Cordoba - City of Contradictions.

‘Mira que bonita era’’ (Look how beautiful she was), the woman next to me mumbled. Another whispered, ‘‘Que fuerte’’, in disbelief. The painting worked its power, the dark eyes gathering visitors to stand and stare.

On the wall she sat, La Chiquita Piconera (The Little coal girl), stirring the embers and Spanish passions still. For some she exemplified the sensuality of the Andalucian woman, for others the exploitation of the female form; exposed in stockings, questioning her predicament or the painter’s intentions in a city of contradictions.

According to the guidebook, Julio Romero de Torres is Cordoba’s most famous son. His portraits have graced bank-notes and postage stamps, inspired songs and films. Mostly nude or topless, they leave little to the imagination. In the era of Dali and Picasso it is ironic the museum dedicated to his work has all the seediness of a gloomy peepshow.

Outside, the Plaza del Potro with its 16th century fountain remembered its past inhabitants -Don Quixote and Cervantes - but I had further to travel back through the ages. In the maze of streets I found it hard to believe Cordoba had once been the most populous city on earth. At its zenith, 1,000 years ago this capital of Muslim Spain sustained half a million souls who clogged these narrow approaches.

Rising above the Guadalquivir River, the Mezquita - described by British writer Gerald Brenan as ‘‘the first building in Spain - the most original and the most beautiful’’ - is of truly immense proportions. The courtyard of oranges provides relief from the shops and the city, a place for reflection before and after visiting the Mezquita. Here I imagined Averroes, the father of western secular thought, sitting cross-legged in turban and a robe. The great philosopher pondered ahead of his time. He rationalised Aristotle’s system of thought with Islam, thus separating reason from religion - which nevertheless continues to influence politics and governments throughout the globe.

Ironic to think the stick we use to beat recalcitrant Islamic countries today originated with a Muslim. Maybe it is not surprising in the late 12th century such ideas were considered dangerous, warranting Averroes’ expulsion from Cordoba and Al-Andalus. Inside the Mezquita, daylight filtered through star cut windows, illuminating a forest of pillars as far as the eye could see. Overhead a canopy of candy-striped arches created kaleidoscopic impressions as visitors spun sufi-like to gain perspective.

Disorientated, I reached the centre only to find the mosque’s heart ripped out. Following the re-conquest of Islamic Spain, the Christians lost the run of themselves trying to prove they could build better and bigger houses of worship to God. They never came close. Their Mezquita’s Christian stamp of authority pokes through the roof and grates against everything. Back in the courtyard, I wondered what Averroes would think of the renovation job or the fact that security guards prevent Muslims from praying in the mosque. Would he be nonplussed, reasoning ‘‘sure didn’t we build the Mezquita on top of a Visigothic church and they theirs on top of a Roman temple, it is the way of religions to give things their meaning’’.

I picked up a leaflet marking Cordoba’s application for European City of Culture in 2016: ‘‘Cordoba, the city that was and continues to be an example of tolerance and peaceful co-existence, its melting pot of people,” it said. The old Jewish quarter held the truth of the statement. Past white-washed terraces, I climbed the cobbles until I was alone in another pretty plaza. On a monument in its centre, the statue of a Jewish scholar, was daubed a blood-red swastika and the word ‘‘SKINS’’.

I looked again at the leaflet and who had written it - Rosa Aguilar, mayor of Cordoba and member of Izquierda Unida, a political party made up from ex-Communists.

Another famous son of Cordoba, the philosopher Seneca, wrote that ‘‘religion is regarded by the common people as true, by the wise as false, and by the rulers as useful’’. The expression of the Chiquita Piconera is at last making sense.

Previously published in Ireland's Sunday Business Post.