Type
Other
Language
Undetermined
Digital
Yes
Manuscript
No
Library
Museum With No Frontiers
Record ID
monument;ISL;pt;Mon01;10;ar
Library Location
Mertola; Beja, Portugal
Notes
“A church that was once a mosque”: This inscription, which refers to the Church of the Matriz de Mertola within the drawing executed by Duarte d’Armas at the beginning of the sixteenth century, leaves no room for doubt. Previously, the most important temple in the city was the mosque, the Mertola Mosque (Murtola). In this context, the structure of the mosque appears clear. The latter was built in the second half of the AH 6th / AD 12th century, and was dedicated to Christian worship after the “Reconquest” phase. Of this temple, which contains five central naves and is covered by a two-pitched roof, the outer walls and four small doors remain (three of them open to the nave of the old building and one to the outside), above which is a slightly elongated horseshoe-shaped arch surrounded by an alfiz. The survival of the foundations of the building, even if we take into account the rebuilding of the roof in the middle of the sixteenth century, gives this church-mosque an unparalleled, strange character. The horseshoe-shaped arches were preserved in the doors that open towards the courtyard (the courtyard of the place designated for worship), and in the mihrab from which the tabiyya was taken a few decades ago, and which was adjacent to a narrow space designated for the pulpit. This polygonal space dedicated to Islamic prayer still shows plaster decorations, today lost their multi-colored, three blind multi-lobed arches ending in a cornice surrounded by an architectural ornament that takes the form of two lines of infinity, a theme that is repeated at the top of the architectural group. What is curious is that this piece is the only one in the whole of Portugal that managed to escape the purges that took place during the Reconquista and the Counter-Reformation, and that it was preserved in almost perfect condition until Today, the National Museum of Archeology in Lisbon preserves a piece of the granite cornice, which still bears two lines of inscription. According to Nickel, this writing goes back to the one that Estacio da Vega talked about in “Memórias das Antiguidades de Mértola.” Arnador de los Ríos was able to decipher within the words of the bottom line the beginning of verse 28 of Surah 36 of the Qur’an (Surat Ya-Sin): “And We did not send down to his people after him (any host).” The meaning of the text, in addition to being engraved on a cornice, evokes a connection with the Mertola Mosque. After the Reconquista, the economic decline of the city led to the reuse of the building whose function only changed (it was transformed from a mosque into a church); The pulpit remained in its state until the beginning of the sixteenth century, after it was converted into an altar. Works carried out around 1530, as well as some structural modifications, made the ruins disappear, but did not completely erase the remains of the ancient mosque, the Jami'.
Sample Text
Santiago Macias “Mertola Mosque” in Discover Islamic Art. Museum Without Borders, 2026. 2026. https://islamicart.museumwnf.org/database_item.php?id=monument;ISL;pt;Mon01;10;ar
