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Haunted places in Morocco
What are the most haunted places in Morocco? The best-known is Aisha Qandisha.
In Morocco the supernatural is less about ghosts of the dead than about the jnun – jinn, the unseen beings described in the Qur’an who are believed to live alongside people, in water, drains, ruins and empty places. Belief is widespread: in a 2012 Pew Research Center survey about 86 per cent of Moroccans said they believed in jinn, more than in any other country polled. Protective phrases, amulets, the Qur’an and visits to saints’ shrines are all part of everyday ways of dealing with them.
- 1 haunting
- 4 recorded sightings
Haunted places in Morocco
The ghost lore of Morocco
The most famous of these spirits is Aisha Qandisha, the beautiful jinniya with hoofed feet who haunts rivers and the sea and lures young men at night. Yet she is also Lalla Aicha, revered within Sufi brotherhoods such as the Hamadsha and among Gnawa musicians, whose trance ceremonies call on her for healing. At the shrine of Sidi Ali Ben Hamdouch near Meknes, pilgrims light candles in her cave and bathe in its spring during the saint’s annual moussem. These are living religious traditions, not attractions, and visitors should approach them with respect.
For travellers, Morocco’s spirit lore is best met through its music and festivals – the Gnawa lila ceremonies, the moussems of the saints – and through the stories told in the old medinas of the north, from Tangier and Tétouan to Fez, where Aisha Qandisha is said to keep to the water’s edge.
Ghost-hunting hotspots
- Sidi Ali, near Meknes
Village of the shrine of Sidi Ali Ben Hamdouch and the cave of Lalla Aicha, scene of a week-long moussem of trance music and offerings.
- Tangier and Tétouan
Northern cities where Aisha Qandisha is said to live by the sea and along the Martil river.
- Fez
The ancient medina, where local folklore places Aisha Qandisha beside a drainage canal rather than a river or the sea.
Timeline
- 17th centurySidi Ali Ben Hamdouch Aisha Qandisha
The Sufi saint whose followers became the Hamadsha brotherhood lives and is buried in the hills near Meknes. Tradition remembers Lalla Aicha as his servant.
- 1926Westermarck’s Ritual and Belief in Morocco Aisha Qandisha
The Finnish anthropologist publishes his survey of Moroccan beliefs, including Aisha Qandisha, and proposes an ancient Near Eastern origin for her that later scholars reject.
- January 2014The moussem of Sidi Ali Aisha Qandisha
AFP reports from the week-long festival, describing candles and incense in Lalla Aicha’s cave, offerings of black animals, and pilgrims who come to be purified of harmful jinn.
- 16 October 2020Kandisha on screen Aisha Qandisha
Alexandre Bustillo and Julien Maury’s French horror film Kandisha premieres at the Sitges Film Festival, carrying her name and legend to international audiences. A Moroccan film of the same title had appeared in 2008.
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