Featured in today's entry is a courtyard in the Alhambra, a palace and fortress of the Moorish monarchs of Granada, in the Andalusian region of Spain.

The name Alhambra, signifying in Arabic the Red, is probably derived from the colour of the sun-dried tapia, or bricks made of fine gravel and clay, of which the Alhambra's outer walls are built.

Constructed on a plateau below which clusters the city of Granada, the palace was built chiefly between the years of 1238 and 1358, during the reigns of Al Ahmar and his successors. After the expulsion of the Moors in 1492, much of the interior was effaced and the furniture destroyed or removed.

Charles V, who ruled in Spain from 1516 to 1556, rebuilt portions of the Renaissance style and destroyed part of the Alhambra to build an Italian palace designed by Pedro de Machuca in 1526.

The Moorish portion of the Alhambra includes the Alcazaba, or citadel, which is the oldest part; only its massive outer walls, towers, and ramparts stand today. The principal courts of the Alhambra are the Patio de los Leones (Court of the Lions) and the Patio de los Arrayanes (Court of the Myrtles), which is featured in today's entry.

The Court of the Myrtles, which you see in this image, has received different names throughout time. Its current name is due to the myrtle bushes that surround the central pond and the bright green colour of which contrasts with the white marble of the patio. It was also called the Patio of the Pond or the Reservoir (Patio del Estanque o de la Alberca) because of the central pond, which is 34 meters long and 7.1 meters wide. The pond divides the patio and receives its water from two fountains (one at each end of the pond). There are chambers on both sides of the patio and several porticoes on the shorter sides of it. These porticoes rest on columns with cubic capitals, which have seven semicircular arches decorated with fretwork rhombuses and inscriptions praising God. The central arch, as you can see in the image, is greater than the other six. This central arch has solid scallops decorated with stylized plant-like forms and capitals of mocarabes (an ornamental design used in Islamic architecture, which consists of a complex array of vertical prisms resembling stalactites). The tiny black dots you see in the sky are hundreds of swallows that fly around the Alhambra at any given moment.
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