No More Moor

The NYT has a travel piece about Cordoba, Spain, which apparently is more than what tour books recommend, the piece reports. Not one time, however, does the word “Muslim” or “Islam” appear in the article, even though the main uploaded photograph is of Cordoba’s center architectural marvel, the Mosque and library of this city, one of the primary centers of Muslim Andalusian Spain. Of course, “Moors” appears, a word that started out as a pejorative when referring to Muslims, but has been used so often and widespread that its naughtiness is no longer something to recognize. Still, would it have been difficult for the author of the article, Andrew Ferren, to have at least mentioned that the human beings behind many of Cordoba's marvels were Muslims, folks who never referred to themselves as “Moors” or the like? The reader does come across “Catholic” as “Catholic king, Philip II,” and “Jews” who were learned in Arabic, Latin, and Greek and thus translated important manuscripts. I have no problem that these religious traditions are mentioned, especially when we consider the cosmopolitan nature of Muslim Spain, which incorporated the scholarly contributions of the three monotheistic faiths. But that means “Islam” too, Mr. Ferren.