Medina Mayrit

discover madrid

Luc Ciotkowski delves into the city of Madrid’s Moorish past and present. Words by Luc Ciotkowski

O

pposite me here, in my little office, cum gym (well, there’s my exercise bike), cum guestroom, there’s a poster of Granada’s magnificent Alhambra. The magnificent Moorish fortified palace has always made me wonder how many beautiful things from Spain’s Muslim era were lost forever with the religious and ethnic cleansing of the Christian Reconquest. Madrid did not become Spain’s capital until long after the Arabs had been defeated, converted, driven out and/or slain, but it owes its very name to its Arab former rulers. The site of Madrid was a strategic military point for the Arab kingdom of Toledo and during the ninth century they built a small palace and a citadel, alMudaina, close to a river to use as a water source that they called al-Majrit (which, not particularly imaginatively, means ‘source of water’ in Arabic). In modern Spanish, it’s a sure-fire assumption that

any word beginning with ‘al’ comes straight from Arabic. In Madrid, you can see the Arabic footprint just by looking at the names of places. Try to find some tangible vestiges of Madrid’s Arab past, though, and it’s a different story. When the Christians captured al-Mudaina in 1085, the mosque was converted into a church as was the practice throughout the Reconquista. Nearly all of the architecturally superior mosques across Spain were hurriedly knocked down and rebuilt, or built on top of, as inferior, and often quite ugly, churches; the Christians were in a great rush to impose themselves on their newly acquired lands and having a church in each settlement was important as having a fort. The new church in al-Mudaina was named Virgen de Almudena and, centuries later, inspired the construction of Madrid’s current cathedral, Catedral de la Almudena. Coincidentally, just opposite the cathedral are the

www.europeanvibe.com

Arab walls that are virtually the last vestiges of Moorish Madrid. If you want to find anything more Moorish, you have to search deeper, literally. Just off what I call, not particularly affectionately, ‘Scallies’ Square’ (Plaza Jacinto Benavente), throbbing with thieves fencing their stolen goods, tourists, workers and locals all milling around, is the entrance to Medina Mayrit on Calle Atocha. A few steps into this building and the evolution of the name Madrid, from Matrit, Majerit and Mayrit (all coming from al-Majrit), makes perfect sense. What you find is a restored remnant of Arab Madrid’s water system: what was called al-gubb, hispanisised as aljibe, was a big cistern for storing water for drinking or bathing. The aljibe has been re-adapted as a hammam (Arab baths), and the vaulted pools, the smells, the atmosphere and the Andalusian chill out music combine to make you feel a lot closer to Moorish or Mudéjar Madrid than the madness its 21st century version just a few metres above.

As the warmth of the hot pool bursts back into me after a dip in the cold pool, I wonder about the Spanish attitude to their Arab past. It seems odd that the Spanish still talk about their Moorish era as an ‘occupation’; while Islam was driven out by turning the mosques into churches, Arab influence on the Spanish remains visible if you look closer at the Spaniard. Marta Sánchez Matamoros from El Escorial tells me a typically handsome Spanish man is, “Moreno con ojos grandes y negros” (tanned and brown haired, with big, dark brown eyes). Would that be moreno, as in the adjective meaning dark skinned or dark haired, like a moro (Moor)? Would what we consider ‘Spanish eyes’ exist without the mixture of Arab and European blood coursing through Spanish veins? The irony of Marta’s comment is that her second surname, Matamoros, means ‘Moorslayer’. Whether the madrileños around me accept their Arab heritage or are musing on the contradictions of Spain like me, they are happy to soak up the relaxation of Medina Mayrit, before returning to the madness of the city above.

june 08

11