Is there a connection between Renaissance in Central Europe and the oriental world? To get on the bottom of that question one should have a closer look at Spain, especially at Andalucia and Cordoba.

Visitting Andalucia in spring can certainly become a quite pricey adventure. Cordoba’s entire hotel squad refused my room availability requests for one man and one night. The only exception was to book a double room at double cost or to spend at least 120 Euro when sleeping in a luxury 4 or 5 star hotel. Using a financial sledgehammer to crack that accomodation nut wasn’t on my mind, so I downgraded Cordoba from a one day stay to a none day stop. To boot three hours are enough to become familiar with the Mezquita, the actual reason why I wanted to stop in Cordoba.

The Mezquita in Cordoba is a really interesting building. Its basement has Visigothic-Christian roots, while later Abd ar-Rahman I. built a Damascene style, or better to say Omayyadic style mosque above that basement. After the Reconquista, the Christian reconquest, the Mezquita had been embellished and expanded while preserving its oriental character. Upon bishop Alonso Manrique’s request a huge Christian nave was integrated into the building. Due to that step the Mezquita became similar to Istanbul’s Hagia Sophia; to be an architectonic unicum and a witness of religions impact on architecture in the course of time.

When entering the Mezquita through the Puerta de las Palmas gate, you’ll instantly find yourself among the most known architectonic element of the building: the filigree forest of columns, whose treetops are red-white painted transverse arches. Walking through the almost quadratic Mezquita contraclockwise, visitors can see the building’s history the way it happened. The columns right after the entrance have Roman and Visigothic roots, while the arches made of yellow sandstone and red bricks are already going back to the Moors. Then soon the detailed and finely delftwared Mihrab, the alcove for prayers, comes into the foreground. The northern area of the Mezquita is the youngest, but also most sober part of the building. Here lots of architectonic and style elements are only a matter of paint anymore.

Early birds coming to the Mezquita before 10:00a.m. can get in for free. All others have to pay 8 Euros to enjoy that melange of Orient and Occident; a building that marries classic European Renaissance off to Middle Eastern attention to details. For me the travel went on to Malaga, to Algeciras, to do the classic ferry ride when crossing the Strait of Gibraltar to plunge into North Africa.

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Date: Apr 6th, 2008 · Comment RSS · Tags: Orient