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Seville, Córdoba, and Granada: A Cultural History
Spain's southern city of Seville basks in romantic myths and legends, evoking the scent of jasmine and orange blossom. But there is an ascetic core to its sybaritic spirit. For all their fame as passionate performers, the poet Unamuno called Sevillanos "finos y frios"-refined and cool. Once Europe's most cosmopolitan metropolis, bridging cultures of East and West and hub of a sea-borne empire, Seville was defined by Spain's great seventeenth-century playwright Lope de Vega as "port and gateway to the Indies". The city retains both the swagger of its seafaring heyday, and the sensual flavor of Moorish al-Andalus. Seville produced Spain's lowest ruffians, grandest grandees and a seductive gypsy culture that colors our wider perception of Spain. Elizabeth Nash explores the palaces, the mosques, the patios, fountains and wrought-iron balconies of Seville, Cordoba and Granada, cities celebrated for centuries by Europe's finest painters, poets, satirists and travel writers for their voluptuous beauty and vibrant cultural mix.
252 pages, ebook
First published January 1, 2004
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Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews
March 30, 2024
Well-written and very readable cultural history primarily of the southern Spanish city of Seville, often about particular Sevillian neighborhoods, buildings, or statues. Along the way there is a good review of books both fiction and nonfiction relating to that chapter’s topic. While most of the book is on Seville, the Sevillian chapters frequently discussed the region of Andalusia as a whole or things that were Spanish in general but there was some “first” or “best example” in Seville relating to a particular subject.
Each chapter focuses on a different subject. The introduction and the first nine chapters are on Seville, with chapter ten on Cordoba and chapter eleven on Granada. The introduction talked about the Sevillian landmark Torre del Oro, how the city was a major port, the history of the picaresque novel, the Roman origins of the city, and talked about Seville’s olive trees (“Sevillanos will boast that the olive groves…produce the finest and fattest table olives in the world”) and orange trees (“There are thought to be more orange trees in Seville than in any other Spanish city…they form an indispensable part of the voluptuous spirt of the place”). Chapter one is a fascinating, on “the spectacle of Holy Week in Seville…an annual explosion of emotion that is part devotion, part fiesta” as well as discussing the Spanish Inquisition. Next chapter, two major Spanish figures and their ties to Seville, Sevillian friar Bartolome de Las Casa, Protector of the Indians of the New World, who wrote in the 1540s “a passionate denunciation of the acts of genocidal cruelty infliction upon the indigenous Americans in the reckless pursuit of gold,” and Miguel de Cervantes whose “great novel Don Quijote, which was conceived, if not written, while the author was in prison n Seville.” Also discusses how Seville had a slave market and one had a population of Black Sevillians. Chapter three was kind of eclectic and discussed among other things the history of Sevillian ceramics, particularly the internationally renowned wares of Charles Pickman’s factory, as well as in 1810 massive theft of Sevillian art by commander of Napoleon’s troops, Marechal Soult, the Hispano-American Exhibition of 1929, and nineteenth century “lovelorn poet” Gustavo Adolfo Becquer, whose poems, especially about love, “capture Seville’s ambivalent mood mingling sweetness and sensuality, laced with sadness.” Chapter four discusses how Seville had a monopoly on Spain’s trade with the New World, the Carrera de Indias or the Indies Route, how Seville became a populous inland port despite the shallow Guadalquivir River, the Lonja de Mercaderes, constructed too late to see much use for its original mercantile purpose as in the early eighteenth century Seville lost its monopoly to the sea port of Cadiz, but the Lonja finding new use, such as the home of the studios of Bartolome Esteban Murillo, “painter of urchins,” and to house the General Archive of the Indies. Also interesting was two pages on Biblioteca Columbina, what remains of a formerly vast library assembled by Hernando, Christoper Columbus’ illegitimate son. Chapter five is a fascinating chapter on Don Juan, “the legendary Sevillian nobleman who has become the universal embodiment of the cruel seducer – a timeless Latin lover” with the author discussing the fictional character and the real-world inspiration. Chapter six looks at another famous archetype of Seville, “Carmen, the seductive cigar-girl or cigarrera,” looking at both the fictional character as well as the real world cigarrera inspirations. Interesting to read how many “male writers, whether adulatory or contemptuous, observed the cigarerras as alien, exotic objects, with a voyeuristic prurience” with in festivals their “provocative colorful dress, their flounces, fringed shawls and elaborate hair.” Quite a bit in the chapter on the history of tobacco processing and use in Seville. Chapter seven looked like it would be mainly about bullfighting and indeed it is covered (along with Hemingway’s 1932 novel _Death in the Afternoon_) but the star of the chapter to me was the fascinating history of the Manila shawl or manton de Manila, “a much-prized commodity” that was original Chinese and became “a popular female fashion accessory in Spain and Spanish America after 1821.” Chapter eight, “Franco’s First Foothold,” looked at the Spanish Civil War, how Seville “was Spain’s first big town to fall to Franco” as well as the use of prison labor by Franco in the area and the Francoist “strongman from Seville,” General Queipo de Llano. Curiously but very interestingly, the chapter concluded with a look at the Coto Donana, a national park that is basically the delta where the Guadalquivir River flows into the Atlantic Ocean. Vital to resident and migratory water birds as well as the very rare Iberian Lynx, the author also discussed the “Father of the Donana,” naturalist Jose Antonio Valverde, able to successfully win a campaign during the Franco years to save the area. Chapter nine is on flamenco, which “is Spain’s blues, or soul, and Seville the Spanish Mississippi Delta or Detroit.” Chapter ten was not on Seville but instead on Cordoba, a beautifully written chapter on the Muslim civilization that once existed there, its baths, the “splendour of Medina Azhara,” “the palace-city built by the wise and cultured Abderraman III,” the great Roman Lucius Annaeus Seneca with his ties to the area, Muslim philosophers Averroes and Maimonides, and Ziryab, “credited with introducing a fifth string to the four-stringed lute – an instrument brought from the Arab world – said to be an essential step towards the evolution of the Spanish guitar.” Chapter eleven is on Granada and I think the most beautifully written chapter in the book, covering the Muslim kingdom, last Muslim city to fall (in 1492), the famed Alhambra, Washington Irving’s 1820s visit and subsequent _Tales of the Alhambra_ which “opened the floodgates” to centuries of tourism, making Alhambra “a stop on the Grand Tour,” and closing with sad passages on burnings of Muslim books and on local poet and playwright Federico García Lorca, executed during the Spanish Civil War in 1936, part of a larger discussion of Spanish efforts in the 21st century “to recover tens of thousands Franco’s opponents dumped in mass graves all over Spain…thrown into anonymous roadside ditches and common graves.”
Very readable, not dry at all. Not really a guidebook per se talking about train or bus schedules, but covers what a visitor might see at a given location and the history and culture behind it. Contains black and white ink illustrations throughout the book, a lengthy “further reading” section, and two indices, one on literary and historical names and one on places.
Each chapter focuses on a different subject. The introduction and the first nine chapters are on Seville, with chapter ten on Cordoba and chapter eleven on Granada. The introduction talked about the Sevillian landmark Torre del Oro, how the city was a major port, the history of the picaresque novel, the Roman origins of the city, and talked about Seville’s olive trees (“Sevillanos will boast that the olive groves…produce the finest and fattest table olives in the world”) and orange trees (“There are thought to be more orange trees in Seville than in any other Spanish city…they form an indispensable part of the voluptuous spirt of the place”). Chapter one is a fascinating, on “the spectacle of Holy Week in Seville…an annual explosion of emotion that is part devotion, part fiesta” as well as discussing the Spanish Inquisition. Next chapter, two major Spanish figures and their ties to Seville, Sevillian friar Bartolome de Las Casa, Protector of the Indians of the New World, who wrote in the 1540s “a passionate denunciation of the acts of genocidal cruelty infliction upon the indigenous Americans in the reckless pursuit of gold,” and Miguel de Cervantes whose “great novel Don Quijote, which was conceived, if not written, while the author was in prison n Seville.” Also discusses how Seville had a slave market and one had a population of Black Sevillians. Chapter three was kind of eclectic and discussed among other things the history of Sevillian ceramics, particularly the internationally renowned wares of Charles Pickman’s factory, as well as in 1810 massive theft of Sevillian art by commander of Napoleon’s troops, Marechal Soult, the Hispano-American Exhibition of 1929, and nineteenth century “lovelorn poet” Gustavo Adolfo Becquer, whose poems, especially about love, “capture Seville’s ambivalent mood mingling sweetness and sensuality, laced with sadness.” Chapter four discusses how Seville had a monopoly on Spain’s trade with the New World, the Carrera de Indias or the Indies Route, how Seville became a populous inland port despite the shallow Guadalquivir River, the Lonja de Mercaderes, constructed too late to see much use for its original mercantile purpose as in the early eighteenth century Seville lost its monopoly to the sea port of Cadiz, but the Lonja finding new use, such as the home of the studios of Bartolome Esteban Murillo, “painter of urchins,” and to house the General Archive of the Indies. Also interesting was two pages on Biblioteca Columbina, what remains of a formerly vast library assembled by Hernando, Christoper Columbus’ illegitimate son. Chapter five is a fascinating chapter on Don Juan, “the legendary Sevillian nobleman who has become the universal embodiment of the cruel seducer – a timeless Latin lover” with the author discussing the fictional character and the real-world inspiration. Chapter six looks at another famous archetype of Seville, “Carmen, the seductive cigar-girl or cigarrera,” looking at both the fictional character as well as the real world cigarrera inspirations. Interesting to read how many “male writers, whether adulatory or contemptuous, observed the cigarerras as alien, exotic objects, with a voyeuristic prurience” with in festivals their “provocative colorful dress, their flounces, fringed shawls and elaborate hair.” Quite a bit in the chapter on the history of tobacco processing and use in Seville. Chapter seven looked like it would be mainly about bullfighting and indeed it is covered (along with Hemingway’s 1932 novel _Death in the Afternoon_) but the star of the chapter to me was the fascinating history of the Manila shawl or manton de Manila, “a much-prized commodity” that was original Chinese and became “a popular female fashion accessory in Spain and Spanish America after 1821.” Chapter eight, “Franco’s First Foothold,” looked at the Spanish Civil War, how Seville “was Spain’s first big town to fall to Franco” as well as the use of prison labor by Franco in the area and the Francoist “strongman from Seville,” General Queipo de Llano. Curiously but very interestingly, the chapter concluded with a look at the Coto Donana, a national park that is basically the delta where the Guadalquivir River flows into the Atlantic Ocean. Vital to resident and migratory water birds as well as the very rare Iberian Lynx, the author also discussed the “Father of the Donana,” naturalist Jose Antonio Valverde, able to successfully win a campaign during the Franco years to save the area. Chapter nine is on flamenco, which “is Spain’s blues, or soul, and Seville the Spanish Mississippi Delta or Detroit.” Chapter ten was not on Seville but instead on Cordoba, a beautifully written chapter on the Muslim civilization that once existed there, its baths, the “splendour of Medina Azhara,” “the palace-city built by the wise and cultured Abderraman III,” the great Roman Lucius Annaeus Seneca with his ties to the area, Muslim philosophers Averroes and Maimonides, and Ziryab, “credited with introducing a fifth string to the four-stringed lute – an instrument brought from the Arab world – said to be an essential step towards the evolution of the Spanish guitar.” Chapter eleven is on Granada and I think the most beautifully written chapter in the book, covering the Muslim kingdom, last Muslim city to fall (in 1492), the famed Alhambra, Washington Irving’s 1820s visit and subsequent _Tales of the Alhambra_ which “opened the floodgates” to centuries of tourism, making Alhambra “a stop on the Grand Tour,” and closing with sad passages on burnings of Muslim books and on local poet and playwright Federico García Lorca, executed during the Spanish Civil War in 1936, part of a larger discussion of Spanish efforts in the 21st century “to recover tens of thousands Franco’s opponents dumped in mass graves all over Spain…thrown into anonymous roadside ditches and common graves.”
Very readable, not dry at all. Not really a guidebook per se talking about train or bus schedules, but covers what a visitor might see at a given location and the history and culture behind it. Contains black and white ink illustrations throughout the book, a lengthy “further reading” section, and two indices, one on literary and historical names and one on places.
January 2, 2008
I found this book at a used book store when looking for books on Spain to read while traveling in Spain. It was quite good on that account, and by the time I was in Sevilla, having read it added a lot to my visit there. The writing is a bit a, I dunno know, quote-y at times, but other than that it seems to work pretty well. I'll have to check out her other books, like the one on Madrid.
January 28, 2010
Awesome!!!!!! Can't wait!
April 10, 2010
A very entertaining read on the history and culture of Sevilla - highly recommend for anyone visiting there.
March 24, 2019
An excellent companion book to Rick Steve's book 'Sevilla, Granada, and Andalucia', in preparation for a trip to the area. I'll derive much more pleasure from my walking tours having read this book. This book is a great cross section of cultural history. From the flamenco artists, to the "sorcery" of Abderraman III and his riches near Cordoba, to the influence of Carmen and the 1929 World Expo. I'm so pleased to have found this book that will enrich my understanding of what I can see and touch in my travels today.
April 21, 2019
Even though Seville's main attractions -- Alcazar, the cathedral, Pilatos and Duenas palaces -- are not covered -- there's enough in this book to make your stay in the city much more meaningful. Elegantly written, carefully researched, the book makes a great companion to visiting this outrageously beautiful place. The past comes back to life with vivid details -- as in the chapters dealing with Don Juan or Carmen, for example; one also gains a better understanding of the present -- of the controversial architectural legacy of the recent Expo or of the ever popular Holy Week processions.
August 23, 2018
Mostly factual & informative, it would have paid me to read this book before I went to Seville last autumn. However, I did feel the chapter about Don Giovanni would have been better left out. Even the author said the connection was tenuous.
Displaying 1 - 7 of 7 reviews