Cordoba, Spain

Cordoba was a 4 1/2 hour drive from Toledo.  Cordoba has a Roman and Moorish past.  It once served a regional capital for both empires.  During the Dark Ages, Cordoba was the center of a thriving and sophisticated culture.  The city was famous for religious tolerance, artistic expression, and dedication to philosophy and the science.

We started our tour by visiting the Alcazar de los Reyes Cristianos. 

The Alcazar was built by Alfonso XI in 1386.  Within the walls stands the old palace which is now a museum with Roman sarcophagi and mosaics.  The Moors added the gardens rich with flowers and fountains.

Then we walked to the Jewish Quarter.  It dates from the late Middle Ages, after Muslim rule and during the Christian era. 

This synagogue is the only one preserved in Andalusia.  It dates to 1315 and was built by Christian, Jewish, and Muslim craftsmen.  The synagogue was used as a church until the 19th century

Our final destination was the Mezquita.

A former mosque, the Mezquita was once the center of Western Islam and a wonder of the medieval world.  The mosque was built in 784 AD.

The Baroque bell tower encases the original Muslim minaret.  The muezzin would climb the minaret five times a day to call the Muslims to face Mecca and pray.

There are 850 columns topped with double arches. 

The arches are round Romanesque above a Visigothic horseshoe arch.  The horseshoe arches are made from alternating red brick and white stone.

In 1236, Saint-King Ferdinand III conquered Cordoba and turned the mosque into a cathedral.  16 columns were removed and replaced by Gothic arches to make the chapel. 

Toledo, Spain

Toledo was a one hour drive from Madrid.  The bus dropped us off at the escalators at the bottom of town.  The city sits on a high, rocky perch that is protected on three sides by the Tajo river.  It is so well preserved that it is forbidden by the Spanish government to have any modern exteriors.

For centuries, Toledo was a Roman transportation hub in the center of Iberia.  In 554 Ad, Rome fell and the city became a capital for the Visigoths.  In 711, the Moors made Toledo a regional center.  The city was reconquered by the Christians in 1085. 

We started with a walking tour of the city.  The city has a confusing medieval street plan.

Our first stop was the Sinagoga de Santa Maria la Blanca.  It is one of Toledo's oldest monuments.  It was built by the Muslims around 1200 and was originally a synagogue.  It has Moorish horsehoe arches and wall carvings. 

During the course of its history, it has been used for worship, military purposes, and even a warehouse.  It was restored once and for all in 1851 and reacquired its former glory.  Today it is a church.

The Toledo Cathedral is considered one of the finest examples of 13th century Gothic architecture.  It was built between 1226-1495.

After visiting the Cathedral, we ended our walking tour at Plaza de Zocodover.  We went to Santo Tome mazapan shop.

We bought a box of assorted mazapan.  It was all very delicious! 

This picture was taken after we had sampled a few!

We then took the elevator back down to the bus parking area and headed off to our next city...Cordoba.

Madrid, Spain

Prado Museum

One of the world's greatest art galleries with a collection of over 5,000 paintings and sculptures.  The building was constructed towards the end of the 18th century as a natural science museum near the Botanical Gardens.

The Prado has Spanish art (Goya and Velazquez), Italian Renaissance art (Titian, Fra Angelico, and Raphael), and Northern art (Durer, Rubens and Bosch).

Just a few of the works of art that we viewed were:

Francisco de Goya:

La Maja Desnuda
The Second of May
The Third of May
Saturn Devouring One of His Sons

Diego Velazquez:
Las Meninas
La Infanta Margarita de Austria

El Greco:
The Holy Trinity
The Resurection
The Adoration of the Shepherds

Palacio Real

This is Europe's third-greatest palace after Versailles and Schonbrunn.  King Philip V commissioned the palace after the fortress on the site burned down in the 18th century.  Philip was the grandson of Louis XIV.  He was born in Versailles Palace and preferred speaking French.  He wanted Palacio Real to be his own Versailles with over 2,000 rooms.



Avila, Spain

Avila is one of the best-walled cities in the world.  Alfonso VI ordered the building of the walls to fortify the city during the battle between the Muslims and the Christians. The walls were built from 1090-1099AD.

The best view of the town is about a mile away at the Cuatro Postes.

The Cathedral of Avila

On the outside, the Cathedral looks like a fortress.  It is situated next to the ramparts and makes up part of the defense system.  It was thought to be the first Gothic cathedral in Spain. 

The Convent of Saint Teresa was built in the 17th century on the spot where she was born.  She established Discalced Carmelite convents throughout Spain. 





Segovia, Spain

Segovia was founded by the Celts around the year 700 BC.  It was conquered and destroyed by the Romans around 80 BC.  The Romans rebuilt the city and it soon became one of the most important imperial cities in the Iberian Peninsula. 

Because Segovia was a Roman military base and needed water, Emperor Trajan had his engineers build a nine-mile aqueduct.  It began at the Rio Acebeda and channeled water to the city, ending at the Roman castle. 

The Segovia Cathedral was built between 1525-1768, when the Renaissance style was already predominant in Spain. This was Spain's last major Gothic building.  It has been named "Lady of Spanish Cathedrals."

The Segovia Alcazar is perched on a rocky ledge where it overlooks all the passes into the valley.  We don't know when it was founded, but there has always existed a fortress here since the time of the Roman domination. 

This palace was a favorite residence of the monarchs of Castile during the Middle Ages. Alfonso VI began to add extensions to the Alcazar.  In 1256, part of the building collapsed but was later reconstructed.  It has grown through the ages and its function has changed many times.  Besides being a palace, it was a prison for 200 years, and then the Royal Artillery School.  There was also a fire in 1862.

The last restoration took place in 1940.  It had now recouped all its past grandeur and architectural splendor.  It is now serves as a museum. 

Bryce Canyon National Park

Bryce Canyon is named after Ebenezer Bryce and became a national park in 1928.  It is located in southwestern Utah.  Bryce is famous for its colors and rock formations.

The best way to see the canyon is to drive to the end of canyon, and then stop at the viewpoints on the way back down.  There are 14 overlooks along the 18-mile scenic drive.  You can expect to spend at least 2-3 hours touring the entire park.

These are just a few of the photos I took during a recent trip in July.

The Getty Villa

J. Paul Getty built a Roman Villa in Malibu, California based on the Villa dei Papiri, a Roman country house that was buried by the eruption of Mt. Vesuvius in A.D. 79.

The Outer Peristyle

A large pool framed by symmetrical landscaping is the focal point of the Outer Peristyle.  By the pool and throughout the garden are copies of bronze statues and busts which were cast after those found in the Villa dei Papiri. These statues depict athletes, statesmen, philosophers, mythological figures, and animals.

The walls of the porticos are decorated with paintings in the Second Pompeian style, which was fashionable in the first century B.C.  

The colors used in the paintings on the walls of the portico match actual ancient paint specimens.

On a wall of the Outer Peristyle a painted fruit-and-flower swag is suspended between two illusionistic Corinthian columns.  On the left and right of the two columns the painting creates the illusion of walls of green ashlar blocks separated by red cement.

The small round structure (tholos) depicted on this wall of the portico is based on a similar wall painting from the House of the Labryinth at Pompeii.

Like any opulent Roman home, the Villa is adorned with gardens and fountains. The East Garden contains a replica of a fountain from Pompeii, decorated with mosaics of stone and glass tesserae and seashells.

It also has two marble theatrical masks. The masks are of Herakles (the Roman Hercules), and his cousin Dionysos, the patron god of theater.

Now let's go inside the Villa.

The Villa has a Basilica.  In the first century A.D., the Roman architectural historian Vitruvius used the word "basilica" to describe a very large room that would usually have been a public hall, but that was occasionally constructed as part of a private house.  Such rooms may have been used as meeting halls or private shrines.  Eight white marble columns divide the Basilica into a wide nave with two extremely narrow side aisles.  This basic plan was adopted by early Christians for their churches.

The Villa's Basilica has many statues...these are just a few of my favorites.

The Temple of Herakles

A room like this would never have existed in a private Roman home. This room at the Villa was designed just for the Museum to house the Lansdowne Herakles. This life-size statue was found near Hadrian's Villa at Tivoli.
 
 

Mosaics

 
 

 
The Romans made mosaics from tesserae, tiny cubes of stone or occasionally other materials, set into a bed of mortar. They used mosaics to cover the floors in wealthy private homes and public buildings.
 
 

 
 
Mosaic floors crafted in only black and white were favored in Italy in the 100s A.D.
 
 

 
A bust of the gorgon Medusa is the center of this Roman mosaic floor. This spinning shield motif with the gorgon's head as its central point appears frequently on Roman mosaic floors.
 
 

Room of Colored Marbles

 

 

By the first century A.D., wealthy Romans were using an array of colored marbles to cover floors and walls and to line fountains and pools. Usually imported from distant lands, different stones not only served as decoration, they also demonstrated the power of Rome and the extent of its conquests and illustrated the wealth and power of the owners of elite homes. Marble was used either in large slabs or in small pieces that were combined to create intricate geometric patterns of different colors and shapes.

Frescos

 

Wall, Ceiling and Floor Decorations

Ceiling decoration in Outer Peristyle

Wall decoration



These mosaic floor patterns from a house in Pompeii were copied in the Villa's Outer Peristyle.

The Villa also contains many statues, jewelry, and other artifacts of Greek, Roman and Etruscan history.

Children (and children at heart), can decorate Greek vases.

They can also perform their own Greek tragedy!

The Getty Villa is a great place to visit to learn more about Roman Villas as well as Greek, Roman and Etruscan art.