Ghadames

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Old Town of Ghadamès*
UNESCO World Heritage Site

State Party	Libyan Arab Jamahiriya
Type	Cultural
Criteria	v
Reference	362
Region†	Arab States
Inscription history
Inscription	1986 (10th Session)
* Name as inscribed on World Heritage List. † Region as classified by UNESCO.

The oasis of Ghadames
Is known to most people, I guess
In Libya's vast land
Half-buried in sand
It survives, and it thrives — more or less

—Limerick by Charles Issawi, Die Welt des Islams 38.1 (1998) p. 9

Ghadames (Berber: ɛadēməs; "classical" Arabic: غدامس (Ġadāmis) [ɣaˈdæːmɪs], Libyan vernacular: ġdāməs) is an oasis town in the west of Libya. It is located approximately 341 miles in the south west of Tripoli, near the borders to Algeria and Tunisia.

The oasis has a population of 7000 Tuareg Berbers. The old part of the town, which is surrounded by a wall, has been declared World Heritage of the UNESCO. Each of the seven clans that used to live in this part of the town had its own district, of which each had a public place where festivals could be held. In the 1970s, the government built new houses outside of the old part of the town. However, many inhabitants return to the old part of the town during the summer, as its architecture provides better protection against the heat.

Houses in Ghadames are made out of mud, lime, and palm tree trunks with covered alleyways between them to offer good shelter against summer heat.

The first records about Ghadames exist not before the Roman period, when there were troops in the town from time to time. The Roman name for the town was Cydamus. During the 6th century, a Bishop lived in the oasis, after the population had been converted to Christianity by Byzantine missionaries. During the 7th century, Ghadames was ruled by the Muslim Arabs. The population quickly converted to Islam and Ghadames played an important role as base for the Trans-Saharan trade until the 19th century.