page_title: Córdoba, Spain
section_title: Prehistory, antiquity and Roman foundation of the city
hierarchical_section_title: Córdoba, Spain / History / Prehistory, antiquity and Roman foundation of the city
caption_attribution_description: Español: Maqueta de la reconstrucción del Templo romano de Córdoba
context_page_description: Córdoba, also spelled Cordova in English, is a city in Andalusia, southern Spain, and the capital of the province of Córdoba. It is the largest city in the province, 3rd largest in Andalusia, after Sevilla and Málaga, and the 12th largest in Spain. It was a Roman settlement, taken over by the Visigoths, followed by the Muslim conquests in the eighth century and later becoming the capital of the Caliphate of Córdoba. The city served as the capital in exile of the Umayyad Caliphate and various other emirates. During these Muslim periods, Córdoba was transformed into a world leading center of education and learning, producing notable figures such as Averroes, Ibn Hazm, and Al-Zahrawi, and by the 10th century it had grown to be the second-largest city in Europe. It was conquered by the Kingdom of Castile through the Christian Reconquista in 1236.
  Today, Córdoba is still home to many notable pieces of Moorish architecture such as The Mezquita-Catedral, which was named as a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 1984 and is now a cathedral. The UNESCO status has since been expanded to encompass the whole historic centre of Córdoba.
context_section_description: The first traces of human presence in the area are remains of a Neanderthal Man, dating to c. 42,000 to 35,000 BC. Pre-urban settlements around the mouth of the Guadalquivir river are known to have existed from the 8th century BC. The population gradually learned copper and silver metallurgy. The first historical mention of a settlement dates to the Carthaginian expansion across the Guadalquivir. Córdoba was conquered by the Romans in 206 BC.
  In 169 Roman consul M. Claudius Marcellus, grandson of Marcus Claudius Marcellus, who had governed both Hispania Ulterior and Hispania Citerior, respectively), founded a Latin colony alongside the pre-existing Iberian settlement. Between 143 and 141 BC the town was besieged by Viriatus. A Roman forum is known to have existed in the city in 113 BC. The famous Cordoba Treasure, with mixed local and Roman artistic traditions, was buried in the city at this time; it is now in the British Museum.
  It became a colonia with the title Patricia, between 46 and 45 BC. It was sacked by Caesar in 45 due to its Pompeian allegiance, and settled with veterans by Augustus. It became capital of Baetica and had a colonial and provincial forum and many temples, and it became the chief center of Roman intellectual life in Hispania Ulterior.
  At the time of Julius Caesar, Córdoba was the capital of the Roman province of Hispania Baetica. The great Roman philosopher Seneca the Younger, his father, the orator Seneca the Elder, and his nephew, the poet Lucan came from Roman Cordoba,.
  In the late Roman period, its bishop Hosius (Ossius) was the dominant figure of the western Church throughout the earlier 4th cent.
  Later, it occupied an important place in the Provincia Hispaniae of the Byzantine Empire (552–572) and under the Visigoths, who conquered it in the late 6th century.
caption: Reconstruction of the Roman temple of Córdoba.
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