The Tale of Solika-the-Just (1817-1834)

El Hi Ani © All Rights Reserved

In all of Fez, and some say, even from one end of the Maghreb to the other, there was no beauty to match Solika the graceful. She was barely seventeen, some say only fifteen, when the son of the king, Abd A Rahman, the “Servant-of-mercy” as some called him, heard of the Jewish belle and summoned her to his lavish court. And when Solika appeared before Abd A Rahman, he told her that in no time at all, he would be king and his desire for her would make her queen!

-Oh, son of kings,
Heir of prophets,
How could a dhimi
Wear a crown
In a castle of believers? Said Solika.

– Enchanted I am
By your charm,
Bewitched
By your spell,
Oh uncle’s daughter.
Say:
“Muhammad is my prophet.
The Eternal is one.”
Replied the son of kings.

– Oh successor,
Fortune maker,
My faith is Sarah’s,
My head is yours to take
If you wish!

And so it was in eighteen hundred and thirty-four to the count of the Romans, the lovely head was chopped and served on a golden platter to the would-be-king. Some say the sacrifice was necessary for the Eternal’s glory, for the one who witnesses all and pronounces right judgments!

Illustration
Cemetery setting (see Fez cemetery photos in my website)
see the tomb of solika in Fez cemetery photos in my website
A prince
A man holding the head a of a beautiful woman on a platter
The body of the woman lying down on the floor without a head.

Note: Solika’s tomb is adjacent to Rabbi Yehuda Ben Atar’s in the Jewish cemetery in Fez