The ruined city of Mansourah, just outside Tlemcen, is the ghost of a Moroccan siege city built in the early 14th century — its surviving minaret standing alone in a wheat field, enormous and improbable and very beautiful. Visit Tlemcen in spring, when the almond trees flower, and it will rearrange your understanding of what this part of the world is capable of.
9. Djémila — Rome at Altitude
The Romans built a town here, 900 metres above sea level in the mountains of northeastern Algeria, and called it Cuicul. They founded it around 96 AD, built forums, temples, triumphal arches and houses, and then, when the population grew beyond the original square grid, they did something architecturally fascinating: they adapted. They bent the street plan around the mountain spur, building a second forum, a new temple to the Severan dynasty, a magnificent arch. Djémila’s ruins are, as a result, not just a Roman city but a record of Roman urban thinking encountering real geography and responding with pragmatic creativity.
