The Mellah of Rabat is an ancient quarter surrounded by walls, with several accesses, formerly reserved for the Jews, who later deserted it. It is a kind of enclave with its own character in comparison with the other neighborhoods because of its atmosphere animated by merchants, street vendors and other activities scattered in its alleys swarming with shoppers. Before, Moroccan Jews built entire neighborhoods in the Mellahs. They baptized their streets in their own way by giving them their own family names. The Jewish quarter of the Mellah of Rabat is of recent creation, since it was only in 1808, under the reign of Sultan Moulay Slimane, that the Jews were forced to live in this quarter, reserved for them, above the cliffs overlooking the river Bouregreg.