ANDALUCIA, SPAIN, 10TH CENTURY

This example, with its highly carved and drilled decoration, is typical of capitals carved in Cordoba and nearby Medinat al-Zahra in the second half of the 10th century. Madinat al-Zahra was founded in 936 by Abd-al-Rahman III al Nasir, three miles northwest of Cordoba. According to the Arab biographer, Ibn-Khallikan (1211-1282), this royal residential city of the Umayyad dynasty contained 4,300 columns. There were major workshops producing such capitals in both cities, with craftsmen relying heavily on their trephine to produce such deeply carved floral motifs. They used abstract ornamentation to deliberately avoid confusion with Christian and Roman religious buildings, and yet the basic architectural vocabulary was derived from late antique forms.

Other examples with similar features can be found in Museo Arqueológico Provincial de Córdoba, Spain, (inv nos. 28.609 and 30.149), The Metropolitan Museum of Art (30.95.134), The Cincinnati Art Museum, Cincinnati, and Kuwait National Museum, Kuwait City (LNS 2 S).