Old Continental Towns

by Walter M. Gallichan

The life was jocund, but sober, for the Moors abstained from wine. “The City of Cities,” “The Bride of Andalus,” are the names bestowed on the beautiful city of Cordova by the Moorish writers of that age.

In the twelfth century Abu Mohammed wrote of Cordova as “the Cupola of Islam, the convocation of scholars, the court of the sultans of the family of Omeyyah, and the residence of the most illustrious tribes of Yemen. Students from all parts of the world flocked thither at all times to learn the sciences of which Cordova was the most noble repository, and to derive knowledge from the mouths of the doctors and ulemas who flourished in its cultured life. Cordova was ‘to Andalus what the head is to the body.’”

The city once boasted of fifty thousand resplendent palaces, and a hundred thousand inferior houses. Its mosques numbered seven hundred, and the cleanly Moors built nine hundred public baths. The city stretched for ten miles along the banks of the Guadalquivir, flanked with walls, battlements, and towers, and approached by guarded gates. Throughout the world men spoke in veneration of its four great wonders—the immense and gorgeous mosque, the bridge over the Guadalquivir, the suburb city of Az-Zahra, and the sciences which were studied in the colleges.

Abderahman III. built a palace a few miles from the city, called Medinat-az-Zahra. It was named after the beautiful Zahra, one of the sultan’s mistresses. A figure of Zahra was carved over the chief gateway of this fairy city. Medinat-az-Zahra was a town rather than a royal residence. There was a splendid mosque upon the site; the suburb had colleges, baths and marts.

Forty years were spent in building this retreat for the caliph and his favourite. Upon the decoration of its buildings Abderahman spent large sums of money. El Makkari, the Arab historian, states that the columns of the buildings came from the east, and that the marble walls of the palace were shining with gold. The caliph even proposed to remove the dark background of hills, but instead the slopes were planted with fruit-trees.

This palace, one of the four great glories of the city, has vanished. The savage host of Berbers, in 1010, attacked Medinat-az-Zahra and burned it to the ground. The natives were slaughtered with fearful cruelty, even within the precincts of the mosque the pursuers cut them down. It is said that portions of the caliph’s palace were afterwards used in erecting the Convent of San Jerónimo, to the north-west of the city. At this time Cordova was assailed, its buildings burnt, much of its treasure was despoiled or carried away by the troops of Abd-l-Jabbar, the Berber leader.

There is one wonder that conquest has left unspoiled to Cordova, and one cannot survey the imperishable mosque of the caliph without veneration for the race that set an example to the world in virtue, culture, and the joy of beautiful living. It is to see this wonder of Moorish art that the stranger visits Cordova.

The way to the mosque (mezquita) is readily discovered, for every stranger is recognised by the street urchins who are eager in offering directions.

The first religious edifice upon this site was a Roman temple. In 786 the building of the Moorish mezquita was begun by the first Abderahman. The work was carried on by the next sultan, Hishem, and by Abderahman III. For more than two centuries the mosque grew in size and splendour, as each succeeding caliph added some new beauty.

The mosque is a magnificent example of Moorish architecture. Vast, massive, bewildering, and beautiful are not extravagant terms to use in describing this edifice. It is worth while to walk round the outside of the building to gain an impression of its vast size and the strength of its structure. Like all Moorish buildings the exterior is plain, with the fine primitive severity of Byzantine work. The interior structure is enclosed by walls of about fifty feet in height, buttressed, and very stout, with numerous towers. The bronze doors are of finest Moorish work. There is a handsome portal on the north side, built in the time of Hakam between 988 and 1000.