The third place we want to visit downtown today in the medina is Ben Youssef Madrasa, quite close to the Marrakesh Museum we have visited prior. It is named after the nearby mosque and it was a major Islamic madrasa (university) at its height. It is also one of the oldest in the world founded in the 14th century and was used to train Islamic scholars in law, jurisprudence and readings of the Qur’an. The main courtyard is quite impressive and we are already looking forward to exploring the rest of the madrasa.
However first we spend some time enjoying the courtyard and its beautiful reflective pool. This is quite a visited site with many other tourists here including groups tours making it more difficult to find peace and quiet while exploring.
The carving details throughout are magnificent, Morocco is our first extended encounter with Moorish architecture and it is beautiful, we really have to go visit Alhambra at some point which supposedly is even more beautiful.
The second floor holds the student rooms and one of them is set up so we can understand how they were living and staying while doing their studies.
We continue exploring both floors, there aren’t that many funished rooms but we still like the feeling of exploration as we enter room by room and peek downstairs when possible. When finished we decide we had enough of culture and plan to explore both the medina and outside it until we have to return to the riad.
