Quote from the UNESCO website: "Founded in the 11th-12th centuries to serve caravans crossing the Sahara, these trading and religious centers became important centers of Islamic culture. They managed to preserve the urban development that developed in the 12th-16th centuries. Usually, houses with courtyards were concentrated along narrow streets surrounding a mosque with a square minaret, all illustrating a typical way of life based on the nomadic culture of the peoples of Western Sahara."
We began our acquaintance with the fortified part of Ouadan from the new mosque (relatively new, it is also several hundred years old) and gradually descended to the old mosque, around which the city was formed. Many houses in the city are very well preserved, only roofs made of palm "croaker" are almost gone.