Sevilla November 6

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Sevilla, November 6, 2007

Today was the first formal day of our ground cruise. They loaded us onto 3 busses and took us for a city tour, which meant we covered the same 3 streets about 5 times as they moved from subject to subject. On this day, we had to find both lunch and dinner on our own.

1929 was a big year for Seville as they had an international exposition in town. They persuaded a whole lot of Western Hemisphere countries to build pavilions to celebrate the discovery of the new world (Columbus set sail from Seville). This is a photo of the Guatemala pavilion as seen from our bus the second time around (thus on our side of the bus). As you might expect, I had to color correct for the tint in the windows.

I don't remember the rationale for including Morocco in the "Americas", but it's such a gorgeous pavilion that I had to include it as well.

As you remember, 1929 wasn't a good year in the economy of the world. For that reason many of these buildings sat empty for quite a while. The city only recently finished paying for their upkeep and repair , but most are now in use for public buildings (schools, government offices, other agencies).

Seville, like Budapest is really two cities separated by a river. The river is the whole reason for the town being here as its the farthest northerly point to which 8^thcentury boats could travel.

Both communities claim the other is the "oh, by the way". Seville actually is on the right in this photo. We can't recall the name of it's partner community.

Seville has been a settlement since before Christ (about 200 BC). In 711, the Moslems decided they needed to take over Europe and invaded (quite successfully) the southern coast of Europe.

Around 1248 the Europeans decided they needed to re-establish their presence here. The Moors knew that if the Christian boats ever passed here it was all over, so they put a chain across the river and dropped it when the Christians wanted to go up river. This tower, known as the Gold Tower, was one end of that chain.

Early in the 8th century, the Moors constructed a fortress/palace (Alcazar) in Seville. It was built using reclaimed materials from Roman times and some of the walls are essentially original (others are reconstructed from stones the Romans brought to town.)
After the Christians retook the town one of the kings updated the Alcazar using Moorish concepts and architecture. The Christians also constructed a Gothic cathedral. This photo shows the Cathedral over the outer wall of the Alcazar.

The interior construction of the Alcazar is very typically Arabic. The bottom of each wall is ceramic tile (so when it floods, the walls aren't damaged) and above that is a plaster / stucco area that is carefully engraved, usually with sayings from the Koran, but sometimes with other poetry appropriate for the space and it's intended usage.

Originally the walls were colored as shown on the far left. Most of the color has faded in the past 700+ years. The picture on the right shows the quarters of the Sultan where he would receive diplomatic representatives. Note how every square inch is covered with designs (and the women could hide behind the balcony windows to listen in without violating the "male" domain).

This photo is taken from the Sultan's "throne" room (he probably used cushions.) The ambassador would be brought to the far end of this garden and the allowed to present himself to the Sultan (with appropriate thoughts about the importance of the man who had such a grand palace.)

Note that there was running water in the gunnels next to the reflecting pool.

We next walked through the Jewish quarters. Much of the investment into the Alcazar was paid by the Jews as was some of the investment in the cathedral. Prior to 1492 the 3 communities (Moors, Jews, and Christians) coexisted quite well. In 1492 Queen Isabella expelled the Jews (after completing the conquest of Granada) and shortly after that came the inquisition where you either made yourself a Christian, or were expelled, or worse.

This is a shared square. The road is that little passageway on the left side. The passageways are a maze and even today are not on any city maps.

We then went into the Cathedral. There had been a Mosque on this property but the only part of that preserved was the garden. This picture was taken standing on the front of the choir looking towards the High Altar (with the nobility placed between the choir and the priests during services; commoners were behind the choir).

It is claimed that Columbus is buried here. In fact, they even did DNA testing to prove it and found that the two bodies in this vault are related. That should prove it is Columbus because he was said to be buried with his brother. He died in the new world, was buried there, then brought back to Spain.

Since we don't have original DNA to test with, I remain skeptical. He asked not to be buried in Spanish soil, so here he is, in Spain, but not in the soil.

On yesterday's page, we showed you the photo of the building across the street from our hotel. After the end of our tour today we went out for a walk to explore. This is the last and most grandiose of the Pavilions from 1929, the one for Spain. It's built in 4 quadrants, one for each Province of Spain. Under each of the arches is a description of one of the counties in that province. This shows you two sections of the pavilion.

Like the other pavilions, this was long vacant. It is now largely occupied; some portions are occupied by the military and you'll see guards outside those spaces. Behind me as I take this is, of course, the required souvenir stand at which Marnie bought post cards and I bought some beverages. We then sat down and enjoyed a break (which was much needed).

Tonight we went back to the Jewish quarter, found a nice small restaurant and had a much lighter dinner than on the previous night. The other advantage of this was we had a mandatory walk to get back to our hotel. We then visited the bar and got appropriate post-dinner drinks which we enjoyed in the lobby of the hotel.

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