Abu al-Hassan Ali ibn Moussa ibn Rashid al-Alami (), also known as Sherif Moulay Ali Ben Rachid, was the founder of the city of

Chefchaouen Chefchaouen (, ) is a city in northwest Morocco. It is the chief town of the province of the same name and is noted for its buildings in shades of blue, for which it is nicknamed the "Blue City". It is situated in a mountainous region in northern ...

Morocco Morocco, officially the Kingdom of Morocco, is a country in the Maghreb region of North Africa. It has coastlines on the Mediterranean Sea to the north and the Atlantic Ocean to the west, and has land borders with Algeria to Algeria–Morocc ...

. He was an

Idrisid The Idrisid dynasty or Idrisids ( ') were an Arab Muslim dynasty from 788 to 974, ruling most of present-day Morocco and parts of present-day western Algeria. Named after the founder, Idris I, the Idrisids were an Alid dynasty descended from Mu ...

and descendant of

Sufi Sufism ( or ) is a mysticism, mystic body of religious practice found within Islam which is characterized by a focus on Islamic Tazkiyah, purification, spirituality, ritualism, and Asceticism#Islam, asceticism. Practitioners of Sufism are r ...

saint Abd as-Salam ibn Mashish al-Alami.Al-Huwwat, Sulayman: Al-rawda al-maqsuda wa-l-hulal al mamduda fi ma âthir Bani Suda vol 2, p. 602 He was also the father of

Sayyida al-Hurra Lalla Aisha bint Ali ibn Rashid al-Alami (), also referred to as Sayyida al-Hurra (, ), was a Moroccan privateer (of Andalusian origin) who governed the city of Tétouan from 1515 or 1519 to 1542. As the wife of Moroccan king Abu al-Abbas Ahmad ...

, governor of Tetouan. He founded the city of

in 1471 as a base from which to attack the Portuguese who had conquered Ceuta in 1415.

References and notes

City founders People from Chefchaouen 15th-century Moroccan people {{Morocco-bio-stub 15th-century Arab people