TUNISIEAt the heart of the medina you will find a city centre full of life and entertainment with its traditional souks and cafes, the Rhaba. The surrounding buildings are inspired by Italian, Tunisian, Moroccan or oriental architecture.
The Medina is full of reproductions of symbolic monuments related to the different eras and civilizations of Arab history. The Skia al kahla gate for example is representative of Fatimid architecture. The Red Dome is as a jewel of Arabic architecture in Sicily and the Golden Tower, recently transformed into a marine museum is one of the most beautiful testimonies of the Muslim civilization of Seville. You may also admire the Blue Tower, a tribute to the Majorelle Garden in Marrakech.
Further away stand the ancient walls of the city of Mahdia dating from the 10th century, as well as the ruins of the ramparts of the city of Sfax. Theses incredible memorial sites are will allow you to dive into Tunisia’s legends and history and legends.
The tower of the Medina mediterranea is a more or less modified replica of that of Seville. It presents the same look, the same invoice and the same general appearance. However, the architect Tarek ben Miled brought him his personal touch by adding a lantern borrowed from the work of the Italian architect Francesco Borromini (1559-1667), a follower of the baroque style to which we owe the church Sant Ivo alla Sapienza of Rome. The Seville gold tower was part of the defensive system of the city in the Almohad period, built in 1220-1221, it was an advanced station on the river Guadalquivir. Chains permitted from the tower and the opposite bank to close the access to the port of the city to protect it from possible aggressors. Dodecagonal in shape, it is particularly elegant and presents a ceramic decoration, a first in Andalusia at the time. The particular form of the tower may be of Byzantine or Roman inspiration.
Today on the banks of the river it is one of the most beautiful testimonies of the Muslim civilization of Seville. The tower is octagonal, it has three superimposed floors and ends with a parapet protected by pyramid-shaped battlements in vogue under the Almohads. On each floor there is a cell. The origin of the tower is uncertain, and is sometimes attributed to a Roman origin. Under the Almohades it was connected to the Alcazar by walls, and supported one extremity of the iron chain which barred the river, the other end of which was to be attached in front of buttresses of masonry. It was erected to facilitate the control and protection of the palaces situated on the southern part of the city, and to guard the port of the city by which the goods of the East arrived and the spices of India, , To various destinations of the Mediterranean, the oil of the Aljarafaria and the cereals of the Sevillian countryside. The name of "Torr del Oro", a tower of gold, comes to him, saying that the gold brought from America in the fifteenth and sixteenth centuries was enclosed by the galleons. In 1760 the upper parts of the tower were added. But originally it was covered with a whitewash, it was also one of the first Muslim buildings of the Peninsula to present a ceramic decoration.
In 1900, during the restorations, the glazed ceramic panels and bands that decorated the second-floor facings were redone. It seems, however, that the green ribbons which surround the arches already existed in the thirteenth century. Today it is a maritime museum that houses a collection of 400 pieces well presented to make understand the importance of the maritime history of Seville and the strong link that unites Seville to the river. By giving a replica of the golden tower, and keeping its nickname our medina invites us to the journey and makes us discover an emblematic monument of Muslim Spain.