El "occidentalismo" de Hispania y la koiné artística mediterránea (siglos VII-VIII)

Abstract

This paper analyses the Spanish architecture from 7th to 8th centuries and its contextualization within the Mediterranean artistic koine. Our research points out the importance of the Late Roman art in the Western Mediterranean. Although, the Visigothic Kingdom of Toledo collapsed after 711, the Arabic invasion in first instance had no artistic consequences within the Spanish architecture dated to the 8th century. A detailed study of coeval architecture from the Eastern Mediterranean evidences the impossibility of any connection between the so-called Umayyad Desert Castles in Jordan and the Spanish Christian architecture, as the �Mozarabist� hypothesis assumes (an Orientalist theory). The same conclusion is reached after a detailed analysis of the Great Mosque of Cordoba architectural structure. On the contrary, the structural features of this monument also point to Western sources.