Seville Travel Guide
Moorish and Mudéjar Seville
A deep dive into Seville's Islamic and Mudéjar heritage — the Almohad capital, the minaret that became the Giralda, Pedro I's palace, the craftsmen who built Christian Seville in a Moorish style, and where to see it all, including Córdoba.
To understand Seville, you have to understand the five centuries when it was a Muslim city, and the centuries afterwards when its Christian rulers kept building in the Moorish style. That heritage is everywhere — in the tower that defines the skyline, in the patios and fountains of its palaces, in the tiles on its walls and in the name of the river itself, from the Arabic for great river. This guide explains the story and where to see it.
Ishbiliya. Seville was a Roman city, Hispalis, and a Visigothic one before the Muslim conquest of 711, after which it became Ishbiliya, one of the great cities of al-Andalus. It lived in the shadow of Córdoba during the Caliphate of the tenth century, when Córdoba was the capital of Islamic Spain. When the Caliphate broke up in the eleventh century into small kingdoms, the taifas, Seville became the capital of one of the most brilliant, ruled by the Abbadid dynasty, whose last king, al-Mutamid, was a celebrated poet. Then came the Almohads, a dynasty from North Africa, who made Seville their capital in al-Andalus in the twelfth century and gave it its greatest Islamic monuments: a great mosque, a new palace complex and city walls.
The Giralda and the great mosque. The Almohad great mosque stood where the Cathedral stands today. Its minaret, built in the late twelfth century, is the lower part of the Giralda, decorated with the lattice of brick arches, the sebka, typical of Almohad art and shared with its sister towers in Marrakech and Rabat. Instead of stairs, a series of ramps leads to the top, wide enough for a rider on horseback to reach the summit to call the faithful to prayer. After the Christian conquest, the Renaissance belfry was added in the sixteenth century. The mosque's ablutions court survives as the Patio de los Naranjos, the Courtyard of the Orange Trees, entered through the Puerta del Perdón, the original horseshoe-arched mosque gate.
The conquest and the Mudéjar. In 1248, Ferdinand III of Castile took Seville after a long siege, and much of its Muslim population left. But the art of al-Andalus did not disappear. Mudéjar is the name given to Muslims who lived under Christian rule, and by extension to the style they and their successors created: Islamic techniques and motifs — carved plaster, wooden ceilings of interlocking geometry, tiles, horseshoe and multifoil arches — used in Christian buildings. Seville is one of the great centres of Mudéjar art, and many of its parish churches, such as Santa Ana in Triana, mix Gothic structure with Mudéjar towers and ceilings.
The Real Alcázar. The supreme Mudéjar building is the Palace of Pedro I in the Real Alcázar, built from the 1360s by a Castilian king who brought craftsmen from Granada, Toledo and Seville. Its decoration echoes the Alhambra, being built at the same time, with Arabic inscriptions praising the king, and the Patio de las Doncellas and the Hall of Ambassadors, with its gilded dome, are among the finest interiors of their kind. Elsewhere in the Alcázar, you can still find traces of the Almohad palace, including the Patio del Yeso, and the gardens preserve the Islamic idea of paradise as a walled garden with water and fruit trees.
Walls, towers and the river. The Almohads built the Torre del Oro on the river in the early thirteenth century as part of the city walls; a chain could be stretched across the water from it. Stretches of the walls survive in the Macarena district in the north of the old town, with the Puerta de la Macarena, and along the Callejón del Agua in Santa Cruz, where the wall of the Alcázar gardens shelters the lane.
The Mudéjar afterlife. The Moorish style never left Seville. The Casa de Pilatos, built in the sixteenth century, mixes Mudéjar plaster and tiles with Italian Renaissance marble. The Palacio de las Dueñas has the same blend. The tiles of Triana carried Islamic geometric patterns into the modern age. And in the early twentieth century, architects such as Aníbal González revived the style for the 1929 Ibero-American Exposition: the Plaza de España, the Mudéjar Pavilion in the Parque de María Luisa and the Hotel Alfonso XIII are all part of this neo-Mudéjar revival.
How to read the decoration. Look for a few recurring elements and the buildings start to speak. Horseshoe and multifoil arches come from Islamic architecture. Sebka, the net of interlaced brick arches, is the Almohad signature on the Giralda. Yesería, carved plaster, covers walls with geometric, plant and calligraphic patterns. Alicatado, tilework made of cut glazed pieces fitted like a mosaic, lines the lower walls of the Alcázar. Artesonado ceilings of interlocking wood form stars and polygons overhead. And everywhere there is water, in channels, pools and fountains, the essential element of the Islamic garden.
Córdoba and Granada. To complete the picture, visit Córdoba, under an hour by high-speed train, for the Mezquita, the great mosque of the Caliphate, one of the most important Islamic buildings in the world. Granada, further east, has the Alhambra, the palace of the last Muslim kingdom in Spain, which fell in 1492; it is too far for a comfortable day trip from Seville and better as an overnight stay, with Alhambra tickets booked well in advance.
A Moorish Seville itinerary. Start at the Giralda and the Patio de los Naranjos at opening, then spend the late morning in the Real Alcázar, focusing on the Palace of Pedro I and the gardens. After lunch, walk the Callejón del Agua and visit the Casa de Pilatos. In the evening, see the Torre del Oro and the river. On a second day, take the train to Córdoba for the Mezquita. Read a little before you go — the history of al-Andalus is as rich as its buildings, and it will make every arch and tile come alive.