Dr. Carmen González Gutiérrez
July 2022 - September 2022
Research Project: Urban phenomenon in al-Andalus: the emergence of Madinat Qurtuba’s Western suburbs (Córdoba)
This project investigates the processes of urbanization of the peri-urban space of Madinat Qurtuba (Córdoba, Spain) focusing on the Western suburbs of the city and with a strong diachronic perspective. It relates to a wider scientific interest which seeks to identify and better understand the urban and social processes through which Islamic cities in al-Andalus were configured along time, frequently over a previous late-antique basis. More particularly, this research delves on the information recovered by recent excavations developed in a specific sector of Córdoba known today as “P.P.O-7”. This is a sector of about 36 hectares that belonged to the former Western suburbs of the Islamic city and that has been almost fully excavated in the last decades. One main objective is to identify the earliest evidences of Islamic occupation present in this sector, some of them already dated in emiral times, in order to address how this occupation was established and how and to which extent it determined the subsequent caliphal expansion. Another particular goal is to explore if official or centralized actions can be distinguished from private ones by paying attention to the organization of domestic spaces around the infrastructures founded for the community, such as a mosque.
Profile
Dr. Carmen González Gutiérrez is a historian and archaeologist who specialises in the medieval history and archaeology of al-Andalus, especially during the Umayyad period and paying particular attention to religious spaces and to urban contexts. She has published on the medieval archaeology of Córdoba, on the urbanism of the former Islamic city and on the archaeology and architecture of mosques in al-Andalus, among other topics. She received an international PhD in archaeology from the Universities of Córdoba, Huelva, Málaga, and Pablo de Olavide-Seville with her dissertation “Las mezquitas de la Córdoba islámica: concepto, tipología y función urbana” in 2016. She is currently a post-doctoral fellow at the Department of Art History, Archaeology and Music, specifically in the Archaeology Area, of the University of Córdoba. Previously, she was a MSCA-COFUND fellow at the Max Weber Kolleg (University of Erfurt, Germany) and a DAAD-fellow at the University of Bamberg (Germany), where she conducted her research project The Islam and the city: building religious and urban spaces in the Middle Ages. She is a scholar in the Getty-sponsored workshop series “Mediterranean Palimpsests: Connecting the Art and Architectural Histories of Medieval & Early Modern Cities” (MCities) and a research member of the “DeIure” Project: De Iulius Caesar a los Reyes Católicos: análisis arqueológico de 1500 años de historia en la Mezquita-Catedral de Córdoba y su entorno urbano developed at the University of Córdoba.
CV
Selected Publications
González Gutiérrez, Carmen (2022), “Islamic funerary archaeology in Córdoba (Spain): state of the arts and future paths”, Mortality.
González Gutiérrez, Carmen / Castro Sánchez, Alvaro (2021), “La ética en la gestión turística del patrimonio cultural y su conservación: reflexiones a propósito de la ciudad de Córdoba (España)”, Revista Internacional de Turismo, Empresa y Territorio 5.2, 116-130.
González Gutiérrez, Carmen (2020), “Mothers, male children and social prospects in al-Andalus: approach proposal for the 10th century”, in: Giulia Pedrucci, ed., Mothering(s) and religions: normative perspectives and individual appropriations. A cross-cultural and interdisciplinary approach from Antiquity to the Present, Roma: Scienze e Lettere, 65-85.
González Gutiérrez, Carmen / Cobo Aguilera, Manuel (2019), “The use of water in religious spaces in al-Andalus: new archaeological evidence from Madinat Qurtuba’s suburbs”, in: Ieva Reklaityte, ed., Water in the Medieval Hispanic Society: economic, social and religious implications (Suomalaisen Tiedeakatemian toimituksia. Humaniora 382), Helsinki: The Finnish Academy, 49-67.
González Gutiérrez, Carmen (2018), “The role and meaning of religious architecture in the Umayyad state: secondary mosques”, Arts Journal 63, 1-17.
González Gutiérrez, Carmen (2017a) “Metrología y modulación en las mezquitas: propuesta de análisis a través de cuatro casos cordobeses”, Arqueología de la Arquitectura 14, 1-14.
González Gutiérrez, Carmen / Ruíz Bueno, Manuel Dionisio (2017b), “De “iglesia” tardoantigua a mezquita califal. Revisión arqueológica de las estructuras conservadas en calle Rey Heredia 20 (Córdoba)”, Munibe 68, 251-272.
González Gutiérrez, Carmen (2017c): “Madinat Qurtuba, urban development and islamization: the evidence of minor mosques”, Beiträge zur Islamischen Kunst und Archäologie 5, 12-27.
González Gutiérrez, Carmen (2016), “Las mezquitas de barrio de Madinat Qurtuba 15 años después: espacios religiosos urbanos en la capital andalusí”, Anales de Arqueología Cordobesa 27, 267-292.
González Gutiérrez, Carmen (2012), Las mezquitas de barrio de Madinat Qurtuba: una aproximación arqueológica, Córdoba: Diputación Provincial de Córdoba.
