When: May 13th, 2024, 6pm UK Time
Where: Instituto Cervantes of London
What history of Spain could be written using the Islamic monuments of Al-Andalus as sources?
Were the Mosque of Córdoba, the Giralda of Seville, and the Alhambra of Granada part of the
nation’s history? What interest could an Arabic inscription or a decorative fragment of
ataurique have at a time when admiration for classical ruins and relics of the martyrs was
prevalent? These questions directly engaged some of the most prominent Iberian historians of
the 16th, 17th, and 18th centuries. The controversy took shape during the Alpujarras
Rebellion, reached its zenith during the expulsion of the Moriscos, and remained active
throughout the Early Modern Period. On one hand, there was a need to explain these
remnants of the past within a general framework that acknowledged the importance of
historical monuments while seeking to establish cultural and religious homogeneity in conflict
with the recent history of the Iberian Islam. On the other hand, it was understood that the
monumental power of these buildings could be of some use in the historical debates about the
origin of Spain and its ecclesiastical history, even competing with the ruins of ancient Rome. In
this overall context, the lecture will address issues such as tensions between transformation,
preservation, interpretation, and appropriation of monuments in a cross-cultural context,
historical forgeries, techniques of describing and analyzing buildings as historical sources, the
relationship of monuments to the religious conflicts of the time and to the Morisco population,
the impact of buildings on city life, and the doubts of historians when confronted with writing
about controversial matters.
Antonio Urquízar-Herrera (Córdoba, Spain, 1973) is Full Professor at the History of Art
Department of the UNED, Madrid. He has published several works on Early Modern Art in
Spain, among them Admiration and Awe. Morisco Buildings and Identity Negotiations in Early
Modern Spanish Historiography (Oxford University Press, 2017), and Coleccionismo y nobleza.
Signos de distinción social en la Andalucía del Renacimiento (Marcial Pons, 2007). He is PI of
the research group Arte y Pensamiento (https://artepensamiento.hypotheses.org/) and has
been Chair to the COST Action CA18129 IS-LE Islamic Legacy: Narratives East, West, South,
North of the Mediterranean (1350-1750), that has brought together more than 250
researchers coming for 35 European and Mediterranean countries (https://is-le.uned.es/). For
further information, see here
For ONLINE ATTENDANCE, Please register your attendance for this event here.
For IN-PERSON ATTENDANCE, Please send an email to artesiberia@gmail.com to confirm your place, before May 5th.
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