Palace of al-‘Abdilliyya

This princely residence is located in the area around Tunis on the ancient strategic site of the port of La Marsa. The nineteenth-century historian Ibn Abī Adhiaf mentions that in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, when Tunisia was governed by the Muradite and Husseinite beys, the Abdalliya Palace reportedly served as a fortified summer residence but also as a place of refuge in the event of threat. In the nineteenth century it lodged Tunisian and foreign figures such as Bey Mahmūd (1814–1824) and his son Husayn Bey. Under the reign of Mustafa Bey and Ahmad Bey (1835–1855) it became a summer residence for Thomas Reade and Richard Wood, the consuls of England, but in mid-century was reclaimed by Muhammad Bey.

The palace, which is surrounded by gardens, was originally composed of three buildings, but only the one known as the Great Abdilliyya has been preserved. The main entrance is a studded door under a portico formed of three pointed arches. It opens into an entrance vestibule which no doubt served as a state room, judging by the benches and a niche where the prince may have sat. The room is surmounted by a dome resting on shell-shaped corner squinches between which stucco panels decorated with Turkish-Italian type motifs are arranged. Marble is used for the floor tiling and the benches. The walls are covered with nineteenth-century Italian ceramics. The hall leads into a ground-floor courtyard with outbuildings opening out onto it. To the north-west are three large rooms containing alcoves and covered with barrel vault, groin vault and hemispheric vault ceilings. Their construction, beauty and elegance indicate that they were not makhzens (storerooms) but rather maqads (sitting rooms). The stables are located on the south-east side between two service courtyards, while the storerooms are on the north-west side. Opposite the entrance is a square tower. The ceilings of the ground floor premises are relieved by arches on transverse ribs, resting on pillars and on the back walls.

The first storey holds the living quarters. Rooms are laid out around a central space containing a rectangular pool and framed on two sides by porticos. The space has been thoroughly rearranged and is soberly designed. The floor is divided into several rooms with groin vaulted ceilings. There are three main halls with alcoves that open widely onto the courtyard and a number of auxiliary rooms.

Despite the simplicity of the decoration, this monument has a special place in Tunisian architecture: it is the only palace that has come down to us from the Hafsid era. It testifies to Maghrebian and Andalusian influences. Some of its elements, mainly the pool and the Almohad type square tower, along with the green brick roofs, call to mind Moroccan houses from the Merinid and Saadian period. The plan of the palace was subsequently copied in other palaces belonging to Tunisian dignitaries (the palace of the Rose in Manouba) and pleasure houses in Tunis, albeit not in the same proportions (al-Oueslati burj at Gammarth).