n.
or Cordova ancient Corduba
City (pop., 2001: 308,072), capital of Córdoba province, southern Spain.
On the banks of the Guadalquivir River , it probably had Carthaginian origins. Occupied by the Romans in 152 BC, it became, under Augustus , the capital of the Roman province of Baetica. It declined under the Visigoths (6th8th centuries AD), and it was captured by the Muslims in 711. Abd al-Rahman I, of the Umayyad family, made it his capital in 756 and founded the Great Mosque of Córdoba, which still stands. By the 10th century it was the largest city in Europe, filled with palaces and mosques. It fell to the Castilian king Ferdinand III in 1236 and became part of Christian Spain. Modern Córdoba's streets and buildings evoke its Moorish heritage.