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Aghmat (Shilha language: Aɣmat, Āghmāt; pronounced locally Ughmat, Uɣmat) was an important commercial medieval Berber people town in Morocco. It is today an archaeological site known as "Joumâa Aghmat".
The city is located approximately 30 km south-east of Marrakech on the Ourika River road. The initial "a" of the name may be unvocalized, and the name may sometimes be spelled "Ghmat", "Ghmate" or even the French-style "Rhmate" (as it appears in the Michelin Guide).
According to a Berbers legend, Aghmat was populated by Christian Berbers when it was conquered in 683 by the Muslim forces of Uqba ibn Nafi, a general of the Umayyad Caliphate in Syria.E. Lévi-Provençal, "Un nouveau récit de la conquête de l'Afrique du Nord", Arabica 1 (1954) 17–43. However, this story first surfaces almost 700 years after that date, and many historians give it no credibility.A. Benabbès, "Les premiers raids arabes en Numidie byzantine: questions toponymiques", in Identités et Cultures dans l'Algérie Antique, University of Rouen, 2005 () It is directly contradicted by one of the earliest Persian historians, al-Baladhuri.al-Baladhuri, Kitab Futuh al-Buldan, translated by Phillip Hitti in The Origins of the Islamic State (1916, 1924) who states that Musa bin Nusair conquered the Sous and erected the mosque at Aghmāt.
When the Almoravids invaded from the Sahara Desert under Ibn Yasin, Aghmāt was defended by Laqūt, leader of the Maghrawa tribe. Laqūt was defeated and the Almoravid army entered the city on 23 Rabi II 450 (27 June 1058).Ibn Idhari, Al-bayan al-mughrib Part III, annotated Spanish translation by A. Huici Miranda, Valencia, 1963 One of the wealthiest of Aghmāt's citizens was Laqūt's widow, Zaynab an-Nafzawiyyat, who married the Almoravid leader Abu-Bakr Ibn-Umar and placed her considerable wealth at his disposal. After Abu-Bakr returned to the Sahara Desert in 1071, Zaynab married his successor Yusuf ibn Tashfin.
By 1068/1069, the population of the city had grown considerably, and Abu-Bakr decided to construct a new capital. He founded Marrakech in 1070, after which Aghmāt declined. The Almoravids continued to use it as a convenient backwater in which to exile people. These included Al Mutamid, former king of Sevilla and Córdoba and noted poet. His tomb remains a place of pilgrimage to this day. Aghmat was also the place of exile where Abdallah ibn Buluggin, the former king of Granada, wrote his memoirs.
In the years 1126, 1127 and again in 1130, the city saw a number of battles between the Almoravid sultan Ali ibn Yusuf and the Almohad Dynasty army led by Ibn Tumart and Abd al-Mu'min. Following a general rout of Almoravid forces throughout Morocco and Algeria, Abd al-Mu'min entered Aghmāt without a fight on the middle day of Muharram 541 (27 June 1146).
Beaumier, writing in 1860, stated the town still had a population of 5500, of whom 1000 were Jews.A. Beaumier, notes to French translation of Rawd al-Qirtas, Paris, 1860
The archaeological ruins visible today consist of part of the city walls, Turkish bath, parts of some houses and (irrigation canals), and some hundred metres or so of the city ramparts.
The tomb of Al-Mutamid is marked by a contemporary mausoleum. It was erected in 1970 and has a cupola in the Almoravid style.
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