*Saints and Sanctuaries of Fez*

[From the French language press]:

Maroc, pays des marabouts: à l’occasion du 1er festival de la culture soufie, Faouzi Skali édite *Saints et sanctuaires de Fès*. S’inspirant de la plus importante œuvre hagiographique sans doute jamais écrite en langue arabe, de Salwat al-Anfas (1902), d’Al-Kattani, Skali suit un parcours en spirale à partir du mausolée Moulay-Idriss-II, pour citer les différents sanctuaires qui se situent dans chaque quartier.

L'Economiste, Maroc - mercredi, 9 mai 2007 - par Youness Saad Alami

Morocco, country of the marabouts: on the occasion of the 1st festival of the sufi culture Mr Faouzi Skali publishes *Saints et sanctuaries de Fès* (Saints and sanctuaries of Fez). Taking as a starting point the most important hagiographic work undoubtedly ever written in the Arab language, the Salwat Al-Anfas (1902), by Al-Kattani, Skali follows a spiral-shaped path starting from the Moulay-Idriss-II mausoleum, to quote the various sanctuaries which are located in each district.

A chapter is reserved for “holy” women with exceptional spiritual destinies, in Islam generally, and in Fez in particular. An occasion to put in perspective the place of the woman and the female personality in the spiritual culture of Islam, far from the prejudices usual in this field -which proceeds from an ignorance which is often also that of the Muslims themselves.

In short, by the smoothness and the relevance of its analyses, this book of Faouzi Skali on the Saints and sanctuaries of Fez contribute an essential share to this field of studies.

According to Faouzi Skali, "it is interesting to establish the way in which Sufi spirituality can become, in the current forms of social or entrepreneurial action, a particularly fertile factor of the human development".