Meeting the Sultan: Personal encounters with the commander of the faithful

Abstract

Abdellah Hammoudi describes the ceremonial occasions when the Sultan came into public view in the pre-colonial period. He suggests that what was happening was a ceremonial system designed to emphasise distance, both inspiring fear of and engendering love for the imam, which were the foundation of obedience. This was true both of ceremonies in which only Moroccans or Muslims were involved (bay'a, 'id al mawlid), and those where foreign ambassadors were received as part of a state ritual. Yet the Sultan was also a man, who needed personal as well as ceremonial contact. We have relatively few accounts of his day-to-day meeting with his wazirs - but there are descriptions of less formal meetings..