In 169/168 BC, Marcus Claudius Marcellus, then sole praetor of Hispania, founded the Latin colony of Corduba, which would later be called Colonia Patricia—i.e., “Colony of the Fathers” or “Colony of the State”—when it received the last contingent of Roman citizens under Augustus. This brought to an end the pre-Roman period during which Turdetan Cordoba had served as the main economic, urban, cultural, and territorial nucleus of the middle Guadalquivir Valley. Situated in the heart of Tartessos, at the exact point where the two Tartessic domains of the Guadalquivir and Guadiana valleys meet in the Sierra Morena mountain range, Cordoba embarked upon a long historical process with Rome that would continue from antiquity to the Middle Ages until the al-Andalus period. An intermediate time links these two realities, late antiquity and the Visigoth period, which were of enormous importance for the future of the city.

Due to its privileged location on the banks of the Guadalquivir River, as well as its important land and river connections, rich metalliferous deposits in the heart of the sierra, fertile countryside, and strategic position, Corduba had been a distinguished and much desired city since the Tartessic period during the final stage of the Bronze Age. With the foundation of Corduba, the Romans ensured their military control and defence of the riches and waterways between the plateau and the sea in the southernmost part of the Iberian Peninsula. Roman Corduba, next to the old Tartessic city, undoubtedly provided a stronghold for the Romanization of a Baetica that, possessing a literary tradition of more than 6,000 years according to Strabo, quickly and easily embraced Latin to the point of almost forgetting the ancestral linguistic origins of its inhabitants within a very short time.

The Romanization of Baetica was possible thanks to the mutual interest and benefit gained by both the Hispanic and Roman nobility: some prospered and promoted themselves, while others negotiated and gained power from their land holdings and the multiple resources they offered. This social phenomenon was similar to what Cordoba would experience eight and a half centuries later when the Arabs settled in the city and adapted its name as Qurṭuba. The coexistence of the Visigoth nobility with the incoming Umayyad rulers initiated a new historical process in which the Romanization of Hispania and its incorporation into the lands of the Roman Empire, deeply marked by the Germanic invasions in the 5th century, would continue in part in the Umayyad al-Andalus, although now with a different model of production in which the process of Arabization, led by the recently established state, would open a new chapter in the city’s history.

In October 711, the freedman Mughīth gained control over Cordoba, and in 716 the city became the center of power in al-Andalus. Although immersed in complex political struggles and intrigues that were kindled, among other things, by ethnic differences, the Umayyad Cordoba saw a time of great glory, first during the two stages of the Cordoban emirate: the dependent emirate of the Caliphate of Damascus (714–756) and the independent emirate of the new Abbasid Caliphate (756–912). This double emirate period would lead to the culminating stage in the city’s history, the caliphate, which although brief—it lasted just over half a century (929–1031)—would bring Cordoba to its height of splendour during the Middle Ages and beyond. After the fall of the Caliphate of Cordoba, the city began a progressive decline during the Taifa and African dynasties, first under the Almoravids and then under the Almohads. In 1236, the city fell into the hands of the King of Castile, Ferdinand III the Saint, thus marking the beginning of the slow agony of al-Andalus.

This volume brings together 19 contributions by recognized specialists in various fields of the history and culture of Roman, late antique, Visigoth, and al-Andalus Cordoba and is divided into two parts. The first part, dedicated to the Roman, late antique, and Visigoth Corduba, includes five chapters that deal with the destruction and disfigurement of the classical city and the starting point of the late antique one (Márquez and Monterroso-Checa); politics, society, and the economy during late antiquity (Panzram); the disperse situation in the Visigoth period (Sánchez-Medina); the architecture of the cities from the 4th to the 7th centuries (Utrero Agudo and Villa del Castillo); and Corduba’s ties with the Byzantine expansion (Vizcaíno—Sánchez).

The second part, dedicated to Muslim Qurṭuba, contains 14 chapters that deal with the city in Arabic sources (García-Sanjuán); the Arab occupation (Ballestín-Navarro); the city’s administrative apparatus (Meouak); the Christian and Islamic populations during the 7th to the 12th centuries (Hidalgo Prieto and Fuertes Santos); the historical and cultural milieu of Christians (Monferrer-Sala) and Jews (Martínez Delgado); the city’s hybrid Islamic–Christian architecture (Murillo-Fragero); the old medina (León Muñoz and Montejo Córdoba); the suburban areas (Murillo Redondo and Casal-García); the palatial complex of al-Madīnah al-Zahrāʾ (Vallejo—Triano); the practice of fine arts (Puerta Vílchez); descriptions of everyday life gleaned from epigraphic remains (Martínez-Núñez); and the fascinating world of science (Samsó) and letters (Buendía).

The up-to-date information collected in each of the chapters that make up this Companion gives a compelling account of Cordoba’s most important archaeological, urban, political, legal, social, cultural, and religious facets. Indeed, this volume offers state-of-the art knowledge on the most outstanding aspects of the city from the late Roman era to the Muslim period. The 19 studies in the Companion will surely provide the reader with fresh insights into the research carried out over the last few decades on the city.

Editors wish to thank José Luis Domínguez Jiménez for his help during the edition process of the present volume.

The Editors

Cordoba, December 15, 2020