Looking towards the courtyard of the Comares palace. The courtyard was one of the most important architectural features of Islamic houses, and the same is true for this palace. A shallow pool of water runs the length of the courtyard, flanked by myrtle bushes (hence the name “Court of the Myrtles”). Adjoining the courtyard are a number of rooms which functioned as the rooms of the King’s wives. At the ends are elaborate seven-arched porticoes supported by slender columns.
The Alhambra as a whole is one of the most fantasized monuments of Islamic Architecture, captivating the imagination of a vast number of writers and artists, including Washington Irving and the French author Chateaubriand, to name just a couple. Indeed, some parts of the Alhambra, such as the Court of the Lions, are commonly written about examples of the most beautiful architecture in the world. The palace-complex as it stands today was built mostly in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries under the Nasrid dynasty (1238-1492), in particular by Yusuf I (1333-54) and his son Muhammad V (1354-59, 1362-1391). Out of six royal palaces, only two survive (the Comares palace and the Palace of the Lions). A summer palace called the Generalife (from the Arabic jannat al-arif, ‘the garden of the architect’) is also extant. – SK
Photograph created 1963. Photograph processed September 1963. Formerly catalogued as B49.205, BV.026, CS.025. Notes written on the slide or index: Court of the Myrtles.
