The Kasbah of the Udayas is a kasbah

Kasbah

A kasbah or qassabah is a type of medina, Islamic city, or fortress .It was a place for the local leader to live and a defense when a city was under attack. A kasbah has high walls, usually without windows. Sometimes, they were built on hilltops so that they could be more easily defended...

 in Rabat

Rabat

Rabat , is the capital and third largest city of the Kingdom of Morocco with a population of approximately 650,000...

, Morocco

Morocco

Morocco , officially the Kingdom of Morocco , is a country located in North Africa. It has a population of more than 32 million and an area of 710,850 km², and also primarily administers the disputed region of the Western Sahara...

 located at the mouth of the Bou Regreg river opposite of Salé. It was built during the reign of the Almohads.
When the Almohads had captured Rabat

Rabat

Rabat , is the capital and third largest city of the Kingdom of Morocco with a population of approximately 650,000...

 and destroyed the kasbah of the Almoravids

Almoravids

The Almoravids were a Berber dynasty of Morocco, who formed an empire in the 11th-century that stretched over the western Maghreb and Al-Andalus. Their capital was Marrakesh, a city which they founded in 1062 C.E...

 in the town, they began reconstructing it in AH 544 / AD 1150. They added a palace and a mosque and named it al-Mahdiyya, after their ancestor al-Mahdi Ibn Tumart

Ibn Tumart

Abu Abd Allah Muhammad Ibn Tumart was a Berber religious Muslim scholar, teacher and later a political leader from the Masmuda tribe federation. He founded the Berber Almohad dynasty. He is also known as El-Mahdi in reference to his prophesied redeeming...

.
After the death of Yaqub al-Mansur (AH 595 / AD 1199) the kasbah was deserted.

Reign of the Almohads

The Almohads brought significant changes to the Rabat area, including the destruction and rebuilding of the Kasbah of the Udayas and turning Chellah into a royal necropolis

Necropolis

A necropolis is a large cemetery or burial ground, usually including structural tombs. The word comes from the Greek νεκρόπολις - nekropolis, literally meaning "city of the dead"...

.

World Heritage Status

This site was added to the UNESCO

UNESCO

The United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization is a specialized agency of the United Nations...

 World Heritage Tentative List on July 20, 2006 in the Cultural category.