Córdoba

Yesterday's excursion to historic Córdoba, a few hours north of Sevilla, was enlightening and eye-opening. Córdoba was once one of the most important cities (along with Damasco, Baghdad and Constantinople), as it was the capital of the Muslim world from the 8th to the 11th century. When the Muslim tribes invaded Spain in 711, they built a beautiful Mezquita Mayor ("main mosque") in their capital city.

The mosque is truly unique - the original had 1013 columns and, as you can see on the left, superimposed arches alternating between brick and rock. Most of the columns were extracted from various Roman sites, so they date back to the first century. In its original state, you would have been able to see from one corner to the other and walk through a forest of red and white arches. But that perspective has now been interrupted, as only 800 of the outer columns remain to complement a Catholic cathedral built right in the center.

Today this mosque, a forest of candycane arches, functions as a Catholic cathedral (though most still refer to it as the Córdoba Mezquita). In the 13th century King Fernando III of Castilla and his troops invaded, reconquered Córdoba for the Christians, and expelled the greater part of the Muslim and Jewish community to ghettos. Shunned from their homeland, many Muslim and Jewish aristocrats and thinkers emigrated to places like Granada or Northern Africa, leaving most of the poorer community to live in ghettos and provide labor for the Christian king (i.e. destroy their mosques and build cathedrals on top of the ruins).

Below you can see part of the Baroque cathedral of Córdoba, built in the 16th century, with the red arches of the mosque in the background. While it is an amazing building, I must say that it was quite a shock to see such ornate Christian architecture alongside the simplicity of the mosque's red and white arches. But maybe that is why it is such a cool place - the mixture of architecture is indicative of a greater mixture of cultures as Spain passed from Muslim hands into its long Catholic reign.


There is a neat anecdote our tour guide told us that shows the irony. The story goes like this: After the reconquest of Córdoba, the bishop wanted to build a cathedral directly where the mosque stood, but the people of the town rejected it, insisting that this mosque was something unique from the Muslim reign that should be indelibly left untouched. The bishop went directly to King Carlos V, who immediately approved the destruction of the mosque, thinking it was like every other of the 300 mosques the Catholics had destroyed in Córdoba following the reconquest. Then, Carlos V and his queen wed in Sevilla, and took their honeymoon in Córdoba so he could see the wondrous cathedral being constructed in his name. When he saw it, he uttered some words that are still very famous in Spain to this day. He said that if he had seen what they wanted to destroy to build this cathedral, he would not have approved its construction - 'you have destroyed something very unique to build something that, while undoubtedly magnificent, could have easily been constructed in another place.'

So that is the legacy of the Córdoba mosque-cathedral. The irony is, although the cathedral in the center stands as a symbol of conquest and domination, the construction of the cathedral is also probably the only reason that the mosque still stands today. It both destroyed and conserved the mosque for future generations. I for one am glad it did not end up like one of those 300 other mosques...