Qalat as-Sanan

Qalat as-Sanan

Qalat as-Sanan is a town in western Tunisia. The town takes its name from the nearby fortress built on the Jugurtha Tableland. The mesa rises nearly 600 meters above the Ez-Zghalma plain. It is 1500 meters long and 500 meters wide, covering a total area of almost 80 hectares. The Tableland is a geological landform known as an inverted relief. Many millions of years ago, the hard limestone top of the mesa was in fact the bottom of a valley. The surrounding softer hills have been eroded away over the years, making Tableland, and the once low point, the highest point on the plain. Qalat as-Sanan's drinking water comes from the Ain Senan spring on the edge of the Jugurtha Tableland. The mesa has been used as a fortress many times throughout history, as its height gives the defenders a good view and the steep rock faces make it difficult for attackers to climb. According to legend, Masinissa, the first king of Numidia, built the first fortress here around 200 BC. Between 112 and 105 BC, King Jugurtha of Numidia used the mesa to block the Roman legions in a long war with them. On the highest cliffs of the mesa, you can still see the steps that his soldiers carved into the steep rock to reach the summit. The fortress was rebuilt in the 18th century by a local leader, the rebel Senan, whose long resistance against the troops of the Bey of Tunis gave the town and its surroundings their name.