Andalucia 2022 (4/9) – Cordoba: Capital of a Caliphate

1. Introduction
2. Sevilla: Cool Before Dorne Was Cool
3. Ceuta & Algeciras: Day Trip to Africa
4. Cordoba: Capital of a Caliphate
5. Granada: Memories of a K-Drama
6. Malaga: Bonus Content Day
7. Stuff We Ate
8. Stuff We Drank
9. Uncategorized Thoughts

A caliphate was a political-religious empire generally recognized as the rightful ruler of the global Muslim community. Four main caliphates succeeded one another in the 14 centuries of Islamic history after the death of prophet Muhammad. However, there were also self-proclaimed regional caliphates from time to time.

In the year 929, the emir of Cordoba Abd al-Rahman III decided that he was too cool to be limited by the title of his ancestors, and declared himself a caliph (think emperor vs. king). The Caliphate of Cordoba was born, a short-lived but glorious chapter in Al-Andalus’s history. As the owner of KingOfMath.com, I am quite fond of self-proclaimed royal titles, and was eager to check out this medieval city where trade and culture once flourished.

If the weather in Sevilla was a tiger, though, the weather in Cordoba would be a tiger with velociraptors as adopted parents.  The Internet told me it was the hottest city in all of Europe, which was hard to conceptualize until our standard for going out at night became “it’s now under 100 degrees so it’s good enough.”

The sun here was unforgiving, but we absolutely adored this third stop in Andalucia.  With a hotel just outside the Mezquita, we were immersed in a world made of yellow bricks.  Despite the massive tour groups (mostly from within Spain, including a lot of students on field trip) and generic souvenir stores, it was easy to make believe that we had been thrown back in time by a millennium.

Equestrian Show

We made detailed plans for seeing Cordoba, which did not include checking into a hotel with a large cardboard cutout advertising the equestrian show at the royal stable.  Well, guess what we did first in the city?  Deferring dinner to watch horses!  I was the one in the family least interested in horses, and was not cultured enough to fully appreciate the subtle ballet-like maneuvers these folks made their rides do, but it was quite an enjoyable experience.  Not only was it a fancy show of equestrian acrobatics, it also was a 9pm event that we were able to sit through without being baked to death.  Oh, and the price of admission was barely a movie ticket in the US, a steal for such a spectacular performance.

Mezquita-Catedral

The Mezquita-Catedral is the first mental image everyone should have for Cordoba, and the single site that I looked forward to the most on this trip.  Built mostly during the Caliphate of Cordoba, as the grand mosque in the capital of that dude with enough balls to self-upgrade his title, the Mezquita was both bigger and prettier than I had imagined.

Like everything else Moors in Andalucia, the Mezquita got the Christian treatment with some parts torn down and rebuilt after reconquista.  For 500 some years it’s been a cathedral.  Its inside walls are lined with Catholic iconography, and the minaret was retrofitted into a sky-scraping bell tower.  Nevertheless, the building is known today as the Mezquita… leaving out the “cathedral” part of the official “mosque-cathedral” name in casual mentions.  I find this aspect super fascinating throughout our trip, as Andalucian Spaniards proudly embraced their Islamic Moors heritage alongside their current Catholic identity.  If people rather than conquerors had the say, would Al-Andalus still be an active part of Iberia?

The Mezquita sat on a compound slightly larger than five American football fields. Around the whole thing were 3-story-tall walls that were both taller and thicker than many city walls we had seen. From the outside, it was a gigantic rectangular block and looked like the largest mud brick you had ever seen.

The inside of the Mezquita was defined by the columns topped with candy-cane-colored double arches that spanned the entire space. The original construction during the Emirate of Cordoba supposedly took advantage of existing Roman leftovers and added those arches on top to boost the ceiling height. Later expansions embraced this architectural mishmash, and this unique style got exported to other parts of the Muslim world. It’s sort of like how celebrities can get away with wearing whatever ugly outfit and turn it into a fashion trend. So, objectively? I’m not sure I’d call this design “pretty”. But knowing the significance it had to a religion, a culture, and a fascinating part of history, I was endlessly mesmerized.

Since the “Mezquita” had been a “Catedral”, there were a ton of Christian elements, too. However, with the exception of one odd-looking chapel, they mostly lined the walls and did not overly intrude on a whole lot of the interior. If anything, it looked like a mosque with exhibits of Christian artifacts.

The Bell Tower

Similar to its Sevillan counterpart, the minaret of this mosque got turned into a bell tower for the cathedral. For a separate (but nominal) admission, tourists could climb up the bell tower for a great view of the city. To that, we said, hell ya.

The administrators of these historic monuments had clear concerns for modern-day people who may not be able to handle tall structures without elevators. Both online and on site, there were warnings against old and unfit people attempting this climb. Children under 7 were explicitly prohibited. Ting was 7.5 by this point so we were in the clear, but she was also the size of four-year-old Caucasians so the ticket man was both skeptical and concerned. It turned out that the tower’s 188 steps were not a real challenge to anyone in our family, and we ascended it in a breeze (I’d use the expression “without breaking a sweat” if it wasn’t 100 degrees already).

Roman Bridge and Calahorra Tower

The Roman Bridge was named as such because it was a bridge dating back to the Roman times and had been part of a main thoroughfare in the Mediterranean world for millennia. As a tourist attraction, however, it was overrated. Its stone construction wasn’t particularly pretty or special. Even when Game of Thrones used it as a filming location for Volantis, it applied heavy CGI to make the bridge almost unrecognizable. Worse yet, the bridge was likely the longest stretch in Cordoba any tourist would encounter with no shade, a prime spot to get heat stroke.

Calahorra Tower was a large defensive structure on the opposite end of the Roman Bridge, built after the Almohads took over this city. It was fairly cool to look at from the outside, and its interior was now a museum of Andalucian history. We weren’t huge fans of history museums, but it had some really cool miniature models of buildings.

Puerta del Almodovar

The only remaining of old Cordoba’s 7 city gates, along with roughly 1,000 feet of wall to go with it. I loved it.

Alcazar de los Reyes Cristianos

Originally the residence of Cordoban emirs and caliphs, this site became the headquarters of the Catholic Monarchs as they campaigned toward Granada in 1482. Four years into that war, Christopher Columbus had his first pitch meeting with the Monarchs about sailing west. What I found most interesting about this Alcazar was that the current structure was mostly built by Castilian kings after reconquista, but it still used the Moorish style.

We were mostly indifferent about seeing this place, and it just happened that when we found a free morning, it was on a Monday when most attractions in Cordoba were closed. Still neat to see it from the outside, though.

Other Places

The scorching Cordoba sun limited our range of sightseeing, but we did manage to squeeze a few hours in and around the Jewish Quarter. Like its counterpart in Sevilla, it was a joy to get endlessly lost in the core part of this city.

A small synagogue in this neighborhood was among the top tourist attractions in this city. Like how the Mezquita hadn’t functioned as a mosque, this old place of worship also hadn’t been a synagogue for 500+ years. You gotta give it to the people of Spain, though, for preserving it and referring to it by its original function.

Inspired by seeing someone else do the same, we bought two loafs of bread to feed the ducks in the Guadalquivir. This was on the east side of the river, where the tourist-to-local ratio was the inverse of the Mezquita side, and businesses didn’t cater to English speakers. In my quest to buy bread, I unknowingly cut in line at a small grocery store, without taking a number, and made a total fool of myself not knowing how to say “bread” or specifying which kind. It was worth it, though, because it turned out to be one of the kids’ favorite things on this whole trip.

Hotel

Hotel Eurostars Maimonides, named after a Jewish philosopher and scientist who lived in Cordoba during the 12th century, was on the northwestern corner of the Mezquita and steps away from the Bell Tower. In terms of getting to and from the top attractions on an unbearably hot day, there was no better location. You could tell though that real estate here was a notch more expensive than Algeciras, because instead of a two-bedroom suite, we got four beds crammed into what appeared to be a room for two. It got a bit crowded during the long afternoon when we hibernated from the sun. This hotel did have a courtyard accessible to the guests, though, and we enjoyed a few games of Big 2 here before checking out.