A Little Moorish History in the Land of the Pomegranates

It is known that the city of Granada has been inhabited from the first recorded discovery of an ancient Ibero-Celtic settlement, then by the Phoenicians, the Carthaginians, the Greeks, the Romans, the Visigoths and the Byzantines.

By the year 711 AD, a Jewish community had established itself in an area of the city called Gárnata al-Yahud (Granada of the Jews). It was this community that assisted Tariq ibn-Ziyad and his forces at the start of the Muslim invasion of the Iberian Peninsula, although Granada didn’t come fully under Moorish control until 713 AD, when the final rebellion was quashed.

At that stage the city was still referred to by the name of ‘Ilbira’ (Elvira to the remaining Christian community), and it was to become the capital of the Califato de Córdoba. When Elvira was destroyed in 1010 following disputes with the Caliphate, it gained its independence and was subsequently rebuilt on the orders of Zawi ben Ziri around the aforementioned ‘Gárnata’ district.

In 1238 another dynasty was formed by Ibn al-Ahmar, also known as Mohamed Ben Nasar or Al-Hamar The Red, due to the colour of his beard, who entered the city through the famous Puerta de Elvira arch.

It was his dynasty, the Nazaris, who finally constructed the Qal’at al’hambra (the Red Fort – the Alhambra) during the 14^th century under the rule of Mohammed V.

In 1492, Abu ‘abd-Allah Muhammad XII known as Boabdil and the last of the Nazaris leaders, finally surrendered the city to the Reyes Católicos , thus concluding a Muslim reign of almost eight centuries.

It is told that as a devastated and tearful Boabdil looked back one last time at his beloved city, his hard and ambitious mother turned to him and cruelly berated him with the now legendary words, ‘Do not weep like a woman for what you could not defend like a man.’ The spot upon which this is supposed to have taken place is known as El Ultimo Suspiro del Moro – The Moors Last Sigh.

Boabdil, although given an estate in the Alpujarras in which to live out the rest of his days, eventually returned to North Africa where he died a broken man in 1533.

During Moorish rule, Muslims, Jews and Christians had lived together harmoniously in the city and one of the terms of the treaty of surrender was that non-Christian people could continue to live by their faiths and customs. However, by 1499 – seven years after the recapture of Granada – the Roman Catholic rulers and their church were beginning to get impatient.

Non-converted Jews had already been obliged to leave the country in 1492, but a large proportion of the Muslims still remained. They were initially given the option to convert to Catholicism, when that did not work they were offered conversion or deportation. The converted were referred to as Moriscos, the non-converted deported to North Africa or to Spain’s interior, and their property handed to Catholic Spaniards.

The Muslim/Catholic dispute continued until 1571, when the king of the Muslim rebellion, Aben Humeya (or don Fernando del Válor – Fernando of Bravery) was killed in the Alpujarra region of Granada. One of the saddest aspects of this conflict, other than the loss of life and livelihood of the innocent inhabitants of the city, was also the Catholic destruction of Muslim and Jewish architecture, of which barely any has survived intact.

Among those Moorish buildings and remnants that have survived, are the Dar al-Horra palace, La Casa de Abén Humeya, El Bañuelo (public baths), Las Torres Bermejas along the walls of the Alhambra that date from the 8^th and 9^th centuries, the Puerta de Elvira which is the entrance to what was the walled city, and of course, the mighty Alhambra, about which I will go into more detail at a later stage.

The Granada of today is separated into various districts: The Realejo was the principally Jewish area of the city during the Nasri reign, and contains many Carmenes – houses typical to Granada that are built around a central patio, usually containing a water feature, and surrounded by a high wall. The high walls of the Carmenes were supposedly because the Jews and the Muslims did not want to openly flaunt their wealth so as not to incite jealousies amongst their neighbours.

La Cartuja is the area built around a Gothic and Baroque styled Carthusian monastery, and contains many of the more modern university buildings. La Plaza Bib Rambla still retains the same name as during the Moorish rule, and leads you into the Alcaicería (Arab bazaar) made up of narrow alleys running off towards the cathedral.

El Sacromonte, located on a hill close to the Albaícin, is the typically Gitano area of Granada. Unique for its cave houses that have been dug into the hillsides (similar accommodation can be found in the village of Galera near Guadix), it also contains some wonderfully cavernous bars and restaurants that often hold impromptu performances of Zambra Gitana.

To Salsa or not To Salsa

Some of my happiest moments during those first few months in Granada, were spent at a little dance club called Barrio Latino.

Having briefly participated in a Salsa and Merengue (pronounced meh-ren-gay and not to be confused with crunchy pudding) course given by one of the teachers at the school, I was pretty convinced that it wasn’t going to be my sort of thing.

Although I had really enjoyed wiggling my childish assets at school discos and other danceable occasions, being told by a well-meaning ‘friend’ during the nightclubbing days of my teens that dancing, especially in public, was something I should probably avoid ‘if I knew what she meant’; sort of put the kibosh on any boogying aspirations – not to mention confidence – I might have had.

So when one of my student peers suggested that we visit a salsa bar, I was quite honestly terrified.

Close to a lot of the older university faculties, Barrio Latino was well-hidden down a street that was just opposite the strangely arid Jardines de Triunfo. The noise hit us as we pushed open the glass door, and after only a few minutes inside, I just knew that I was going to be spending a lot of my time there.

There was practically no room for sitting, not much more for standing and the volume of the music made conversation an almost insurmountable challenge.

No, that place was all about dancing; and seeing the plethora of lithe young bodies seamlessly emulating the seductive beat of the Latin American tunes, my usually crippling inhibitions deserted me and I joined right in.

One of the many advantages of Barrio Latino over the profusion of discotecas to be found in Granada, was that us girls could bop away, secure in the knowledge that we would be safe from unwanted groping and in fact any type of uninvited male attention. The majority of the men there were only interested in us for the dexterity of our footwork and swingy-ness of our hips, and were rather less interested in trying to get us into bed.

Although I never really got to grips with dancing salsa with a partner – dances that involved actual steps stubbornly resisting all efforts to make them ‘my thing’, the Merengue was a different story altogether.

Consisting of footwork resembling nothing more than rhythmic and exaggerated marching on the spot – with free-reign given to undulating hips and thrusting buttocks – what gives the Merengue its artistry are the turns.

And turns turned out to be far easier to perfect in style and speed when my feet were doing simplistic things that required no counting, no concentration and no coordination.

Marouanne, a skinny Moroccan beanpole from Meknès, became my regular dance partner, and the technical mastery of our Merengue routine became so fluid and well-practised that our fellow dancers often stood around the edge of the dance floor clapping us on as we spun and twisted our way round each other – a decidedly surreal experience for a dumpy Brit with two decidedly left feet, but also gloriously, fantastically and deliciously addictive…

Before long I could be found in Barrio Latino from ten o’clock at night until five, six or sometimes seven o’clock in the morning at least three times a week – no doubt my Spanish studies suffered the consequences, but hey, when the rhythm calls…