The Moors in Northern Spain
visiting Arab sights in the north of the country
We think of the Moorish culture of Spain as limited to the south of the country and Andalusia. But the north is also full of Arab monuments and influence.
When you think of Moorish work in Spain, it’s the monuments of the south you’ll think of first – the Alhambra in Granada, the fine Giralda tower in Seville, the Great Mosque of Cordoba. Andalusia is the Arab heartland of Spain.
But the Moors ruled the country all the way up to Madrid, and beyond – in fact at one point they reached Narbonne, in France. Toledo and Segovia were both in Moorish hands for more than two centuries. And some of the greatest monuments of Islamic art in Spain are in the northern half of the country.
Zaragoza (Saraqustah in Arabic) has a monument that rivals both the Alhambra and the great Mosque of Cordoba. The Aljaferia, built about 1050, dates from the period of the independent taifa kingdoms – after the Cordoba caliphate that built the mosque, and before the Nasrid dynasty that built the Alhambra.
The fortified wall with its little round turrets doesn't feel Arabic – it’s more like the walls of Avila, a Christian redoubt. But inside, the lacy stucco designs and beautiful arcades leave you in no doubt that this is a Moorish palace. It continued in use as a royal palace for the Christian Kings of Aragon, who conquered Zaragoza in 1118 – but the mosque still survives. And the feeling of the palace, which despite the fortifications creates an effect of interlinked, translucent spaces, is entirely Moorish.
La Seo, the cathedral, is built on the site of a mosque, and betrays its roots in the mudéjar decoration of its external walls. But the thirteenth century ‘Arab baths’ are in fact probably Jewish.
Teruel, dramatically positioned on a rocky outcrop, is another fine mudéjar town. The cathedral boasts a thirteenth century painted wooden ceiling, including Arabic and Latin inscriptions as well as figures of kings and mythical beasts. It also shelters the romantic tomb of the doomed lovers of Teruel. This story of the Crusader who went east to make his fortune, and died of a broken heart when he heard his beloved had married, reminds us that cultural currents flowed in both directions – east to west, and west to east.
The church towers of Teruel are easily recognisable as minarets; the designs are like fair isle sweaters made of brick, with white dots enlivening the pattern. This is, in many ways, an Arab city made Spanish.
Toledo (the Arabic Tulaytela) was brought back under Christian control quite early, in 1085, yet retains two mosques and two synagogues. The Cristo de la Luz, a mosque before the mudéjar apse was added to turn it into a church, is a perfect cube, with nine rib vaults supported by four columns. The lesser known Mezquita de las Tornerias, nearer the centre of the city, is very similar.
Even after the reconquest Toledo supported a multicultural society. The church of San Roman, for instance, contains Arabic inscriptions as well as fine wall paintings of saints and bishops. And both the fine synagogues were built after the reconquest, by Muslim builders working for Jews in a Christian society. The Synagogue del Transito, built for rich Jew Samuel ha-Levi, is decorated with Arabic inscriptions as well as with the arms of Pedro the Cruel, who employed ha-Levi as his finance minister. The many mudéjar churches, with fine brickwork arches, also echo Toledo’s Moorish past.
Segovia (Siqqubiyah) is also an outpost of Arab civilisation. There’s fine mudéjar work in the Alcazar – the very name of the castle is Arabic, al Qasr, ‘the fortress’, though most of it is a nineteenth century reconstruction after a disastrous fire. The synagogue, also rebuilt after a fire, is similar to the synagogue of Santa Maria la Blanca in Toledo, though smaller, with horseshoe arches and sharply carved pine cone capitals. And the royal monastery of San Antonio, just outside the centre of the city, has a marvellous mudéjar ceiling and many fine works of art.
But perhaps you get the feeling of Arab Spain most strongly in the little barrio of San Lorenzo. The low half-timbered houses here are quite different from the stone built noble houses of the city; they were intended for mudejars, Arabs who stayed behind in Christian Spain and worked mainly in agriculture. The church has a horseshoe arch at the west end, and a mudéjar roof over the crossing.
And if you walk down a little path, away from the church, you’ll see the huertas, or market gardens, irrigated by a little channel just like the falaj or qanat systems of Arabia and North Africa. While it’s cultural splendours that attract most travellers to the Moorish monuments of Spain, it’s in front of this little water channel that you feel the presence of an Arab civilisation most strongly.
