Mahdia, the green city

What city in Tunisia is do we gathered, as in a handkerchief, monumental ruins and colorful boats, Millennium mosque and fortress pirates, weaving silk and gold fish market, Ottoman minarets and cafes fishermen? Mahdia.
Medina built on rock flower on a tiny peninsula, Mahdia was first forbidden citadel, the first capital of the dynasty of the Fatimid caliphs before being abandoned in favor of Cairo. it became
then a port like so many others around the Mediterranean, open to all the conquests and all influences. Normans of Sicily, Knights of Malta, Genoese and Spaniards marked their footprints.

The former capital of the Fatimids today is alive with fishing.
How to forget the past when this singular visit the ancient city? You turn your back to the fishing port, the second country to be facing the imposing Skifa Kahla, the "black door" of the ancient citadel. We crossed the long hallway, oppressed by the narrow stone arch and a few strides away, instead of Cairo spreads its Mediterranean nonchalance all under one roof greenery. It bypasses the mass

austere of the Great Mosque, reconstructed in terms of the Fatimid building, and can be seen, slipping on rocks at the foot of a sapphire sea, simple fishing boats that evoke both Malta. And at the tip, between the Turkish fortress and the door of conquest proud ruin upright in the water, extending the moving marine cemetery, women are buried, buried according to tradition in the garb of silk, gold and money from their marige.