Courtly Splendor in the Islamic World - The Metropolitan Museum of ...

nasrid rule in spain (1232–1492)
By the thirteenth century, only one Islamic kingdom remained in Spain, the
Nasrids of Granada (1232–1492). In spite of geographic gains by northern
forces elsewhere, the southern part of the Iberian Peninsula flourished as
an intellectual and artistic center as it had two centuries earlier under the
Spanish Umayyads. The Nasrids built a palace in their capital, Granada, around
an existing hilltop fortress, which came to be known as the Alhambra (from
the Arabic word for red, hamra, referring to the color of its outer stone walls).
The Alhambra quickly became the most recognizable symbol of
Islamic civilization in Spain. Its decoration is the result of a synthesis of
preexisting local Spanish traditions and artistic influences from neighboring
Christian regions, North Africa, Iran, and other areas of the Near East. This
distinct Nasrid style is known for its slender columns, colorful geometric
tilework, horseshoe arches, carved plaster walls with lacelike patterns and
Arabic inscriptions, extensive use of muqarnas (small, honeycomblike niches
used to decorate architectural surfaces), and four-part gardens (fig. 22).
Known as Moorish, this style was used by Muslims and Christians alike in
fourteenth-century Spain (see, for example, the similarities between the
Alhambra [fig. 22] and the Christian King Pedro’s Alcazar in Seville). The
style eventually reached as far as Russia, England, Germany, Turkey, Syria,
Egypt, and the Americas as travelers’ accounts of the Alhambra spread
around the world. Nasrid rule in Spain ended in 1492, but the Christian
conquerors from the North continued to use the Alhambra palace, and
adapted many Andalusian forms and styles into their own visual culture (see,
for example, the Museum’s sixteenth-century Spanish ceiling [56.234.35.2]).
unit 5: chapter 1. court arts of islamic spain
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