Seville
There could be no better point of departure than Seville for an expedition to Spain and Morocco. Our morning walking tour began on the banks of the Guadalquivir, Arabic for “great river.” It continued with a visit to the Alcazares, the palace and gardens complex built by the Moors in the fourteenth century. Islamic architecture emphasizes interior space: enclosed courtyards and fountains, not rooms with a view. A religion that originated in the Arabian Desert placed high value on water and courtyard fountains are characteristic features. Ethereal plasterwork colonnades evoke Bedouin tents or the caves in which Mohammed sought refuge and the honeycomb that sustained him in his time of trial. A strict interpretation of the commandment against making graven images produced a uniquely beautiful tradition of geometric ceramic design and calligraphy. All these elements strangely satisfying to the early twenty-first century western mind, skeptical of intellect and sensuous of disposition, were on view today.
In contrast, Seville Cathedral, the largest Gothic church edifice in Europe and the next stop on our guided tour, is altogether more oppressive. Its erection in the late fifteenth century on the site of the former mosque was part of the triumphalism of the Reconquest that reached its climax with the fall of Granada in 1492. That year saw the expulsion of the Moors (and the Jews) from Catholic Spain, even as Columbus - one of whose tombs now occupies pride of place in the Cathedral – claimed a New World in the name of the Most Catholic rulers Castile and Aragon from this home port. Historians remind us that Columbus’ voyages of discovery would not have been possible without the Arab mathematical, trigonometrical, astronomical and navigational science of Moorish Spain.
Back outside the Cathedral, we paused to view the Cathedral’s bell tower, La Giralda, an emblem of the city, its curious name deriving from its gyroscopic weathervane. Originally that part of the mosque from which the muezzin called the faithful to Friday prayers, the structure was converted to a bell tower to serve the same function for the Catholics on Sunday. Aesthetically it works magnificently: the two traditions coming together to produce something greater than their component parts. Can we, in these troubled times, have the grace to do likewise?
There could be no better point of departure than Seville for an expedition to Spain and Morocco. Our morning walking tour began on the banks of the Guadalquivir, Arabic for “great river.” It continued with a visit to the Alcazares, the palace and gardens complex built by the Moors in the fourteenth century. Islamic architecture emphasizes interior space: enclosed courtyards and fountains, not rooms with a view. A religion that originated in the Arabian Desert placed high value on water and courtyard fountains are characteristic features. Ethereal plasterwork colonnades evoke Bedouin tents or the caves in which Mohammed sought refuge and the honeycomb that sustained him in his time of trial. A strict interpretation of the commandment against making graven images produced a uniquely beautiful tradition of geometric ceramic design and calligraphy. All these elements strangely satisfying to the early twenty-first century western mind, skeptical of intellect and sensuous of disposition, were on view today.
In contrast, Seville Cathedral, the largest Gothic church edifice in Europe and the next stop on our guided tour, is altogether more oppressive. Its erection in the late fifteenth century on the site of the former mosque was part of the triumphalism of the Reconquest that reached its climax with the fall of Granada in 1492. That year saw the expulsion of the Moors (and the Jews) from Catholic Spain, even as Columbus - one of whose tombs now occupies pride of place in the Cathedral – claimed a New World in the name of the Most Catholic rulers Castile and Aragon from this home port. Historians remind us that Columbus’ voyages of discovery would not have been possible without the Arab mathematical, trigonometrical, astronomical and navigational science of Moorish Spain.
Back outside the Cathedral, we paused to view the Cathedral’s bell tower, La Giralda, an emblem of the city, its curious name deriving from its gyroscopic weathervane. Originally that part of the mosque from which the muezzin called the faithful to Friday prayers, the structure was converted to a bell tower to serve the same function for the Catholics on Sunday. Aesthetically it works magnificently: the two traditions coming together to produce something greater than their component parts. Can we, in these troubled times, have the grace to do likewise?
