The Great Mosque of Cordoba, known in Spanish as the Mezquita, is one of the supreme achievements of Islamic architecture in Europe and among the most beautiful interiors ever built. It stands in the old capital of al-Andalus, Muslim Spain, and its hall of striped arches has drawn travellers for more than a thousand years.
From cathedral to mosque and back
The site began as a Christian church. After the Muslim conquest of the Iberian Peninsula, the Umayyad emir Abd al-Rahman I began building a great mosque here in the late eighth century, around 785 CE. Over the next two hundred years his successors enlarged it in successive campaigns, extending the prayer hall and adding a splendid new mihrab. When Cordoba was captured by the Kingdom of Castile in 1236, the mosque was consecrated as a cathedral, and in the sixteenth century a Renaissance choir was inserted into its centre. Today it functions as a cathedral and is protected as a UNESCO World Heritage Site, a building that carries the layered history of two faiths.
A forest of arches
The Mezquita is famous above all for its prayer hall, a seemingly endless grid of columns, many reused from Roman and Visigothic buildings, linked by a bold invention: double-tiered arches. By stacking one arch above another, the builders raised the low salvaged columns to a soaring height, and by alternating red brick with pale stone they striped the whole hall in warm colour. The effect, repeated hundreds of times, is hypnotic, a shaded grove of stone that seems to have no edges. It is one of the earliest and most influential examples of this kind of hall in Mosque architecture styles around the world.
The mihrab and its mosaics
The tenth-century mihrab, the niche marking the direction of prayer toward Mecca, is a jewel in its own right. Framed by a horseshoe arch and crowned with a ribbed dome, it is dressed in glittering gold mosaics, made by craftsmen whose art descended from the same tradition that adorned the Great Mosque of Damascus (Umayyad Mosque). The connection is no accident: the Umayyads of Cordoba consciously recalled the grandeur of their ancestors in Syria, and the mosaic-clad mihrab is their homage to it.
Why the Mezquita matters
For centuries Cordoba was one of the great cities of the world, a centre of learning where scholars of different faiths worked side by side. The mosque was the heart of that city. As a monument it shows how Islamic architecture adapted to a European setting and how, in turn, it shaped the later art of Spain. Its arches echo in buildings across the Mediterranean, and its story sits within the wider short history of mosques. You will find it alongside the other landmarks in our pillar on Great mosques of the world, and can look up terms such as mihrab or Qibla in the Glossary.
Visiting
The Mosque-Cathedral is one of the most visited monuments in Spain and welcomes tourists throughout the year outside service times. Modest dress and quiet are appreciated in what remains an active place of worship. To find working mosques and Muslim-life places on your own travels, browse the find mosques directory or open the the interactive map. For a very different vision of the mosque as sacred space, compare the earth-built Great Mosque of Djenne, Mali in Mali.