Túnez :: Comparisson reports

“At dusk we enter the Jewish Quarter. We see no Arabs, no white djellabas, no girls wrapped in clothing; we only see thin and black figures wearing a dark overcoat with red front, brown stockings, closed shoes, a black rag serving as a turban on a shaved head. We see feminine figures in the already-described heavy way of dressing though they sometimes have very thin faces. At times they show themselves through half-broken windows behind iron bars. The little streets are narrow and dirty; at times they are open and, at others, they have a bridge above with arches and pillars decorated in the Moorish fashion. Here we also hear nasal prayers in the afternoons issuing forth from the synagogue; there are numerous synagogues in this neighbourhood. A taste for Moorish decor predominates in them; for this reason you might think you were in a mosque were it not for the benches and the cabinets holding the valuable Torah rolls.”

(Ph. 6 in the Jewish Quarter)

Archduke Ludwig Salvator of Austria, Tunis. Ein bild aus dem nordafrikanischen leben, Heinrich Mercy, Prague, 1870