The dominion of the Moors in Spain was marked by a high civilization and an extraordinary activity in building. The style they introduced became the national style in the regions they occupied, and even after the expulsion of the Moors was used in buildings erected by Christians and by Jews. The “House of Pilate,” at Seville, is an example of this, and the general use of the Moorish style in Jewish synagogues, down to our own day, both in Spain and abroad, originated in the erection of synagogues for the Jews in Spain by Moorish artisans and in Moorish style, both during and after the period of Moslem supremacy. Besides innumerable mosques, castles, bridges, aqueducts, gates, and fountains, the Moors erected several monuments of remarkable size and magnificence. Specially worthy of notice among them are the Great Mosque at Cordova, the Alcazars of Seville and Malaga, the Giralda at Seville, and the Alhambra at Granada. [Illustration: FIG. 83.--INTERIOR OF THE GREAT MOSQUE AT CORDOVA.] The +Mosque at Cordova+, begun in 786 by ‘Abd-er-Rahman, enlarged in 876, and again by El Mansour in 976, is a vast arcaded hall 375 feet × 420 feet in extent, but only 30 feet high (Fig. 83). The rich wooden ceiling rests upon seventeen rows of thirty to thirty-three columns each, and two intersecting rows of piers, all carrying horseshoe arches in two superposed ranges, a large portion of those about the sanctuary being cusped, the others plain, except for the alternation of color in the voussoirs. The _mihrâb_ niche is particularly rich in its minutely carved incrustations and mosaics, and a dome ingeniously formed by intersecting ribs covers the sanctuary before it. This form of dome occurs frequently in Spain. The +Alcazars+ at Seville and Malaga, which have been restored in recent years, present to-day a fairly correct counterpart of the castle-palaces of the thirteenth century. They display the same general conceptions and decorative features as the Alhambra, which they antedate. The +Giralda+ at Seville is, on the other hand, unique. It is a lofty rectangular tower, its exterior panelled and covered with a species of quarry-ornament in relief; it terminated originally in two or three diminishing stages or lanterns, which were replaced in the sixteenth century by the present Renaissance belfry.