Charles de Foucaulds Reconnaissance au Maroc, 18831884

Rosemary A. Peters-Hill

Description

Charles de Foucauld’s adventurous memoir of exploring Morocco with an extensive introduction and notes

Womanizer – Delinquent – Glutton – Deserter; Visionary – Linguist – Explorer – Hermit. The lexical fields do not match, yet both sets of descriptors apply to one man: Blessed Charles de Foucauld (1858–1916), one of nineteenth-century France’s most complex and challenging figures. Upon graduation from the prestigious École de Saumur, Foucauld went to North Africa with his cavalry regiment. In a sense, he never went home: the desert had called to him, converted him even, and the once-renegade scion devoted the rest of his life to studying the land and culture of North Africa and preserving its language and traditions. The two halves of his life part almost mathematically: a dissolute, disconsolate orphan whose wealthy family, peers, and superiors did not know what to do with him; and then an intuitive, dedicated scholar and priest who revolutionized European knowledge of Morocco’s geography and culture, and defied the mission civilisatrice by refusing to evangelize the Berber population among whom he lived. Foucauld’s biography typically divides into these two sections, with his youth glossed almost as a fleeting adventure and clear priority assigned to his later years as a hermit and spiritual director.

This book seeks to turn that model on its head. Rosemary Peters-Hill provides an in-depth examination of the year Foucauld spent exploring Morocco in 1883–1884, after he had resigned his army commission and taught himself Arabic and Hebrew. This book is more than merely a translation: it is a meticulously researched and documented critical edition that addresses the history of nineteenth-century French colonial endeavors and Moroccan resistance to them; cultural traditions and spaces within the closed country where Foucauld sojourned; the intersections of language, politics, and economics with religion; the praxis of Arabic and Berber interactions and the ways in which official cartographies neglect local knowledge of tribal and seasonal rituals; and the failures of Empire when it comes to defining or delimiting national identity. Peters-Hill, as a literary scholar, also brings to bear a careful examination of Foucauld as author: the ways he pitched his account toward government bodies likely to pay attention to them, his use of literary tropes within his memoir, his narrative agency. And the way these things change: through Foucauld’s encounter, and increasing identification, with Morocco as not just a backdrop for imperial expansion but a subject and a plurality of voices in its own right. As Foucauld’s narrative advances, so too do its Arabic inflections, its lyricism about landscape and cultural practices, its investment in documenting and preserving Morocco’s own specific history. Another, much later, Foucault (Michel) would write that space itself has a history: he might well have been inspired by Charles de Foucauld’s conversion and dedication to the specific selves and possibilities discovered during his immersion in Moroccan space.

Peters-Hill has written a study of Charles de Foucauld’s youthful undertaking in unknown territory that seeks to represent as honestly as possible both the evolution of Foucauld’s mindset regarding French engagement in Morocco and the consequences of his work in that country. While delving into how the author is changed by Morocco, she nonetheless holds Foucauld accountable for his nationalist and religious biases, the details he discounts or ignores, the unavoidable oversights in such a brief cultural encounter, the things he got wrong. She situates Foucauld’s year in Morocco as the exegesis of his ultimate desert calling, the transformation of a black sheep into a sacrificial lamb, a man the Catholic Church venerates as a martyr. This critical edition draws from several discrete fields, which nonetheless intersect in Foucauld – travel writing, botany, hydrology, and topography; cartography, ethnography and sociology; linguistics and amazighité, alongside formal literary criticism and French (post-) colonial studies – to present a fuller view of a writer whose legacy remains an inspiration, a frustration, and an enigma.

List of Figures; Acknowledgments; “There are no roads”: Charles de Foucauld’s Reconnaissance au Maroc—a Critical Introduction, Rosemary A. Peters- Hill; Charles de Foucauld, Reconnaissance au Maroc, 1883–1884; Letter to François de Bondy; Introduction; Avant- Propos; I. Tangiers to Meknès; II. Meknès to Qaçba Beni Mellal; III. Qaçba Beni Mellal to Tikirt; IV. Tikirt to Tissint; V. Sojourn in the Sahara; VI. Tissint to Mogador; VII. Mogador to Tissint; VIII. Tissint to the Dadès; IX. The Dadès to Qçabi ech Cheurfa; X. Qçabi ech Chorfa to Lalla Maghnia; Appendix: The Jews of Morocco; Note on the Materials Used to Draw Up My Itinerary; Report Delivered to the Société de Géographie de Paris in Its General Session of 24 April 1885 by M. Henri Duveyrier on the Journey of M. the Viscount Charles de Foucauld through Morocco; “Itineraries in Morocco” by the Viscount Charles de Foucauld; Afterwards: An Afterword, Rosemary A. Peters- Hill; Glossary of Terms; Bibliography; Index.

Sujets

• Religión
• Marruecos
• África
• Travel
• Christianity
• Morocco
• Africa
• France

Informations

• Publié par: Anthem Press
• Date de parution: 25 septembre 2020
• Nombre de lectures: 2
• EAN13: 9781785274114
• Langue: English
• Poids de l'ouvrage: 1 Mo

Extrait

Charles de Foucauld’s Reconnaissance au Maroc, 1883–1884
Charles de Foucauld’s Reconnaissance au Maroc, 1883–1884
A Critical Edition in English
Rosemary A. Peters-Hill
Anthem Press
An imprint of Wimbledon Publishing Company
www.anthempress.com
This edition first published in UK and USA 2020
by ANTHEM PRESS
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or PO Box 9779, London SW19 7ZG, UK
and
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Copyright © Rosemary A. Peters-Hill 2020
The author asserts the moral right to be identified as the author of this work.
All rights reserved. Without limiting the rights under copyright reserved above, no part of this publication may be reproduced, stored or introduced into a retrieval system, or transmitted, in any form or by any means (electronic, mechanical, photocopying, recording or otherwise), without the prior written permission of both the copyright owner and the above publisher of this book.
British Library Cataloguing-in-Publication Data
A catalogue record for this book is available from the British Library.
Library of Congress Control Number: 2020940483
ISBN-13: 978-1-78527-409-1 (Hbk)
ISBN-10: 1-78527-409-0 (Hbk)
This title is also available as an e-book.
CONTENTS
List of Figures
Acknowledgments
“There are no roads”: Charles de Foucauld’s Reconnaissance au Maroc —a Critical Introduction
Rosemary A. Peters-Hill
Charles de Foucauld, Reconnaissance au Maroc, 1883–1884
Letter to François de Bondy
Introduction
Avant-Propos
I. Tangiers to Meknès
II. Meknès to Qaçba Beni Mellal
III. Qaçba Beni Mellal to Tikirt
IV. Tikirt to Tissint
V. Sojourn in the Sahara
VI. Tissint to Mogador
VII. Mogador to Tissint
VIII. Tissint to the Dadès
IX. The Dadès to Qçabi ech Cheurfa
X. Qçabi ech Chorfa to Lalla Maghnia
Appendix: The Jews of Morocco
Note on the Materials Used to Draw Up My Itinerary
Report Delivered to the Société de Géographie de Paris in Its General Session of 24 April 1885 by M. Henri Duveyrier on the Journey of M. the Viscount Charles de Foucauld through Morocco
“Itineraries in Morocco” by the Viscount Charles de Foucauld
Afterwards: An Afterword
Rosemary A. Peters-Hill
Glossary of Terms
Bibliography
Index
FIGURES
1 Tikirt.—Demeure du Cheikh
2 Tikirt
3 “O. de Bondy” signature on the photogravure
4 Dahio, November 3, 1885
5 Image from the inauguration of the Foucauld Memorial Monument
6 Historic postcard showing the Charles de Foucauld Monument in Casablanca’s Parc de la Ligue Arabe (Parc Lyautey)
7 Excerpt from letter of September 7, 1907, to Louis Mercier
8 North face of the Beni Hasan hills. (Vista drawn 5 kilometers from Tetuan, on the road from Tangiers.) Author’s sketch
9 The western slope of Djebel Beni Hasan
10 Chefchaouen
11 Djebel Sarsar and Djebel Kourt
12 Djebel Tselfat
13 Foucauld’s sketch, uncaptioned
14 Djebel Gebgeb and Djebel Terrats
15 Eastern part of Fez and Bâll
16 Djebel Terrats from the mellah of Fez, Djebel El Behalli
17 Djebel Zerhoun
18 Tribal arms
19 Fez—general view of the town and its fields, from the peak of Aqba el Djemel
20 Djebel Riata
21 Gap where the Oued Innaouen passes
22 Tâza
23 Tâza, the city and its environs
24 Exterior enclosure and the countryside around it
25 Course of the Oued Innaouen and countryside northeast of Tâza
26 Djebel Beni Ouaraïn
27 Sfrou’s farmlands and Djebel Aït Ioussi
28 Djebel Zerhoun, Djebel Outita and the Saïs plain
29 Djebel Heçaïa
30 Bou el Djad
31 Bou el Djad
32 Mosque and mausoleum of Sidi Mohammed Ech Chergi in Bou el Djad; two of the three mausolea in Bou el Djad
33 Countryside around Bou el Djad, Qoubbas β
34 Qaçba Tâdla
35 Qaçba Tâdla
36 Fichtâla
37 Foum el Ancer and the village of Aït Saïd
38 Foucauld’s sketch of the cliffside caverns
39 Tirremt
40 Village of Ahel Sabeq; Zaouïa Sidi Mohammed Bel Qasem and the northern part of the gardens of Qaçba Beni Mellal
41 Zaouïa Sidi Mohammed Bel Qasem and the Tâdla plains
42 Qaçba Beni Mellal and the Tâdla plains
43 Djebel Beni Mellal
44 The first grades of the High Atlas, forming the left side of the valley of the Oued el Abid
45 Valley of the Oued Ouaouizert; Valley of the Oued el Abip
46 Ouaouizert
47 Caves hollowed out of the right side of the valley of the Oued Ouaouizert
48 Ouaouizert and valley of the Oued Ouaouizert
49 Entry of the long narrow pass where the Oued el Abid disappears, at the end of the Ouaouizert plains
50 Valley of the Oued el Abid
51 River-crossing device
52 Demnât
53 Western part of the city and gardens of Demnât
54 Adrar n Iri and Tizi n Telouet
55 Upper section of Tagmout and valley of the Oued Adrar n Iri
56 Adrar n Iri
57 Adrar n Iri and Tizi n Telouet
58 View toward the south, from the Telouet pass
59 Telouet pass, the plain of Telouet and the village of Aït Baddou
60 Tigert (Oued Iounil)
61 Village of Tizgi and valley of the Oued Iounil
62 Djebel Anremer and the village of Tazentout
63 Oued Tidili
64 The ruins of Tasgedît
65 Old gate at the north corner of the Tasgedît enclosure
66 Plain where the wadis Iounil, Iriri and Tidili come together
67 Mountain ranges of Morocco
68 Sides of the Oued Aït Tigdi Ouchchen valley
69 Right side of the Oued Aït Tigdi Ouchchen valley
70 Rocky massif located between Tazenakht and the Oued Azgemerzi and the right slope of the valley of this river; village of Adreg and Djebel Siroua
71 Oued Tazenakht at the foot of Tazenakht; the house of Chikh ez Zanifi in Tazenakht
72 Djebel Taïmzour, seen in the southerly direction, from the Agni pass
73 The Bani range, Djebel Taïmzour and Foum Tissint
74 Bed of the watercourse
75 Oases of Tissint and Aqqa; plateau, plains, Atlantic Ocean and High Atlas
76 Hartania of Tissint
77 Feïja, the oasis of Qaçba el Djoua and the Bani
78 Kheneg et Teurfa and Aqqa Igighen
79 Kheneg of Adis, Kheneg of Adis and the Oued Toug er Rih
80 Areg to the south of Tissint and portions of the Bani crest
81 Mrimima
82 Small plain surrounded by a ring of mountains, between Imiteq and the Tanamrout pass
83 Tizgi Ida ou Baloul
84 High valley of the Oued Iberqaqen
85 Qçar of Iligh and the valley of the Oued S. Mohammed ou Iaqob
86 View taken from Tizi n Haroun, in the northerly direction
87 Section of the Zenâga plain
88 Azdif
89 Northern and southern sides of the Anti-Atlas range, with Tesaouant marked on the southern side
90 Tesaouant
91 Oued Drâa, in the Mezgîta
92 Valley of the Oued Drâa
93 Oued Drâa and Djebel Kisan
94 Oued Dadès valley
95 Foucauld’s sketch
96 Foucauld’s diagram of the embankment
97 Oued Todgha and the qçar of Tiidrin
98 Headdress of a Jewish woman from the Todgha
99 Foum Jabel, southern portion of the Tiallalin plain
100 Aït Khozman, valley of the Oued Ziz and the qçar of Aït Khozman
101 Shape of the kheneg
102 Tizi n Telremt and Djebel El Aïachi
103 Djebel Tsouqt and Djebel Oulad Ali
104 Mlouïa valley, Misour, Middle Atlas and Rekkam
105 Middle Atlas, Mlouïa, Rekkam
106 Shape of the ravine
107 Djebel Oulad Ali and Djebel Reggou
108 Debdou and the valley of Oued Debdou
109 Oued Za valley and Djebel Mergeshoum
ACKNOWLEDGMENTS
This project has spanned years, continents, and personal and professional addresses; therefore, I have many people on my own reconnaissance list!
First, my family. Andrew, Julian and Nathanaël have been my triune touchstone as I write and read and learn and travel. Thank you, my loves, for keeping me grounded, making sure I eat, getting me to play, and helping me see Foucauld and Morocco and translation and exploration and ultimately, of course, myself through new eyes. I owe you everything about this book.
The ATLAS (Awards to Louisiana Artists and Scholars) foundation funded one summer of crucial research. A Fulbright Senior Scholar Award took me to Morocco during 2015–16 and brought the country and its history, culture and traditions to life for me. I am especially grateful to James Miller for his support and to the entire MACECE staff for guiding me and my family through our stay in Rabat. I cannot adequately express my thankfulness to Ceola Edwards, who has generously sponsored my research through the Albert and Angelle Arnaud Professorship in French Heritage in Honor of Louis Curet. Benjamin Guichard of the Bibliothèque Universitaire de Langues et Cultures in Paris granted me access to the Fonds André Basset, which contains some of Charles de Foucauld’s manuscript documents. Dominique Casajus has encouraged this project since our first conversation. Members of the French Colonial History Soci