshadowed by the monarchys firm consolidation and redistribution of
national power. In this context the male and elite centered Moroccan feminist movement failed
to maintain the Protectorate-era positions which had been gained or the popular momentum and
attitudes relevant among Moroccan families. Thus, in the nineteen sixties and nineteen
seventies, a period of which it was described that Moroccan feminist leadership was on the
whole monopolized by women with French cultural interests and secure positions in urban
society, Moroccan women failed to be able to claim and hold significant political roles within
official state channels and positions.694
Yet the depoliticization of women in which they were relegated to roles concerning the
household and family came to be historically responded to with a far greater base of interest in
the politicization of family and womens legal status. The multi-dimensional and national center
toward which these political interests levitated concerned the reform of personal status law (almudawana). In 1957, one year after independence Allal El Fassi wrote a moderately revised
mudawana for independent Morocco, in a political move in which women and their family roles
had become a centerpiece in a carefully invested representation of tradition.695 One Moroccan
feminist scholar has interpreted this juncture as, not merely the inscription of patriarchal values
in a state law. It was rather the articulation of national unity and political legitimacy around

unlike American Negroes, have accepted the leadership of those who are their alleged
oppressors.
694
Pennell (2000) p. 348.
695
Baker (1998) p. 30.
231

gender meanings.696 The charged content of the mudawana code of family was the
specification of womens property laws, divorce laws, and the legal basis of limitations on
polygamy, all of which continued to clearly and strongly entitle the agency and judgment of
Moroccan men over women. Though lettered elite nationalist women had discussed reforming
the mudawana to further favor womens equality in the nineteen forties it would not be until
several decades, in the nineteen eighties that Moroccan women would begin to thereafter exert
an increasingly important political influence on the state and the revision of the mudawana.697
The contours of the many post-independence social and economic changes altered
Moroccan families and womens realities beyond an accurate correspondence with Allal El
Fassis legal and moral vision.698 The changes which a Protectorate-era slave owning Fasi
family confronted in the nineteen forties and nineteen fifties were rapidly outpaced by those of
and following the nineteen sixties. As elite Fasi families reorganized and increasingly moved
from the medina, all of their constitutive relationships also changed. Among the new patterns of
relationships were the breakdown of older patriarchal polynuclear model, which would no longer
function as a residential and corporate unit, and thus no longer fulfilled the primary functions
of a relatively integrated social system.699 In this process of social and familial distancing,
relations have been characterized as having become increasingly selective and pragmatic.700

696

Zakia Salime, Between Islam and feminism: New political transformations and movements
in Morocco (Unpublished Ph.D. Dissertation, University of Illinois at Urbana-Champaign,
2005) p. 6.
697
Ibid p. 3.
698
See Fatima Sadiqi, Women and Linguistic Space in Morocco, Women and Language, (Vol.
26, 2003).
699
Salime (2005) pp. 67-68.
700
Saadia Sabah, Mediation in a Moroccan Setting (unpublished Ph.D. dissertation, Purdue
University, 1984) p. 74.
232

In 1957 the first woman graduated from the Qaraouine university in Fes.701 However,
despite Istqlal and the Makhzans promotions of nationalist interests in womens education, this
arena would prove to be a grave national disappointment.702 In 1984 over 90 percent of
Moroccan women were illiterate.703 The traditional elite and those who could join them horded
educational, economic, and political opportunities which did not expand proportionally with
population growth, much less democratization. As one political analysis from the period
explained, the progeny of the commercial families of Fes happen to be those Moroccans with
the highest levels of education and technical capacity and thereby merit their importance
according to technical as well as ascriptive criteria.704 Despite the diehard commitment of then
marginalized and radical Moroccan feminists, and wider perceptions of changes in womens
possible roles, as the modernized Moroccan elite reproduced itself through national and
international institutions of higher education, non-elite women gained disproportionally minor
access.705 Yet the few spaces that Moroccan females of all class backgrounds were able to
occupy within the government they succeeded within. The new Moroccan middle class entailed
a growth of civil servants, the ranks among which slowly growing numbers of women were able
to find employment, further setting the stage for the contemporary politics of the mudawana in

701

Baker (1998) p. 53.

See Daniel Wagner, Literacy, culture, and development: becoming literate in Morocco (New
York : Cambridge University Press, 1993), Fatima Agnaou, Gender, literacy and empowerment
in Morocco (New York: Routledge, 2004).
703
Pennell (2000) p. 364.
704
Waterbury (1970) p. 98.
705
See Rachel Newcomb, Singing to so many audiences: Negotiations of gender, identity, and
social space in Fes, Morocco, (Unpublished Ph.D. Dissertation: Princeton University, 2004),
also see Pierre Vermeren, La formation des lites marocaines et tunisiennes: des nationalistes
aux islamistes, 1920-2000 (Paris: Dcouverte, 2002).
702

233

which the gendered power relations of family life increasingly and literally blurred the
interactions between women, households and the state.706
After independence as the institution of domestic slavery continued to decline and was no
longer a widely endorsed Fasi family norm, many relevant and related features of its practices
and heritage become evident. The nationalist project launched and led by elite Fasis was related
to social changes in the end and aftermath of slavery and of larger Afro-Maghribi history in its
fostering of women as political subjects with an attention to their education and status which
could be appropriated and severely limited but could not remain indefinitely allocated to the
status of a protectorate of Moroccan men.
Another complex and expansive feature of the movements significancewhich also parallels
and interfaced with features of European historical dominancecan be seen with Allal el-Fassis
founding and tireless editorializing in the daily newspaper Al-alam,707 which was a principal
vehicle in the formulation, advocacy and realization of an imperial Moroccan vision. In 1975
Hassan II led some 350,000 Moroccans in the symbolic Green march of occupation into the
former colonized territory of the Spanish Sahara. In an arguably similar way as the French
Declaration of the Rights of Man and Citizen was forbidden in the Protectorate,708 and the 1943
Protectorate reform of the Moroccan penal code remained unpromulgated,709 the category of
justice was removed from post-independence state annuairies, and what had come to be
international recognized as human rights entered what has come to universally acknowledged
(even by the contemporary Makhzan) as a dark period of imprisonments and abuses. In one

706

Sabah (1984) p. 55.

Pennell (2000) p. 270.
708
Halstead (1967) pp. 51-52.
709
Pennell (2000) p. 266.
707

234

interview Hassan II offer a pithy testament of his supreme position, stating that human rights
end that the question of the Sahara.710
By the nineteen seventies the dominant political and intellectual frameworks for
approaching Moroccan society and family had been shaped in such a way that domestic slavery
continued to be relegated to non-discussion. For a lengthy time prior Moroccan domestic slavery
was represented and understood as a womens issue, and after independence as Moroccan
womens issues developed, their dominant orientation was shaped by a sufficiently elite
character so that slaves and former slaves voices were generally muted and spoken for.711 At
once emblematic of and exceptional in this predicament, Fatima Mernissi, attempted to
acknowledge voices from the haram but shows a willful insistence that the early nineteen
eighties contemporary counterpart of Batul Binjalluna, a former Fasi slave she interviewed,
would be women equipped with university degrees and fired by fierce ambitions for salary and
professional status.712 While offering an historically powerful political position and intellectual
intervention, historiographicallyand in the long run politically as well this interpretation
stands as an ideal projection which neither readily helps account for the actual relevant pulses of
social changes which occurred during the first decades following independence, or lends itself to
a self-reflective and diachronic explanation of why this specific study of Moroccan womens
voices found it necessary to feature the voices of two former slaves interviewees but only one
university educated woman. Clearly Mernissi never intended to celebrate and enshrine elite
Moroccan society womens accomplishments, elegance and hospitality, as the best of her work
710

Ibid p. 366.
For example the January 5th 1913 New York Times article Pleads for release of Moroccan
Women pg. C4 noted French doctor Mme. Legey writing to Stop Slavery and Help Women to
Self-Support.
712
Fatima Mernissi, Doing Daily Battle: Interviews with Moroccan Women (London : Women's
Press, 1988) p. 2.
711

235

has sought connection with and to encourage awareness of the lived frontline of Moroccan
womens struggles for university degrees, and equal salaries and professional status. Yet beyond
the responsible shoulders of pioneering scholars, with the contemporary international shift of
interests toward sex trafficking, child labor, and Muslim womens status, rights, and political
participation, the social changes which had radically reshaped the lives of male and female Fasi
slaves, former slaves and their descendents such as those whom Mernissi grew up among
remained complex, unclear, and under analyzed.713
Fasi Family Legal Practices During the Decline of Domestic Slavery
Where earlier discussion (see Chapter 2) focused on Fasi families usage of the Islamic courts of
the medina concerning liberations and the general end of the institution, present attention will be
given to legal practices related to families and relevant social currents during the decline. While
changes in laws and their enforcement did not bring the end of Moroccan slavery, legal records
featuring references to slaves offer many valuable insights into the familial and social contexts
within which Fasi slavery ended as an institution. We begin our continued probe of related
realms of conservative social changes through noting some relevant historical dynamics of legal
ideals and practices concerning slavery.
Throughout the Protectorate years the tolerance of Fasi domestic slavery was rationalized
with an interrelated combination of social and legal assertions concerning Islamic law and
Moroccan Muslim families. The single most encompassing and important assertion and
reification was the political move endorsing a normalization of slavery for the privileged. The
tradition of slavery was projected as self-evidently justified by the exigence of power and

713

See Fatima Mernissi, The Harem Within (London: Doubleday, 1994), and Fantaisies du
harem et nouvelles Schhrazade (Paris: Somogy, 2003).
236

sanctioned through culture and religion.714 In reality this static representation served to
rationalization a colonial political position conveniently favoring a selective constituency of elite
and powerful patriarchs throughout Morocco.715 It has been insightfully suggested that
indigenous policy,
takes as a starting point some basic postulates which do not bring up only Lyauteism.
The first of them, it is that it is necessary to preserve the system of the roles and statutes
assigning each one their place and to respect the modes of exercise of the acquired
authority. This is why the Protectorate will not prohibit slavery by a legislative act, and
will approach only tangentially the field, reserved for the colonized, of the gynce and
womens society.716
One Eurocentric extension of the logic inherent to this position was to entirely efface any
recognition of an historical basis of personal legal claims, through the misplaced assertion that
the concept of the rights of man was alien to pre-protectorate Morocco.717
Such a perspective imprisons any consideration of historical changes within social phenomena
such as slavery within a black box of European inputs and assimilative Moroccan outputs. Even
more fundamental, our present study demonstrates this perspective to be purely ahistorical, as
Protectorate legal reforms were clearly limited strategically to validate Moroccan legal practices
with Maliki shara.
This leads us to a second major assertion which held that slavery was part of an elaborate,
immutable and textually verifiable Islamic legal system, in which slaves were given real
guarantees and fair access to justice according to their status. Combined with the generalized
714

This condition is alluded to in a comment in R. Brunschvigs Encyclopedia of Islam article,

Abd, Other considerations, no doubt, keep France from having slavery abolished by law in
Morocco, where there are in any case only mild survivals in the cities or the southern oases.
CD-ROM Edition v.1.1.
715
An example of this can be seen in a brief memo from the Residence General reiterating the
importance of not penetrating into the personal lives of our protgs, Note: Au sujet de
lEsclavage au Maroc, M.B. (Likely Edouard Micheaux-Bellaire), 1923 (CADM).
716
Rivet (1999) p.305. Gynce refers womens areas of ancient Greek and Roman houses.
717
Halstead (1967) p. 51.
237

European and Moroccan elite attitudes of domestic slaves being treated like family, this approach
to the legal ideals of slavery was essential in formulating Protectorate policy. As previously
noted, there was a very minor though provocative Protectorate intellectual interest in promoting
Moroccan legal interpretations which challenged slavery.718 But in full continuity with
Protectorate interests and approaches to Moroccan traditions, their maintenance actually
involved conceptually complex processes of intervention. A most notable and perverse
intervention was the 1923 circular 17 which rendered slaves free by their own volition and
recognition by local Moroccan legal authorities. The very fact of this maneuver having been
made the basis of freedom resided within an arbitrary nudge of French command not in any way
based upon shara; the offer of freedom was to be based upon slaves themselves and then
validated through local Islamic legal authority. This policy made minute direct impact because it
entailed no serious effort at promoting the interests of those subsequently defined as
voluntarily enslaved. The Protectorates design of profound social segregation, along with its
systematic support of asymmetrical power relations among Moroccans, withered its possible
impact upon the conditions of slaves lives among their owners families. What was plainly
missing along with an uncompromising will for abolition was a practical connection with
the social and cultural realities in which Moroccan legal relationships and the status of slaves
were reproduced.
Collectively these assertions of Protectorate authority hovered at a remove from the
actual dynamics in which social and legal historical changes related to slavery occurred. While it
would be an overstatement that the Protectorate presence was non-influential to Moroccan law;
concerning slavery, selective French reforms and preservations were not formally or directly

718

See Chapter 2 pp. 36-44.

238

influential to clear and absolute legal changes. But such a line of analysis ultimately risks
reproducing the very limitations of the Protectorate orientation through obscuring the most
significant historical features of this change. Rather than an orientalists projection or quest for
an essential shara of slavery or shara of freedom, among the most relevant and revealing
sources of legal changes related to slavery were Fasi legal practices.
Attention to the varied pace of changes relevant to Fasi slavery which occurred among
law, society, and the political order is particularly important due to their interrelation
characterizing this conservative historical change. Here shifting legal and political norms show
us something important about the lived paths of ongoing social changes and vice versa. The
early twentieth-century shift rendering the slave trade a discreet private and clandestine affair
reflected a generalized deep respect for private affairs and discretion exercised concerning
changes in the practices of slavery within the norms in family life. As has been suggested, the
legal ideals of Moroccan shara are best understood in relation to custom, and the changing
practices and interpretations of shara provide its continued basis of legitimacy and relevance.719
The primary role of legal change was not an instrument of active enforcement of social change,
but changes in legal practice marked a significant interactive social reflection constituting law, or
were at very least essential to the meaning of legality. This makes the historical reconstruction
of the social transition of law difficult, and makes it impossible to declare the moment of full and
complete freedom for all Moroccans. By the same token this nebulous shifting of laws and
customs related to domestic slavery has proven to have very clearly opened deep and enduring

719

Lawrence Rosen, Equity and Discretion in a Modern Islamic Legal System, Law & Society
Review (Vol. 15, No. 2 1980 - 1981), Law and Custom in the Popular Legal Culture of North
Africa, Islamic Law and Society, (Volume 2, Number 2, 1995).
239

implications tied to the ongoing reconsideration and politicization of family and personal status
in Islamic law evident in post-independence Moroccan society and well beyond.720
Continuing from the precedent of Fasi adaptation following the 1905 public slave market
closure, Fasi elites and the jurists who were integral to their social fabric closed ranks among
themselves in controlling how and what they sought to legally represent concerning their
practices of domestic slavery. In this way the established norms and legal guarantees concerning
the practices of slavery were upheld along with gradual and informal legal reforms which
occurred among Fasi families and Fasi courts.721 Notaries themselves could exercise influence
on this process as intermediaries and as providers of the means for Fasi family legal practices
related to slavery, both toward continuity and and change.722
As noted above, the following discussion will examine several aspects of legal practices
related to slavery. Relevant pathways and patterns of legal data will be given both a quantitative
and an extended qualitative analysis. In outlining evidence of slowly shifting social
relationships, dominant tendencies and notable exceptions which characterize these changes will
be considered.
Marriage, Concubinage and the Recognition of Children
Turning to specific historical changes in legal practices related to slavery and family, we begin
with marriage and concubinage. Within Maliki law the only legal marriage between a free

720

See for example Bruce Maddy-Weitzman, Women, Islam, and the Moroccan State: the
Struggle over the Personal Status Law, Middle East Journal (Vol. 59, No. 3, 2005).
721
Le Tourneau (1949) pp. 215-216, Tharaud (1930) pp.109,129,131.
722
In legal practice such notaries could exercise significant influence through their authority and
knowledge. As footnoted in Rosen (1980-1981) p. 220, By telling potential litigants that their
case is of dubious merit, notaries may significantly affect the kinds of cases that come before the
court. Rosen also notes a relevant example of a notary discouraging litigation in John Henry
Wigmore, A Panorama of the World's Legal Systems (Washington: Washington Law Book Co,
1936) p. 587.
240

Muslim man or woman and a slave first requires that the slave be freed.723 Because a former
slave is introduced, or symbolically born, into legal recognition as a non-slave through a free
person responsible for and thereafter always legally, and to some extent socially, referred to in
the former slaves legal name, Fasi legal documents record these spouses (wives) as zowj wa
mowtek, or zowj wa mustowleda, or zowj wa mowdabira of a specific person and their family
name.724 Thus many of the freed slave women we are considering appear as former slaves of
other men and women, even after long decades of their lifetime in freedom and marriage.
Freedom and legal marriage symbolized that a former slave had acquired a great degree of
formal social recognition.
In spite of powerful social constructions surrounding the sexual figure of a concubine
(mustowleda), as a Fasi legal identity and category the common reference precisely signified a
female slaves recognition of having given birth to her owners child.725 In social and
marketplace discourse, as well as within elite Fasi household life, there were slaves of the bed,
female slaves sold and bought expressly to serve as sexual slaves.726 However unless legally
freed, their legal status would remain the same as slaves of the kitchen or slaves of the
house. As there was no form of legal prohibition against a male owner having sex with any of
his female slaves, a female slaves future was not solely determined by an ostensible purpose for
723

This was almost exclusively relevant for men marrying women. A very rare example
examined in this research noted a free Fasi woman married a freed male slave (Rcif
1.1.1345/11.7.1926). In some cases notaries combined these designations, ex. zowj mustowleda
mowtek (Smat 7.11.1362/14.1.1943).
724
Zowj wa means wife and.
725
For a term more common term see J. Schacht, "Umm al-Walad (a.)." in Encyclopedia of
Islam. Edited P.Bearman et al. Brill, 2007. Brill Online. Accessed 14, April 2007.
726
The Moroccan jurist Al-Wazzani is quoted concerning concubines, I swear on my religion
that concubines can be acquired at a lower price than the advantages that one gets from them.
And there are no worries: one can take a large or a small number of them; one can treat them as
equal or not; one can choose to be or not to be intimate with them. Mohammed Ennaji, Young
Slaves and Servants in Nineteenth-Century Morocco, Critical Quarterly (39, 3, 1997) p. 61.
241

which she or her ancestors, be they immediate or multigenerational, were bought. Commonplace
sexual relationships with slave women across the range of domestic functions could blur any
lines between slaves and concubines, and produced many mustowleda and children. The
principal formal legal route through which a slave could be freed for having served as a
concubine would be through a recognized child.727
There are several features of the overall shape of the decline of domestic slavery
represented within chart below (Figure 5) worthy of consideration. Firstly, of these figures
compiled from the over 1340 total references to slaves within notarized family legal documents
from the Rcif and Smat courts of Fes medina throughout the period between 1913 and 1971, it
should be noted that the total 224 references to former slave wives amount to over three times
the total references to immediate liberations or liberations upon death, while the 647 total
references to mustowledas comprise nearly nine times the frequency of these liberations.728
Clearly liberation was not as viable or frequent a formal legal practice as either of these family
relationships throughout the decline of the institution. Also it should be noted that though these
871 references comprise the majority of all formal legal references to Fasi domestic slaves
throughout this period, these figures are extremely low-bound, and all other forms of historical
evidence indicate that there many times more Fasi domestic slaves during this period than the
remainder of 469 non-liberated slaves within these figures.

727

Also in certain cases pregnancies of concubines were formally recognized and recorded.
Though it is clear that records of Fasi family legal actions were not comprehensively
compiled, these records provide a rare and invaluable window into these historical processes. It
should be noted that when within a single document (or within multiple documents referring to
the same people) there were references both to liberations and marriage, such references have
been counted within both categories, but only as a single reference among the total references to
slaves. Also the distinction of zowj mustowleda has been calculated and analyzed distinctly from
a mustowleda.
728

242

7KHLPDJHSDUWZLWKUHODWLRQVKLS,'U,GZDVQRWIRXQGLQWKHILOH

Figure 5.729
A further essential feature of this data to consider is the shifting historical relationships
reflected in the gradual decline of concubinage with a very slight increase at the end of this
period, and the increase, decline, then slight increase of references to former slave wives. The
decline in concubinage suggests a social change in family values and practices in which the
purchase and the use of Fasi female slaves as biological mates became decreasingly accepted.
That this decline actually appears from the nineteen-teens onward, suggests that rather than any
fixed point or specific legal interventions, Fasi families gradually pursued internal
reorganizations in interaction with external historical forces. The ongoing and very slight
increase in references to recognized concubines after independence perhaps raises the issue of
the growing legal representation of family and women, but more realistically this also must be
associated with the meager endurance of the institution. The dynamic wave-like rise in
729

After Independence by 1957, the Rcif holdings were merged with Smat.
243

references to marriage with concubines from the late nineteen twenties until the end of the
nineteen forties signifies a social shift in which a greater numbers Fasi patriarchs were
recognizing their personal and familial relationships with slave women and attempted to
assimilate them fully and legally as spouses, very frequently along with their other wives and
concubines. After the late nineteen forties both sorts of references dropped sharply, reflecting
changes in elite Fasi family life amid postwar currents and turns which resulted in the continuity
and reorganization of the dominant economic, political, and social order; the new claims of
which became fully evident following the nationalist and monarchical consolidation of power.
The then small rise of references to wives following independence is suggestive that rather than
indicating the direction of a minor rebounding social trend entailing domestic slavery, the
somewhat higher level of recognition of these relatively few former slave wives in the period
between 1968 and 1971 than since the late nineteen forties, among other factors, corresponded to
a prevalent social principal supporting such a status and respective familial assimilation.
The following chart (see Figure 6) addresses the legal recognition of the children of
former slave wives and concubines, as well as a third category which will be explained. The
chart reflects no effort to account for the total number of Fasi children being born during this
time period by free women in general, but rather an interest in the

244

7KHLPDJHSDUWZLWKUHODWLRQVKLS,'U,GZDVQRWIRXQGLQWKHILOH

Figure 6.
relative number of direct and explicit references to recognized motherhood among these
groupings. An important point called to our attention by this chart when considered along with
the overall references to Former Slave Wives and Concubines in Figure 5 is the much higher
overall percentage of children having been recognized within the total references to Former
Slave Wives (85%) than within the total references to Concubines (46.5%). According to the
ideal all references to mustowledas were by definition legal recognitions of motherhood, and it
could thus be postulated that these discrepancies are due to the non-comprehensive available
recorded data as to every recognized child of a mustowleda in Fes medina within Smat and Rcif
documents during this period. However, subsequent discussion of oral historical research will
consider how these figures stand as highly suggestive, even emblematic of the familial and social
politics of recognition and broader challenges which Fasi slaves, former slaves and their children
245

confronted in lived experiences. In a total of 214 cases, sometimes within the same documents
as references to the children of former slave wives or concubines, the maternity of legally
recognized children was given the oblique signification from another (min ghaliha).730 Thus
in more cases than the mention of recognized children of former slave wives (191), there was an
unclear reference which might have represented divorced or deceased wives. Fasi notaries
generally were meticulous and the total incidence of these references did not result from random
sloth. Rather, they suggest a simple and effective legal device representing the realities of
particular patterns of family arrangements in which children were far more readily entitled to
familial, legal, and social recognition than their slave or former slave mothers.731
Due to the potential familial conflicts which arose concerning recognition of the children
of slaves and former slaves, some Fasi slaveowning fathers use a notary for the expressed
purpose of officially recording their declaration of guardianship over their own child.732 An
important form of recognition which included the children of slaves, was an asa which legally
designated their guardianship following their fathers death, until legal recognition of their
majority, through a rushd. Ideally these arrangements would provide the children of slaves and
former slaves with formal substitute protectors. However asa and other legal sources reveal
very mixed realities.

730

Sometimes Children from Another (min ghaliha) were specified in the number of respective
children but not by name. As found in for example, (Rcif 25.9.1351/22.1.1933) and (Rcif
1.3.1369/21.12.1949).
731
As will be considered in the following section of this chapter, there were also larger lived
implications for the inheritance, social and familial standing of children in general.
732
As in one example noting the guardianship of children from a slave, (Smat
13.1.1336/29.8.1917).
246

Even during mustowledas pregnancy, unborn children could be recognized, and given an
asa.733 Also a slave owner could also provide a mowtek woman with an asa stipulating the freed
slave guardianship over her child. Through the action of granting guardianship, a child who may
have been biologically descended from an owner or former owner, would not necessarily then be
recognized as their descendent. In one such situation, the daughter of a mowtek was awarded
inheritance from her mothers owner, along with the statement that she will remain with her
mother, in an emphasis that reveals a deliberate legal gesture carefully conceived of to oppose
any familial forces which would challenge the vulnerabilities of her former slave mother.734 In
fact, guardianship frequently was often applied to mustowledas themselves. In many cases a
mustowleda was not the designated legal care taker of her children, which could dramatically
reinforce or reshape experiences of power relations within a family, as when a free wife was
made legal guardian.735 Having a legal guardian did not mean that children lived with or were
raise by their guardians; relations or even friends were often made the legal guardians of the
children of mustowledas, as well as mustowledas themselves.736 Because elite Fasi men
continued to have children, particularly with slaves and former slaves, long after women of their

733

As noted in the following cases: a pregnancy of a former slave wife was noted, emphasizing
her free status in a will (Smat 12.4.1342/21.11.1923). Other examples of recognized pregnancies
include: within a will (Rcif 22.1.1335/18.11.1916); within an act of liberation (Rcif
4.2.1342/15.9.1923); a recognition with reference to a pregnant zowj mowtek in a will (Smat
3.12.1357/24.1.1939); as well examples of guardianship for unborn children of a mowtek
mustowleda (Rcif 9.3.1364/22.2.1945), and the child of a mustowleda (Smat
22.2.1347/9.9.1928).
734
(Smat 15.4.1334/19.2.1916), and in an example of a similar case a child is protected and
allowed to stay with her mother (Smat 16.12.1334/14.10.1916).
735
For example, one such document was written on behalf of a grandchild (Rcif
2.3.1335/27.12.1916), and similarly in another case a free wife was given protection of the two
children of a mustowleda (Smat 6.11.1346/27.4.1928).
736
For example, in one instance the children of three mustowledas are placed under the
protection of friend (Smat 14.9.1347/24.2.1929), and similarly in other cases as well (Smat
15.4.1334/19.2.1916), (Smat 12.7.1347/25.12.1928).
247

generation had entered menopause, it was also not uncommon to award guardianship to protect a
mustowleda and children from her to his previous children, who could be considerably older. In
one example, a zowj mowtek who was recognized as mother of four children was thirty years
younger than her former owner and current husbands son.737
Frequently added to the situation were conditions for the protection of recognized
children and mustowleda. In one such instance, a wife Fatima was stipulated to protect all
minors in the family, including the recognized children of a concubine, but if she were to
remarry then the guardianship would goes to his grandson Ahmed.738 Furthermore, there were
formal legal refusals to recognize children. In one such case a son an owner declares that he
refuses to recognize a son.739 In another, an owner liberates a pregnant slave referred to as a
mustowleda, carefully noting that he does not recognize the child, and fears that it is from one of
his own children.740 Though multiply disadvantaged, recognized slave mothers and former
slaves also repeatedly pursued their interests through legal channels. In one case, a woman who
has presented herself before a judge as a mustowleda had with three children who were not
recognized. It is detailed that Abslim lived with this women like she was his wife until there was
a dispute between them and he kicked her and her children out. In a direct and powerful
condemnation the Fasi judge refuses to recognize even the case, let alone whether she was a

737

(Smat 11.4 1382/11.11.1962).

(Smat n/d 1337/1938-1939). In another such example the condition of being granted
guardianship over her children was such that if a former slave remarried guardianship of the
children would then be given to another free wife, (Smat 17.3.1340/17.11.1921). Other cases
with such conditions are interesting for how mothers are described, in one instance a zenjeah
(black) mustowleda is given a conditional guardianship (Smat 26.1.1342/8.11.1923) and in
another a woman is first noted as an ama, then a mustowleda, providing her with the inheritance
of her child until she comes of age (Smat 10.7.1342/ 4.2.1925).
739
(Smat 8.12.1337/15.2.1924).
740
(Rcif 13.3.1339/24.11.1920).
738

248

mustowleda and called her a miserable jaria.741 In other instances, women who were legally
confirmed former slave mothers pursued an asa for their children; as was recorded with Yacout,
a zowj mowtek who successfully appealed to a judge for an asa.742 Former slaves even sought,
with limited success, to overturn the conditions of an asa, as seen with a former slave and former
wife who appealed to be able to both remarry and keep guardianship and custody of her
children.743
Property and Inheritance
Property transference and inheritance was another legal realm which helps to reconstruct
slaves and former slaves conditions within Fasi families during the decline of the institution. In
a rare instance an ataraf (attestation) notes that a husband has given his wife an ama, declaring
that she is hers;744 and in another similar rare case perhaps reflecting Fasi marriage politics
concerning slaves, another female slave is carefully noted as not belonging to a man but rather to
his wife.745 Though slavery continued, notaries no longer directly recorded slaves as part of the
division of property within an inheritance.746 In addition to the well-vested informal capacities
and social networks of Fasi elite power, this legal function was obviously accomplished de facto
as references to slaves, and former slaves appeared directly throughout all manner of documents

741

(Shekait and Mounazat 7.9.1371/5.31.1952) These documents refer to correspondence

among judges and employ language not typically found in other notarized Smat and Rcif legal
documents.
742
(Rcif 19.9.1376/20.4.1957). In another case a mustowleda Yasmine came before twelve
witnesses to insure the protection of her daughter Hebah, (Smat 25.3.1341/22.11.1922). As well,
a similar case can be found in inter-court correspondence (Shekait and Mounazat
2.11.1386/12.2.1967).
743
(Shekiat and Mounezat n/d, circa 1343-1346/17.10.1917- 6.11.1918).
744
(Smat 10.5.1340/9.1.1922).
745
(Smat 12.10.1333/23.9.1915).
746
Rita Aouad Badoual notes the changes in inventories (2004) p.335. Also of interest is the
article by M.J. Lapanne-Joinville, LOrganisation de lindivision en droit musulman, La Revue
Marocaine de Droit (Casablanca: 1952) pp. 35-43.
249

related to inheritance. Slaves and former slaves often appeared as inheritors. Documents
revealing the material basis of Fasi social status, detail the intent to give to, and the chits from,
slaves, former slaves and their descendents.
A widely varied extent of the receipt of money, houses, land, rents from boutiques,
clothes, furniture, furnishings, jewelry, and clothing reflected upon slaves and former slaves
complex personal and familial relationships. The control of gifts and inheritance often form an
intimate feature of the regulation of family and lineage. As actions in this context they often
evoke forms of compensation, as in the case of a willed sum of 500 franks to a wifes ama,747
and the giving of one-third of an entire inheritance to Abdelatif son of an ama of her husband
Moulay Abdel Khadir.748 Also it should be mentioned that slaves clearly could become adept
practitioners among the multiple lines of possible relations which were formed within large
polynuclear Fasi slave owning families. Illustrative examples include inheritance specified for
the daughter of a male mowtek749; a will for the mowtek of a brother750, the will of 20,000 rial
frankiah for Said son of ama Fatima,751 and 5,000,000 frank for the mustowleda of a son.752
Slaves and former slaves bequests and inheritances varied enormously, from the lions
share of large estates and freedom to nothing and continued slavery. However the most common
themes are of differential treatment in which deprecating familial and social values are mirrored.
Though complex, with many contingencies and exceptions, it must be emphasized that slaves
and former slaves in Fes throughout this period of transformation remained vulnerable to

747

(Rcif 16.9.1354/12.12.1935).
(Smat 13.1.1360/17.4.1935). Also in another example a woman is noted to have willed to the
mustowleda of her husband (Smat 8.1.1361/25.1.1942).
749
(Rcif 28.8.1359/1.10.1940).
750
(Smat 28.7.1357/23.9.1938).
751
(Smat 12.6.1373/16.2.1954).
752
(Smat 6.2.1372/25.10.1952).
748

250

exploitation in the execution of wills even when the deceased were notably generous or
prudently fair. Thus, a mowtek who received the rent from a shop for life would then frequently
become dependent upon the honesty and accountability of an intermediary.753 Within the
practiced standards of giving of lesser proportions to slaves, the following division of 2.25 each
for an ama and an orphan (mfoul) and 4.5 to a grandson likely would have appeared kind.754 The
giving of gold jewelry was often repeated in legal documents, and was described by informants
to be understood as a form of social security and status, as well as possible income.755 In one
example, along with being given clothes, and blankets an ama was given gold bracelets756, and in
another situation upon being recognized as the mother of Sidi Hamids child, mustowleda
Mberka was given a bracelet of gold and gold belt.757 Often notaries would combine multiple
functions within a single document as in the liberation upon her owners death and the willing to
mamluka LAnbar all of her clothes of mlif, a kaftan, the fraj (couch) covering, the bedding,
wool filling and a sewing machine.758 The most standard kinds of material gifts and inheritances
which slaves received were of household and personal items. In addition to giving coats to his
family, a slave owner gave earrings to ama Mbarka while ama Msouda received a kaftan.759
Within the details of the objects given, a continuum of gradations of inheritance can be retraced.
An ama mowdabira Yacout was willed 250 franks, a couch filled with wool, cushions, blankets,
a mlif kaftan, all in her personal chest (sundouk).760 Another document shows the gift to
mowdabir Anbar of two gold bracelets, a headdress (thaba), earrings, 100 franks, and couch
753

(Rcif 23.10.1345/26.4.1927). Elkabate is the term for such an executor or intermediary.

(Smat 12.6.1353/21.9.1934).
755
Fine clothing and jewelry could be rented out for a profit within the circuit of Fasi weddings.
756
(Rcif 16.11.1333/26.9.1915).
757
(Rcif 21.5.1345/27.11.1926).
758
(Smat 2.4.1335/26.1.1917). Mlif is a popular high end Moroccan fabric.
759
(Smat 3.2.1337/7.11.1918).
760
(Smat 8.7.1345/12.1.927).
754

251

(fraj) filled with wool.761 While a wasefah, also named Anbar, received an inheritance of wool
covers, the clothes she has on and a kaftan.762
It was not only the amounts of material worth that varied; also the conditions of
inheritance. For example in one will deliberately given with the condition that more inheritance
goes to male than to female heirs, it is stipulated that if they do not
accept this condition the money will be used to pay someone to read the Quran before them.763
Conditions ranged, from the innocuous giving of 3000 franks, a fraj, clothes, cushion, and box to
a slave upon request,764 to the personal intervention of a mustowleda who willed to her slave on
the condition that she is freed and marries a specific freed slave man.765 Among the most
frequent condition given concerned a female slave or former slaves marriage or remarriage, in
the event of which for example an inheritance might be given to grandchildren,766 or a monthly
sum of 20 franks per month would cease and a mustowleda would then leave, being allowed to
take nothing.767
Another dimension within the politics and controls concerning inheritance was that the
owner making a will could and frequently did change their mind and then readily changed it.
One slave owner named Zazooah is noted to have changed her mind three times in the same day,
eventually refusing all she had willed and in the end giving nothing.768 Whereas this transaction
suggests something about an individuals character, the larger picture of such changes strongly
761

(Smat 5.6.1345/11.12.1926).
(Smat 10.8.1345/13.2.1927). (Smat 7.7.1359/11.8.1940) Another woman mentioned
received only a fraj, cushions and blankets.
763
(Rcif 21.11.1343/13.6.1925). The document also states that if a zowj mowtek has additional
children then they take 1/3.
764
(Rcif 16.4.1352/8.9.1933).
765
(Rcif 4.5.1334/9.3.1916).
766
(Smat 26.7.1366/16.6.1947).
767
(Smat 12.3.1344/1.9.1925).
768
(Smat 7.2.1357/8.4.1938).
762

252

suggests the influential role of family, including their presence as witnesses and of notaries
themselves. In an interesting case perhaps representing a response to protracted squabbling, a
execution of a will (waseah) comprised of 55,000 franks complete, which allotted 20,000 to a
sister and 5,000 each to seven mowdabira, was then in same day retracted and no money was
given to any of the mowdabira or his sister, only his grandson.769 In another case a women
suddenly changed her mind in the middle of a will and rather than giving a major portion of her
inheritance to a slave gave 20 rials.770 Sometimes slaves benefited from changes in wills, as seen
with the decision to give a granddaughter one one-eighth and an ama seven-eighths of an
inheritance being changed to disinherit the granddaughter with all her portion going to the
ama.771 One slave named Yasmine was among the benefiters of a notaries trip to a hospital room
to record the will of a cadis son, receiving 750 franks along with 75 for a hospital nurse who is
pretty, and from his box two bracelets for this sister and daughter.772 Similarly, a will to a
family was revised to give one-third of funduk (an inn) and shop to ama mowtek LGhalia, with
her fees and maintenance paid from the other two-thirds.773 Such changes also frequently
revolved around the recognition of children, as with a refusal and then reconfirmation of the
inheritance for the children of a mustowleda.774 The broadest and most compelling aspect of
such changes reveals the sheer embittering vulnerabilities which slaves and former slaves faced
within family life. In a few moments with a notary mustowleda Mbarka went from receiving

769

(Smat 12.6.1365/14.5.1946). The mowdabira were given an omara until their death with the
conditions of not going out, marrying, or having another child.
770
(Smat 26.6.1337/29.3.1919).
771
(Smat 11.2.1366/4.1.1947).
772
(Smat 8.11.1358/19.11.1939).
773
(Smat 27.11.1368/22.11.1949).
774
(Rcif 24.1.1337/11.10.1918).
253

rents from various shops for the rest of her life to being given 100 franks.775 Family contentions,
interpersonal distaste and ill-will produced changes which affected children, such as in a changed
will refusing any inheritance to the mustowleda of a female slave owners son.776 Combined
with such erratic material events were sudden legal changes in the recognition and guardianship
of children as in a changed mind concerning an asa for a pregnant mustowleda,777 or the refusal
to allow a former slave mother legal guardianship of her child.778
Contestation and contention with family members was a dominant motif in the legal
experiences of slaves and former slaves. In a scenario disclosing evidence of a classic familial
tension involving slaves, a free wife insisted before a judge that two mowteks were not actually
wives and that her family has thus refused to give them any inheritance. Subsequently, notarized
legal acts recognizing the marriages of Saylah and LHana were located and produced from the
possession of a third party, thus forcing the wife and her family to adhere to their entitlement.779
In another case, several cousins attempted to revoke the inheritance of a mustowleda and her
children, and following a dispute, before a notary rather than a judge, the cousins finally
recognized and respected their heritance.780 These disputes often reveal heated accusations of

775

(Smat 7.8.1361/9.9.1942). In a similar case inheritance is taken away from mustowleda

Fatima (Smat 5.9.1335/26.5.1917); another comparable instance shows a refusal (Rcif
10.8.1334/11.6.1916); in other cases inheritance is refused for a wasefah (Rcif
19.4.1345/26.10.1926), (Rcif 1.7.1343/26.1.1925); or refused for a mowtek (Rcif
30.6.1367/10.5.1948); or as in one document there is an abrupt change of mind (Rcif
24.1.1337/30.10.1918).
776
(Smat 9.11.1343/1.6.1925).
777
(Smat 24.2.1348/31.7.1929).
778
(Rcif 2.1.1345/12.7.1926).
779
(Rcif 4.1.1365/9.11.1945), (Rcif 15.10.1365/11.9.1946). In a similar case there was a refusal
of inheritance involving a zowj mowtek, followed by a legal resolution, (Rcif
25.1.1361/11.2.1942).
780
(Smat 14.10.1357/7.11.1938) It was noted that if they quarrel again they will go to court.
254

lies as in a case before a judge involving two mowteks,781 and for example the accusation before
witnesses that Sidi Abdel Razuck and his mowteka Sayla were not married.782 Another repeated
aspect of these circumstances was the revealing of social disrespect for all associated as slaves or
former slaves, as seen in a case in which a brother sought the inheritance of his sister because he
does not accept that she married Mohamed Khabbas, a khadim.783 Within the challenges of
these contestations slaves and former slaves are shown to have often asserted themselves within
the confines of their agency. Evidence of this spans from subtle arrangements of change such as
an owner refuting then altering and subsequently awarding an asa in the presence of his
mustowleda Mbarka,784 to a mowteks somewhat flamboyant usage of the services of a French
lawyer.785 Brave acts displaying slave and formal slaves input in legal processes tended toward
the commonplace, akin to when a mowtek sought her inheritance, 786 or another mowtek demands
that nothing be sold until the ert has been divided.787 Frequent examples also involved money,
such as when a zowj mowtek Sadiah challenged the refusal of payments to her following her
husbands death,788 or when following a divorce a judge asked the police to bring Ali Ben
Mohamed so that he pay zowj motwek Fatama her fard.789
The continued appearance of slaves and former slaves within inheritance documents is
particularly revealing concerning the inventories of accounts related to property, rents and

781

(Rcif 10.9.1364/18.9.1345).
(Smat 25.10.1374/16.6.1955).
783
(Shekiat and mounzat 16.11.1343/8.6.1925).
784
(Smat 9.10.1337/7.7.1919).
785
(Shekait and Mounzat n/d.4.1955).
786
(Shekait and Mounzat 20.6.1931).
787
(Shekait and Mounzat 11.10.1370/16.7.1951). She also demanded for an inventory of the
property to be inherited.
788
(Shekiat and Mounezat n/d.1343-45/1924-1927).
789
(Shekait and Mounezat n/d 1384-1386/1964-1967). Fard refers to a religious duty of
payment.
782

255

payments received and due which notaries and elkabate (executors of wills) were supposed to
annually and accurately produce.790 The abuse of this legal ideal in the realities of legal practice
is very apparent for these generally illiterate and socially and legally weak family inheritors.791
The following list of documents suggesting abuse is organized by the range of their lapse beyond
12 months: an inventory of monthly expenses for a mustowleda produced after 96 months and
noting no conditions related to the inheritance,792 an inventory for the two minor children of a
mustowleda after more than 80 months,793 an inventory after 72 months for care of the children
of a mustowleda,794 a similar document reflecting a lapse of 61 months,795 an inventory after 54
months for a mustowleda and her daughter in which they both testify that they have taken their
share,796 a comparable account after 45 months,797 an inventory for a mustowleda now working
in the arrangement of Fasi weddings after 42 months,798 an inventory after 37 months for a
deceased fathers mowtek,799 a similar inventory for the mustowleda of a father after 27
months,800 an inventory noting an ama after 24 months,801 an inventory for a mustowleda at 23
months,802 two inventories at 22 months for an asa for mustowleda and her children,803 and for

790

An one example there is reference in an inventory to al rqeeq (the slaves) (Rcif

23.2.1337/27.11.1918). Inventories repeatedly showed slaves: 2000 franks to an ama (Rcif
9.10.1350/16.2.1932); an ama was often noted within inventories (Smat 13.1.1345/23.7.1926),
(Rcif n/d.1337/1918-1919), (Smat 19.3.1336/3.1.1919). Examples of former slaves include:
(Smat 15.7.1337/16.4.1919), (Rcif 16.8.1338/5.5.1920), (Rcif 26.10.1349/16.3.1931).
791
See Goichan (1929) pp.27-28, for a discussion of the abuse of inheritance for Fasi orphans.
792
(Smat 18.11.1354/12.2.1936).
793
(Rcif 1.5.1342/9.11.1923).
794
(Smat 23.3.1363/18.3.1944).
795
(Smat 5.11.1377/24.5.1958).
796
(Rcif 21.5.1341/9.1.1923).
797
(Smat 16.7.1357/11.11.1938).
798
(Smat 17.10.1359/19.11.1940).
799
(Rcif 11.11.1362/9.11.1943).
800
(Rcif 30.12.1348/29.5.1930).
801
(Rcif 26.6.1345/1.1.1927).
802
(Smat 28.12.1356/1.3.1938).
256

the inheritance of Aiasha (a mustowleda) with three children,804 and an inventory for the care of
mustowledas and four slaves produced after 18 months.805 Against this current were rare former
slave women who themselves actively demanded inventories concerning them and their children,
as in the request for an inventory for her two sons at 12 months by a zowj mowtek,806 and as with
Yacout another zowj mowtek demanding an inventory for herself.807
One of the most frequent suspicion-raising ways in which former slaves appeared in the
Fasi legal system was in their own business dealings. In one case a document simple states that a
man has purchased a house with the money of a mustowleda (who is twice referred to as an ama
and that the house is now in his name, and that she accepts.808 In many oral histories of the
descendents of Fasi slaves and former slaves there are references to business transactions in
which illiteracy and inexperience combined in their attraction as targets of exploitation. Such
stories are collaborated by documents such as the mowtek appearing before a judge for having
purchased a house with no documents from the sale, or in the case of a notaries act for the
purchase of lands which disappeared after the death of a judge who conducted the transaction.
But it should also be noted of this domain that former slaves were striving to assert their interests
despite obstacles and the collusions of those who absconded with their assets. This is clearly
suggested by a female mowteks pursuit of a business deal purchasing cows and sheep.809 In a

803

(Smat 23.4.1363/17.4.1944).
(Rcif 3.4.1344/23.9.1925).
805
(Rcif 13.1.1354/17.4.1935).
806
(Rcif 15.10.1352/31.1.1934).
807
(Rcif 13.1.1354/17.1.1935). In a similar case, a mustowleda Aicha has initiated an inventory
herself after 52 months. (Smat 7.2.1385/7.6.1965).
808
(Loulkedah Muktalefeah 15.7.1331/20.6.1913).
809
(Loulkedah Muktalefah 27.7.1348/29.11.29).
804

257

further memorable case the mustowleda of a caid appeared in court to get permission to sell the
olives in the truck in which the caid recently died, before they rot.810
Housing
Another specific legal area reflective of slaves and former slaves conditions within Fasi families
concerned housing. Similar to what has been seen regarding children and inheritance in general,
slaves and former slaves lives concerning housing ran a spectrum from ample, even palatial
accommodations to unhealthy miserable conditions and even homelessness. Indeed, sometimes
there was a share of a large house given for the freed daughter of an ama.811 In contrast, a slave
could be freed and given no money or housing.812 Along these lines there were cases of clear
legal demands that a former slave not be in the house, as when ex-husband showed a Fasi judge
his notarized receipt of having paid his fard and declared that he does not want the divorced
mowtek to continue returning to his house.813
The legal practices evidenced through notarized Fasi family documents concerning slaves
and housing, strongly suggest that Fasi customary accommodations in general (which
encompassed slaves and former slaves lives) meant that more people lived in Fasi homes than is
consistently and accurately shown in legal representations. It is legally unclear and uncertain
that an ama liberated and given her clothes, bed covers and 20 rials with no mention of housing
would not continue living with her former owners family and in her former owners home.814 In
fact the high incidence of slaves and former slaves inheriting wool-filled couches, pillows and
bedroom furnishings, with no mention of housing strongly suggests that housing was often

810

(Shekiat and Mounazat 26.12.1371/16.9.1952).

(Smat 5.11.1363/23.10.1944).
812
(Smat 18.2.1348/17.5.1930).
813
(Shekiat and Mounazat 7.8.1372/21.4.1953).
814
(Smat 23.9.1335/13.7.1917).
811

258

assumed and arranged informally, according to the order of a family and spaces within a
household, without legal documentation.815
Despite routine practices of hospitality, housing concerning slaves was a highly revealing
form of legal action. As with other previously noted courses of legal action, housing concerning
slaves was frequently subject to capricious notarized changes, such as refusing a former slave a
place to live,816 and the changing of a will to give 100 franks to Mbarka and Ftama (two
mowdabira), and refusing them a place to live.817 In one provocative case, a Sidi Mohamed Duri
gives an omara for mustowleda Mayjuba in a room near his grand house, the rent from a
boutique with the condition that she does not marry, a fraj, a cover, and clothes, only to then
within the same document switch her room with another with the same conditions adding 1/8 of
his furniture and alawlah (provisions), and finally by the end of the will he refuses all he has
given her, in the presence of an unspecified relation Sidi Kasim Duri.818 Omaras concerning
housing for slaves and former slaves provide us with a very useful example of the kinds of
familial influenced legal dynamics slaves and former slaves confronted.
The following chart (see Figure 7) clearly conveys the minor extent to which formal legal
omaras were given for slaves and former slaves (forty-five), despite the widespread historical
impression that blurs owners care for and responsibilities over domestic slaves with their own
families. Again, this figure reflects an important informal social variable in which housing
arrangements, as clearly opposed to ownership, would have occurred far more often.

815

(Smat 4.4.1335/28.1.1917).
(Rcif 15.5.1342/23.11.1923).
817
(Rcif 18.1.1343/19.9.1924).
818
(Rcif 18.10.1352/3.2.1934).
816

259

Figure 7.819
In addition to documenting the total relevant historical omaras for housing, these figures
represent that in 71% of these cases these forms of inheritance came with specific conditions.820
The point of drawing such close attention to these details concerns the behavioral controls which
continued to be exercised upon slaves and former slaves after their owners death.
Housing omaras with no apparent conditions such as given for fifty years to
mustowleda Ftama and mowteka Mbarka,821 and in a similar case explicitly stated for a
lifetime,822 likely were subject to similar social and familial expectations as those in which
explicit conditions appeared. In some cases very specific and personal kinds of conditions were
given, such as woman slave owners omara given to a freed female slave which included money
819

These omaras reflect combined Smat and Rcif data.

If the only condition was that upon death the housing returns to the family then this was not
noted here.
821
(Smat 4.6.1360/29.6.1941).
822
(Smat 24.1.1337/30.10.1918).
820

260

from two houses, and rent from a boutique, on the condition that she marries a noted male slave
who had been freed by the same owner.823 Also conditions could be relatively considerate and
supportive such as was specified for two mowteks who were legally permitted to return to occupy
a room on the terrace of the riad in the event that they should divorce.824 However, as noted
above, slaves and former slaves inheritance of housing nearly always brought explicit
conditions and restrictions to their freedom. The nature of these conditions most often concerned
sexuality and marriage. For example, two former slaves are noted to be allowed to live in a room
provided that they do not marry, upon which case the room, a fraj and a table will be given to his
grandchild adding, Allah curse anyone who attempts to sell the rooms until the last grandchild
receives them.825 In another similar case a mowdabira Rahma will be evicted if she marries or
goes out to others.826 This theme of controlled movements and intimate associations is echoed
in the condition that if a former slave marries, goes out, does anything shameful, or leaves and
enters frequently, or if there are problems where she lives, family members will reclaim the
room where she lives as fast as possible and reclaim her clothes and two blankets.827
Other kinds of conditions for housing included to not misbehave, in the award of a
doweriah with beds, mattresses and jewelry further stipulating that three mustowledas were not
allowed to marry and must live peacefully.828 Sometimes the conditions hinged upon pleasing

823

(Rcif 4.5.1334/9.3.1916).
(Smat 9.3.135321.6.1934). A similar case is also found in (Smat 28.10.1352/13.2.1934).
825
(Rcif 4.1.1343/5.9.1924).
826
(Smat 14.7.1333/29.5.1915).
827
(Rcif 23.6.1335/16.4.1917). In another similar situation a mustowleda named Jourah was
given 100 rials and omara of a room in the house where she lives (next to the Moussem Sidi
Mohamed ben El Fakay on the condition that if she marries or if she goes out with others then
she will leave the house immediately and she cannot take her jewelry. (Smat
14.7.1334/8.4.1944).
828
(Smat 2.11.1333/12.11.1915). A doweriah is a small house, often built immediately next to a
larger family house.
824

261

specific family members, as the mustowleda who was allowed to stay with her owners children
(who were not specified as to whether they were her own children), and if the children are
unhappy with her she goes with her belongings.829 Also in some cases there were references to
specific authorities appointed to oversee these conditions, as occurs in the giving of an omara for
Saida and Yacout, a room above their owners childs home, provided that they do not marry or
associate with men, and leaving his brother Sidi Mohamed to watch the two to determine if they
go out often.830 These controls suggest a social and familial demand that slaves show respect to
their former owners, and in doing suggest an excess of the general legally practiced conditions
and social and familial expectations which free wives faced in inheritance. For example, a small
room was given to a mustowleda Yasmine on the condition that she would be evicted if she
marries or has a relationship with a man, while it is noted in the same will that if a wife marries
she can claim his full inheritance until there is a grandchild.831 Finally, another aspect of these
conditions worthy of note was the arrangement of the accommodations in itself, as dramatically
indicated by an omara for six slaves to live in a single room and receive five rials each per
year.832
In spite of these housing conditions, which strongly contributed to isolated, fearful and
dependent lives, some slave and former slave women did challenge the power of family
members and attempt legal recourse concerning housing. One example is seen in two female
slaves refusal to accept an inheritance upon learning that an expected room would not go to

829

(Rcif 5.1.1361/22.1.1942). Similarly in another case a mustowleda with children was granted
housing on the condition that she not remarry. (Rcif 22.4.1363/16.4.1944).
830
(Smat 6.8.1334/7.6.1916).
831
(Smat 6.6.1349/13.7.1917).
832
(Smat 30.8.1336/10.6.1918).
262

them.833 In another interesting episode of Fasi family contention surrounding slaves, two
mustowledas and as unspecified number grandchildren of their former owner appeared before a
judge in a dispute over their housing and in payments for the maintenance intended to go to the
mustowledas. While the grandchildren were attempting to push the two women out, the
mustowledas responded with surprising show of independence one had gotten married and the
other wanted to claim control over her childrens inheritance and to no longer live within their
familys home.834
Continuities and Changes in Social Attitudes and Personal Relations
An important feature of Fasi legal documents referring to slaves is the persistent representation
of social attitudes toward slaves revealed through the language of the document. In general Fasi
notaries could add their own tones and even judgments to documents, such as in noting that a
women whose will was being recorded is a bit ill, but she knows what she is doing.835 Yet,
addressing slavery and slaves persistently brought judgments which reflected the interaction of
social attitudes and relevant legal practices during this period. For example, even after a slave
had lived as a free person, sometimes for decades they were not only referred to as a mowtek, but
an ama mowtek.836 In some cases it seems as though a notary might have begun recording
information prior, and drafted the document without being informed that a mowtek was also

833

(Rcif 19.4.1345/26.10.1926).
(Rcif n/d 1339-1341/1920-1924).
835
(Smat 27.1.1359/7.3.1940).
836
For example: ama mowtek (Rcif 28.8.1359/1.10.1940) and in (Smat 18.12.1365/12.11.1946);
ama and mowtek (Rcif 26.3.1359/4.5.1940); ama mowtaka;
and in a reveal error zowj ama mowtek (Smat 26.7.1374/21.3.1955).
834

263

married, which was the entire expressed purpose of some documents.837 Similarly, many women
are referred to as an ama then only subsequently as a mustowleda.838
A far more explicit reflection within notarized family legal documents was the recurrent
fixation upon color and physical difference related to slaves and former slaves. In some cases a
description or a name would depict a slaves ethnic background or origins. For example there
were references made to a mowtek turkiah (Turkish),839 or zowj mowtek turkiah.840 More
commonly a name would reveal a Moroccan region, as with Saida Tata,841 or Shlahowa
Sousi within in one rare instance which included an explicit mention of age, the document
expressly states Jourah Soussi, about forty.842 However, the overwhelming preponderance of
references concerning blackness strongly suggest a continuity within the legal culture, based on
routinely insuring the legal and commercial transactions of the trans-Saharan slave trade and the
institution. Descriptions of color and bodily features, nearly always of women, were continually
given even when the legal subject being addressed or described was a free person. The possible
interpretation that these references served as a practical and considerate measure of security to
oppose the possible questioning of slaves and former slaves legal status and claims, nevertheless
points to the undeniable presence and import of the same prevalent social attitudes indicated by
the actual descriptions in themselves along with their great frequency.

837

For example in one document there is a testimony that a mowtek was married (Smat
25.1.1354/29.4.1335). In another instance ama is duly noted even as the woman in question was
freed and married (Smat 4.2.1355/26.4.1936).
838
(Smat 10.7.1342/15.2.1924), (Rcif 30.10.1351/25.2.1933).
839
(Rcif 13.12.1351/9.4.1933).
840
(Rcif 3.4.1358/23.5.1939).
841
(Rcif 10.6.1352/30.9.1933).
842
(Rcif 12.5.1361/28.5.1942).
264

In a very few instances a slaves white color was described,843 and a slightly more notable
number of recorded slaves were variously represented as slightly black,844 or with much color,845
more often still as brown.846 However, across the overwhelming majority of color descriptions
the three most popular legal terms to describe the blackness of slaves in Fasi legal documents
during this period were kabdieah,847 zenjeeah,848 and swadah.849 In addition to weight, height

843

(Rcif 23.3.1350/8.9.1931) noted among eleven mustowleda was a Yacout lbaidah (the
white), and in another instance an ama Aicha was noted as very yellow (maghlou katou, and
being a bit wide, with a small nose, small eyes, and thin eyebrows. Another ama is noted
as being ghrbeah (a foreigner) (Rcif 14.4.1350/28.9.1931).
844
(Smat 12.10.1333/23.9.1915).
845
(Smat 10.8.1334/11.6.1916).
846
Brown here refers to smr. To note some examples: a mowtek willing a sewing machine to
another mowtek, was physically described as brown, tallish and old, fat, has a scar on the right
eyebrow, has no teeth, has no chin tattoos, (with) thin eyebrows and big lips. (Smat
23.5.1335/17.3.1917). In another case an ama named Yasmine is more succinctly described as
being brown and mid-height. (Rcif 23.5.1345/29.11.1926). Another mowtek, who is giving to
another woman for the case of a daughters future marriage, is termed a bit brown, with a
small nose, and is old. (Rcif 27.7.1341/15.3.1923). As well as a mustowleda profiled as
brown, short, (with) fine eyebrows, (a) tattoo on the chin, (and a) big mole on her lip. (Rcif
23.11.1335/10.9.1917).
847
Kabdieah comes from kabda or the liver. To sample several examples: a bit tall, round
face, small nose, scar on her eyebrow, kabdieah (Rcif 10.4.1350/24.9.1931); black
kabdieah, mid-height, blind in left eye, missing teeth round nose (Rcif
25.11.1346/16.5.1928); mid-height, kabdiedah, small eye brows, upturned nose, kabdieah
(Smat n/d 5.1 1370-71/1950-1953); tall, old, kabdieah, small nose, skinny(Rcif
8.2.1353/22.5.1934); ama mowdabira Yacout was given :250 franks, fraj with wool, cushions,
blankets, mlif kaftan, all in her sundouk, she was described as Black kabdieah , thick
eyebrows, round face, wide nose (Smat 18.7.1345/22.1.1927); in the liberation of an ama
Lghalia she is depicted as tweme kabdieah.. (very marrow like liver) (with an) extended
forehead and was given all that she has in her hands. (Rcif 16.7.1355/22.5.1934).
848
Zenjeeah is translated simply as black. Examples include: the liberation of Mbark who
recorded as zenjee, without clothes, with round face, mid-height. (Rcif 6.4.1335/30.1.1917);
the liberation of a woman recorded to have been zenjeeah, short, (with) fat lips, (a) wide nose,
and thin eyebrows (Rcif 2.6.1343/29.11.1934) ; and of another, zenjeeah, mid-height, having
two scars on her face, and a big nose. (Smat 1.1.1337/7.10.18).
849
Swadah is derived from the aswad, another term for black. Some examples of which are: of a
wealthy mustowleda Ghalia who willed a riad and significant wealth thin, aswad, small, (with)
thin eyebrows and a scar on one. (Rcif 23.1.1344/13.9.1925); in noting the lost record of
purchase for an ama who was thereafter liberated, a description is given as mid-height, wide
nose, very black swadah, tattoo (washam) on forehead between her eyes. (Rcif
265

and age, facial features were given great attention, with a particular attention to the size of black
womens noses and lips, as well as facial scars and facial tattoos.850 Examples could be quite
reductive as the slave Aishata depicted as zenjee, small and with a unibrow,851 another physically
recorded as black and old, with big lips many scars on her cheeks.852 The liberation of an ama
represents her as having mid-height, a wide nose, being very black swadah, and having a tattoo
(washam) on her forehead between her eyes,853 another slave is noted as being zenjeeah, midheight, with has two scars on her face and a big nose,854 still another is noted as swadah, black,
mid-height, with a small but wide nose, a big upper lip, missing one tooth, and having thin eye
brows.855 A freed former slave is described during the process of recording in her own will as
brown, tallish, old, fat with a scar on her right eyebrow, having no teeth, no chin tattoos, thin
eyebrows and big lips. She was attempting to will a sewing machine to another mowtek for
whom the following description is also given, Yasmine- brown, mid-height, ama.856 Such forms
of arbitrary and formulaic physical descriptions were not necessary for a Fasi minister, or even a
poor Fasi woman, in their access to perform notarized legal acts. This is not to suggest that
notaries recorded no other physical descriptions during this time period, but to draw particular
attention to the persistence of socially resonate images that underpinned the values within
slavery within Fasi family legal practices throughout this period of historical transition.

9.5.1350/22.9.1931); as well as a case noting a woman as being swadah , mid-height, a small

but wide nose, a big upper lip, missing one tooth, thin eye brows. (Smat 26.4.1340/26.11.1921).
850
Either of which were attributed to reflect a slaves background.
851
(Rcif 8.10.1362/8.10.1943).
852
(Smat 12.8.1353/2.11.1934).
853
(Rcif 9.5.1350/22.9.1931), also noted in 273.
854
(Smat 1.1.1337/7.10.1918), also noted in 271.
855
(Smat 26.4.1340/26.11.1921), also noted in 273.
856
(Rcif 23.6.1345/29.11.1926) .
266

In addition to the themes thus discussed, references to slaves and former slaves appeared
in numerous other relevant contexts, often interrelated with these themes but also revealing
multiple quite distinct family dynamics. In fact, the act of being a witness and simple
declarations were sometimes in themselves historically significant. A former slave being
formally witnessed as declaring that they have nothing belonging to another could serve as a
means of avoiding future pretexts and legal conflicts.857 Slaves figured into spousal dynamics
such as in documents carefully noting that a slave is not the property of a husband, but rather his
wife.858 In several instances the physical abuse of a former slave was presented before judges in
an appeal for their intervention. For example, Kanata a mustowleda and zowj testified that her
husband beats her and locks her in the house without visitors and with nothing to eat. It was
indicated that she was recovering from having lost an eye, and she was recorded as stating that,
if she remains with him she hopes to die. She asked to be allowed to move into a neighbors
home where they can witness her actions, and that her spouse, do what he is supposed to do.
No response from the judge was recorded.859 In another similar situation a mowtek returned to
the judge she had presented herself to after her husband had last beaten her, now having been
refused entry to her home in reprisal for having initially gone to the judge.860 In a dramatically
different direction, the husband of Menana, a mowtek, has gone to court to accuse her of still
being married to another man, and in a contrast to the passive official responses which the prior

857

Ibid. In another instance, a freed slave woman testifies that another freed slave man has
nothing of hers except her bracelet (Rcif 10.9.1339/18.5.1921). Another case notes that a
mowtek has taken money (Smat 7.2.1349/14.11.1915).
858
(Smat 12.10.1333/23.9.1915). A similar instance can be found in (Smat 10.5.1340/9.1.1922).
859
(Shekait and Mounzat 18.6.1370/26.3.1951).
860
(Shekait and Mounzat 18.4.1941).
267

noted presentations received, he was recorded to have been actively waiting for her along with
police.861
Compelling legal evidence of complex emotional and psychological bonds which were
formed within and beyond slave owning families by slaves and former slaves is found in
inheritance documents of former slaves themselves. Such references reveal a wide range in what
was given, from a mustowleda Ghalia who was thin, aswad, small, and with a scar through one
of her eyebrows which are very thin giving a riad and a very considerable amount of wealth
away,862 to the most meager but very likely personally meaningful of possessions. It seems that
the most frequent recipients of the inheritance of mowteks and mustowledas were children. In
many instances these heirs were designated as the children of a mustowleda,863 or a zowj
mowtek,864 as well as their grandchildren.865 In one such example, following the death of a child
an inheritance of a mustowleda was designated to her grandchildren, with a request that the son
of her former owner protect a specific young girl within the family.866 In even more cases such
child heirs were noted as the children,867 and grandchildren868 of former slaves liberators. In the
former sort of documents it is generally not indicated whether these heirs are themselves the
descendents of former slaves. Highly personalized bequests appear in the giving to a specifically
chosen child such as the very old ama mowteka who gave to Saidah the daughter of her

861

(Shekait and Mounzat 12.10.1388/7.10.1918).

(Rcif 1.3.1344/20.9.1925).
863
(Rcif 27.12.1363/13.11.1944).
864
(Smat 21.3.1351/25.7.1932).
865
(Rcif 16.1.1364/1.1.1945); (Rcif 14.10.1366/31.9.1947).
866
(Rcif 30.12.1343/22.7.1925).
867
(Smat 8.11.1334/6.9.1916); (Rcif 2.7.1364/13.6.1945); (Rcif 3.2.1364/18.1.1945); (Rcif
15.1.1369/6.11.1949); (Smat 16.1.1367/29.11.1947); (Rcif 30.10.1351/25.2.1933); (Rcif
27.8.1353/5.11.1934); (Smat 15.11.1336/22.11.1918); (Rcif 28.1.1351/3.6.1932).
868
(Smat 12.9.1350/20.1.1932).
862

268

liberator, a sheet, napkins, a small and regular sized kaftan, and a sugar box.869 In some cases
which remain open to interpretation, inheritance would be given to children of an unclear
relation, save that they were from a famed and powerful family, such as in a zowj mowteks from
the Jilali family gift to children within the Ben Kiran family.870 A further clear pattern of
inheritors were the husbands of mowteks,871 who were often given to along with specific
children.872 Also a significant amount of freed slaves gave their entire inheritance, or a large
portion thereof, to other freed slaves.873 In one such example an old, black mowtek described as
having an upturned nose who was very ill and had thin eyebrows gave one third of her heritage
to LAnbar, another mowtek.874
In addition to providing a significant amount of historical evidence toward the
reconstruction of slaves and former slaves lives, the changes and continuities evident in Fasi
legal practices offer a reflection the slow modifications in the common shared attitudes that
shaped the endurance and decline of the institution. Though less concrete a form of historical
evidence in documenting the overall decline of Fasi domestic slavery than liberations, or the total
decline of references to slaves and former slaves of any kind, the forms of familial legal evidence
examined here demonstrate the value if not the necessity of approaching this historical
phenomenon through close attention to different and shifting configurations of values and
interpersonal politics related to slavery within Fasi slave owning households and families. As

869

(Rcif 14.3.1361/31.3.1942). Historically Fasi brides received a series of rbiaah (silver sugar
boxes).
870
(Rcif 8.11.1348/8.4.1930).
871
(Smat 2.7.1354/30.9.1935); (Smat 13.4.1357/12.6.1938); (Rcif 10.8.1350/20.11.1931); (Rcif
25.7.1350/5.11.1931); (Rcif 28.8.1359/1.10.1940).
872
(Smat 5.1.1362/12.1.1943); (Smat 12.9.1348/11.2.1930).
873
(Smat 8.12.1368/1.10.1949); (Rcif 25.6.1345/31.12.1926); (Rcif 28.6.1345/21.4.1917); (Rcif
27.7.1341/15.3.1341); (Rcif 11.1.1349/9.6.1930); (Smat 24.7.1346/18.1.1928).
874
(Smat 25.5.1335/19.3.1917).
269

with formal legal liberations, these familial forms of evidence confirm an historical periodization
that occurred over decades and should not be primarily associated with an official legal moment.
The following chart (see Figure 8) details178 references to slaves or former slaves of an
older generation; for example, when a slave or former slave parent is directly mentioned.875 In
some cases they have been clearly indicated as deceased, while more often this has not been
specified. The resiliency of references to living slaves across the decline of the institution
supports the interpretation that the institution did not simple expire when access to slaves was
constricted, or when slaves themselves died. Rather, informal social, familial, interpersonal, and
personal changes were the dominant determinants of the course of this decline.

875

Because not all examples of references to slaves and former slaves reveal a clear generational
break from slavery, these figures have been compiled from references to earlier generations, not
multiple living generations. An example of the kinds of multi-generational references which
have been included instances in which the details of a freed slaves inheritance note an
intended heir to be a now deceased descendent, and trace the award of inheritance to another
generation; ex. (Rcif 24.1.1344/12.9.1925).
While cases such as those which note a mowtek and her daughter who was also a mowtek (Rcif
26.2.1345/4.9.1926), may well reflect a similar period for their respective liberations and have
not been included. Also, older generational references have been noted only in cases when
documents overtly stated slave; instances such as when a mother Mbaraka ex. (Smat
30.7.1343/24.2.1925) would have very likely been a slave have not been included.
270

7KHLPDJHSDUWZLWKUHODWLRQVKLS,'U,GZDVQRWIRXQGLQWKHILOH

Figure 8.
Fasi family legal documents throughout this period help reveal the tensions slaves and
former slaves experienced between being semi-adopted and like family, and actually
participating on par with the claims and identities of owners and former owners family
members. As the recurrent nebulous social and familial status slaves and former slaves
experienced would gradually no longer be a significant Fasi or Moroccan legal practice, the
informal arrangements with domestic servants rapidly expanded. Part of reformulated elite Fasi
family life was and continues to be expressions and experiences of an informal heritage of
domestic slavery, including the paternalist semi-adoption and contingent treatment like family of
servants, particularly when young.876 Along with the continuities of slave owners attitudes and
876

This was suggested by Aouad Badoual (2004) p. 351. In the large middle-class houses, the
evolutions are carried out without brutal rupture: one announces neither waves of stamping, nor
massive departure of the houses. In extreme situation of dependence, these women base
themselves in the model of servile domesticity, are integrated, "adopted" by the families.
271

practices and slaves and former slaves extreme vulnerabilities and dependencies was a simple
and effective elide of status in the popular usage of khadim, which could refer equally to a
slave or a free domestic worker and household member. In Fasi legal discourse across the time
period considered here, mustaqdam/a (and not khadim) was the reference to domestic servants.
Documents reveal the conditions of mustaqdama as parallel in many regards to slaves and former
slaves. For example mustaqdama were listed alongside slaves,877 and were also given omaras
with conditions of not being allowed to marry.878 They similarly appeared in inventories,879 and
even asserted themselves to demand the fair accounting of and processing of their inheritance in
spite of dubious protectors.880 As a final note, anticipating changes to come, in cases freed
slaves took sympathy upon the plights of mustaqdama,881 as when a mowtek gave money to the
children of a mustaqdama, and when and zowj mowtek appeared before a judge to demand that
the state give a mustaqdama who worked cleaning a school for girls at Batha, money to for the
care of her children.882
Slaves, Former Slaves and their Descendents:
Experiences and Changes in Relations, Recognition and Belonging
In addition to historical experiences which centered around work within Fasi slaveowning
households, lives and changes were lived through, among, and in interaction with Fasi
slaveowning family relationships. Where archival and legal records reveal many contours of
Fasi domestic slaves lives and the end of the institution, they do not in themselves offer us an
adequate reconstruction and historical sense of related experiences. Though challenging, this

877

(Smat 7.5.1370/14.2.1951).
(Smat 14.9.1363/2.9.1944).
879
(Rcif 22.2.1350/9.7.1931).
880
(Smat 8.3.1337/12.12.1918).
881
(Rcif 14.6.1351/15.10.1932).
882
(Shekait and Mounazat 11.2.1356/23.4.1937).
878

272

subaltern transformation was marked by lived pasts, recoverable through attention to retracing
the generational and personal contexts of changes within Fasi families. We thus turn to voices
within families, the oral histories of slaves, slaveholders, and their descendents, in an effort to
survey and historize the salient features and patterns of their experiences, actions, and internal
lives inside and beyond this institution.
Slaves Experiences of Fasi Family Holidays
Oral histories concerning this period reveal the experiences and relationships of slaves and
former slaves within the complexities of Fasi families.883 Children in large slave owning
households grew up with their ideas and attitudes molded by overhearing and witnessing the
conversation, opinions and interactions of a range of roles and personalities.884 Within the norms
of family organization, young boys would remain among women, but for slaves and their
children such an order varied, especially during the performance of their household work. For
example, young slave girls frequently grew up serving much older male guests and relations, in
ways that free and recognized daughters of free Fasi elite wives might never have. In some
households with large enough groups of slaves, these patterns of gendered separation were
repeated among slaves themselves in their opportunities for social and family lives.
In addition to the basic gendered divisions of household space and eating there were
elaborate generational dynamics. An elite Fasi raised in a slave owning family recounted of the
respect which was expected of a patriarchal father, in the past the son couldnt even know the

883

Several European authors offer passages concerning these relations. See for example Le
Tourneau (1949), Jerme & Jean Tharaud (1930), and Goichan (1929).
884
Goichan (1929) p. 53.
273

color of his fathers eyes, so imagine for the abidrespect was holy in the past.885 An elite Fasi
woman similarly retells,
in the past when the man entered the house everyone in the house used to feel fear
Our fathers had rooms upstairs and when I and my sister used to hear him in the stairs we
kept silent, even if we were quarrelling, and we used to continue after he left. We
couldnt be impolite with our father now you can laugh with your father and tell him
what you want, but we used to speak only to our mother and she used to communicate
with our father about what we needed. We used to kiss his hand when he came.886
Along with generational respect came traditional shifting of gendered controls with age, so that
even during the nineteen twenties older women of the family and household were observed to
normally be expected to be more freed.887 As has been noted, another important generational
feature encountered in the depictions of families was the persistent observation that members of
younger generations sought distinct expectations and desires from their parents.888 In social
terms intersecting but not duplicating class formations was an important consciousness of shorfa
status. One elite Fasi woman reminisced with pride and humor how she learned the power of her
fathers status: her sharif father was insulted nearby a shop in the medina by a poor and rude
non-sharif woman, the muzwar was called and the woman was arrested, questioned, and jailed;
she consequently believed that she could have a parrot jailed for insulting her.889 The social
distinction of old Fasis versus new poor immigrants was another deeply socialized family value,
as a woman who had grown up the daughter of a slave and was then married into a wealthy Fasi

885

Interview with Fasel Shawi (Fes, June 2, 2004).

Interview with Fatima Beez (Fes, April 19, 2004).
887
Goichan (1929) p. 61.
888
Goichan (1929) p. 64.
889
Interview with Khadija Sbai (Fes, June 5, 2004). A muzwar is officially charged with
matters related to chorfa families.
886

274

family noted pointing out both households she had lived within from a rooftop, here is Ben
Kirans house near Skat. Only Fasi people. There was no one from the countryside.890
In addition to quotidian family functioning that has been discussed, domestic slaves were
acutely aware of the double standards which they lived through in the routine disruptures of
family holidays and parties. The most important annual religious holidays celebrated by Fasi
families in this period were Eid Seghir, Eid Kbir, Mouloud, and Achoura, parties occurred at
various occasions among different families.891 An elite Fasi woman explained that Lala goes to
a party and a slave abid is invited or not, further noting that a slave going to a party might be
limited in their movements, because there was a concern that they not be allowed to give away
their family secrets.892 A Fasi man who had grown up as a slave recounted, for Achoura they
were given djellaba, trousers or kandarissa, in Eid Kbir we didnt use to buy a sheep.893
Another two female informants with a similar background mentioned of the lived contrast among
household children, for the first, in Achoura they went to their grandsons or they invited them,
and you are all the time with your mother, you dont have anyone to whom you could go and
visit;894 and the other, we ate and drank but we didnt get nice clothes or wonderful things like
that.895 Bitter memories of Eid were frequently repeated, with the theme of being denied a
chance to enjoy oneself and family. One daughter of a slave recounted,
we used to feel inferiority. People were happy and we didnt have that feeling. no one
used to care about you, you had no existence. Because you were nothing, you had no
ability to say I Am. So go to the street and say whatever you want. They used to use
the abid and eat a meal. But not you I remember the sheep in the Eid. But the abid
890

Interview with Maghdouj (Fes, January 17, 2004).

See Le Tourneau (1949) pp. 592, 595.
892
Interviews with Khadija Sbai (Fes, June 3, 5, 2004).
893
Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 27, 2004). Kandrissa are traditional pants,
wide then narrowing at the knee, often made in white.
894
Interview with Maghdouj (Fes, January 17, 2004).
895
Interview with Lala Zohra (Fes, February 7, 2004).
891

275

used to work on Eid to cook meat, to prepare meals. They were always and completely
busy.896
Others from former slave backgrounds echoed such experiences during family holidays,
they gave us what was left behind, they said he is just a slave,897 and concerning Eid and
eating meat, at Eid we used to feel that we were just charka we didnt have a lot of meat not
like those who had their own sheep, I felt that feeling inside my heart,898 and finally in a
statement that may have been hyperbolic but conveys one mans charged memoires, for Eid
they used to eat the crumb in secrecy, if you ate meat you would be beaten.899
Compounding their frequent depiction of emotional disturbances that came with family
holidays was the coercive social and familial force in which slaves and their children internalized
double standards practiced within slaveowning families or at least would have to display
gratitude and pleasure in performing their often arduous work. As one informant recounted
plainly, we werent really happy. We acted happy at the holidays. We acted as though we were
happy.900 Another theme which arose in remembering holidays was the social and familial
meaning and importance that went along with the wearing of clothing. As explained from the
memoires of stifling experiences,
in parties people got very prepared concerning clothes. Golden belts, scarves, sherbil
(fine womens shoes) balna (embroidered mens shoes) for men not like now, in the past
those without were always far away from happiness. They could never feel the feast,
because all the others were better than them wearing expensive clothes, not like them I

896

Interview with Kanata (Fes, March 16, 2004).

Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).
898
Interview with Hachuma (Fes, February 9, 2004). Charka literally means to share;
impoverished families unable to purchase a sheep to celebrate Eid Kbir pool resources to buy
one.
899
Interview with Sidi Brahim (Fes, March 17, 2004). Similar statements were made by another
informant, Interview with Yousef (Fes, March 24, 2004).
900
Interview with Maghdouj (Fes, January 17, 2004).
897

276

saw the clothes and I felt inferior because I did not know what to do You see that you
dont have, and what they have. 901
The commonness of this experience was confirmed by a Fasi elite womans mention of a
proverb, the silk has become worthless because it is used to clean pots, explicating that of
course sitting with Lala at a party would make her feel inferior.902 Such feelings and phenomena
were not the reserve of slave only, because, a recognized free wife or a mustowleda in no way
prevented your children from receiving different treatment within
a family. As was offered of contemporary feelings among siblings from mothers of free versus
slave backgrounds during family functions,
Q: Do you feel inferior among your brothers when youre invited to family parities?
A: Yes. I feel Im different among them.
Q: Why? You too are a daughter of Berrada?
A: I have those feelings of inferiority like my mother because when I was young I used
to remark our differences.903
Clearly holidays were particularly revealing and memorable instances during which slaves and
their descendants experiences of family life where often painful reminders of their discounted
human value and second-rate-at-best entitlements based on their affiliation.
Marriages and Color
Beyond being another form of family festivity which marked slaves differences, Fasi marriages
represented multiple intersections and dimensions of slaves and former slaves lives during this
period. Weddings themselves among Fasi slaves and former slaves were repeatedly described as
simple affairs. One of the chief remembered features was the making of a variety of cous-cous

901

Interview with Rakiah Lalou (Fes, April 18, 2004).

Interview with Khadija Sbai (Fes, June 5, 2004).
903
Interview with Lala Zineb (Fes, April 15, 2004).
902

277

(elkasae delhlal) to commemorate the event, which at times would entail an adoul and sadak,
and more often did not. In recounting these occasions, several times the following proverb was
summarily referred to, a poor man has married a poor woman and the medina is calm.904 The
dominant pattern was of masters deciding upon marriages among slaves. One child of slave
parents noted that his grandparents union had been arranged by their separate owners,
describing their grandmothers place of origin as El Fandak near El Katanine and their
grandfather from Wald Labid near Marrakesh.905 More often inter-slave marriages occurred
within a household, as was explained of slave grandparents,
well he came and asked her for marriage and they let them marry each other at home.
He was also a slave. They had two or three slaves inside the house not only one, and they
had many servers, three or four, when they started to become grown, they let them marry
one another. They did not give their possessions away, they said lets marry each one
with the other and their children will work for our grandsons. The old one stayed with
the old, and if they died no problem. And when their children grew up and studied and
got a job and married, they gave them their slaves, to take with them. They said it is
yours and you can take it with you.906
Significantly in this account there is mention of the grandfather first approaching the
grandmother then acquiring permission; other accounts repeatedly confirm similar scenarios and
note that grandparents and parents marriages often or usually which were fully arranged and far
less than voluntary.907 In other testimonies as well, when there was a male personal marriage

904

One informant noted the brining of an adoul and the making of cous-cous, Interview with
Halima (Fes, January 27, 2004). Others mentioned marriages without official papers, or a
spoken Koranic verse without sadak or an adoul, with merely a ekase dlehlal (cous-cous), and
sometimes with mohr (nuptial gift). Interview with Hachuma (Fes, February 9, 2004), Interview
with Naima (Fes, February 10, 2004).
905
Interview with Said (Fes, January 15, 2004).
906
Interview with Maghdouj (Fes, Janurary 17, 2004).
907
For example, several interviewees noted her grandmothers arranged marriage with another
house slave, Interview with Zahra (Fes, February 7, 2004), Interview with Said (Fes, February
15, 2004). Another stated of her mother, Allah knows they bought her and she stayed with
them until she grew up and they gave her to their slave, Interview with Maghdouj (Fes, Janurary
17, 2004).
278

interest expressed, as noted by a descendent of slaves of the Makhzan (where there were
frequently multi-generations of slave families) a permission was sought, you should inform
your father and he will inform his ashikh (boss) who will tell it to his chief, and then you should
wait, because they can accept or refuse.908
A crucial and perennial marriage dynamic involving slaves and their children within Fasi
slaveowning households in this period was the possibility of marriage with female slaves and the
general controls of male slaves sexuality. As was recollected,
it was normal. Whenever you entered any house, you would find that the master could
marry his khadim, but the Abd could not marry his Lala, and if there were any doubts
about this they used to burn him.909
The ready opportunities of marrying a female house slave could open an interpersonal pandoras
box of machinations. One central aspect of this situation was the interests and the tensions
which were created between female slaves and all free household males, particularly Sidi. The
daughter of a slave who was married by the son of a prominent Fasi when she was thirteen
recounts the lived logic of these relations which she encountered in childhood, noting an ideal
transformation through which young female slaves would work (and do) the housework and if
he (Sidi or a free household male) liked her, he would give her freedom and have a baby with her
and she would become his wife.910 Interestingly, the same informant noted that as a girl she did
not think of escaping, but that for her marriage at a young age was like an escape.911 The same
ideal was also explained as follows, when he bought her she became his. He marries her
without sadak (dowry), and she stays with him in the house, and she becomes the owner of the

908

Interview with Halima (Fes, January 27, 2004).

Interview with Said (Fes, Janaury 15, 2004). Burn here indicates sterilization.
910
Interview with Maghdouj (Fes, January 17, 2004).
911
Ibid.
909

279

house, and she takes care of his children.912 Despite such this simple portrayals, female slaves
marriages were regularly deep and complex family affairs. A major source of complications
came from those within a family who sought to stifle the possible marriage of a free male with a
female slave. One interviewee testified that a prevention of marriages had occurred between his
grandparents, they were afraid that my grandmother would get married with one of their sons,
or my grandfather could love or marry one of their daughters, so he decided to marry them to
prevent them from tempting his children.913 Another informant explained in detail,
according to what they told me, it was they (the slaveowners) who wanted to marry
them (his grandparents) to one other. Tazis people. Because both of them were working
together for them in the house, so they said this man will marry this girl. Without act.
Without anything. They gave her to him by force, because she did not want to marry
him The truth was she wanted to marry a Tazi. There was a relationship between them
so she got the idea to marry him, but when his wife started to suspect their relationship,
she decided to let my grandfather marry her... They (his grandparents) lived with them
(their owners) and then they had babies The Tazi lover wanted only to live with her
but she wanted marriage914
Thus in what would have been a common outcome a female slave said to have been sixteen was
forcibly married to another older household slave said to have been over forty, due to a free
wifes preventative measures. Such differences in age, and far greater differences, within interslave and slave-free marriages, often led to young slave and former slave widows with their
children, as was noted of a former slave married to an old man and widowed with child at
fourteen.915
In the charged Fasi household contexts of propinquity, power, difference and desire,
color repeatedly figured into intimate relationships and marriages. One of the most basic
features of this consciousness was the understanding of the contingencies within which social
912

Interview with Said (Fes, January 15, 2004).

Interview with Hachuma (Fes, February 9, 2004).
914
Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).
915
Interview with Hachuma (Fes, February 9, 2004).
913

280

status and color functioned. As a son of slaves recounted, a powerful Fasi elite son would not
necessarily become any less powerful due to his color, noting that ould (the son of) Ben Jalloun
is black and all his brothers are white.916 Yet slave family reconstructions overwhelmingly
underscore a dominant pattern of a desire and historical practice within marriage strategies for
lightening. There were repeated and sometimes detailed accounts spanning up to four
generations, noting how children have become lighter.917 As noted, they are becoming lighter
and though less black, their faces are nearly the same.918 The categories of black and brown
were variously reflected upon. For example, the older people were darker very black, darker
than me yes my grandmother Masouda was very black, and each one of them is less black than
the other, the older they were the blacker they were.919 And similarly, the son of a slave
suggested, we are not like we were, the color has become less black.920 Among the ways in
which color was understood, brown was often an elastic description which overlapped widely.
Parents and relations were often described as being more brown than me,921 or as being
brown like me.922 However many informants referred to color during the decline of slavery
not as seamless continuum, but against clear symbolic Manichean colors. For example,

916

Interview with Mohammed Mufeed (Fes, January 6, 2004).

This human geographical trend was repeatedly evidenced in family photos and visits across
generations. As informants repeatedly indicated, family color is becoming lighter, Interview
with Hachuma (Fes, February 9, 2004), Interview with Halima (Fes, February 8, 2004); others
noted that their parents and grandparents had been considerably darker, Interview with Ma Aziza
Mokri (Fes, April 6, 2004), Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 21, 2004); others
sometimes associated darkness of parents and grandparents with Saharan origins, Interview with
Lala Zineb (Fes, April 15, 2004), Interview with Eliza (Fes, March 15, 2004).
918
Interview with Naima (Fes, February 10, 2004).
919
Interviews with Halima (Fes, February 8, 10, 2004).
920
Interview with Youseef (Fes, March 24, 2004).
921
Interview with Hada Sousi (Fes, March 13, 2004).
922
Interview with Sanae and Kenza (Fes, June 8, 2004).
917

281

yesgrandmother was black (samba), mother less, me Im between black and white,923 and
in another case, my grandmother was blacker,mother middle brown, father was black, and
I have a white girl and a black one.924 Others offered unique approaches the lightening of color,
such as, yes with time they became lighter, my mother was white like cheese and my father was
a dark color.925
A sense of shame dually inscribed with color and slavery was often reported, particularly
concerning attitudes of inferiority among older slaves.926 An heritage of this continued in many
personal perceptions of color among the children of slaves.927 These attitudes among the
descendents of slaves were also frequently evident concerning marriage. As was recounted,
I was going to marry a black journalist from Rabat, but my family told me no. No dont
marry a black man. I decided (that we should) escape together, but Allah did not allow it
to happen, so I married that. I wanted to marry a black man my family hates them
they say the black man, may Allah protect us, it is as though they draw a bad omen
from the black man. Me, no. I find the blacks fine, even jnoun (spirits) which are in me
are blackMy sisters daughters do not like black people, Im the only one.928
In reconstructing and interpreting the dynamics of color within Fasi elite slave owning families,
several informants suggested gendered differences concerning color. In their perspective, elite
Fasi wives tended to seek white Fasi husbands for their daughters, one informant explained
simply of a the tendency among Fasi Lalas toward preservation and color consciousness, she
wants to marry her daughter to a white man because she is white.929 Yet, the extent to which
this was a dominant principal among Fasi marriages, Fasi mens desires and pursuits of black

923

Interview with Kanata (Fes, April 13, 2004).

Interview with Hada Sousi (Fes, March 13, 2004).
925
Interview with Om Kalthoum (Fes, April 19, 2004).
926
Interview with Mbark of Moulay Abdellah (Fes, February 6, 2004).
927
For example, some informants responded plainly and directly to the question, Do you feel
ashamed of your color? Yes. Interview with Hada Sousi (Fes, March 13, 2004).
928
Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 21, 2004).
929
Interview with Eliza (Fes, March 15, 2004).
924

282

slave women insured nearly insurmountable challenges to such pure color segregations within
Fasi families. One woman summarized her own related experience,
Q: Your husband was free, his mother was the daughter of Skat and his father the son of
Ben Skroun, so why did he accept to marry the daughter of a khadim?
A: He liked my color. Thats all. He was white and he wanted a black girl
Q: Do your children have the same color as their father?
A: No they are all my color, only one of them has their fathers color.930
As will be discussed below, actions upon such colored desires toward slaves, frequently did not
entailed marriage.
A son of Fasi slaves suggested a parallel which he found between Fasi mens desire for
black slave women and European favoritism toward Moroccan blacks, noting specifically
Saharawis. He recounted instances in which French guests were introduced to slave women,
some of whom were married and brought to France.931 Another transnational appearance of Fasi
mens interest in black women occurred in Fasi business communities, as was noted in a local
British paper from Manchester.932 The son and patriarch of Fasi merchants with businesses in
West Africa recounted with enthusiasm and pride how his family had been in his used of the
French term mtisse,
me Im mtisse. My mother is from Gambia, Alhumdullah the mtisse is good.
From the 19th century we went to Africa and we started mixing with them We went to
Dakar and St. Louis It was them and other families of Fes who started businesses in
Cote Ivoire933

930
931
932

Interview with Maghdouj (Fes, January 17, 2004).

Interview with Mohammed Mufeed (Fes, February 15, 2004).
Fred Halliday, Lancashire The Millet of Manchester: Arab Merchants and Cotton Trade, British

Middle Eastern Studies (Vol. 19, No. 2, 1992) pp. 159-176.

933
Interview with Fasel Shawi (Fes, June 2, 2004).
283

Journal of

In reflecting upon his experiences and observations about power and color, a different
identification was taken, and though most of his life was spent in Fes, his experience working in
family businesses in West Africa were returned to, I used to have well off friends in Africa,
intellectuals. I used to know them well. If I lied to anyone of them and I insisted, they used to
believe me easily because Im white, I cant understand that.934 Clearly the contingent and
shifting self and national identifications within or outside of blackness and Africa, reveal claims
a position of mobility and power in relationship to color and slavery.
Several informants who were the descendents of slaves spoke directly about their views
concerning color and marriage for themselves and their children. One man stated categorically,
my father was khal samba (very black) and my mother was khal fatah (light black) like me I
took my mothers skin I do not wish to marry my daughter with a black man because I am sick
of the life of slavery. I used to see everything black, enough from that color935 When asked
their preferences between white and black spouses with similar wealth, and then to offer their
thoughts why, though the majority choose white their responses varied widely. One son of a
slave simple stated, I would choose the white woman because I like white women.936 A
daughter of a slave explained further,
A white man By nature I like white men, my desire is in the white man. I dont have it
in the black man. Allah offered me that, and I dont know why I cant accept the black
man. I cant accept him, perhaps it can be a complex. But this isnt a complex it is my
life. I want to spend it with a white man, I found a white and blond man I like and I
married him.937
Other women of similar family backgrounds responded that they preferred black men.

934

Ibid.
Interview with Azouz Karima (Fes, March 25, 2004).
936
Interview with Yousef (Fes, March 24, 2004).
937
Interview with Fatima (Fes, February 8, 2004).
935

284

For example, of course I would choose the black man without money between white and black
men,938 and, Id prefer the black man because I like black people and my husband Allah rest
his soul was black.939 Another woman who agreed added with a strange and contradictory
emphasis, I like him. I like his white teeth, I like everything about him, I say to myself, that
man has a black face but the heart is white.940 In many cases, the question was altered or
redirected, pointing to the qualitative personal substance not captured in such a survey. One
woman preferred neither black nor white,941 another preferred brown,942 another chose her own
skin color,943 one man insisted that he would chose the good one,944 one woman paused and
stated, now (if) there is no love there is nothing,945 a woman choose the richest one because
this is the time of money.946 Two other women directly disagreed with this motivation, the
first stating her choice based on decency and generosity, because the money, even after a long
time, disappears and at last only indulgence remains, and the mercy of Allah there are black
people with white hearts and white people with black hearts,947 and the second, I choose who
Allah likes the money isnt eternal, not like morals.948
Familial Assimilation and Tensions

938

Interview with Hachouma (Fes, February 9, 2004).

Interview with Hada Sousi (Fes, March 13, 2004).
940
Interview with Lala Zohra (Fes, February 7, 2004).
941
Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 27, 2004).
942
Interview with Rakhia Lalou (Fes, April 18, 2004). I choose the brown
943
Interview with Mimouna Mokri (Fes, April 10, 2004). I will choose my color I will
choose humrani (a skin color between black and white).
944
Interview with Mbark of Moulay Abdellah (Fes, , 2004).I will choose the good one
945
Interview with Kanata (Fes, March 16, 2004).
946
Interview with Lala Zaneb (Fes, April 15, 2004). Q: if I bring you rich black man and poor
white one, who will you choose as husband for your daughter? A: I will choose the rich one. Q:
why? A: This is time of money.
947
Interview with Mimouna Mokri (Fes, April 4, 2004).
948
Interview with Om Kalthoum (Fes, April 19, 2004).
939

285

While on the whole it was much easier for males to leave slave owning households, female
slaves had far more possibilities of joining their owners families. The core of their possibilities
for a transformed familial and social status rested upon their formal recognition as mothers and
wives. With or without such recognition, intimate relationships between male Fasi slave owners
and their slave women were surrounded by a nexus of motivations and power relations expressed
and lived in the most personal of terms.
In varying degrees within different families, slaves assimilation into Fasi families often
occurred. As a Fasi elite woman recalled, Ranja wasnt khadim anymore and she was happy
she was no longer a khadim she did not do housework anymore and she used to wear a kaftan
just like her Lala but in different colors farajiya and (with) a scarf.949 Another woman
explained of her own experiences of transformation from slavery, noting that when she married
at sixteen her,
mother-in-law showed me many things and was very kind with me, teaching me how
to cook, make bread and many other things I initially felt awkward. Alhumduallah I
started to eat and drink normally and she bought me things too. I had babies, and I saw
their father happy with them and buy them many things, and I took part too,
Alhumduallah950
In another variety and degree of assimilation a recognized mustowleda was noted to have been
given a monthly salary for caring for her children without incident after giving birth.951
Tensions proved to be a more common emphasis than assimilation within the testimonies
and reconstructions of slaves lives in Fasi families. One of the most powerful and recurrent
images in this regard was of a free wife, particularly an older first wife, and her attitudes and
behavior toward female slaves. As an elite Fasi woman explained,

949

Interview with Khadija Sbai (Fes, June 5, 2004). Farajiya is a traditional garment.
Interview with Maghdouj (Fes, Janurary 17, 2004).
951
Interview with Khadija Sbai (Fes, June 3, 2004).
950

286

the khadim didnt have the ability to impose her free will. She used to do all the
housework and the husband came to her at night Every woman used to be jealous even
of the khadim because the woman refused always to share her husband with another. But
she couldnt protest. Now she can even insult her husband, but before she couldnt, he
could beat her952
Another elite Fasi woman explained how when her father had married a white khadim as his
second wife, her mother hated him, but couldnt do anything about it because he had the
power.953 In addition to underscoring the perceived immutable centrality of the Fasi patriarch,
the Sidi figure, in these relations, the same informant reasonably suggested that there had been
greater tensions and territorial defensiveness against additional wives children, and families
when Fasi slave owning families were less wealthy.954 Though wealth did not resolve potential
and real tensions, it frequently alleviated them. As was shown in the resentment which an
informant and her mother faced after her mother married her owner,
Q: Did he (her father) use to sleep with your mother like with his first wife?
A: In the beginning yes, but when I grew up I remarked that his first wife used to create
a scandal if he went to my mothers room. She used to send some men to spy on him, to
know whether he gave us something or not.
Q: Did he give your mother any gold accessories?
A: Only in the beginning as the others said to me he was white but he used to like
black women. He did insist on marrying my mother because she refused in the beginning
since he was already married...
Q: What about her Lala?
A: Shes her Lala. My mother was her khadim, and she had abid. Her father was rich,
shes the daughter of Bennis. That means there was big difference between them. My
mother was her khadim and then they became fellow-wives She (her mother) was
khadim; she was sold and bought just to work in houses. When my father saw her, he
married her (later on) she lived in her own house but she kept on doing needlework.

952

Interview with Fatima Beez (Fes, May 24, 2004).

Interview with Khadija Sbai (Fes, June 3, 2004).
954
Ibid.
953

287

Q: So she stopped working for her Lala?

A: Yes, she stopped being under her control. When she married my father her Lala (it
means the first wife) refused to let her live in the same house.955
This case alludes to the recurrent family pattern of a transitional period in the development of
intimate relations between slave women and their owners perhaps semi-formally recognized by
symbolic gestures such as gifts and changes within the household order, or even legally
recognized, then perhaps followed by children and their recognition throughout the course of
which there were ongoing daily personal household interactions. In this case jealousy and
resentment led the first wife to push for the relocation of the informant and her mother into
another house, the availability of such within the increased crowding of the medina would likely
be an option reserved to those with means.
These relationships were a recurrent source of household changes, often with great
implications for Fasi families. In practice, slave women and their children were not always
housed within a single family house, or in accommodations of an equal standard.
One male historian from a prominent Fasi family offered the following perspective about
masters relations with slave women,
its not unlawful and the traditional houses are known by mssriya (small house), the
master of the house used to make mssriya especially if he wanted to spend the night with
anyone of them, thats why the mssriya is built because of respect of for her psychology
even it was his own house. That is lawful956
Beyond the ideal legality of this arrangements, the then contemporary and long ongoing shift to
subdividing Fasi houses and increasing the total number of family units in most areas of the

955

Interview with Lala Zineb (Fes, April 15, 2004).

Interview with Sidi Mohammed Bennai (Fes, April 19, 2004). The same informant noted a
Quranic right to possess your ayman. Another informant noted a situation in which a Fesi
slave was not married but was given her own khadim to serve her and a massria, becoming like
his jaria. Interview with Lala Zineb (Fes, April 15, 2004).

956

288

medina meant that small rental properties, such as rooms within larger houses, could be used to
house recognized or secret families of slaves, former slaves, servants and their children.957
Many informants acknowledged the great impact of these relationships upon them as
children. One Fasi elite womens free mother died when she was still young at which time her
step-mother was a former slave, their relationship was pocked by deep lingering resentments and
ultimate rejection.958 It was suggested in a study of children in Fes in the 1920s, the maturation
of a daughter sometimes raised their mothers anxieties about their husbands interest in a
younger wife.959 Similarly, as semi-adopted slave girls approached and reached puberty familial
and household tensions arose.960 As a daughter of slaves recounted from her embittering
personal experiences,
when I grew up, when she (Lala) even saw me she used to insult me because I was
beautiful and she was afraid that her husband could remark me and she used to control
him Now Id marry him just because of her grudge and envy. If only I had the
authority I would torture her because of what she used to do to people. I would take him
just to be alone (with him) and to never come back to her
Q: How would you take him?
A: With my hard work and the parsimony of my own hands a khadim will not come
and cook food for him, Ill cook with my own hands Do things he wants with my
hands and with quiet parsimony As we know the stomach of the man comes before
his mind, he likes the woman who makes him delights They had many advantages
when khadamat in the kitchen used to cook What a life they had, khadim used to cook
in the kitchen and she was standing there, insulting her and her parents. Anyway
Alhumdallah, all is over now961
Childhood and young adolescent experiences of these tensions would not only produce

957

It was suggested that periodically such secret families, including the sons of khadim had
been maintained in Fasi rental properties. Interview with Khadija Sbai (Fes, June 3, 2004).
958
Ibid.
959
Goichon (1929) p.26.
960
Goichon (1929) p.30.
961
Interview with Mimouna with Fatima (Fes, March 25, 2004).
289

generalized deep anger and internalized resentments, children grew up being exposed and
socialized to attitudes frequently expressed through contrasting feelings for, and behaviors
toward, Sidi and Lala. One unrecognized daughter of a slave mother explained how her mother
and she would violently over-wash and abuse Lalas clothing with the intent of gradually
damaging it with impunity and in the process making her look dowdy, while Sidis clothing was
dotted over and treated with affection.962 A Fasi elite woman had long observed these tendencies
and explained, she used to love Sidi but not Lala in order to take her husband she used to
be kind with him, to bring him delicious food, to wash him his feet, so he found that tenderness
and liked it963 Deeply tied to such mounting daily psychological strains were Fasi childrens
exposure into Fasi womens widespread interests and involvements with Afro-Maghribi
womens healing practices and perceived spiritual powers related to the politics of relationships,
love, marriage, fertility and health.964
On this subject, one Fasi elite noted,
the khadim of my mother used to stay next to the hair to take it and burn it while
combing her hair, or the water she took a shower with. Khadim used to keep it from
anyone as a bodyguard. They were afraid of sorcery against her. I remember khadim
from Sudan, she was with my mother and she used to tell me the day Sidi dies they will
cut you to pieces. But Allah wanted my mother to die before my father965

962

Interview with Fatima (Fes, February 8, 2004).

Interview with Fatima Beez (Fes, May 24, 2004).
964
For example see the suggestion offered by Amal Rassam, Women and Domestic Power in
Morocco, International Journal of Middle East Studies, Vol. 12, No. 2. (Sep., 1980) p.174.
Despite this built-in conflict between the wife and her mother-in-law, the culture's only
institutionalized mechanism to deal with the tension is for both protagonists
to turn to shor, or witchcraft. The mother-in-law uses witchcraft to limit her son's attachment to
his wife and perpetuate his dependence on her. No wonder that within a certain sector of
Moroccan society, women are known as the Rope of Satan Denied power in the real world,
they scheme and compete, using whatever means are available to them, in order to attain a
measure of control over their destinies.
965
Interview with Mekhalee (Fes, April 12, 2004).
963

290

In such ways young Fasi elite children were introduced and socialized into powerful and
enduring social images associating blackness with sorcery.966
Power and Sexual Relationships
The interpretation of Sidi and Lalas marriage and their respective sexuality formed a recurrent
theme among slaves. Fasi patriarchs sexual interest in slave women was sometimes directly
related to the characterizations of Fasi women. One informant explained, the men used to
prefer khadim. They found them nice and kind because they werent like ahl Fes who were
haunted by protocol.967 Scholarship interpreting the shifting historical roles of Fasi and wider
Moroccan marriages, asserts the image that Fasi wives were more mother than wife,968 and
long continued to not be the object of their spouses romantic love.969 Undoubtedly only a
minute fraction of elite Fasi women would have been able to pursue extramarital affairs. Some
accounts mentioned female slaves colluding, through being sent under a pretext to serve as an
intermediary, in making arrangements through a right stitch, in communications between
lovers, and in acting as a watchman.970 Also in rare and dangerous cases slave men within a
household were noted as having intimate relations with free Fasi women.971 Great differences in
age and their repercussions were observed and commented upon, as noted and suggested of a
Bashas much younger wife, when the Basha was old, she was young and very kind to the
slave.972 Further along these lines one Fasi man who grew up working as alongside his slave

966

Again see for example, Le Tourneau (1949), Jerme & Jean Tharaud (1930), and Goichan
(1929).
967
Interview with Homera (Fes, January 7, 2004).
968
Goichon (1929) p.26.
969
Rassam (1980) p.175.
970
Interview with Maghdouj (Fes, January 17, 2004), also see Goichon (1929) p.8. Right Stitch
here refers to deception.
971
Interview with Kanata (Fes, March 16, 2004).
972
Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).
291

parents postulated of such occurrences within Fasi households that particularly older Fasi men
suffered sexual problems and that women married them for their wealth, while the abd is quite
healthy, because of tamara (suffering), hard work is like sports.973 While very few slave men
would have ever found such supposed fringe benefits from their lifelong sufferings, this romantic
if not fantastic depiction does underscore the generalized pattern of the lack of fulfillment, and
the accepted limitations, channeled desires, and courses of action within Fasi slave owning elite
marriages.974
At the core of the social and familial changes within which domestic slavery declined
was a shift in values as to whether sexual relations with slaves were acceptable. Those who had
experienced these relationships within their families did not explain the subsequent changes
within which the institution declined in terms of legality. As an elite Fasi woman shared,
a lot of ahl Fes became parents but without sadak, just jariat. Hallal, not haram. They
used to take them and have children with them. Those who had children with ahl Fes,
their children have more importance, they often were rich. I know children of khadim
who are rich merchants. Why merchants? Because their parents were merchants, but
there those were who did deny them.975
Another elite Fasi woman explained:
the master made love with slaves who were not married if she had a baby it would
receive inheritance even if there was no was legal marriagejariat is without sadak
Nearly free. He can make love with her in El Fatiha jaria is hallal
Q: How can it be hallal?

973

Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 25, 2004).

Same sex intimate relations were noted by some informants, including a male wife of Sidi
from one household, Ibid. and cases of lesbian relationships, Interview with Kanata (Fes, March
16, 2004), Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, Januray 18, 2004).
975
Interview with Fatima Beez (Fes, May 24, 2004), Interview with Maghdouj (Fes, January 17,
2004).
974

292

A: This is what is saidthey said that el khadim was hallal for him, without this or that,
he can take her with nothing and she would inherit from him once he died976
By contrast with the legal arrangements and understandings of sexual relations within slavery, it
is difficult for many if not nearly all contemporary Fasi women with no direct or known familial
experiences of slavery to accept that any woman could be made love with without sadak and it
be hallal. While such relations have clearly become more readily recognizable, if not more
frequent, with the shifts following the decline of domestic slavery, these relations have also
become more comprehensively understood as haram. Also it should be noted that it was
persistently very clear among informants that it was haram for a slave who was having sexual
relations with her owner to simultaneously have sexual relations with another man.977
The practical terms of sexual relations with slave women varied across the arrangements
and power relations of distinct Fasi households. In some households Fasi men were purported to
simply and directly pursue their desires of slave women, as noted, in the kssoura (palaces) they
were just abidat and if Sidha liked her he would sleep with her.978
In another womans experience,
with rights and everything in the past they used to treat them badly. You cant give
khadim as your gift. But at that time, that was the secret of the big house, he used to tell
them, Im going for a walk in kssr (the palace) but in fact he went to abda did what he
wanted to do, then went to his wife. Why, because the house was too big and they could
find somewhere to hide979
In fact there was a frequent interest noted in dodging wives attentions to informal sexual
opportunities taken with slave women. As was explained of another household, he went to the
976

Interview with Maghdouj (Fes, January 17, 2004), also Interview with Said (Fes, January 15,
2004). El Fatiha refers to the Koranic authority.
977
Interview with Maghdouj (Fes, January 17, 2004), Interview with Kanata (Fes, March 16,
2004), Interview with Fasel Shawi (Fes, June 2, 2004).
978
Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 25, 2004).
979
Interview with Kanata (Fes, March 16, 2004), others also noted the size of elite houses
providing a pretext, Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, Janurary 18, 2004).
293

slave (el khadim) whenever his wife went to hamam (the traditional bath) or to visit one of her
relatives, and left her khadim to look after her children these are the opportunities which he
could find.980 Also noted as popular in some, perhaps less pious households, when Lala was not
in the house, parties with female singers and dancers were held during which arrangements for
liaisons could be made.981 As was explained by a participant of such parties which were held
within the Glaoui household,
people in that period were intelligent and they made everything in secret. So when you
see a woman sitting down with someone it means that they had already made something
together, not like modern people who do everything at random nobody could refuse the
Caid and that huge quantity of foreign people who got all that they wanted. For example
women were sitting and drinking wine and whenever el Caid wanted one of them he
would take her982
While such a grand scope of debauchery was only possible amongst a handful of very powerful
Moroccans, from an elite womans perspective Fasi slave owners could pursue their interests
with young or new slave women, who might then for a period of time be sexually favored, but,
then, when they were bored with them, they would put them with the rest or sell them.983 For
the sexual relations with slave women which proceeded to be become increasingly, or semiformal, various practical arrangements or habits of rotation often developed. As was explained
of a grandmother who bore an unrecognized child from her Sidi,
perhaps at that time they (women of the household) were colonized because when his
wife used to have her period, he went to khadim. His wife knew that, he went to do it
with khadim. That was a rule for them, now that doesnt exist. Who got pregnant, got
pregnant. Who was saved from this, was saved. That is how it was.984

980

Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 27, 2004).

Interview with Mohamed Mufeed (Fes, Febuary 15, 2004).
982
Interview with Mesalha (Fes, January 21, 2004).
983
Interview with Khadija Sbai (Fes, June 3, 2004).
984
Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 21, 2004).
981

294

The same woman recounted her mothers experiences within the next generation: he used to
sleep with khadim, if Moulat Dar (mistress of the house) was ill, the first were those abdiat
sanbat (black female slaves). His wife told him go away from me, just go to her. Im ill
now.985 Two senior slave informants from large households mentioned a system of rotation
along with the serving of tea and accompanying an owner in a private hamam,986 and the other
noting of relations with an owner that selected slaves would go to his bed until sunrise, she gave
him what he wanted and arranged the blanketshe only slept in his bed.987 Amid the world of
stressful uncertainties Fasi slave women faced subsequent to or along with these intimate
relations there would then often follow a relationship, perhaps leading to immediate or eventual
combinations of freedom, marriage, and children. Informants repeatedly confirmed cases of a
single,988 or limited wives with multiple other recognized or unrecognized slave women
partners.989
The profoundly exploitative and asymmetrical realities of these relations shaped a
personal and familial politics of recognition based on the manipulation of slaves frequently
blurred interests in freedom, marriage and motherhood. The giving of symbolically elevating
gifts, sometimes memorably including the monetary instruments of gold jewelry, figured into
many slave womens consciousness of their relationships.990
In many informants lives there was a nurturing and socialization into sexual relationships. As
explained of her childhood,
985

Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 25, 2004).

Interview with Mimouna LMokri (Fes, April 10, 2004).
987
Interview with Om Kalthoum (Fes, April 19, 2004).
988
Interview with Khadija Sbai (Fes, June 5, 2004).
989
Interview with Said (Fes, January 15, 2004).
990
Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 21, 2004). These informants noted that
clothing and jewelry could be sorts of monetary instruments for women in general, at one point
quipping Al Mokri gave her some gold and when she needed it she spent it Alhumduallah.
986

295

...they stole me young.

Q: Where did they steal you from?
A: Im from Souss, my town is Rijan between Agadir and Tiznit.
Q: Did your parents search for you?
A: They died and only my sister was left, this is why they stole me I was offered as a
gift from one to anotherI am one of the jaria lichira, yes Im one of them Lala Khti
Lyassar brought me up she too was Lyassar wives of Hadj Mohammad Mokrian
old woman brought me up
Q: Did you work in the house?
A: I played, ate and did housework.
Q: And when you became an adult?
A: He penetrated me.
Q: Did you have children with him?
A: No.991
In some cases which perhaps were influenced by Fasi families heightened interests in retaining
domestic slaves during and throughout the decline of the institution, sexual relationships with
slaves did not produce freedom or formal recognition but did produce children, and multiple
generations of slave women in sexual relations with owners and members of owners families.
Such slave mothers and grandmothers, as well as other figures who played improvised paternal
roles in efforts to protect slaves girls from being exposed to exploitative sexual relations often
proved unsuccessful or even tragic. One woman perceived how her grandmother and mothers
efforts to continually monitor her and keep her with them could not prevent her eventual
familiarization with sexual abuse. She recounted,

991

Interview with Om Kalthoum (Fes, April 19, 2004). It is likely that her kidnapping occurred
in the nineteen twenties. Jaria lichira refers to her status as slave and concubine.
296

(my mother), me and my grandmother were living there in Dar Hayoun, I was brought
up there without knowing the difference between right and wrong. Whenever my mother
went I used to be with her. We were living well and without any need. When I started to
grow up and see my mother and my grandmother working I used to say, that is my
family and they werent my family because we were living as abid. We kept living there
but we had one lack, we didnt have perfect freedom. They used to say do this and do
that, you couldnt feel at rest. So I started to question my mother when I slept with her
and her master came at 10pm and called her to go with him. I couldnt understand why
she used to go and stay for a long time. And when she returned I used to ask her where
did she go. She used to tell me, Im here my daughter. I remained that way until I
grew up and some Sidi used to follow me wherever I went and touched me I couldnt
understand why, I used to say to myself that it kindnessthe master used to bring up the
girls as he wanted992
Such formative experiences continued to influence personal relations well beyond the legal or
social categories of slavery or freedom.
Because well-being and power were strongly associated with childbearing and marriage
with Sidi, notions of freedom were sometimes fused with becoming Lala or like-Lala across
generations. In one possible scenario a slaves use of sexual relationships allowed her access to
greater claims to power within the family, as an example of which was represented in the
following narrative,
When the wife went to the hamam, her husband went to the slave (El Khadim) and made
love with her, and she liked that. So the next day in the morning when her master
brought her some meat and beetroots, she separated it into two parts, and she took the
first part into the kitchen and put the second at Lalas door, and when her master (Lalaha)
opened the doors in the morning and asked her What is that Mbarka? She answered
her, What? I am used to meat, and each of us has her own room.993
Many such expressions of claims existed and were historically important, and could be even
taken further, as seen in the fact that the largest single variety of legal references to slaves during
this period was to slaves who were recognized as having been impregnated by their owners.

992

Interview with Kanata (Fes, March 16, 2004).

Interview with Maghdouj (Fes, January 17, 2004), another similar story ended with the punch
line, Why do you want me Lala, everyone has their own meat, their own turnips and their own
doors. Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 21, 2004).
993

297

However, oral historical evidence strongly suggests that in cases many times the number of
official notarized and verifiably recognized former slave wives and mustowledas, slave women
and their daughters were not able to use their sexuality to their full advantages. A coalition of
forces fears, vulnerabilities, and received messages concerning authority and belonging among
family were frequently exploited within the emotions and very identities of slave girls. A
relevant example of which was retold as follows,
the nephew of Sidi used to touch my breast, I couldnt say anything. I couldnt say no,
we were living in his house, so how could we refuse and say no, they used to do such
things with my grandmother and my mother and me so how could we say no? If we said
no they would throw us out and where could we go? What could we eat? How could we
live? I was thinking that I wasnt a slave abid but a member of their house and that we
too were the owners of the house when he used to hold me and kiss me.994
In the previous case Mbarka appears somewhat empowered and very focused on the
transformation of her status and material conditions, while the second case reveals a deep
predisposed psychological investment in the desire for a transcendent feeling of belonging.
Despite considerable opposition, Fasi slave women were not sexually pliant and often
rebelled against the logic of an institution which directed them into intimacy with Sidi.
Sometimes the incentives to have a sexual relationship and babies with the master were
weakened by stronger forces. To be certain masters relative attractiveness was not lost within
slaves desires and discernments, as the daughter of a slave noted of one Fasi patriarch, he
married a woman but she didnt want him, his mouth was always flowing with saliva. It was his
cousin, daughter of his uncle who accepted him995 Another daughter of slaves who continues
to live and work for the family who owned her mother reflected,
would I sleep with him to enjoy his riches to become like Lala? You know I couldnt
deceive myself. He used to torture us. I didnt use to feel good with him because he did
994
995

Interview with Kanata (Fes, March 16, 2004).

Interview with Fatima (Fes, January 15, 2004).
298

beat us I wouldnt sleep with him for millions. Never. I dont like him. I cant
imagine myself with him996
Voicing the other side of the equation a Fasi elite male explains of a relevant experience,
this khadma used to always take care of me and give me all I wanted and I thought she
could give me anything I asked her so I was an adolescent, 18 years old, and once I
went to room at night. She got angry and she told me she would tell it to my
grandmother997
In other notable cases slaves were threatened with rape and beaten but continued to refuse sexual
relations at all costs, enduring continued punishments,998 and fleeing into uncertainty.999
Informants experiences and testimonies harshly failed to correspond with the essential
myth of the gentile life of a pampered concubine.1000 In spite of refusals and the frequent limited
access to new clothing and personal hygiene, vulnerable female slaves were consistently exposed
to patterns of sexual abuse. Violation and fear meant that sexuality was frequently compounded
among the various forms of controls slaves struggled against. As one women testified from her
life,
many slaves used to zrazay (porter) came to the soukhri (errands) to the door So he
caught me and took me to the stairs to violate me but I refused
Q: Such things happened?
A: Yes catastrophes were usual. There was pressure and suffering it remained that
way until Allah brought the relief now if anyone wants to give their daughter to be a
matalma, (I tell them) sell everything you possess and make her learn a trade, its
better Yes it was the usual thing. One day the son of Sidi wanted to violate me with
996

Interview with Rkiah Halou (Fes, April 18, 2004).

Interview with Fasel Shawi (Fes, June 2, 2004).
998
Interview with Eliza (Fes, March 15, 2004). This informant recounted, Some abid slept with
Sidi others refused Allah bless her soul she used to refuse that condition with her master
They punished and burned them
999
Interview with Hada Sousi (Fes, March 13, 2004).
1000
Emblematic of this point of view it was reported that, in the large Moroccan
familiesthe form of domestic slavery or female concubinage in general is fairly soft.
Typed draft of report from J. Lapanne-Joinville for the Director of Cherifiennes Affairs, Rabat,
7.9.1955. (CADN).
997

299

violence, he did really torture me but Allah preserved me from him. I couldnt tell
anyone When I was young, when I was seven years old one old woman was violated
by their son, she refused, so he beat her, kicking her until they had to take her from the
garden to the hospital in a wheelbarrow (brwita).1001
Along with or as an alternative to brute force, Fasi domestic slaves and their daughters
experiences of sexual abuse often entailed manipulations. As was remembered,
When I started to mature, he (a son of the family patriarch) became tender and used to
bring me golden rings. I didnt used to understand that, when he brought me the golden
rings I used to say to myself this is the same ring as Lala has or better. So Im so
important because he offered me a ring. After seven days he brought me something else,
so I started to love him. You know honestly you couldnt not love someone tender with
you. You had no authority. No law. Why not love him? He was tender and kind and so
why not love him? that was the first that time I started to feel I had value as other
people.1002
After the same woman experienced the pains of an unrecognized childbirth she continued to have
sexual relationships with males of the household, noting in jaded retrospect, better to sleep with
my master than to go outside and be violated by delinquents.1003 She further assured herself,
moreover your master couldnt let anyone hurt you because were living in that house could not
leave it.1004 An unrecognized daughter recounted how her biological father would take my
mother in front of my grandmother when he desired her and Lala was away.1005
The personal heritage of the sexual abuse of Fasi slaves took many forms. One informant
reflected that slaves remained susceptible to emotional and sexual exploitation throughout their
lives, because they follow only love and affection, so whenever they find love they go toward it,
since they suffer from a lack of love.1006 By contrast, one daughter of slaves remained celibate

1001

Interviews with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 21, 25, 2004).
Interview with Kanata (Fes, March 16, 2004).
1003
Ibid.
1004
Ibid.
1005
Interview with Fatima (Fes, January 15, 2004).
1006
Interview with Halima (Fes, February 8, 2004).
1002

300

in her forties and had never had an intimate relationship. She explained that she refuses to marry
because she fears a man who wants her to work for his benefit,
I will never accept to marry someone and give him money. But I want to marry someone
who will work to support me and I am feed up with workingthey say that I am
abnormal since people love me and I dont pay any attention to them but I tell them that
all this is a lie since when a boy loves a girl he should go to her parents and ask to marry
her and then everything becomes clear.1007
Some women were philosophical about their responses to sexual abuse. An elderly slave who
remained steadfast in her enjoyment of singing, smoking and laughing with dear old friends
recounted among her tales having slept with the Shah of Iran, and summarized her lifes relations
in passing humor, flan loved me and I loved flan.1008 Another woman who was a prostitute for
a period of time after she left her mother and the house she grew where up as an unrecognized
daughter, recounted her eventual marriage,
yes I had relationships. I had a mind of youth and heedlessness; I was searching for
the meaning of woman He wanted me. He had his stories before too, but when he
knew me as serious we got married and I veiled. I had enough of outside, I wanted to
stay homeIf he found that I still searched for stories outside he would throw me away.
I have children with him, as you see I have beautiful children1009
For far more others for which there is no documentation, patterns of abuse and self-abuse
continued to dominant their lives. As was narrated of life after living with a Fasi family who
moved to Rabat,
I worked for some people in Fes Jadid for 6 years. They had the same system of control
like the others. Like slavery, and the husband wanted to sleep with me and slept with
me What could I do? He used to tell me, Ill knock on the door and youll open for
me. What could I do? If you cried, he would throw your clothes outside. Better to keep
silence and living in tranquility1010

1007

Interview with Lala Zohra (Fes, February 7, 2004).

Interview with Mekhalee (Fes, April 12, 2004). Flan refers to people.
1009
Interview with Fatima (Fes, February 8, 2004).
1010
Interview with Kanata (Fes, March 16, 2004).
1008

301

Deeply pathetic, the same informant noted of herself, I have a complex, I dont trust marriage, I
want Sidi not another1011 The stifling inability to escape the internal consequences of these
relations reveals with compelling human complexity the unclear, fragile, and arbitrary meanings
of freedom in contexts so lacking of recognition and belonging.
Children and Recognition
In addition to an immaterial and abstract internalized legacy of these relations which continued
to shape experiences, propinquity produced children. Slaves pregnancies often produced
reactions among differing family elements. One Fasi elite man explained that out of fear some
pregnant khadim hid their pregnancies and even their childbirth, and that in some situations
owners, their wives and their relations would become involved in hiding her from the sight of
other families, even going to extreme cases of pregnant slaves being beaten into aborting.1012
Another Fasi woman emphasized the banality of slaves pregnancies,
they used to get abid pregnant, they didnt use to kill the baby in her belly even if she
wasnt married with him. She had the child, made sabaa and everything for him, he grew
up as the son of Sidi, his master like any of your cows or sheep. If they gave birth you
wouldnt ask her why did you go and do this and that!1013
Such a perspective was supported by a woman who gave birth to an unrecognized daughter,
they were rich and important people so they didnt used to care about you, if pregnant
or not. For example, your working in a company and the director wants you, if you
refuse he will push you out. So Im abid and my grandmother is living there, they used
to take care of her with jewels1014

1011

Ibid.
Interview with Fasel Shawi (Fes, June 2, 2004).
1013
Interview with Mekhalee (Fes, April 12, 2004). Sabaa refers to a rite for new born children
the seventh day after their birth.
1014
Interview with Kanata (Fes, March 16, 2004).
1012

302

Slave and free Afro-Maghribi midwives were dominant figures in the actual delivery of
children.1015 In face of Protectorate era reforms of medicine as well as legality, this was
explained as important, my Lala had an old woman, a midwife living in Deb Fida, because if
you went to the doctor, he would ask for the certificate of marriage and your husband.1016 The
amount of time which slave women were reported to have received before they were expected to
return to work was generally noted as a week,1017 though occasionally less,1018 and in some cases
ten days or more.1019
When slave womens children from their owners failed to be formally recognized, the
tensions over paternity often continued throughout lifetimes. As one Fasi elite woman
recounted,
I know of a khadim, a Fasi took her and when she got pregnant he sold her. She gave
birth and brought up the child and worked with those people until that child grew up and
became a man. So his mother started to explain to him and told him that his father was in
that place. And he called... he went to his father but he denied him so he went to his
half-brothers and quarreled with them, they told him (their father) to give him some
money to avoid scandal, his father was a rich merchant1020
In another situation, an unrecognized slaves child explains of her life,
my mother became pregnant with me and when her Lala knew that she dismissed
her She told her we do not know your baby kicked her and Dada Zadya outA
family knew about that and they bought her to live with them. Then they lived with the
neighbors in Ould Azrak There they lived

1015

Interview with Om Kalthoum (Fes, April 19, 2004).

Interview with Kanata (Fes, March 16, 2004).
1017
Until sboua the seventh day after birth naming ceremony, Interview with Ma Aziza (Fes,
June 6, 2004), Interview with Hada Sousi (Fes, March 13, 2004), Interview with Om Kalthoum
(Fes, April 19, 2004). Another noted, in Dar Mokri (the child was) named on the sabaa, seven
days with leeyalate chikhate (women hired for music and dancing) and everything Allah Yrham
Chikha Rekiya, Interview with Mekhalee (Fes, April 12, 2004).
1018
Five days rest was noted. Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 21, 2004).
1019
Interview with Halima (Fes, February 10, 2004). Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes,
March 27, 2004).
1020
Interview with Fatima Beez (Fes, April 19, 2004).
1016

303

Q: Have you ever said that was your father?

A: A slave could never speak in front of their master he remained your master. He
wouldnt recognize you as his daughter because she had other children, them white and
you black. The daughter of khadim remained always the daughter of khadim, you
couldnt say thats my brother, he was white and you black No one could say that, he
didnt recognize (you). So simply they couldnt, no one could speak. Now hes dead.1021
In this womans experiences the actions of a jealous wife were associated with a fathers
decision to not recognize a slave child. This was found in other cases as well, as noted a
khadim was impregnated and he (Sidi) didnt recognize that that poor Ouzaniya had died..
and the wife did know1022 Though an enduring tension, it can be suggested that as Fasi
women sought greater control of their families and over what was permissible for their husbands,
many slave women and their children received a blunt non-recognition in the renegotiation of
status. Parallel to the French having simply officially ended slavery by supposedly not
recognizing the purchase of slaves, the non-recognition of the children of Fasi domestic slaves
meant that they simply did not exist as family. Some informants suggested that the burden of
recognition lied fully with the slaves themselves, not with the ideals of Moroccan law, and that
the problem in these cases stemmed from slaves uneducated conditions. One articulation of this
position is as follows,
its a big mistake because the abid are ignorant, the master had to give them their right.
They werent awake, the khadim wasnt educated. The day she had children with her
master she used to be free because he was free It was the wish of every khadim, if she
had children with him she would carry his free children, she would become free and her
children would be the same as the children of the free women1023

1021

Interview with Fatima (Fes, January 15, 2004).

Interview with Hada Sousi (Fes, March 13, 2004).
1023
Interview with Sidi Mohamed Benani (Fes, April 19, 2004).
1022

304

Sometimes tenacious threads of conscious were revealed to span and connect across the perverse
gulf between policies and legal ideals on the one side and lived incongruities on the other.
Informal interests and relations with unrecognized children and their mothers
were noted to variously occur. As was remembered,
Q: Why didnt your mother have your child recognized?
A: Your master can never recognize you and he was married with a beautiful woman
and to recognize abda, to feel proud of her He disliked her by instinct After a long
time he came and asked me what I had. I told him a girl. He said congratulations and he
gave me a golden necklace. He told me, thats a gift for the girl.1024
In such cases, even after the lines of family and non-family had been made damningly clear,
other lesser forces could continued to surface.
One important point of historical rupture which occurred increasingly with the
unrecognized children of slaves and free fathers was that they would no longer continue in the
same patterns of household labor and personal relations as their slave parents. In a subtle shift of
status, the majority of such children would become non-slaves by the historical default of Fasi
social and familial changes. However, another overlapping historical force among which many
such children of slaves would have grown up was the use of inter-slave children among large
families to continue the institution. As one slave woman long living her omara explained,
he (her father) was stolen. The Caids who wanted more power brought him. (They)
stole peoples children and offered them as gifts to give them more power. The Caid used
to choose the man to give a boy, not in order not to torture him but who would serve
him Hadj Salem was his name He used to bring the boys from the Zawiya of Moulay
Ali Sharif as gifts to be brought up in the house. (When) the boy became big they married
him to bring another boy again1025

1024
1025

Interview with Kanata (Fes, March 16, 2004).

Interview with Om Kalthoum (Fes, April 19, 2004). Torture here suggests sterilization.
305

Another informant mentioned the intermarriage of slaves and the raising their children within the
house as a means of supplying slaves and protecting family secrets.1026
Childhood and Slaves Families
Slaves capacities to form and maintain family life were intimately tied to the character of their
relations among their owners families and their household labor conditions. Despite frequently
being the primary caregivers for infants and children in slaveowning households, the
opportunities for childcare for slave children were very limited and slave infant mortality was
commonplace. When asked if slave mothers could attend to their children if they cried for them
while they were working, informants unanimously explained that work took unconditional
precedent. A Fasi elite confirmed the norm that if a slave woman was breastfeeding her baby
and needed fifteen minutes, a master could not wait fifteen minutes but the baby could.1027 A
Fasi elite woman attempted to soften this image by suggesting that if a slave baby was crying
then the master would be served first, but if the baby had fallen then the master would not want
her to neglect the child.1028 The experiences of informants who had spent their childhood with
slave parents added much further detail. As one woman explained,
no she couldnt leave her work and come to take care of me, especially if her Lala was
present in front of her, or her master. She couldnt. She used to serve them first and even
I was crying or whatever, she couldnt please me first. Except if Id fallen down or
something and the masters were absent, then she could come take care of me1029
Time again it was recalled that it happened not only with my mother but with everybodythe
work first.1030 Also it was clarified that in many if not most cases slave children were not

1026

Interview with Khadija Sbai (Fes, June 3, 2004).

Interview with Fasel Shawi (Fes, June 2, 2004).
1028
Interview with Khadija Sbai (Fes, June 5, 2004).
1029
Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 25, 2004).
1030
As one informant noted, when asked If you were crying while your mother was working?
No no she didnt have the capacity to hold me she would be busy. She let you cry? She
1027

306

continually kept in immediately view, several informants recalled regular extended periods of
being left alone, while various-time consuming daily tasks took their parents away them even
within the same large house. One son of slaves maintained that it was a common practice that
the children of slaves were drugged,
the mother could not take care of her child when she had work to do, so she gave it
what is called tajin dlahoub some spices used as drugs so that he would sleep for nearly
twenty hoursOf course after giving him something to eat and changing his
clothesThen she can even travel and comeback but the consequence is that those
children grew up mentally damaged. Its right that they are going to (sleep) because of
eating hshisha but they are going to lose their intelligence My mother did this, she was
obliged to do so in order to accomplish her work in time, and then come back to her
children to try to have them wake up1031
Another man recalled memories from his earliest childhood with focused bitterness,
I cried and cried until I felt tired and stopped. If she was cooking or doing the
housework, she could not have left all of that and held me, she couldnt I remained in
that suffering, because even the parents who would care for us and give us affection and
love were unable to give us that love and that affection, because they were also under the
power, and when you try to speak they say that you are slave We continued and lived
in that hardship. What was the cause? They were.1032
Informants collective depiction of Fasi slaves early childhood was of neglect and a harsh
physical and emotional initiation.

would be busy. She didnt have the right? No she would be cooking, in the kitchen
preparing the cooking. Interview with Maghdouj (Fes, January 17, 2004).
Similar testimonies were repeated. Interview with Lala Zohra (Fes, February 7, 2004).
Others explained, She couldnt go to her children and the big family hadnt eaten yet, she
couldnt even if they felt hungry she couldnt. The big family should eat first then she could
collect what they left and give it to her children. Interview with Hachouma (Fes, Feburary 9,
2004); No she couldnt carry him and finish her work, because she had to do her job.
Interview with Hada Sousi (Fes, March 13, 2004); Master first. Then she would take care of us
even if we were crying, because she said that we would cry then calm down so she has to serve
her master first. Interview with Eliza (Fes, March 15, 2004); When she had a task she couldnt
go and see me, because she was the khdam and she had to obey. Interview with Fatima (Fes,
January 15, 2004); She used to serve him first. Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes,
March 21, 2004).
1031
Interview with Mohammed Mufeed (Fes, Feburary 15, 2004).
1032
Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).
307

Several informants noted the importance of raising young slave children within the
households they were intended to live and work for, which meant the fullest possible exposure to
and impact of socializing them into familial expectations and intimate emotional controls. One
woman retold,
they used to bring them when they were small children and they would grow up in that
house. For example, a particular person came to a particular house so she would grow up
in it and she wouldnt go out and she would eat if they gave her food, and they would
establish their law. So this girl would wear clothes which the person had left behind her
and she would live with them until they would find her a husband and she was obliged to
accept him as he is the same thing but a man. Because he had to accept her as wife even
if she was blind or ill because he is a slave1033
The socialization of introducing children to emotional manipulations of their desires to feel
familial belonging thus began with their earliest identity formation. Many descendents of slaves
were discursively aware of this conditioning and alienation. One man explained and revealed his
exposure to this conditioning and its compounding force within his familial relations and
identity,
they used to bring abid young, (or) they were born abid and opened their eyes in that
house, so he would feel it as his house. Consequently he couldnt steal from them. He
said to himself my parents were born here as abid, Im living in this house, in our
house a man must not betray his profession (sanat bouk laynalbouk) at that time
you should have patience and endure suffering as your father because my father was
living in that house from his childhood so you should endure that life with him in that
house I didnt use to feel the real sense of slavery they lived, even though I was living
in slavery. But not like them, they were bought and sold. You couldnt feel that because
you didnt live it. You couldnt think of escaping. Only if you would be beaten, at that
time you felt fear. So you would think of escaping, only if you would be beaten. At that
time you would think of escaping. But, but, after you would say to yourself even if I will
escape they will surely catch me, because there were abid reserved to search for the abid
of the house and bring them back1034
In the logic of this institution, as Fasi slave children repeatedly experienced in their cognitive
development and upbringing, this kind of internal dialogue of alienation was intended to remain
1033
1034

Interview with Lala Zohra (Fes, February 7, 2004).

Interview with Sidi Mohammed Marrakechi (Fes, March 18, 2004).
308

fully controlled and internalized. These childrens tortured existential processes of becoming
and being were forcefully suppressed and masked by the dominant coercive expectations, habits
and roles within enslavement. Another woman noted,
we used to pick it up from them. We used to see my mother, how she was behaving
with her Lala and how my father was behaving with his Sidi. I kept that in my mind,
even were free now we still apply that to people, we say to the man Sidi and to the
woman Lala we lived that and it remained anchored in our mind1035
Thus slaves parents daily behaviors served to amplify the deepest and in many cases most
binding messages slave children picked up and processed in absorbing and responding to
their familial conditions.
Fasi slaves efforts to sufficiently juggle realityboth temporally and psychologically
to experience their own family lives revolved around work and the interstices of the demands of
their bondage to and negation by another family or families. A daughter of slaves had previously
reflected upon the multi-generational effects of slaves work patterns upon their children and
interpreted that her mother and aunt had a developed a complex because her grandmother used to
leave them to work as a khadim.1036 A son of slaves explained the bedrock constraints of his
relationship with his mother. They waited nearly fifteen minutes to eat after the family had
eaten, if there was a party he would only see his mother late in the night and could not go get her
in general,
she had to wait for them to go to sleep then we could sleep and then she has to wake
up early in the morning and even if I am hungry I cannot tell my mother because we had
no gas. So she was obliged to prepare coal and wood for the bathroom of the master and
she spent a long time preparing that and then she had to prepare breakfast for the whole
family and there were many1037

1035

Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 25, 2004).

Interview with Hada Sousi (Fes, March 13, 2004).
1037
Interview with Said (Fes, January 15, 2004).
1036

309

The constant demands of housework regimes profoundly warped how domestic slaves were able
to relate to and perceive their parents. One womans memories of asking her mother why she
looked depressed seemed to reflect her lifelong internal conversation concerning her image of
her mother rather than, or in addition to remembered conversations. She recalled her mothers
voice or what it might have told her, sure my daughter, a person who lived in suffering and
hardship, a person who never studied, or saw people, or received guests who stayed all the time
in the kitchen, and you are so young and you see your parent suffering in front of you1038
Another similar pensive and self-engaged tone was taken by a woman interpreting how her slave
mother explained their family history to her,
She did not know about my grandfatherWhat my mother was telling us, perhaps she
was telling herself, she didnt want to admit that for us Perhaps she was talking about
others Who could talk about that and even if they knew, they didnt speak; if they did
they would be in pain They were working just with their stomach thats all..1039
Another man had imprinted the, humiliating image of Tazi riding along and on a mule and my
father holding the shopping. What can I say? I can say nothing about that. It is too much. It
was a pity if one could see all of that directly This horrible behavior against slaves.1040 To
generations of daring and romantic contemporary European passing visitors to the medina, such
images of daily functioning were quaint; while to the Protectorate government and all those Fasis
for whom using domestic slaves was a normal and legal necessity this was utterly banal,
irrelevant and harmless. Yet in slave childrens penetrating perceptions of their parents and their
familys place in the world these images could be personally devastating. A son of a slave
explained, One day I saw him beating my mother, I couldnt forget that. Why was she beaten?

1038

Interview with Maghdouj (Fes, January 17, 2004).

Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 21, 2004).
1040
Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).
1039

310

Because she didnt prepare the bathroom for her master on time.1041 These displayed acts of
punishment had a doubly damaging effect on children, in altering their most basic images of their
parents, and further, by the forced apprehension and continual mental and emotional intimacy of
a logic and explanation of such violence based upon slave owners terms and interests. Slave
parents were not only beaten or physically controlled in front of their children because of their
immediate delays, (due perhaps to childcare or even in performing other housework), but more
fundamentally because of an intimate use of violence and the intent to instill self-policing fear
combined with an acceptance of the primacy of the owner and his family.
Along with producing deep psychological wounds, slaves familial experiences within
their childhood and adolescent socialization into the norms of domestic slavery opened
unexpected disjuctures in many informants lives. Perhaps due to their inherent intimacies
within families comprising a wealthy, ambitious, and powerful elite society, Fasi slaves children
were often exposed to complex and shifting presentations of acceptable reality. For example,
during very secular parties in some Fasi homes, slaves children could not avoid the presence of
a behind the scenes element of elite urban Moroccan lifestyle. As one woman shared,
I opened my eyes and found my father working in Dar Markara, he died and I remained
turning around their legs. They used to leave us alone in a room with bad blankets and
tamara (misery). We didnt sleep and they were drinking wine at zhaw slwan (nocturnal
parties), we had to keep staying at the door1042
For another woman, her adolescent exposure to her mothers participation in household parties
was further influenced by her own experimentation,
they used to drink wine and do everything. One day they called my mother, she set the
table and there was everything wine, cigarettes, and walnuts. Only women gathered
around. So I was sitting and looking at my mother drinking wine and smoking and I was
thirteen yrs old, so I started to smoke just secretly
1041
1042

Interview with Said (Fes, January 15, 2004).

Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 21, 2004).
311

(Asked if she then drank wine?)

We use to after going to the kitchen, just like they did.1043
In this way young slaves became more fully integrated into the wider range of informal functions
among which they would often be exploited, would seek to make sense of, and perhaps try to
subvert. Many dimensions of slavery in Fasi family life were less clear than slaves work roles
within formal presentations and rigid regimes maintaining socially presentable images, which
cannot tell us all or even all of the registers through which these children came to know.
Childrens personal development, self-consciousness and primary and secondary forms of
socialization were molded around the omnipresence of double standards of domestic slavery. It
is important to record that in this regard the recognized children of slaves could still be
stigmatized. As a Fasi elite woman commented, if they feared Allah he left him part of his
heritage to recognize him as his sons, but he was son of khadim.1044 One woman expressed her
unsettling feelings in being the recognized daughter of a slave,
honestly there was difference I dont know, he used to keep a difference between
them and my mother, me too I felt that difference. For example when I want to kiss his
hand he used to take it away rapidly. I felt those things when I started to grow up.
Q: When you were little did he use to kiss and embrace you?
A: No, as I told you he refused us to kiss his hand but things were different with the
others.1045
While the legal experiences of recognized mustowledas children were clearly varied, many
informants general impression of family and social attitudes toward the children of slaves was

1043

Interview with Kanata (Fes, March 16, 2004).

Interview with Hada Sousi (Fes, March 13, 2004).
1045
Interview with Lala Zineb (Fes, April 15, 2004).
1044

312

expressed well by one womens adage, the eye can never rise above the eyebrow, do you think
that the khadims son will be equals with the masters son? Never.1046
Slaves interactions and relationships with non-slave children within Fasi households
were regularly noted by interviewees as vivid points of personal reference and experience. One
middle aged woman had pinpointed a change in her youth,
when I was seven years old I started to feel inferior I used to feel low when their
parents offered them clothes not like ours. We werent living like them, everyone with
his own room, surely there was inferiorityWhen I played with them I was beaten, even
if innocent1047
A comparable childhood emotional experience was remembered by a daughter of a slave
who had married into a Fasi family,
a sadness existed. We were not like the owners of the house. As when you saw their
children wearing beautiful clothes and again nothing was given to you during feasts
(or) Ashoura you do not have anyone who you can visit
le gwal you receive the taarija and are obliged to show that you are happy
(of another non-slave household children) you should not hit her since you are not able to
hit her even if she hits you, and you are not able to answer back to her1048
And again a similar feeling was shared by yet another woman, I was very sad, I saw their
children living in very good conditions, and I was suffering, because I didnt get good food or
nice clothes, and I didnt have time to relax, and when I tried to speak they beat me or insulted
me.1049 The burden of this sadness and training in personal suffering and self-restraint was not
experienced by all slaves or their children. Some rare individuals, particularly female slaves
raised to have a demeanor involving their owners sexual interests, seem to have experienced
idyllic childhoods. As an old Fasi slave woman retold in satiated reminiscence,
1046

Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 21, 2004).

Ibid.
1048
Interview with Maghdouj (Fes, January 17, 2004). Le gwal you receive the taarija refer to
percussive instruments.
1049
Interview with Ma Mahjouba (Fes, January 20, 2004).
1047

313

they used to raise me and care about me, to give me clothes and food and water. They
didnt do anything to me until I grew up I was spoilt and cherished, even the day we
didnt used to see it We used to go to the hamam at night, he rented the hamam and we
went at night1050
These actual but highly uncommon experiences among a Fasi elites cohort of a fully unified
female we were sharply contrasted by household relations most slaves children encountered.
When asked if she dreamt to be like Lalas daughter when he was young, one woman replied,
Yes I dreamt that but the conditions I wanted to wear nice clothes and live a normal life
and I dont.1051 One man detailed his experiences and responses to these inter-family relations,
I considered the master as my second father to me Because I was born in his house and
I grew up with his children and when I needed something I just went and asked himI
asked for clothes, shoes. For example if I wanted a trousers I told him since we didnt
make money, we were living with them only with food, and he brought clothes for us
when he went and brought for their children. But he didnt buy the same quality, for
example- if his son wanted a double-breasted jacket he would buy him one for 50.000
frank, but if I asked he would buy me one for 1000 rial from the al khurda (flea market)
or he would give me the old one of his son
Q: That hurt you?
A: Yes of course. This is why my brothers and I escaped from there, because of
discrimination between families We were living with this family, it is not our real
family but it has a strong power over us, because even our father and mother are ruled by
the father of this family Lahlou1052
Thus along with learning of lessons in bearing the weight of childhood sorrows, there were other
impulses that could develop as well, such as produced these brothers escape.
As Fasi slaves children grew up and assimilated the world around them in their strained
capacities to formulate values and identities, their parents actions, understandings and
approaches to their own relationships within their conditions of enslavement became central to

1050

Interview with Mimouna El Mokri (Fes, April 4, 2004). See Le Tourneau (1949) for a
discussion of 1940 night rental prices of Fasi hamams.
1051
Interview with Lala Zohra (Fes, February 7, 2004).
1052
Interview with Nordine LHalou (Fes, January 9, 2004).
314

parent-child bonds. In addition to assimilating the symbolic meanings of how their parents were
treated such as was noted for example, when she cooked we used to go hide and then come and
eat their crumbs when they finished my parents used to collect their crumbs;1053 slave
childrens parents were put into inherently complex and painful situations in their efforts to have
more influence upon their children than the overall force of their circumstances. Revealing of
these relations, one daughter of a slave who raised her son in the household she grew up in told
of an occasion in which her son brought her a spoon,
I heated it in a fire and put it in his hand I told him, whenever you find something in
the street or the house, dont bring it to me. And they told me if he wasnt your son you
would be punished for what you did to his hand. I answered mind your business, I teach
my son how to behave correctly1054
While raising children and informing their values within domestic slaverys lived intimacies of
power entailed much more than training for a household order, the dependency in which slave
parents themselves lived often overwhelmed the best intended messages of their parenting
abilities. In fact one of the ways many Fasi slave parents sought to protect their children was by
teaching them satisfactory behaviors within their expected household and family roles. It is
likely that the gradual decline of the institution added a source of emotional misunderstandings
and tensions across generations, which in turn contributed to the decline through children and
young adults fleeing in rebellion. One informant interpreted that his mother did not want to tell
him any details of their lives that would prevent him from growing up normal.1055 Numerous
other children of slaves cited conversations, specific lessons and principals which their parents
instructed them. In one womans recounting, they raised us with respect, we couldnt be
impolite, for example if they asked us to bring them anything we should do it immediately, it
1053

Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 25, 2004).

Interview with Hachima (Roubel) (Fes, June 6, 2004).
1055
Interview with Said (Fes, January 15, 2004).
1054

315

was unclear whether politeness was intended for both her parents and their owners.1056 Another
womans similar narrative was clearer, she (her mother) used to tell us Dont talk to him
staring at his eyes, dont show your eyes to him, and your head should be bowed that is all.1057
This training to perform submission was equally applied to slave boys, one man recalled his
father teaching him to lower his head and Say Sidi and Lala to whatever they asked me to
do.1058 Another mans mother taught him to respect his masters as she does, for example I
was not allowed to enter the room in which my masters are sitting together and enjoying their
time.1059 Some slave parents were remembered as offering slaves children explanations or
forms of conscious recognition of their conditions. One woman distinctly remembered why she
did not fight with other children, I was very calm mother taught me Dont do something
bad and so as not to let them blame us, for example, you dislike that someone mistreats you and
we dislike that someone shouts at us or mistreats you in front of people.1060 Along with
reasoned and sophisticated approaches there were often reassurances of hope, as was offered to a
slaves daughter,
during feasts we ate and drank but we didnt get nice clothes or wonderful things like
thatwe felt valueless, but we had nothing special to do, they used to buy new clothes
for their children and give us the old ones my mother told me Look my daughter just
keep quiet and be patient, and I will buy it for you, and you are going to grow up and
know those real clothes, but now we are just working for people.1061
In being asked if he blamed his slave mother as a child for their lives, one man responded to the
question indirectly noting, my mother told me, You should live like me, because I came into
the world at the wrong moment and I found myself in this situation. My mother consoled me
1056

Interview with Hachouma (Fes, February 9, 2004).

Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 21, 2004).
1058
Interview with Sidi Mohamed of Moulay Abdellah (Fes, March 22, 2004).
1059
Interview with Mohammed Mufeed (Fes,February 15, 2004).
1060
Interview with Lala Zohra (Fes, February 7, 2004).
1061
Ibid.
1057

316

until my escape1062 In such cases childrens rejections of their parents advice was
accompanied by a further rejection of their patents lives and of slavery itself which also then
often painfully separated them from what families and blood relations they had.
Some informants explained how childrens relationships with slave parents often suffered
various complications and strains. One Fasi elite man had the impression that the son of abda
never succeeds, and if he does so strange, because a mother is like the first school they said
the son of abda can never succeed because he doesnt learn anything from his motherthe
children of slaves used to treat her as a slave, to shout at her, and order her. Her son abused
her.1063 Several children of slaves interpreted that their parents beat them because they
themselves were beaten.1064 One man recalled that his mother would insult him when angry, but
was clear that,
the Twaza they were worse, here slave come here, slave go, shut up. They insulted
us and we were listening, and we dont know what to do, because of the control. We
were colonized and controlled by them, and you dont have any power, even though you
heard them insulting. And I told you that in the day which I gathered my power I
escaped I was a young boy of sixteen or seventeen.1065
When asked about this father, the same man reveled that he had long been very introspective and
developed a deeply empathetic understanding of his relationship with his parents,
even he was colonized. He was a slave and he didnt have anywhere to go. He didnt
find any solution to leaveWhen I start to talk about that I feel unhappy and nervous. I
cant. I dont like to remember all that, once and for all, forever, that hardship, that bad
state, and your parents are suffering in front of you and you dont have enough power to
help them or yourself and living in such hardship. They saw their child suffering and in
that hardship without shoes at sixteen or seventeen years old With ragged trousers and
without shoes and it is raining and you see their children with beautiful new shoes and

1062

Interview with Said (Fes, January 15, 2004).

Interview with Fasel Shawi (Fes, June 2, 2004). This is an ironic contrast between this
informants romantic notions of those children raised by a Dada.
1064
Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 25, 2004).
1065
Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004). Refers to the Tazi family of Fes.
1063

317

clothes, and if you speak to them they tell you, shut up slave, go away son of a slave
and insulting, a real hardship.1066
Other important dimensions of these relationships included the relations between parents.
When a son of Fasi slaves was asked what would happen if there were problems between his
mother and father he explained,
the only problem was when my father asked my mother to do something for him and
she refused, then he hit her thats all She could not say that she hated him because then
she would be hit, women in that period had no rights1067
Also in larger slave owning households there were relationships with non-parent adult slaves, as
was noted for example of a slave wet nurse,1068 and a room of male slaves that boys began to
sleep with, no longer with my mother because I started to grow up.1069 Among such these
figures, a certain Dada Batoul in the Makhzan was noted to have tried to calm and rationalize
conditions for young girls. One woman recalled their conversation after she had been severely
beaten,
I didnt accept that. She told me, Even me I was suffering and beaten because I did not
want to obey the orders, but when you will be married everything will change. She used
to tell me about that and said that she suffered a lot when she was a child1070
Eventually she fled with the help of this Dada and went on to marry a Fasi musician whom she
met while dancing to entertain royal guests as she had been raised to perform.
As the children of slaves grew up being socialized daily into double standards, their
relative value within families became clearly contrasted with slave owners children. One man
explained that as a child he was prohibited from playing with the children of the master, recalling

1066

Ibid.
Interview with Mohammed Mufeed (Fes, January 6, 2004).
1068
Interview with Mekhalee (Fes, April 12, 2004).
1069
Interview with Said (Fes, January 15, 2004).
1070
Interview with Zahia (Fes, March 23, 2004).
1067

318

how the masters children were taught to ignore him.1071 He explained how the weight of his
suffering was directly formulated in relation with another standard of treatment unavoidable to
observe,
with their children they wouldnt do the same. Their children were always living in
harmony, whenever they needed something they took it, money, they got everything they
needed. I still remember that hardship, and how they were with their children. Me too, I
worked and did my best with them, and they never gave me a patterned or a trouser, or
told you take this. We got only the clothes which they would throw out I cannot
speak about that. I dont feel ok when I start to speak about the state in which we were
living. When you see that sons of the master are wearing new and beautiful clothes,
shoes, and going to festivals, parties, and always going out; you are always wearing
ragged clothes. They went to school every morning and their breakfast was excellent, but
we took only what was left
Q: Do you feel damaged?
A: That complex will never disappear, never. We really suffered, that will stay in my
mind forever, I will always think about that. How can I forget all that suffering?... I have
never seen something which would make me happy and fine, never.1072
Another man with a similar life history explained that he spoke with the daughter of the master
inside the house like she was his sister, but that by his early adolescence there was a fear of
punishment, specifically the fear of sterilization.1073 One woman interpreted the effect of these
experiences as follows, the children of slaves are calm, if they ask for something and they dont
want to give it to them, they wont ask for it another time. Because they know that they will be
hit, not like the children of the masters who get all they want.1074 Gradually slave childrens
knowledge of the inalterable limitations placed upon their recognition and value within the
owners family sank in so deeply that relationships with newborn free children were occasions of
anticipated dread. As was noted,

1071

Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).

Ibid.
1073
Interview with Said (Fes, January 15, 2004).
1074
Interview with Halima (Fes, February 10, 2004).
1072

319

so those living Fouk Fegig, the birthday of the boy was so special and when the boy
broke the cup they did achia (had an afternoon party) for him and when they used to
shave off the hair of the baby in the fortieth day they did achia for him with dwazatay
(tea and cakes), everything Watching with the mind of childhood you know, and we
became big and saw that in front of us, we regretted our life1075
While these experiences and feelings were known far more commonly than by Fasi slave
children alone, they were particular in that their intimate level of familial exposure to and
humiliation by double standards was a personalized expression of the social basis of values
within domestic slavery.
In addition to painful incidents of intimate discriminatory treatment, slaves children
were also exposed to intense acts of physical cruelty. It was repeatedly acknowledged that a
slaves child would be beaten if a non-slave child playing with them were hurt, as noted of
course this was to teach him to care about the son of the master next time.1076 For example, one
woman reported that when she was a girl she was fastened to a ladder and beaten after she
pushed the daughter of her owner.1077 Such childhood punishments occurred in many contexts.
One man remembered when he
accidently broke a tree branch as a boy that he was punched in the face and given a bloody nose,
called a son of a khadim and left tied to the tree.1078 These violent acts were frequently cited in
explaining what led them to flee from a household. One man recounted,
They burnt me because I refused to do their shopping for them, so they burnt me to
punish me and I disliked that because only my mother has the right to punish
me.During Ashour the son was given a car and a small toy or nothing was given to me,
and this is why I escaped For example, I was playing with the son of el Iraqi called
SiMohamed, and fell and he beat and beat me, even though we were the same age. And
for example, if he bought a djellaba for his son, he brought me kmiss (a shirt), and if he
1075

Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 25, 2004). Fouk Fegig is a town near
Algeria and the expression meaning living the good life.
1076
Interview with Ma Aziza Mokri (Fes, March 30, 2004).
1077
Interview with Maghdouj (Fes, January 17, 2004).
1078
Interview with LHasn (Fes, March 24, 2004).
320

bought balra (shoes) for his son, he bought me nothing. They used to go out and entertain
themselves on Friday and I stayed at home. His mother used to give him a banana or an
apple and I didnt get any, even if it was my mother who prepared that.
Q: How did you escape?
A: One day Iraqis son and I were playing together and running around a fountain and he
took a stick and beat me with it and I also beat him. So he took a poker and brunt me
with it on my back two times and he beat me on my foot and my mother god bless her,
went to him and asked me to forgive me since he was continuing to attack me throughout
the night; and it was only the son who was going to do that because, his father had died.
Their house had two doors, one of them lead to the principal house and the other to the
slaves house. Then my mother took and we went to our room and I told her, Listen
mother I will escape, so please tell me about someone of our relatives to whom I can go?
and she answered me You dont have anywhere to go, they need you only for their
benefit. I told her, But I was beaten by the son. And if his son Abdelrahman heard me
he would attack me or do something bad to me but he wouldnt let me escape I was
only seventeen or eighteen years old I took my clothes I put them in a basket and I left
my mother who was sleeping and I escaped and when I came back to ask about her I
found out that she died.
Q: How long were you gone for?
A: I was gone for 13 years.1079
Another man who had similarly escaped after long suffering violent abuse explained that,
when you are a small child you play. But they forbid you to speak, play or to go out,
you should stay there. They said, you are also a slave and you have to work for them
anyway. Whatever you did no food, no clothes, nothing. You stayed anyway, they
saw you as a slave(Once) I was holding a platter and I fell and it broke. Then the son
of Tazi beat me with a bowl on both sides of the face this was the reason for my
escape(Another time) I was holding a piece of wood when I was going out with his
father the son, the son of Tazi who hit me. I dont know. He shocked me and then
there was something that I dont remember. Until I felt a blow on my face this is why I
escaped until I was twenty seven years old1080
In such cases escaping after experiences of violence throughout childhood brought periods of
separationif not a final separationamong slave family members. The need to leave

1079
1080

Interview with Said (Fes, January 15, 2004).

Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).
321

tormenting conditions could then bring further pains of emotional isolation and loss to both slave
parents and their children.
Dada
Perhaps the greatest of differences in the perceptions of domestic slavery within Fasi households
concerns the Dada figure. When nostalgic memories of childhood intimacy and love for Dada
were probed, some informants began critical reassessments. Upon reflection, Dadas emotional
life, her mental and physical health, her relationships, even her funeral often revealed the
differences between her being like family and family. No informants wanted their own
daughters to live a life as Dada had lived. Fasi elite informants whose families had historically
been raised by Dadas, including they themselves, often idealized their Dada and the figure in
general. As one woman depicted the Dada within Fasi households,
in the past there was no childrens milk so she (Dada) used to feed kids and change
their clothes to wash them and give them food to eat In short, their mother was
always having a rest and if there was wedding party their mother was invited to, Dada
used to look after them, the master of the house went to the party and the khadim kept
looking after the kids and the house perfectly 1081
Another Fasi elite man characterized rich Fasi slave owning woman as seldom raising their own
children, but rather concentrating on her makeup, henna, her clothes but Dada was primary in
raising children, she was reserved to do everything for the baby.1082
Many agreed that the emotional bonds between a Dada and children were not continued with
non-slave domestic servants. This was apparently observed by Dadas themselves, as was
recounted along these lines,
when they left us we felt strange feelings The khadim who were with those rich
people they didnt used to feel as khadim. That Dada Massouda who was in the house, I
used to tell her, for their mother they didnt feel this, but for the khadim they used to
1081
1082

Interview with Fatima Beez (Fes, May 24, 2004).

Interview with Sidi Mohammed Benanni (Fes, April 19, 2004).
322

cry She was always saying, Just wait, your children wont even find khadim. Now
there are no khadim. Where?1083
Some children of slaves also had similar images of the exceptional qualities and relationships of
a specific Dadas, and Dada as a general and often ideal figure. One woman was firm that a
Dada, was holding the secrets of her Sidi and her Lala. Even beaten Dada Zady told you, I
dont see I dont know, Even if you beat her very hard she couldnt unveil secrets, never and
really she did see and know.1084
In many Fasi homes a transitional feature of the decline of slavery was a Dada figure
raising and thus training non-slave servants into a households order and expectations. A Fasi
elite woman noted on this point that, the khadim raised by Dada used to be clean and polite.1085
One old slave woman mentioned that she had raised more than ten matalma.1086 A very different
image emerged from those children of slaves observing this while they themselves were growing
up. As one woman detailed of a Dada,
she was tender with us and she used to look after use and to calm us She used to
steal things and to give them to us telling us, They wont give to us, so that is the way, to
take things by our hands She was like the mother of children giving them food,
making them sleep, cleaning them, combing their hair. She was their own mother.1087
The several contrasts in this description and perspective are remarkable. Here a Dada was
depicted as not only capable of stealing, or from another perspective, redistributing to household
children, but also of teaching the children of slaves and future servants an ethos of concealed
self-assertion that recognized the real and emotional facts of their lives and modeled a response
to their conditions. Clearly this is suggestive that the extreme trust which could be gradually

1083

Interview with Sanae and Kenza (Fes, June 8, 2004).

Interview with Fatima (Fes, January 15, 2004).
1085
Interview with Mekhalee (Fes, April 12, 2004).
1086
Interview with Mimouna LMokri (Fes, April 4, 2004).
1087
Interview with Rkiah Halou (Fes, April 18, 2004).
1084

323

invested in a Dada could allow her to negotiate her own interests and other slaves interests
among inherently opposed demands. Another son of slaves noted a very different relationship to
a Dada who, was always shouting, always angry and in a strange mood. And Dada of kssr (the
royal palace) shouted at girls and khadim because Sidna had given her the ability to supervise his
house.1088 An elite Fasi woman offered the following elucidation of her understanding of Dada
in discussing the differences between Dada and non-slave servants,
Dada is black. She puts always a scarf on her head. Ftah Zhar was fat, with big eyes.
Theyre black, but theyre good people.
Q: What is the Dadas work in the house?
A: To oversee the housework. To look after the kids. Shes like a mother for them.
Q: Can she be better at helping them than their own mother?
A: Yes, she can be more tender than the real mother.
Q: Who is the best to bring up the children Dada or the parents?
A: Dada, because shes always with the child from the time their born. Shes tender with
the child and she looks after them all the time.
Q: Is the role of the matalma the same as the role of Dada inside the house?
A: Theres big difference between them. Dada is always living with them but the khadim
is just for work.
Q: When did a child start to be in no need of Dada?
A: When he gets married, and even after that he can visit her from time to time.
Q: Can he stay with Dada even in the adolescence period?
A: Yes. Dada can even bring up their children.
Q: During adolescence children want to do certain things, so did Dada use to help them in
that?

1088

Interview with Mbark of Moulay Abdellah (Fes, February 6, 2004).

324

A: Yes. But not in bad things.

Q: And if he wants to smoke can she give him money to smoke? Can she hide that from
his parents?
A: She cannot help him in bad things.1089
Again there was the ideal that Dada could not be involved in anything compromising, though she
was simultaneously expected to be more directly or indirectly involved in the emotional and
personal matters of the children she raised while they were young, and perhaps throughout their
lives, than their biological parents. A near reverence for an older Dada figure was also reported.
As one elite Fasi recalled,
I used to go with my mother to a family, I found an old abda she was about ninety years
old. She was their Dada. Her presence was like a Baraka (blessing) in that house, they
used to treat her differently, not as khadim. She was Baraka in the house because of her
age and her devotion. They were known by their devotion, when they age, they become
so believing; they have baraka in their good prayer. So they used to take children to their
Dada to pray for them after the fajr (first prayer) and Allah bring the good that remained
their role in the end 1090
This image of Dada as a saintly slave, exceeding in devotion for her owners and for Allah lies at
the heart of what was an institutional denial of slave womens personal human emotional and
psychological needs.
One Fasi elite informant in particular revealed his ongoing personal introspection about
who his Dada was historically. He held many strong images of her which were compatible with
the dominant ideals of a Dada as an incarnation of care giving, she used to sing Dikr Allah as a
lullaby, and memories of taking him to run errands from the time he was a six years old, telling
him that he was to protect her and always calling him Sidi.1091 He noted of her relation with his

1089

Interview with Lala Zineb (Fes, April 15, 2004).

Interview with Sidi Mohammed Benanni (Fes, April 19, 2004).
1091
Interviews with Fasel Shawi (Fes, April 9, June 2, 2004). A religious chant, often sung to
children.
1090

325

father that she reported on all of the things which other slaves had done that he disliked, she
used to tell him flan did this, flana did that.1092 It was further lauded that,
Dada used to consider that children she raised were her own children, and the
foolishness of children always used to please her and she was veiling it. When they did
something bad she used to threaten them, Ill tell it to Lala, but didnt used to. She was
listening to the child as he began growing up as her own child She raised doctors and
engineers.1093
Yet as more about beloved Dada continued to be recalled and considered from his own critical
vantage point, memories and strong images of Dada had become notably more challenging and
unstable. Along these lines, it was observed that, she didnt expect anything at all. I dont
know why because honestly they gave everything and you found her searching to do all you
wanted again and again.1094 In fact many emotionally resonate and long overlooked features of
Dada emerged. When asked if she was abused verbally, she was noted to have been called a
bastard girl and the daughter of a khadim, but never plain khadim, and she in return was calling
growing boys Sidi.1095 Asked how he addressed her, he pensively recalled calling her Fatima
the first time, and if she didnt answer him many times he used to call her come bastard and
insult her.1096 She was noted to have been aware when boys stole and sold things in the house
for money, which in this case referred to the Fasi patriarchs sons and younger relations, and
which put her in a very compromising position. In returning to images and feelings of his
fondness for Dada, it was narrated and considered at length,
One day I fought for her. When I was young they sent her to tiskhr to a butcher. He was
impolite with her. I dont know what he told her. Tramp? She came and told us what
happened. So I asked her to go with me in order to show him to me. She went with me,
1092

Ibid. This informant asserted an interesting distinction, Khadim considered herself

differently, not as a member of the family, she was less than Dada.
1093
Ibid.
1094
Ibid.
1095
Ibid.
1096
Ibid.
326

showed him to me and I quarreled with him. I did beat him, and they took him to the
hospital to heal and took me to the police. Fortunately nothing happened. I told them
what happened and moreover the beaten man asked for my pardon. One day our cousin
went to the pilgrimage when he came back we kept asking him about tawaf they made on
the hadj. Instead of someone from the family, he told us that he made it for Dada Fatima
and my aunt Allah hamar. He made seven tawfat for Dada Fatima that was the
relationship between us and that madam
Q: It means that you loved her?
A: Yes and she used to love us too, the problem was that her love was bigger than
oursShe couldnt benefit from freedom because she didnt used to know anything
outside She used to just want to get married, she too used to
know her interest, and the marriage could be useful to her as I understood. In addition to
all that I saw her working, and she was more than fifty years old and doing something she
disliked. People used to order her and the poor used to feel that she became too old to do
such things One day my grandmother gave Dada Fatima chickens to rip open but Dada
Fatima didnt find anyone who could do that. She stayed outside for a long time and
returned with the chickens without heads and my grandmother thought that they were
ripped open. That means that she got nervous or was abnormal1097
In exploring how Dada Fatima found fulfillment in life there was a long pause, and the subject
again turned to pride in her childcare abilities,
Dada had a girl. Her mother was ill and that Dada had no salary. So they all used to trust
her, she used to tiskhr from people. The family saw her stealing to give to that girl and
let her. Sometimes that girl used to shout at her but her love for her let her bear
everything. That girl is not a doctor in Casablanca.1098
When asked how he had been influenced by Dada Fatima, there was a repeated emphasized
perception of how her love had served to lessen discrimination. He attempted to express his
perceived transcendence as follows,
the thing you learn from Dada was the feeling of a man who was called azi or
abd Because if you feel him you cant call him azi or abdEven if you say it you
wont tell him that in a way devoid of humanitySo you learn to feel things that others
cant feelThe life? What is the life? Life is feeling everything to feel a feeling that
others cant feel. To feel a man like you or better than you, that was the feeling to feel
that Dada and the Queen were the same or the opposite1099
1097

Ibid. Tawaf and tawafat refer to the rite of turning around the Kaaba during hadj.
Ibid.
1099
Ibid. Azi is a term for black.
1098

327

As conversations with this informant continued, it was evident he had clearly begun to
reconsider and more critically reconstruct a different understanding of Dada Fatima. When
asked about how she experienced family life, a more intensely searching form of personal
empathy was drawn upon in reflecting on the entire experience of domestic slavery, or at least
his relationship to Dada Fatima. For example in talking about experiences of the family holiday
of Eid it was noted,
How could she feel the poor woman? In fact you saw them feeling like animals.
Everybody was having fun and enjoying that Eid and they were serving those who were
enjoying. And when all was over she used to cry. I saw her with my own eyes many
times crying. She didnt used to feel and enjoy the Eid It means that day of Eid when
she had to have rest, contrarily she used to do a lot of work. Why didnt she get married?
I saw her many times crying. Surely she used to think of that. If she had children. If she
had a house. In winter she used to sit at the house door in the cold with the firepot
(majman) and keep crying and drying the tears. I dont know always why she liked the
fire so much.1100
Along these reflective lines, it was further recalled of Dada Fatima that when she was ill before
her death, they took her to the public hospital; unfortunately they didnt take her to the (private)
clinic.1101 When asked if Dada Fatima was still living what would he do, it was immediately
stated, I will take care of her, concerning food and walks. Ill have her see the world she didnt
used to see before.1102
Old Age and Funerals
Along with the issues surrounding sexuality and childcare, the relations of Fasi domestic slavery
were reflected in care for the aging as well as in slaves funerals. It was noted in cases that as
slavery declined and Fasi families more frequently dispersed, aged slaves remained with family

1100

Ibid.
Ibid.
1102
Ibid.
1101

328

members, staying as guests moving from one family to another for ten or fifteen days.1103
Some informants confirmed what was a minority experience of an omara with large
accommodations, and in one case a small allowance.1104 Sometimes a very small room was
given,1105 and bare and meager furnishings, of the crushed and ruined class.1106 While slaves
and former slaves typically contributed to household work activities throughout their lives, in
some cases it was noted of parents that had been expected to work until they could not longer
work and then died.1107
In several cases the funerals of slaves and former slaves were noted to have been given
special importance or to have been of the same importance as those for non-slave family
members. One Fasi elite stressed assertions of her familys kindness, noting that this was proven
by a Dada who had remained with them until her death, at which time Sidi assumed everything
for her funeral.1108 Other testimonies were more compelling as the burial of a Dada in a special
family cemetery,1109 or in the case of a daughter of a slave who was married and had eight
children with her elite Fasi husband, it was noted that the husband buried her mother next to his
own.1110 It was noted that non-slave family members had been very emotionally moved at a
slave grandmothers well attended funeral.1111 An unrecognized daughter of a slave who was

1103

Ibid.
One informant explained that a deceased owner had given his slaves everything we need
until death the contracts therewith the Makhzan, until the day (we) die at that time it will
return to the habous of Al-Karaouine. Interview with Om Kalthoum (Fes, April 29, 2004).
Another inheritance was described as entailing, marble floors, with zelij, table, radio the
house was good. Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 21, 2004).
1105
Interview with Lala Zohra (Fes, February 7, 2004).
1106
Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 21, 2004).
1107
Interview with Abdelmalek (Fes, January 18, 2004).
1108
Interview with Khadija Sbai (Fes, June 3, 2004).
1109
Interview with Fasel Shawi (Fes, April 9, 2004).
1110
Interview with Maghdouj (Fes, January 17, 2004).
1111
Interview with Hada Sousi (Fes, March 13, 2004).
1104

329

critical of the differences between slave and non-slave funerals found comparisons in her
experiences of their respective funerals,
in the old days funerals for strangers meant taking them to the henna suq (an area of
the medina) and mosque For Sidi all the medina stood attention with by brih (a crier)
and zarzaya (porter) they were crying that so and so had died. I still remember his
funeral he was kind and did merit that, saadatou (how lucky) They made a funeral for
Dada Zadya. A big funeral. All were sad for her death, they did cry for her They
brought moussamina (hired recitor) and fikh. They used to love her a lot so (she was
buried) as an important person because she brought up their children. They loved her a
lot, even now; their son loves me he asks about me. I ask about them 1112
In some other cases, various features of Fasi funerals were noted, such as a three day ceremony
with sadak and talba.1113 As was noted in one such case, my mothers funeral was simple
and normal, they buried her they had some Quran read and prepared couscous.1114 For nearly
all those slave parents who worked until they became ill and died in their owners houses, it can
be inferred that their funerals were generally perfunctory.1115
Several informants emphasized what they experienced and perceived as clear and
humiliating differences revealed in the funerals for Fasi slaves. One womans testimony
contextualized slaves funerals with how their health was treated,
he died as a dog, no value. Nothing. But if someone of them died
a wedding not a funeral, and if a khadim died, as a dog simply Allah yaoun, they brought
talba to read Quran on his soul and took him to bury him that is all At night they were asleep
1112

Interview with Fatima (Fes, February 8, 2004).

Interview with Ma Aziza Mokri (Fes, March 31, 2004). Others described: a general and
vague point of view was offered, when someone (a slave) died they were very sad sorry and
cried for him and sent him to a grave and organized a funeral ceremony for him because he is a
human being like them so they accomplished their duties toward him and washed his body and
the sent him to the grave. Interview with Mekhlee (Fes, February 7, 2004); as well as, at the
funeral they used to cry that altyam (3rd day after the funeral) then everyone went home.
Interview with Hachuma (Fes, February 9, 2004), and similar testimony in another case,
Interview with Naima (Fes, February 10, 2004); while another detailed a Dar Makhzan funeral
for a Dada being, like ahl Fes with larda and ykhrjouha (midday burial), lacha talba fkiha (an
evening meal of the men reciting Koran), Interview with Lala Zohra (Fes, April 12, 2004).
1114
Interview with Mohammed Mufeed (Fes, January 6, 2004).
1115
Interview with Said (Fes, January 15, 2004).
1113

330

and they used to get them up and tell them, Get up we have guests and prepare the food. That
influenced their health and inadequate clothing and the hard work1116
Others shared their comparable impressions. As one man who was the son of slaves observed,
there was not a sense of funerals for slaves being like family She died no problem.
Allah yaoun, Wlads Sidi Aisa. Come and help her out of the door and bury her as if
she had never existed or had moved out of that house They may never remember that
she was working and suffering for them. No to remember her and make her a funeral
ceremony, that can never happen1117
A man of a similarly background explained his experiences, funerals for slaves were not cared
about. They did not make sadaka and talba.1118 He further noted that owners brought fiqha to
wash him, to take him to the mosque to pray for his soul, and to take him to the cemeterytheir
enjoyments continued.1119 Others experiences and memories were less bitter and more matter
of fact. Several such informants noted an attitude of intent to return to normal working patterns.
One woman noted for example of her slave grandparents funeral,
they made saksou (couscous) and on the third day of sadness and talba they buried
them Only slaves cried Their masters behavior toward them was normal, they said
that Everybody is going to die; there is no need to stop working. They gave then a
day off then told them to go back to work, It is no use crying for a dead person.1120
Another woman explained that funerals for the slaves and the poor were not like for the rich,
when asked what the difference was, she stated, People. Sidi died, they all come. Khadim died,
no one came.1121
Meaningful Familial Relationships Beyond Slavery

1116

Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 21, 2004).

Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004). Allah yaoun is an expression meaning
may Allah help you, but is used here convey indifference and apathy. Wlad Sidi Aisa here
represents decedents from the region Sidi Aissa who worked as zrzaya (porters) for Fasi
families.
1118
Sadaka literally means alms. Talba are hired to recite the Koran.
1119
Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 25, 2004).
1120
Interview with Halima (Fes, February 8, 2004).
1121
Interview with Fatima Beez (Fes, May 24, 2004).
1117

331

The lived personal relations and family experiences within domestic slavery were frequently
noted to have shaped lives and relationships beyond the clear hold of the institution. As slaves
and their children who had lived and worked together faced the reorganization and moving of
Fasi elite families, familiar relationships were altered. As was noted of one such experience,
my mother went to Casablanca and I went with her. We got separated because those people
who brought us together have died. Why should we stay in that house, it became empty.1122
Other testimonies showed a general pattern in which slaves and their descendants futures were
effected far more by personal than property bonds in the relocations which took place as large
Fasi households were reorganized by younger generations.1123 Often a Dada figure would
accompany those she had raised, and typically the personally closest and most materially
dependent relationships within slavery continued through the maintenance of patron-client
relationships and varied forms and degrees of assistance.
In a variously repeated scenario slaves and their descendants outlived Fasi patriarchs who
had purchased or legally owned slaves, and were proceeded by younger heirs for whom
maintaining domestic slavery was not a perceived social or familial necessity. These changes
reshaped slaves and their childrens inheritance in varied and unexpected ways. One
interviewees family experiences help illustrate these changes. It was explained that her former
slave mother had not sought their own part of an inheritance for herself, but rather for her legally
recognized daughter,
I have the pictures and my brothers got the papers. My brothers overpowered the
inheritance and they gave me just a small part.
Q: They gave you a small part because youre only the daughter of a khadim?

1122
1123

Interview with Kanata (Fes, March 16, 2004).

Interview with Khadija Sbai (Fes, June 5, 2004).
332

A: Yes.
Q: But its unfair?
A: What can I do? They have money in the bank, theyre rich. Im living with the money
they gave me, anyway thanks to Allah.
Q: How much inheritance did you get? Could you buy a house?
A: I couldnt buy a house because I got just a little part, about 4 millions. I was pregnant
and I got sick, my mother stayed with me and we spent what we had.1124
It further became clear that the relationship between the former slave mother and her former
owner had shaped the outcome of the inheritance,
even if I had a father, my mother was taking care of me concerning all. He couldnt
leave his rich wife to follow the poor one. He loved my mother when he wanted to enjoy
his time. My mother used to work for people, to cook or to wash clothes. I grew up and I
got married with my mothers cousin, from Sahara. He too had another wife. First I got
married with man from Sous, he died I had a boy with him, hes 28 years old now. I got
married again and I had a girl, shes 13 years old.
Q: How and why did your mother wind up living in a rented house?
A: As I said before, he stopped visiting us progressively.
Q: Was that due to his first wife?
A: He gave us alms and some money when we used to visit him but he stopped coming to
see us a long time ago.
Q: How much money did he use to give to your mother?
A: In the past, one dirham was sufficient to get the coal and the flour. One dirham was
sufficient to get the shopping of one day.1125
In complete contrast to the perspective of former owners children having providing for a room
with blankets and pillows and everything,1126 was understood by former slaves and their
descendents as quite far from having everything. In one reported case three families of slaves
1124

Interview with Lala Zineb (Fes, April 15, 2004).

Ibid.
1126
Interview with Khadija Sbai (Fes, June 3, 2004).
1125

333

and their descendents were allowed to continue living in the room they had inhabited, while the
family moved and the entire house had been vacated and placed under their supervision.1127
Such arrangements were designed to strongly encourage slaves and their children to fend for
themselves. However, along with this theme there were also cases which showing interests in
maintaining dependencies through having the children of slaves continue to be available to serve
for family events and periods of visitation to relive the traditions of an old Fasi family house.
Another way in which personal and familial experiences shaped the lives of former slaves
and their children was evident in the repeated incidence of having never registered for national
identity cards.1128 In addition to several cases where no reasons were offered, 1129 many cases
were tied with personal and psychological issues. One man recounted how he will not marry
because of a great weight he carries because he has no papers. When asked why he cannot
pursue papers, he cited his awkward relationship with the sons of parents owner, there being no
record of his mother or of her marriage, and his intimation before police and government
employees, particularly judges. He mentioned having visited the family and having interpreted a
deep cynicism in being told, the house is yours, you can come whenever you would like to.1130
He continues to fuse his identity and freedom with his recognition by the Fasi family which

1127

Interview with Maghdouj (Fes, January 17, 2004).

Reflecting on the process in itself, see Andrew R. Smith, Sedq in Morocco: On
Communicability, Patronage, and Partial Truth, Cultural Critique (No. 51. Spring, 2002), pp.
101-142. As one Moroccan woman put it: "They think they are doing you a favor even when
you are asking for a birth certificate or any official paper every citizen is entitled to obtain; it is
the administrator's duty to provide the citizen with such a service, in theory at least, but even the
gatekeeper or the lowest employee on the scale behaves in such a way as to make citizens, the
'normal' folk, feel that he has some power over them." p. 118. This phenomenon was even more
intimidating for many informants.
1129
Many informants noted not having official papers. Interview with Mimouna LMokri (Fes,
April 4, 2004), Interview with Yousef (Fes, March 24, 2004), Interview with Nordine LHalou
(Fes, January 9, 2004).
1130
Interview with Said (Fes, January 15, 2004).
1128

334

enslaved his family, as evidenced by the perspective in the statement, as they didnt do anything
positive for me I am still a slave.1131 Another man who continues to experience similar
struggles explained,
how could I get them? My mother did not have even the most basicneither a birth
certificate not identity card in that period. She had nothing When I go back and tell
them they dont know me. I try my best to convince them by crying and telling them
about my suffering, since even me I would like to have my official papers and get
married and have children.1132
When asked further about the issue, he mentioned not having studied and revealed his profound
fears, emotionally referring back in time to why he had never sought an official state recognition
of his identity, there was no one who could answer you not like nowadays. One woman
without papers herself who had not registered her daughter then twenty year old daughter
responded to with pain when asked if her daughter will marry,
who will (she) marry? Its too late. She is khadim of those people and they brought
her up. It is too hard and too far to struggle for your papers. You can ask no one for the
vaccine papers. The hospital you were born inthe woman who attended for me
died1133
While such numerous cases were not the majority, they reflect upon widely experienced fears
and negations of self and family among former Fasi slaves and their children.
In addition to slaves and their children who had remained without official identification,
most successfully had, and some recounted their related experiences.
In a two cases informants had pursued recognition of claimed shorfa status for themselves and
their children; one had apparently remained unsuccessful, while the other had produced a very
complex situation. A woman who had grown up as the informally adopted daughter of a slave
had been legally married and had children who were fully legally recognized as the children of a
1131

Ibid.
Interview with Abdelmalik (Fes, January 18, 2004).
1133
Interview with Kanata (Fes, March 16, 2004).
1132

335

wealthy Fasi shorfa. In the womans experiences after her husbands death she and her family
had clearly not been treated as his other family members and heirs. Apparently at some point in
her pursuit of the contacts she had known through her ties to Makhzan she had spoken to the
King Hassan II who had written on a small piece of paper for her which she later had laminated.
She believed that the small piece of paper, which she held dearly to in her wallet next to her
national identity card, would add to her case in her ongoing pursuit of her inheritance, and
particularly her children and grandchildrens access to the social channels which her husband
had commanded. In repeatedly pursuing access to family inheritance documentation over a
period of over six months with this woman, it became very clear that in reality any authority (i.e.
a Muzwar) who she reached the stage of showing her small piece of paper to, avoided
respectfully addressing or assisting her. In reflecting with her about what freedom meant for her,
it had become associated with the full recognition of her family,
when I was born I knew that I would never leave that place. I was young and went to
play in the center of the house. I wore modern clothes. When I became an adult I started
to go out with djellaba. It was forbidden to go out, enough playing in the childhood;
moreover I didnt know where to go. I thought to myself this is a strange destiny look
how you used to be and how you have become. Who could believe that I would live in
lmssira People (referring to her husbands family) lived in palaces, houses with
marble. But who can believe I took my sister in law with me to lkssr (the palace)
Malaki, she told them How my brothers wife can be living this way with patience, the
toilette of kssr is better than where she lives now1134
Others recounted various forms of struggle entailed in getting their legal documentation and a
national identity card. In one family the parents felt that photos were haram,1135 in several
instances it was noted that ages were approximated which could legally alter the biological order

1134
1135

Interview with Ma Aziza LMokri (Fes, March 31, 2004).

Interview with Rkiah Halou (Fes, March 22, 2004).
336

of siblings,1136 for another woman twelve witnesses had to be gathered and a new name and
surname was used.1137 In fact names were a persistent area reflecting personal and family
changes. Both first names and family names were often changed by former slaves and their
descendents because of their strong preferences and their intention to create a different social
representation for themselves. Popular slave names such as Mbark and Mbarka have were often
changed and became unpopular childrens names. For example, one daughter of slaves created
her own surname of Ben Mhamed.1138 In one case of a naming concerning the recognition of a
daughter from a former slave it was explained,
Q: Did your father put your name in his civil state? (to recognize her as his daughter)
A: My mother was asking him that incessantly when she wanted to put me in the school,
and finally he did.
Q: Did he give you the same surname he had? I mean Zineb, the daughter of Berrada
Mnawar?
A: Yes, the same surname. They called my stepsister Zineb and my aunt asked my father
to call me Zineb too, but in order to keep a difference between us they called her Zineb
Jamal and me Zineb Mnawar. My name is Zineb Berrada Mnawar; the other is Zineb
Berrada Jamal.1139
It can also be noted while the forms of respectful addressed Sidi and Lala continue in their
manifold contexts, Dada remains strongly tied to far more singular association with slavery and
has greatly declined in usage.
Another frequent area in which informants reflected upon deliberate changes which they
had made in response or in relation to experience of slavery concerned their intended approaches
1136

Interview with Naima (Fes, February 10, 2004). She explains, in my birth certificate it said
that Im fifty years old and my brother was born before I was forty two, because when the birth
certificate was produced they werent concerned with knowing too much about the real age of
children.
1137
Interview with Fatima (Fes, February 8, 2004).
1138
Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 21, 2004).
1139
Interview with Lala Zineb (Fes, April 15, 2004).
337

in raising their own children. One couple who were each the children of slaves explained
together,
we used to ask our parents to leave that place. Enough of that life. Enough of that
tiredness. Enough of that suffering. Enough of that discrimination. We used to ask our
parents to go home and live far from that life. We used to ask them a lot of things, but
our children didnt live like that Shouting. Not like how were treating our children.
Though we lived that and we endured it, we never try to treat them that way; we treat
them with tenderness and kindness because were not like our children.1140
Interestingly, in contrast to their deliberate efforts to tell their children directly what they did not
what them to undergo, their own parents had not told them about their family past and had
attempted to mute discussion of their conditions. As was explained by the husband,
as I told you my father refused to tell us about the past or about what was happening.
He used to hide that in his heart and to fall silent. Like us, he didnt have wings to fly.
He couldnt tell us about everything or have us study. Because he had no means, because
he was just an abid with scared cheeks.1141
At least one informant held the view that no one can deny their origin and roots, even if you are
the daughter of abda you have to feel proud of your mother.1142 Yet far more often parents and
women in particular had attempted to make a complete break for their children by sheltering
them and not informing them of anything about their lives and their grandparents lives related
with slavery. For example, a woman who noted that my children do not know about our
origins, was asked what she did if her children were insulted because of their family history, she
responded, I do not explain it to them.1143 When another mother was asked whether her
daughter understood or had experienced the inferiority and scorn which she (a daughter of
slaves) or her mother had it was stated that,

1140

Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 25, 2004).

Ibid.
1142
Interview with Kanata (Fes, April 13, 2004).
1143
Interview with Hada Sousi (Fes, March 14, 2004).
1141

338

she doesnt feel that. I dont tell her those stories at all. She is young and must not
take those burdens of our misery. I took it before her. I dont have to fill her mind with
problems. It means I have to have patience with her.1144
In a similar case, a woman who will not tell anything of her past to her children for expressly
noted personal reasons, mentioned that her husband, who had no known family connection with
slavery, did not want her to continue her relationship to her old family. She similarly noted that
her daughter imposes her will upon her and wears what she wants.1145
Within many family histories it was difficult for informants to clearly determine who was
the first member, or generation to know beyond any doubt that they were free.
Clearly experiences of domestic slavery intimately tied family life with a sense of belonging and
were frequently understood as inseparable from meaningful freedom. There were important
personal ways in which this was experienced beyond slavery, including a blur in which some
informants were conscious of having continued their relationships within slavery far beyond
slave owners and the experience in their family. One woman noted her lifelong habit even in
the street when someone touches me I call him my son and Sidi they ask me did you learn
Lala and Sidi at school?, I call everyone Sidi and Lala.1146 It was noted by one man that he still
experienced feelings of being seen as a slave, yes we feel that from peoples glance, if he
considers you free or just as abid, suggesting paradoxically that, slavery became extinct step
by step, but slavery never became extinct, those who were abid remained abid.1147
For many others slavery and freedom were personally defined and pursued in direct
relation to family. One woman sought her freedom through deliberately striving to not become
like her mother,
1144

Interview with Hachouma (Fes, February 9, 2004).

Interview with Fatima (Fes, February 8, 2004).
1146
Interview with Ma Aziza Mokri (Fes, March 31, 2004).
1147
Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 27, 2004).
1145

339

first it was the conditions. No money. (My) mother was abda so she couldnt give
anything. Not even tenderness. Nothing. She was caught in housework and tiredness.
You see what daughters of Sidi are wearing and you nothing. I escaped not to become
like my mother Abda. If I stayed in that house I would be like my mother I wouldnt
have children. I wouldnt have a life. I wouldnt be independent myself I would
remain khadim I found good people everywhere I went. I returned thanks to the Quran
he used to read in front of me. I returned back praise be to Allah.1148
After a period of self-employment in the informal economy and as a prostitute in Marrakesh, she
developed a family life for herself. She began veiling and moved to Fes along with her husband,
were she is raising their two young children. Another dominant related theme was modeling
freedom after becoming like a former master and emulating their family life,
for me freedom was to live like the master. To eat like them. To have a boyfriend, go
to the caf, cinema, swimming pool, beach etc
Q: Did you feel free when you got pregnant with the man you loved?
A: I wanted to live my freedom, but the problem happened when the man who I loved
left me. I stopped thinking about freedom, because I became pregnant and had a baby
without being married, and if they gave me my freedom I wouldnt take it in that
period.1149
In this case the enchantment of love relations and the transformations projected upon physical
intimacy created a sharp halting turn in her dreams to become like her Lala. Another womans
far less impetuous experiences showed how her emulation had been very selective. Asked if she
dreamt of becoming like Lala or her daughter,
Yes I dreamt that, but the conditions I wanted to wear nice clothes and live a normal
lifeand I dont mean by this to be rich and give orders to the others and to be arrogant,
but to live ones life as free as possible and to benefit from education We were patient
and the patient win. We had nothing special to do in the street We lived with those
people during a special period of our lives and now we are living in a rented house and its
better, thank Allah.1150

1148

Interview with Fatima (Fes, February 8, 2004).

Interview with Halima (Fes, February 10, 2004).
1150
Interview with Lala Zohra (Fes, February 7, 2004).
1149

340

Another woman explained some of the subtle qualities of maneuvering and selectively exhibiting
symbols of what was previously restricted. She said,
freedom is a precious thing. We took our rest. We too started to cook our own food
with our hands To wear what we want, but if you were working as khadim for a
woman you couldnt wear something beautiful. Because you should always wear
something less than her and to remain poorly dressed (mbahdla) in front of her1151
Thus being capable of using and controlling the symbols that Lala monopolized controlled over
became an important and complex feature in how a non-free selves would be constructed and
presented while working as opposed to during personal and family live.
For many men and women marriage and family in themselves represented freedom. One
informant explained how his mother, still did not believe that their marriage was real because
she had a complex after the masters were involved and she wanted to repeat it even after her
children were grown up.1152 One woman noted,
I used to understand freedom as leaving that place. To stop living with them. To
marry with my freedom to have children with my freedom. I didnt want to have my
children in the house of the masters, not to be their abid them too, like me. That was my
wish I used to like living my life free, not to sleep with time and get up with time, not
to go outside with time. I wanted to have my own time always, free time for me and not
for the masters... For me when I got married and had my children I started to feel free.1153
Another woman similarly testified that freedom for her had been to bring up my children, to go
here, and to go outside with my husband, and to do whatever I wanted.1154 These definitions
were ironic given the historically defining realities, that for the Fasi elite, experiences of birth,
childhood and marriage were literally surrounded by slaves.

1151

Interview with Mimouna and Fatima (Fes, March 21, 2004).

Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 27, 2004).
1153
Interview with Azouz and Karima (Fes, March 25, 2004).
1154
Interview with Hada Sousi (Fes, March 13, 2004).
1152

341

As one Fasi elite woman summarized, when I was born I found khadim in my house and when I
married I found khadim in my husbands house.1155 Clearly freeing people in itself was
understood as incomplete, and was frequently viewed as being less important than having forms
of familial recognition and belonging through which care could be exchanged and non-slave
identities fully asserted. Emblematic of these complex terms seeking to legitimize and further
the personal bonds of free family lives, one man expressed freedom as to run away to be free
to go wherever I want and to work for my parents.1156
Conclusion
This chapter has examined several interconnected contexts and forces revealing slow, ambiguous
social changes and continuities integral to the end of slavery within Fasi family life. In the first
section of discussion attention was given to sites of generational change influential to elite Fasi
families slave ownership. Educational changes, the meaning making and socialization
surrounding the increasing modernization of material culture, and new forms of media and
community interactions were accompanied by re-evaluations of household and family values and
altered expectations. A consequential example can be seen in the decline of concubinage amid
changes in marriage patterns which broadly turned from a polynuclear organization to a greater
emphasis upon singular relationships.
The second section of this chapter delved into legal evidence of gradual and often
complicated social changes related to Fasi slaves. Quantitative and extensive qualitative
examination of this data confirmed and detailed the elongated and ambiguous end of domestic
slavery through transformations on familial and household levels. One such area concerned the
recognition of former slave wives, concubines and their children.
1155
1156

Interview with Sanae and Kenza (Fes, June 8, 2004).

Interview with Sidi Mohamed of Moulay Abdellah (Fes, March 22, 2004).
342

Complex human relations and personal bonds were represented in examples such as concubines
and former slaves wills to various parties, including the children of former owners and former
slaves. Such actions mark a contrast to the rarity of formal housing allocations consistently
accompanied with strict conditions. While providing evidence of slaves and former slaves
widespread legal and social vulnerabilities, this discussion also documented general changes in
official legal practices related to Fasi slaves.
The third section of this chapter further revealed the irregular historical strata and
staggered pace of these social transformations through examining numerous interviews depicting
common themes among dramatically diverse lived paths. Testimonies framed across the life
cycle attest to experiences and transformations concerning contention within forms of
recognition, familial and personal identifications, and power and sexual relationships within and
beyond the institution. This final section brings greater emphasis and human detail to features
which are shared across the chapter. Notions and practices of elites concerning concubinage,
blackness, and the Dada figure were seen from the range of perspectives of those who
experienced and continued to live with the direct heritage of these constructs, particularly the
descendents of domestic slaves who grew up in slaveowning households with their parents.
Another conclusion supported by the discussion was that though there was no radical moment of
a legal break during the Protectorate or even with political Independence, the overall pace of
relevant social and familial changes following Independence was accelerated through
reconfigurations of the social values and practices within which domestic slavery had been
maintained.

343

CHAPTER FIVE
Conclusions
The prior three extended discussions comprising this dissertation have probed several
overlapping themes and core questions in an examination of how domestic slavery ended in Fes.
A basic orientating question investigated here concerned how the Protectorate was influential to
the end of domestic slavery. In Chapter Two a close examination of Protectorate policies,
practices and attitudes accompanied a survey of Fasi slave owners legal practices of
emancipation, revealing the influence of the Protectorate and primary limitations of these sources
in the reconstruction of this history. The entire duration and fullest capacities of the Protectorate
had an overall limited and indirect influence upon the end of domestic slavery throughout
Morocco. Official French efforts to end the public slave trade, including their legal declarations,
failed to produce either absolute results concerning suppression of the trade or unambiguous
consequences concerning the social institution. Although the Protectorate did not instill clear,
decisive and recognizable emancipatory factors commonly registered within the experiences of
Fasi slaves and their descendents, careful examination of this historical apparatus proved
conceptually pivotal, clarifying the need to frame the study of this transformation beyond routine
legal-centered expectations. Rather, detailed attention was given to how Protectorate era forces
and interventions were features of larger economic and social currents within which elite slave
owning Moroccan households and families were gradually reorganized. Both of the opening
sections of Chapters Three and Four pursued these multifaceted currents of change.
In the first section of Chapter Three broad socio-economic forces and patterns were
analyzed in an effort to trace the contours of shifts relevant for Fasi households. Several
widespread influential socio-economic contexts of change were considered among distinct

344

slaveowning household orders, particularly from the nineteen thirties onward. As discussed,
interrelated economic shifts and migrations influenced the reorganizations of Fasi household
labor. While many conservative Fasi elite families were gradually leaving the medina for the
Ville or the Atlantic coast, wage earning migrant families were entering the medina and
responding to and altering the norms of domestic labor in their efforts to satisfy their basic needs.
A gendered change in norms entailed increasing numbers of poor, often rural-born, non-slave
women who participated in wage earning within Fasi homes. Many slaves and their children
were influenced by these conjoined patterns which continued to evolve throughout the
Protectorate era, only to expand in scale and accelerate in pace following independence.
In the first section of Chapter Four emphasis was laid upon sources of social
transformation and relevant contexts within which slave owning Fasi families and individual
lives were reconfigured. Influential sources of gendered generational changes such as shifts
within education; the modernizations of the marketplace, household and personal material
culture; in addition to new channels of media, were inseparable from community-wide alteration
of basic expectations and values concerning owning and using slaves within families. Family
and personal life were closely bound with changes such as the decline of concubinage, which
also continued throughout the Protectorate era, expanding and accelerating in the postindependence period.
In addition to these discussions based on a combination of Protectorate archival
documentation and varied secondary literature, foundational legal evidence was assembled and
interpreted in sections of Chapters Two and Four. In similar ways to the interpretative
challenges of colonial sources, Fasi legal documents required a critical qualitative and
quantitative engagement intent and capable of addressing patterns of legal practices within

345

ambiguous forms of social change. Rather than seeking out a parallel of the contrived definite
historical moment offered by the impracticable Protectorate circular 17 within Moroccan sharia,
these discussions have offered a more useful and accurate depiction of how Fasi legal
documentation reflected relevant lived social changes. These forms of analysis necessarily
advance the case that in this historical context an official legal mandate against slavery did not
serve as a decisive or direct instrument in the demise of this social institution.
In the second section of Chapter Two inherently low-bound figures representing Fasi
legal practices related to slavery were used to establish a distinct outline of the institutions
decline. Though this data demonstrated features which overlapped with the Protectorate, it also
definitively detailed that the decline continued after Independence. On the subject of liberations,
it was definitively shown that domestic slavery did not end either as the consequence of official
laws (French or Moroccan), nor through Fasi masters officially and legally liberating their
slaves.
The second section of Chapter Four offered a thorough examination of the intricate and
continuing ways in which Fasi family lives underwent changes directly related to slavery. As
was discussed concerning the dynamics of marriage, concubinage and the recognition of
children, the total references to mustowleda were over nine times more frequent than the total
references to either immediate liberations or those upon a slave owners death. Another major
feature examined here concerned the overall decline of formal legal references to concubines and
the eventual relative rise of legal references to wives who were former slaves. It was also seen
that the total references to the children of former slave wives were much higher (85%) than those
of the children of concubines (46.5%), which reinforces the evidence of oral testimonies
emphasizing that lived experiences differed from the ideal of an automatic recognition of female

346

slaves children fathered by their owners. Property rights and inheritance were another area in
which the social vulnerabilities and complex experiences of slaves, former slaves and their
descendents were shown within legal practices. Likely a combination of convention and internal
family politics severely limited the formal recognition of omaras granting housing rights for
slaves and former slaves. Among the relatively rare instances of this formal practice, many of
these cases (71%) entailed directly stated legal conditions which limited the mobility and
security of slave and former slave women, generally extending forms of lifelong social control.
This section also inspected how legal sources mirrored social attitudes and practices related to
color and slavery, which were compatible with dominant attitudes of the Protectorate as
examined in the third section of Chapter Two.
In addition to these themes and discussions based upon French and Moroccan archival
materials, a core feature of this study has been the extended collection and examination of oral
histories reflecting lived experiences and perceptions within Fasi domestic slavery. This body of
evidence brought a requisite human linkage among and across the core questions of this study.
The ambiguities and ambivalences of this transformation were lived and understood in ways
which careful interpretation of formal sources can broadly chart, but for which voices and
personal interrogations reflecting informal channels render palpable.
In the second section of Chapter Three interviews were used to reconstruct and discuss in
detail the working relations of domestic slavery within Fasi household organization.
Testimonies concerning working conditions and experiences registered various modes of control
including generalized physical and emotional abuse. Common themes of exhaustion,
humiliation and fear were shown to have weighed profoundly upon the mental and physical
health of slaves and their children. Variations within work organization brought varied

347

experiences and opportunities. For example, tasks such as errands (tiskhr) and skilled household
occupations such as cooking were of frequent significance beyond slavery. Another key feature
of this discussion was the documentation and analysis of slaves responses in this context. Along
with actions of resistance and the pursuit of self-interests were more subtle efforts toward the
meaningful construction and transmission of values and senses of belonging. Among the most
important of these responses were efforts to build meaningful senses of freedom within working
lives beyond slavery amid the socio-economic changes and continuities within which slavery
declined and transformed.
Section three of Chapter Four takes the studys documentation and analysis into more
intimate familial and personal domains framed around the life cycle within slave owning Fasi
households. Here detailed testimonies reflected complex experiences and perceptions of family
life, identity and belonging within and beyond the institution. Multiple interconnected themes
related to lived patterns of boundaries within familial and personal recognition were examined.
For example, as noted in prior discussions the politics surrounding marriages with former slaves
revealed a repeated consciousness of color and its often contingent meanings and functions.
Sexual relationships formed another realm within which radical asymmetries of power were
examined. In a reinforcement of what was noted in the examination of legal evidence in section
two of Chapter Four, the social, familial and legal status of a child born from a slave mother and
her owner hinged upon actual recognized parentage of the child. Also the processes and
socializations into slavery were considered from the vantage point of children, and the lived
realities of the nostalgic Dada figure were interrogated.
A vital theme of this study which deserves to be underscored concerns struggles and
expressions of identity and agency among slaves, former slaves and their descendants. Where

348

colonial archival materials were generally void of voices reflecting the experiences of slaves,
Fasi legal documentation offered somewhat more to work with. The discussion of legal evidence
in the second section of Chapter Four featured examples of slaves asserting their claims to
inheritance and status, as well as cases in which slaves legally willed possessions to whom they
saw fit. Far beyond what either of these sources offered, the oral historical evidence, particularly
within the conclusions of Chapters Three and Four, proved useful and rich. Work and family life
were repeatedly shown to be charged sites for creating a meaningful existence beyond slavery.
In fact, varied and complex exertions of freedom within these contexts were inseparable from the
collective composition of this difficult historical change.
A final point can be made about the varied paces and registers through which the social
institution of domestic slavery declined, transformed and ended within Fes. Beyond the forgone
conclusion that slavery slowly ended over the course of decades lies the far more important
substantive detail of this ambiguous change how its intelligible contours were comprised of
multiple irregular historical features and experiences. Thus, close attention has been given to
Fasi domestic slavery as an historical composite, in an effort to reconstruct how political and
legal changes and continuities were bound in convergence and divergence with socio-economic
and cultural influences lived within households, families and lives.

349

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368

Appendix 1
Selected Glossary
abd (pl. abid): slave/s
adoul: legal notary
ahl Fes: Fasi folk
al-mudawana: Malaki personal status law
ama: female slave
asa: legal designation of guardianship
ashash: guardian
ataraf : legal attestation
atk(s): act(s) of liberation
brarek: small rental rooms
caid: governor
cadi: judge
falaka: a stick used for whipping
fraj: couch
habous: trust lands
haik: a long body-covering garment
hamale: porter
hamam: traditional bath
harira: traditional soup
hedora: a sheep skin rug
hur: free
jaria: slave of the bed
369

khadim: literally meaning servant, but also used to refer to slaves and can carry a strong
connotation of blackness
khalifa: representative
khersa: an earring, associated with male slaves
kssr: the royal palace
khamas: sharecroppers
litham: a thick, full white veil
maalema: literally master
Makhzan or Dar al-Makhzan: the monarchical Moroccan state
mamluk(a): slave
matalma: domestic servant
melk: private lands
mfoul: orphan
mohtaseb: municipal officials regulating commerce
mokadema: neighborhood authorities
mowdabir(a): a former slave who has been freed upon the death of their owner
mowtek(a): a former slave who has been immediately freed
mustowleda: a female slave recognized as having given birth to her owners child, also widely
known as umm al-walad (mother of children)
muqaf: standing place for seeking employment
omara(s): a will for housing
raqeeq: slave
rushd: recognition of legal majority status
sadak: dowry
370

sanae: a skill or trade

shorfa: descendents of the Prophet Mohammed
sundouk: personal chest
suq: market
tamara: misery
thaba: a headdress
tiskhr: to do errands
waseah: a will
wasefah(a): slave
washam: tattoo
zelij: traditional Moroccan tile
zowj: wife (as in zowj wa mowtek, zowj wa mustowleda, zowj wa mowdabira)
zrazay: porter

371

Appendix 2
Maps

Moroccan Cities
(Source: CIA World Factbook, 2009)

Fes Jdid and Fes El-Bali

(Source: Jacques Revault et al. 1985)

372

Curriculum Vitae
Richard David Goodman
Pratt Institute
Department of Social Science and Cultural Studies
200 Willoughby Avenue
Brooklyn, N.Y. 11205
Electronic Mail: Rgoodman@Pratt.Edu
______________________________________________________________________________

Education
Ph.D. in History, Indiana University, Bloomington, 2009.
Disseration Title: The End of Domestic Slavery in Fes, Morocco. Areas of Focus:
Modern and Pre-Colonial Africa, African Diaspora, Modern Middle East, Modern World
History and Ethnomusicology.
M.A. Historical Studies and Anthropology, New School for Social Research, New
York, 1998. Masters Thesis: Gnawa Music in New York City: The Commoditization and
Africanness of a North African Musical Form. Areas of Focus: Modern African History,
Modern Middle East, Modern World History, U.S. since 1607, Europe since 1750,
Cultural Anthropology and Ethnomusicology.
Cours de Civilization Francaise, Sorbonne, Paris, France, 1994.
B.A. Sarah Lawrence College, New York, 1993. Academic concentration in Colonial
History and the Making of the Third World.
Academic Year, Wadham College, Oxford, England 1991-1992.
Professional Experience
8/2007-Present. Assistant Professor, Pratt Institute. Courses taught: World
Civilizations I & II, Beyond Slavery, African Society and Culture, World Music History,
Popular Music and Movements.
1/2005- 5/2006 Associate Instructor, Indiana University. Course taught:
Contemporary Africa.
8/2001- Adjunct Lecturer, University of Southern Indiana.
Courses taught: History of Africa, History of the Modern World.

1/2001-8/2001 Higher Education Assistant, College Now, City University of New

York, Lehman College. Co-founded the Institute of Collaborative Learning at Lehman
College.
9/2000- 8/2001 Part Time Faculty, The New School Jazz and Contemporary Music
Program. Courses taught: World Music History, Tutorials in Composition for
Percussion.
1/2000- 8/2001 Visiting Lecturer, Pratt Institute.
Courses taught: Middle Eastern Society and Culture, World Civilizations I, World
Civilizations II.
9/1998-5/2000 Adjunct Lecturer, City University of New York, Baruch College.
Courses taught: Modern Imperialism, Western Civilization Since 1500: The West in
Global Perspective, World History Since 1500.
9/1998-5/2000 Adjunct Lecturer, City University of New York, Lehman College.
Courses taught: Origins of the Modern Age: World History Since 1500 & Core 104:
Origins of the Modern Age within the Lehman College Freshman Year Initiative
Program.
9/1997-8/2001 Adjunct Lecturer, City University of New York, Staten Island
College. Courses taught: History of Modern Middle East, American History: 1607 to
1865, American History: Since 1865, Past and Present: World History to 1500, Past and
Present: World History Since 1500.
Publication
"The Space of Africanness: Using Gnawa Music in Morocco as Evidence of North
African Slavery and Slave Culture," Journal of Asian and African Studies,
No.64 September, 2002.
Awards

2005 American Institute of Maghribi Studies Short Term Research Grant

2005 Indiana University History Department Grant-in-Aid of Research
2004 Woodburn Dissertation Fellowship
2004 Leo Solt Dissertation Travel Award
2004 Hill Fellowship

2003-2004 Fulbright-Hays Award for Dissertation Research in Morocco

2003-2004 Fulbright IIE Award (Declined)
2003 Indiana University History Department Grant-in-Aid of Research
2003 Woodburn Dissertation Fellowship
2003 Hill Fellowship
2003 Lillie E. Fosbrink Award
2002-2003 (Academic Year) Foreign Language and Area Studies Fellowship (FLAS),
U.S. Department of Education, for Advanced Arabic at Indiana University.
2002 (Summer) Foreign Language and Area Studies Fellowship (FLAS), U.S.
Department of Education, for Study of Arabic at A.L.I.F. in Fez, Morocco.
Various Tution Scholarships

Memberships and Affiliations

African Studies Association
American Anthropological Association
American Historical Association
MANSA
Middle Eastern Studies Association
Saharan Studies Association
Society for Ethnomusicology
Languages
Arabic: Advanced usage.
French: Advanced usage.
References
John Hanson, Associate Professor, History, Indiana University.
Phyllis M. Martin, Professor Emeritus, History, Indiana Univeristy.
Claude Clegg, Department Chair, History, Indiana University.
Ruth Stone, Laura Boulton Professor, Ethnomusicology and Folklore, Indiana University.
Richard Bauman, Professor Emeritus, Folklore and Ethnomusicology, Indiana University.

Donald Scott, Professor of History, Queens College, City University of New York.
Steven Caton, Professor of Anthropology, Center of Middle Eastern Studies, Harvard University.
Mohammed Mbodj, Director of African Studies, History, Manhattanville College.