THE grandeur of Cordoba, like the effect of stage scenery, ceases on a near inspection. The city, as has already been noticed, stands in the midst of a vast plain, bounded by ranges of distant mountains; but, on entering within the gates, the prospect of the smiling valley and darkly wooded sierras is altogether excluded, and, in exchange, the traveller finds his view confined to the white-washed walls of the low and poverty-stricken houses that line the narrow, crooked, jagged streets of the once proud capital of the Abdalrahmans.

From the painful glare of this displeasing contrast, the eye in vain seeks relief by turning towards the winding GuadalquivÍr; for, the bridge once passed, not a glimpse of its dark blue current can be obtained from any part of the city.

There is a suburb of some extent on the southern bank of the river; but the city, properly so called, is altogether situated on the opposite side. An old Saracenic castle, modernised and kept in a defensible state, interdicts the approach to the bridge, which edifice is also a work of the Moors. It is a solid structure of sixteen irregular arches, 23 feet in width, and 860 in length. Its erection is usually attributed to the Caliph Hassim (son of the first Abdalrahman), towards the close of the eighth century; and, according to Florez, that enlightened sovereign was himself the planner and director of the work. I can see no reason to doubt this respectable authority, although some English writers have stated the bridge to be of Roman construction. It is very possible that the present edifice may have been raised on an old foundation, though the bridge built by the Romans is generally supposed to have been higher up the river.

The summer stream of the GuadalquivÍr scarcely warrants its being distinguished by so grandiose a name as the Great River—Guad-al Kibeer, for its volume of water is but small, and, from being led off into numerous irrigating conduits and mill-races, is reduced to so inconsiderable a current that, during nine months of the year, the greater part of the river’s wide sandy bed is left perfectly dry.

Some of the mills “below bridge” are Moorish, and very picturesque; as are also the crenated, ivy-clustered towers of the city walls overhanging the river. On the right bank of the stream, above the bridge, a handsome quay is (1833) constructing; but, as the “great river” is navigable only for small boats, the sum expended on this costly work appears to be an absolute waste of money, which ought rather to have been laid out in sinking a channel, so as to render the river practicable for barges and trading vessels down to Seville. If this were done—and it was effected to a certain extent by the French, during their occupation of the country from 1810 to 1812—a quay would soon be constructed from the profits arising from the increased commerce of the place. But the Spaniards generally begin things at the wrong end, and in this, as well as most of their projects, they might derive great advantage from the study of Mrs. Glasse’s well known recipe for making hare soup, beginning, “first catch a hare.”

The precise date of the foundation of Cordoba is unknown. By Strabo, who calls it the first colony of Roman citizens established in Boetica, it is attributed to Marcellus, but which individual of that name is meant it would be difficult to determine. It must, however, have been founded very soon after the Romans obtained possession of Spain, since the city is mentioned by Appian in the war of Viriatus, as well as by Polybius in the expedition of Marcus Claudius against the Lusitanians. We may suppose, therefore, that it was built by the Romans, to secure their dominion over the country on the expulsion of the Carthagenians, that is, about 200 years before the Christian era.

By Hirtius, Cordoba is spoken of as the capital of the country at the period of Julius CÆsar’s second visit to Spain; and, from that time, it seems ever to have been a rich and powerful city, and the residence of many noble Roman families. But the most glorious epoch in the annals of Cordoba dates from the arrival of the renowned Abdalrahman, sole surviving male descendant of Mohammed in the Ommiad line, who, being forced to seek shelter from the enemies of his race in the deserts of Africa, was called over to Spain, became sovereign of the country, and, fixing his residence at Cordoba, assumed the title of Caliph of the West, A.D. 755.

Abdalrahman repaired, strengthened, and extended the walls with which the Romans had already encircled the city; built a splendid palace, and commenced the celebrated mosque; and, during his long reign, so firmly did he establish his sway over the rest of Spain, as even to force a tribute from the hardy descendants of Pelayo, entrenched within the wild recesses of the Asturian mountains.

The western caliphs continued to exercise great power for upwards of two centuries, and, indeed, the prosperity of Cordoba was at its acmÉ during the reign of Abdalrahman III., who flourished in the middle of the tenth century. The days of its glory ceased, however, with the life of Mohammed Almanzor, the celebrated vizier of the weak Hassim II., A.D. 998; and, not long afterwards, the caliphat of Cordoba finished, and several small kingdoms were founded on its ruins.

The kingdom of Cordoba, in its diminished and enfeebled state, continued to exist until A.D. 1236, when its proud capital fell an easy conquest to Ferdinand III. of Castile, who, to merit the saintly title which Spanish history has conferred upon him, drove the turbaned inhabitants from their homes, and rendered the beautiful city a wilderness of brick and mortar.

Cordoba never recovered the effects of this cruel and impolitic act; and its population, which, during the caliphat, is reputed to have amounted to upwards of a million of souls, at no after period reached a tenth, and can now, at the utmost, be estimated at a twentieth part of that number.

The circumvallation of the city is still very perfect, and embraces a considerable space; but many parts of the enclosure are not built upon, and the houses generally are low and but thinly inhabited. The once flourishing trade of the place is now confined to some trifling manufactures of leather, called Cordovan, which ill deserves the celebrity it even yet enjoys.

We took up our abode at the Posada del Sol, than which a more wretched place of accommodation, either for man or beast, the sun never shone upon. Nevertheless, it was represented to us as being (and I believe at that time was) the only eligible lodgment for Hidalgos which the city contained.[235] One advantage it did hold out, however, namely, that of being immediately in front of the great and only lion of the place, the famed cathedral, or Mezquita, as it still continues to be called.

This remarkable pile has evidently been raised upon the ruins of some gothic edifice, which again is generally supposed to have stood upon the site of a yet more ancient Roman temple of Janus.

The Mezquita, in fact, may be said to be made up of the reliques of those two nations, its architecture alone being Moorish. It was finished by Hassim (son of Abdalrahman, its founder), towards the close of the eighth century; but subsequent caliphs made great additions to it.

The exterior of the building is extremely gloomy and unprepossessing; its dark and windowless walls, and low engrailed parapets, giving it the appearance of a prison, rather than of a place of worship. The horse-shoe arches over the doors are nevertheless well worthy of notice, and the principal gate is covered with bronze plates of most exquisite workmanship. Of the four and twenty entrances that formerly gave admission to the holy shrine of the prophet’s descendant, but five are now open, which may in some degree account for the gloom that pervades the interior.

Never did the feeling of astonishment so completely take possession of my senses, as on first entering this most extraordinary edifice. You step at once from the hot and sun-bleached street into a cool and sombre enclosure, of vast extent, which has not inaptly been likened to a forest of marble pillars; and, indeed, to carry out the simile, the arches, springing in all directions from these polished stems, present a vaulted covering which, at first sight, appears as complicated in its construction, as even a forest canopy of nature’s own formation. One soon discovers, however, that the thickly planted pillars are aligned so as to divide the dark interior into regular avenues or aisles, and that the arches springing from and connecting each column with the four adjacent pillars (thus spanning both the main and transverse intercolumniations) form arcades, extending the whole length and breadth of the building. These arches are mostly of the Moorish, or horse-shoe form, but some few are of the pointed gothic, and seem to me to be the remains of a building of more ancient date than the time of the Moors.

The interior of the mosque is nearly a square, its dimensions being 394 English feet from east to west, and 356 from north to south. But on attentive examination it becomes evident that the side which, correctly speaking, must now be considered the width of the mosque, was originally its length, an addition having been made on its eastern side, which has given it greater extent in that direction than in the other, so that its original interior dimensions were 356 feet from north to south (the same as at present), but only 240 feet from east to west.

This space was divided by ten lines of columns into eleven aisles, extending north and south through the building; the centre avenue, which was directed straight from the great gate of entrance to the Maksurah, or sanctuary, situated in the middle of the south wall of the mosque, being (as it continues to this day) two feet wider than the others. Each of these ten rows contained thirty-one columns, placed about ten feet apart, from centre to centre; but they did not extend the whole length of the building, a small space at the south end being partitioned off for the apartments of the Imans.

By the addition which was afterwards made to the Mosque, (doubtless rendered necessary by the increasing veneration with which it came to be regarded) it gained 154 feet in width, and eight aisles were added to the eleven already formed; and, as no part of this was reserved, it required thirty-four columns in each row to fill up the space. These, however, were not throughout placed so as to align transversely with those of the original portion of the building; which circumstance has probably occasioned the discrepancies observable in the accounts given of this singular building by different writers. Swinburne, whose descriptions are generally very accurate, has fallen into error by stating that the mosque was divided into but seventeen aisles, having apparently overlooked the fact, that an avenue on each side has been taken off since it became a Christian church, for the erection of chapels dedicated to the divers saints of the Cordoban Calendar.

The mosque may, therefore, be considered as having formerly been divided longitudinally into nineteen principal aisles or avenues of columns, and transversely into thirty-five. But it is to be observed that the line of columns which marks the division between the old and modern parts of the building differs from the rest; being rather a series of clusters of pillars (four in each pier), than isolated columns: and two similar lines divide the interior also, transversely; so that in making a calculation of the number of columns it formerly contained, these must be duly taken into the account; and it will then be found that the total number did not fall far short of the thousand it is rumoured to have contained.

Although, as I have observed, the cross alignments of the columns in the old and new portions of the building do not exactly correspond, yet in some parts of the interior the arrangement of them is so perfect, that the spectator looks down eight avenues from the spot where he stands; four being at right angles with the walls of the building, the other four bisecting these, and extending diagonally across the mosque.

The columns are of polished jasper, marble porphyry, and granite, and offer as much variety in their architectural as in their geological character; some rising doric-like from the pavement, others resting on low bases; many swelling in the shaft in the early style of the Egyptians, and some few ascending spirally, bespeaking the vitiated taste of the middle ages. Many are capped with Corinthian, others with grotesque, and some with purely Gothic, capitals.

All these varieties of colour, shape, and ornament, have, after a time, a displeasing effect; but on first entering the building the spectator’s attention is so riveted by the novelty of its character, and the vastness of its dimensions, that these violations of the prescribed rules of taste are overlooked.

The columns, which are mostly eighteen inches in diameter, rise only nine feet above the pavement; and even with the additional height of their capitals, and of the arches springing from them, the roof is elevated but thirty-five feet above the floor; a height totally disproportioned to the extent of the building. On advancing further into the interior, however, this defect is less conspicuous; for the roof is found to be there raised in a singular manner—in steps, as it were—by a second series of horse-shoe arches, that spring from square pillars raised on the columns which support the lower arches; and thus—the space between the two series of arches being left open—forming a kind of double arcade, of a peculiarly light and fanciful kind.

In different parts of these raised portions of the roof, small cupolas are erected, which admit the only light that the interior receives. The distribution of light is, consequently, very unequal. But the effect produced is remarkably well suited to the character of the building; as the partial gleams of sunshine thus scattered throughout the complicated architecture of the roof, by gradually diminishing in strength as the long lines of columns recede from view, leaves them at last in a distant gloom, which makes the avenues appear interminable.

The appearance of the interior is much spoilt by the erection of an enormous Gothic choir, in the very centre of the building; for it intercepts the view of nearly one half the columns, (the long vistas between which constitute the great beauty and wonder of the place) and offers nothing to compensate for the injury thus inflicted but some carved wood-work, representing subjects taken from the Scriptures, executed by one Pedro Cornejo. The life of the artist is said to have been miraculously preserved until the very day on which he had completed his pious undertaking. This Gothic pile was erected so late as the time of Charles the Fifth, who seems to have taken a pleasure in disfiguring every thing Moorish that his predecessors had not laid their intolerant hands upon.

When in its pristine state, despite all its sins against good taste, the interior of the Mezquita must have presented a superb coup d’oeil. The roof, composed of wood, and wonderfully well put together, was richly painted and gilt; the walls were covered with elaborate stuccoes, and the floor was paved with gaudy mosaics. But of all this splendour little now remains. The all-destroying hand of Time has long since robbed the vaulted aisles and graceful cupolas of their brilliant tints; the not less destructive hand of Bigotry has stript the walls of their tasteful arabesques and inscriptions; and to the fragile mosaic pavement the change from slippers to shoes has been equally fatal; for, excepting here and there, round the foot of some column, scarcely a fragment of the bright glazed tiles with which it was originally laid can now be discovered, amidst the bricks of which it is composed, and dust with which it is covered.

From this sweeping destruction one small recess has most fortunately been preserved, to afford the means of judging what the whole must have been in its original state. This little compartment is situated at the south end of the mosque, near the sanctuary, and must have been included within the portion of the building set apart for the Imans. It was brought to light only in 1815, by the removal of some bookshelves and a slight brick wall, which had, probably, been put up purposely to screen it from the eyes of the superstitious multitude, and save it from mutilation. By the Spaniards it is called the Chapel of the Moorish Kings. Within it was found a tomb, containing the sword, spurs, and bones, of one of the principal chieftains who accompanied San Fernando to the siege of Cordoba, and at whose request, we were told, this beautiful little nook has been permitted to retain its Mohammedan decorations. In lightness and elegance of design it equals any portion of the Alhambra, and from its high state of preservation may be looked upon as the best specimen of Moorish workmanship extant. Indeed, it would be difficult to imagine any thing more beautiful of its kind, such is the perfection of its mosaic pavement, the sharpness of the fretwork and brilliancy of the colouring on its walls, and the dazzling splendour of the gilt stalactites pendant from its roof.

Adjoining this invaluable little casket is the maksourah, or, as it is called by the Spaniards, el zancarron[236] (the heel-bone): a name which favours the supposition that it was the place of burial of the founder or finisher of the mosque, rather than the sanctuary of the Koran, as is generally supposed, although, indeed, it might have been both.

The architecture and ornaments of this sanctum differ from those of the rest of the mosque, being even yet more complicated and richly finished; but it is by no means in so good a state of preservation as the recess just described. The face of the arch that spans the entrance of the zancarron is elaborately worked in crystals of various hues, and encompassed with moral precepts from the Koran. The interior is an octagon, only fifteen feet in diameter, and is domed over by a single block of white marble, carved into the form of a scollop-shell. Another huge slab of the same material forms its floor.

The shrine of the caliph, descendant of the prophet, probably occupied the centre of this recess; round which the feet of the numberless pilgrims who visited the holy place have worked a groove in the hard marble. It is situated now towards the south-west angle of the building, but in the original mosque it stood, as I have already stated, exactly in the centre of its south wall, facing the grand entrance. On each side were the apartments of the Imans; and in front, extending east and west, across the building, a space of the width of two intercolumniations was set apart as a chancel or mikrab, wherein the officiating priests performed their mysterious ceremonies before the people, to whom different portions of the rest of the building were appropriated, according to their rank in life.

At the north end of the mosque is a spacious court, encompassed on three sides by an open colonnade, and furnished with copious fountains. Here, when occasion required, the Mussulmans purified their bodies by ablutions ere entering the holy place, and, leaving their slippers under the arcades, proceeded barefoot to the shrine of Mohammed’s descendant, making divers prostrations in the course of their short journey.

This court, now called the Patio de los Naranjos,[237] is the same width as the mosque, and adds 200 feet to its length; making the exterior dimensions of the building 574 (English) feet from north to south, and 416 from east to west.

From the north wall of the court rises the campanilla, or belfry, from the summit of which a fine view is obtained of the city. Beneath it is an archway of more recent date than the mosque, called the Gate of Mercy, through which a flight of steps leads from the street into the court. This gate faces the principal entrance into the Mezquita.

The cathedral is rich in silks, jewels, candlesticks, and brocades; and the altar of the chapel of Villa Viciosa is splendidly furnished.

The sacristy contains also some tolerable paintings, said to be by Murillo, and other first-rate Spanish artists, but I doubt whether any of them are originals; for the French, who have a nice discrimination in these matters, twice sacked the city, and were on both occasions so little expected, that the priests had barely time to carry off the plate, and reliques of the churches, to places of greater security. Besides which, the Spaniards are prone to call every black, tarnished old painting a Murillo or a Velasquez.

The bishop’s palace is an immense, and rather handsome pile, standing a little removed from the cathedral, towards the river. The very face of it shows, however, that of late years the prelates have appropriated the revenues of the see to some other, perhaps more legitimate, though less orthodox, purpose, than that of setting their house in order, for it is in a very neglected state. The interior, which is not better looked after, exhibits, in an eminent degree, that mixture of splendour and misery so conspicuous in all things Spanish. A spacious, costly, and particularly dirty marble staircase ascends to the first floor, whereon are the state apartments; they consist of a suite of long, narrow, whitewashed rooms, communicating one with another the whole extent of the building, and each furnished with a prodigious number of shabby old chairs, an antediluvian sofa, and some daubs of paintings in poverty-stricken gilt frames.

The principal apartment, or sala de la audienca, is hung with portraits of all the goodly persons who have worn the episcopal mitre of Cordoba, from the days of San Damaso (who flourished about the middle of the third century) to the present time. Some of these paintings have much merit; but, if they are likenesses of those for whom they were drawn, a disciple of Lavater or Spurzheim must either abandon his faith, or admit that most of the beetle-browed, low-crowned originals, deserved a gibbet rather than a bishop’s cap. Nevertheless, several of these peculiarly “ill-favoured” ecclesiastics are—so our conductor solemnly assured us—now saints in heaven.

One old gentleman, who was not exalted to the episcopal see until he had attained a very advanced age, by way of giving a sarcastic reproof to his patron, had his portrait taken, with a grim figure of death placing the mitre on his head. Another painting represents death holding the mitre in one hand, whilst with the other he is directing a dart at his victim’s breast; leaving us to infer, that the bishop died whilst the pope’s diploma was yet on its way to him from Rome.

At the head of the bench is suspended a very good painting, and admirable likeness, of the truly amiable Pius VII.; and over the fireplace hangs an execrable daub, but an equally striking resemblance, of the detestable Ferdinand VII.

The most noble part of the episcopal palace is the kitchen; which, whether the bishop be at his residence or not, daily furnishes food for 2000 poor persons.[238]

The garden is laid out with taste, and contains some rare transatlantic plants.

There is little else worth noticing in Cordoba. The king’s palace is not occupied; the royal stud-house, where, in former days, the best breeds of Spanish horses were reared, is empty; the fine alameda, outside the city gates, is unfrequented; there is not a handsome street, I may almost say an edifice, in the place; and idleness, penury, and depravity, meet one at every step.

The market is held in the Plaza Real, or de la Constitucion (the name varying according to circumstances), and the houses encompassing it, like those in the market-place of Granada, are lofty, and furnished with rickety wooden galleries, that have a very picturesque Prouty appearance. Some of the old buildings, in the narrow Moorish streets, possess the same kind, of sketchy beauty; but the houses of the other parts of the city seldom exceed two stories in height, from which circumstance Cordoba is, perhaps, the most sultry place in Andalusia.

The inhabitants are a diminutive race, and the most ill-looking I have seen in Spain.

During our stay at Cordoba we witnessed the grand procession of Corpus Christi, at the commencement of Lent, which is considered one of the most holy and imposing exhibitions of the Hispano-Roman church. It was a lamentably splendid sight; for a more heterogeneous, heterodoxical mixture of bigotry and liberty, superstition and constitution, wax candles and fixed bayonets, it never fell to my lot to witness. It moved through the streets, preceded by a military band of music, which played Riego’s Hymn and the Tragala alternately, with sacred airs and mournful dirges. This was only in keeping with the rest of the absurdities of the ceremony; but it was a crying sin to compel the poor old bishop to parade through the streets, in his full canonicals, at a pas de valse.

The Cordobeses of all classes are held to be very religious, and particularly “servil;” and this degrading exhibition was, probably, got up by the exaltado party, then in the ascendant, to bring the prelate and priestly office into contempt.

On my return to Gibraltar soon after witnessing this indecent ceremony, the Bishop of Malaga, then a refugee within the walls of the British fortress, was publicly insulted by a shameless countrywoman (the prima donna of an operatic company then performing in the garrison), who, placing herself opposite to him whilst seated on one of the benches in the public gardens, sung the Tragala;[239] applying most emphatically to him the word perro (dog), with which each verse of the constitutional ditty concludes.

The venerable prelate listened most patiently until her song was concluded, and then very composedly said, “Gracias hija mia, muchissimas gracias;[240] in good truth, it is a bone fit only for the mouth of a perra.”[241]

The laugh was rather against the chaste Rosina, who, I should not omit, however, to mention, received a hint, that if the bishop were favoured with any more such gratuitous proofs of her vocal powers, she would herself have a disagreeable bone to pick at the town-major’s office.