Maimonides and the philosophers of Córdoba route

A full-length bronze sculpture by Amadeo Ruiz Olmos, inaugurated in 1965, dedicated to Lucius Annaeus Seneca, the Stoic philosopher born in Córdoba around 4 BC and tutor to the emperor Nero.

It opens the route because he is the oldest of the four Cordoban philosophers, from Roman Córdoba, before the Islamic and Jewish Córdoba that follow. The statue of Averroes is barely a couple of minutes away, next to the wall.

Opposite the wall, between the Puerta de Almodóvar and the Puerta de la Luna. A work by the sculptor Pablo Yusti Conejo, from 1967, it depicts Averroes (Ibn Rushd) seated with a book on his knees. He was born in Córdoba in 1126 and died in 1198, and was the great commentator on Aristotle of the Islamic world.

From here you enter the Jewish Quarter along Calle Judíos, towards Plaza de Tiberíades: about 310 metres, 4 to 5 minutes on foot.

A bronze sculpture by Amadeo Ruiz Olmos, inaugurated on 7 June 1964, depicting Maimonides seated with a book. The square takes its name from Lake Tiberias, in Israel, where he is buried. He was born in Córdoba in 1135 (although some recent research, based on documents from the Cairo Geniza, places his birth in 1138) and had to go into exile with his family during the Almohad period; they settled in Fez in 1158 and later in Palestine and Fustat, in Egypt, in 1165, where he died in 1204.

The Synagogue is less than a minute away, practically next door.

At Calle Judíos, 20. It already has its own page in this series, so here only its connection to the route is needed: it is the only medieval synagogue preserved in Andalusia, one of the three still standing in the whole of Spain, and the religious reference point of the district where Maimonides lived.

Casa de Sefarad is right opposite, across the street: about 9 metres, half a minute.

On the corner of Calle Judíos and Calle Averroes, opposite the Synagogue. It already has its own page in the series. As a museum of Sephardic memory, it completes the philosophical route with the context of the Jewish community of Córdoba to which Maimonides belonged.

Last stop, the statue of Ibn Hazm at the Puerta de Sevilla: you have to leave the Jewish Quarter and head down towards the Alcázar area, about 700 metres, 10 to 12 minutes on foot.

A monument dedicated to Ibn Hazm at one of the historic gates of the walled enclosure. He was born in Córdoba in 994, in the al-Mugira district (today's San Lorenzo), and died in 1064 near Huelva, after withdrawing from the city's political life. He wrote more than 400 works and is the author of The Ring of the Dove, one of the first treatises on love in Western literature.

It is the close of the route, somewhat apart from the core of the Jewish Quarter, on a quieter stretch beside the wall.

On foot it is a little over 1 kilometre in total spread over six short stretches, about 20-25 minutes of walking. But if you go in to visit the Synagogue and Casa de Sefarad, which have their own tickets and hours, the full route takes between 1.5 and 2 hours. It works best first thing in the morning or late in the afternoon, when the Jewish Quarter has fewer guided groups. We do not have a guided tour focused specifically on these four thinkers.

Check the opening hours of the Synagogue and Casa de Sefarad beforehand: they close one day a week and the hours change with the season. Comfortable footwear, as the streets of the Jewish Quarter are narrow and cobbled. It is a short route that combines well with the page on the Jewish Quarter as a district, for those who want to go deeper than the four thinkers.

A Roman, a Muslim and two Jews, all four born in the same city and with a statue in it. The route does not retell the life of each one (that is already on their own pages and on those of the Synagogue and Casa de Sefarad), but the thread that links them: in little more than a kilometre fit a thousand years of Cordoban thought.