MOORS THE PITY

Simon Sebag Montefiore goes in search of his exotic relations and finds them in the city where Orson Welles filmed Othello

AFTER two lost centuries, there is no bet- ter place to begin the quest for one's long- lost Moorish family than the palace of Hassan II, King of Morocco. It is a labyrinth of heavily guarded, elaborately decorated mansions that bear an unfortu- nate resemblance to a golfing-casino leisure complex with an Eastern theme.

I had travelled to Morocco to learn if the Moorish Sebags, once trans-Saharan traders, still existed, and if slaves still toiled mid-Sahara in Mauritania. If I wished to find the Sebags, the Casablanca Jewish community informed me, I must start at the King's court because the most powerful counsellor to this Moslem King is a Jewish banker from the same town as my family arguably came from — Essaouira. In a neo-absolute monarchy like Morocco, where possession of the King's ear is power itself, royal counsellors are more powerful than Cabinet ministers, I telephoned the King's eminence grise, Andre Azoulay, counsellor to His Majesty: 'I know precisely who you are a piece of Moroccan history. I can help you. I'd be fascinated to meet you. Please present yourself at the palace this after- noon at three o'clock. Au revoir, Mon- sieur Sebag.' Royal security was tight at the palace which is effectively the seat of Moorish government: the Prime Minister and royal counsellors work where the King lives. The ceremonial guards wear splendidly exotic uniforms. Azoulay's chief secretary led us into an anteroom where we were waited on by young royal squires, in red fezzes and white robes, who serve the King and all his men.

A squire showed me into Azoulay's office. He was a fastidious, grey-haired gentleman in his late fifties with a cropped grey moustache. He spoke with a French accent, his suits were tailored in London and he was an ex-director of Paribas in Paris. His air was redolent of the lost cos- mopolitan world of haute banque. This charming Jewish potentate at the court of a Moslem monarch took us back to the golden age of Moses Maimonides when many advisers to the prince of Moorish Spain were Jews. In the Sixties, Azoulay was a left-wing opponent of King Hassan. 'Indeed, His Majesty saw fit to arrest me and place me in jail,' said the cultured ex-banker, trying to sound grateful for this honour. 'But His Majesty does not bear grudges and later appointed me his counsellor. This is not unusual for Morocco.' Azoulay has also played a fascinating secret role for his pro- Western king in the PLO-Israeli peace process: 'I talked to Arafat, Rabin and Peres frequently at that time, organising and attending secret meetings for the King. . . . The peace is dangerously strained. But it will survive. It must.'

A squire brought in tea in silver teapots. `I lost the thread of your family long ago — tell me the story.'

When the Sebags arrived in London, they sported Arab names and Moorish cos- tumes but they swiftly transformed them- selves into English banker squires with an unJewish taste for hunting. Joseph Sebag, who founded an eponymous stockbroker's, was Sir Moses Montefiore's nephew and became his heir. In 1864, that English baronet travelled to Morocco to intercede with His Shereefian Majesty the Sultan about the rights of Jews and the conditions in Essaouira. After that, silence until now.

I was always proud of my Moorish antecedents in the romantic 18th-century fortress port of Essaouira. Like Algiers and Tunis, it is a jewel of the Barbary Coast, a mercantile entrep6t especially built by the then Crown Prince, later Mohommed III. Amongst the Jews he settled there were the Sebags of Marrakesh who rose to become the Tajir al-Sultan — the Sultan's Mer- chants. The main trade was with England and America and across the desert to Tim- buktu: ivory, gold, silver, ostrich feathers and slaves. Azoulay had an 18th-century Essaouiran map behind his desk. His wife was the author of a book on the town. I asked if the King appreciated his Jewish subjects.

`Very much. He knows history well. In fact, His Majesty knows all the Jewish festi- vals and congratulates me on them. Recently, he awarded me a medal in public which no Jew has ever received,' said Azoulay.

`We are glad you have returned. If you need any laissez-passers, I shall ease your voyage. There are few Jews remaining in Essaouira — but there may be a Sebag. Ask for antiques. . . . '

One last question: Did the King ever joke about throwing you into jail years ago?'

`Naturally. His Majesty has a fine sense of humour.'

Nothing had prepared me for the beau- tiful magnificence of my home town of Essaouira (once called Mogador). The sea shimmered and the sun beat down on 18th-century ramparts, forts and towers supposedly designed by French architects; famous as the set for Orson Welles's Oth- ello and inspiration of Jimmy Hendrix. The few Westerners in town appeared to be elegant French boulevardiers.

There was only one Sebag in the tele- phone directory — Nissim Sebag — but someone sensitively informed me that he was dead. I walked through the town, ask- ing: 'Vous connaissez les Sebags?' The Moors nodded enthusiastically: `Sebagh? Follow me!' They pronounced it with a guttural ending. I was passed from Moor to Moor shouting down little alleys, `Sebag! Sebag!' Heads appeared, jabbering out of high windows, fingers pointed in the baroque maze. Finally, I was pushed into a little shop filled with furniture and jewels. A plump and swarthy dandy with a scarf around his neck greeted me.

`Sebag, I presume?'

`I am Joseph Sebag.'

`I am Simon Sebag.'

My long-lost cousin was a cool customer with a sly but warm smile, a soft, feline voice and a subtle sense of mischief. I liked him immediately. His shop was Essaouira's best, a Magreb treasure-chest.

`You're a descendant of the Sebags who left Essaouira to go to England long ago? Then we're surely related,' he said in per- fect French-accented English.

If my ancestors had not left for London, then I could be Joseph Sebag. How rarely we get the chance to go back two centuries and actually see what might have been. Joseph, known as Jojo, son of Nissim, had recently returned to live with his mother in Essaouira and ran his shop — though he had grand plans. He was 35 and had trav- elled the world making, then losing, small fortunes. Jojo was attended at all times by Said, a manservant-bodyguard 'who has been with the Sebag family forever'.

`My next scheme is to found a super- market in a Polish town I know well. I have many girlfriends there,' at which he produced photographs of voluptuous, scantily clad, snub-nosed Polish peasant girls of some beauty.

Jojo, attended by Said, showed me round the dilapidated Jewish Quarter. `Many Jews left?'

`Only four. Two Sebags. So you might say we are the majority of the minority.'

When we were walking around the walls, Jojo said, 'This reminds me of that film, Twins. Two lost relatives meet again: Arnold Schwarzenegger and Danny De Vito.' `Which am I?'

`You're Schwarzenegger. I'm De Vito.'

Jojo invited us for a Jewish meal with his mother, an old lady who speaks only Ara- bic and Hebrew. The Sebag apartment was comfortable, airy, finely decorated with paintings and ancient Jewish scrolls. After Jojo had said the Jewish blessing `to the fruit of the vine' we drank Pernod.

Afterwards, he took me to the old Jew- ish cemetery. It was the loveliest cemetery I have ever seen: the crowded, Hebrew- engraved graves had a poignant, noble simplicity. Waves crashed against rocks only feet away from the remains of mer- chants who traded across oceans. The cemetery was a village of dead Sebags. It was from here, beside the Atlantic, in this exotic entrep6t in faraway Morocco, that I came.

Jojo knew all the foreigners who lived in Essaouira. He was proud of his friends, so we were taken to drinks with a series of elegant, wealthy, French designers in their immaculate mansions, crowded with trea- sures. There was lots of talk of Saint Lau- rent, the Comte de Paris, and did I know the Giscard d'Estaing and isn't Prince Murat vulgar — what do you expect from Bonapartist creations? I felt I was in a newly discovered manuscript of the unknown Moorish novel from Proust's A la Recherche.

Sebag was an enthusiast for his town, his country and his King but he would not dis- cuss the socio-sexual habits of these for- eigners. know nothing about that. But Essaouira's the most beautiful town in Morocco!' However, he enjoyed puncturing Essaouiran myths: 'Jimmy Hendrix was only here for half an hour and unconscious for most of that.... '

But when I was on my own, the locals and foreigners boasted repeatedly, 'Non, mon cher, Tangiers is finished, Essaouira is Europe's new gay capital! Oh, the cruising here!'

What a thing to be told minutes after weeping at the graves of my ancestors! But history has a wicked sense of humour.

Before I left, I bought jewels at Jojo's fascinating emporium.

`Is this ring gold from Tuareg tribes?'

`Of course!' Jojo hesitated, then joked, `Actually, no. Since you're family, it is brass from Thailand!'

As we set off for the wilderness of Span- ish Sahara and Mauritania to find slaves, I embraced my cousin: `Visit London's Sebags!'

`Or else we can meet my mistresses in Gdansk!' Then seriously he added, 'If you have any problems in the 2,000 miles from here to Mauritania, call. send Said with money and medicine! He will come!' There is nothing like family.

Simon Sebag Montefiore, Sunday Times journalist, presents Travels with my Camera — In Search of Slaves on 1 December at 8 p.m. on Channel 4.