Cordoba Mosque

Mosque of Cordoba

The Mezquita in Cordoba, Spain is one of the few peculiar buildings of the world. It is eccentric not in its exterior architecture but is unique in that it was once a Mosque and now houses a cathedral. It was converted from a mosque into a Christian cathedral in the year 1236.

The Moorish character of the mosque was altered in the 16th century with the erection in the interior of a central high altar and cruciform choir, numerous chapels along the sides of the vast quadrangle, and a belfry 90 meters high in place of the old minaret.

This Mezquita was once the second largest mosque in the world. This amazing mosque in Cordoba took more than 2 centuries to build. Construction started in 784 A.D. The original structure was built by the Umayyad ruler 'Abd ar-Rahman I in 784–786 A.D. with extensions in the 9th and 10th centuries that subsequently caused the mosque to double its initial size. The mosque was also once the site of Visigoth cathedral of St. Vincent’s.

Another peculiarity of the mosque was that the Mihrab does not point towards Mecca. The most probable explanation was that the mosque was built upon the foundations of previous Roman and Visigoth constructions. These original foundations were not aligned with Mecca. Hence, the Mihrab did not point toward to Mecca.

The interior of the Mosque is a visually stunning. As we can see from the photo above, this area of the mosque is full of thin pillars that support the building. There are 850 pillars in this hall. What makes it unique is that the arches are painted an alternate red and white. This makes it look like many Chupa Chups lollipops put together. As we can see from the picture below, that is what a Chupa Chup looks like. Doesn’t that resemble the picture of the mosque above?

Personally, I find this structure very refreshing. I do not understand why this hall was built in this manner though. One would think that if there was such a large hall available, one would not want to use pillars to make the hall look smaller. However, this was very much the case. This visual still keeps me wondering.

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