Seneca, Elder and Younger, ibn Hazm and Maimomides, or Reduce, Reuse and Recycle

It is Saturday, and we board the bus for Córdoba, birthplace of Roman, Muslim and Jewish philosophers, seat of Roman and then Muslim rule for Iberia.

Dark clouds hover over the olive orchards and rolling hills. A bull´s silhouette stands sentry over this stretch of highway. His enormous blackness towers over the hilltop. A billboard for liquor, it remains despite a nationwide ban on billboards, its text painted over, its iconic shape a promise, and for some, a threat. A few kilometres more, a black guitar points to the sky. Someone quips, "Buddy Holly," and my mind sees the familiar black frames, corraling the guitar.

Rain falls for a mile or two and then stops, only to start again as the miles click off. It stops again, and the sun bleaches the clouds to brilliant white, a luminous foil for ancient structures towering over the city. We arrive.

As we cross the Puente Romana (roman bridge) to reach the city center. the Rio Guadalquivir flows beneath, on its way to Sevilla and the Atlantic Ocean. I ask if people canoe or raft it but get an incomplete answer.



A towering monument to San Rafael greets all who cross the bridge. San Rafael, the patron saint of Córdoba, saves the town from earthquake in the 1800´s, a miracle worthy of this memorial.



And then, the Mezquita (mosque). Massive doors centered in arched frames of mosaic tile hint but do not give away the incredible architecture inside. A courtyard of trees, orange now (Spanish), palm before (Muslim), suggests its former use for Muslim pre-prayer abulations only in the network of irrigation channels that course through the laid stone to the trees. Fountains spout water into the channels, a drink against the hot Spanish sun.







Inside, an infinity of red and white double arches perched atop reclaimed and reused Roman marble columns. The story goes many ways, that the first caliph of the conquered Roman province bought this site of a former Roman/Christian church, or that the caliph simply razed the church and built the mosque on top. The mechanics of the story´s how fall away in the magnificent of the Mezquita. It is a quintessintial example of reduce, reuse and recycle, though the reduce has connotations more fitting for conquering than living green.







Marble floors, paved with reused Roman stone and sprinkled with inset headstones of Spanish notables, lead beneath the incredible arches and into the small family chapels that outline the perimeter of the vast space. Marble, brick, tile and plaster, a glorious assemblage of found architecture.



There are no corners,and there were no walls until the Reconquista, when Spain regains control of its peninsula. And then, in predictable but lamentable fashion, the Catholic Church remakes the Mezquita in its own image. It builds a soaring Gothic cathedral, complete with elaborate vaulted ceilings, gold leaf, painted frescoes and flying buttresses, in the middle of the Mezquita. History is nothing, if not incongruous. Incongruity has an order unto itself, a pattern that weave its way through a place, a people, a culture. Philosophers know this and explore its vagaries and its instances.







A few metres from the Mezquita, is an instance, vagaries swept aside through a culture narrowed by fear, greed, and power. Though heralded as a progressive city for its inclusiveness, its architecture often tells a different story. Tucked away one of many narrow, cobbled streets, the 14th-century synagogue stands. Its walled entry courtyard suggests a home, like any other found in Córdoba. The front door, however, opens into a prayer room complete with a women´s gallery. It is less than 550 square feet in size. The walls are covered with plasterwork in the Mudéjar style, intricate patterns incised into the carefully restored walls. People speak softly in deference to the small space, to the realization that the last prayers, the last Shabbat in this place of worship were in 1492. We leave. From across the narrow calle (street), morning prayers rain down, and we see glimpses of a tallit through the barred open window.



The limit of our four-hour visit speeds us to the Caliph´s Baths. Speed was of essence in the building of the Mesquita, for the care of the soul. The baths, of parallel importance for the care of the body and of business, showcase the skill of the Moors in harvesting and using water. Skilled plumbers, the Moors. And busy! A Moorish town was known for the number of its baths.



The church bells sound 3pm, and we return to Sevilla. Cristina is horrified that we give Córdoba only four hours. She insists that we go back for at least a full day. We promise ourselves, and her, to return.