Raseef22 tells, in Arabic, the story of Al-Qarawiyyin in Fez, Morocco, one of the oldest continuously working centres of learning in the world. Families from Kairouan settled in Fez under the Idrisid dynasty, and Fatima al-Fihriya, a woman who had inherited a fortune, paid for the building, which took about eighteen years. Later dynasties expanded it and endowed it with property.

Over the centuries it grew into a hub of religious and scientific study that drew scholars from across the Islamic world and Europe. For freethinkers the story upsets two easy assumptions at once: that higher learning was a European invention, and that women played no part in founding it.

Source: Mohamed Yousry, Raseef22 (Arabic) (2026-10-30)

Summarised by the FTI newsdesk.