The meaning of "mosque", Mosque-Cathedral of Cordoba (Spain)
The meaning of the Mosque in the Islamic World
The word “Mosque” comes from the arabic word masyid that means: the place
where we bow, or where we bend, that shows the muslim way of praying.
The building is a symbol, it is not only a temple where the muslim go praying along the history, but also it is of Islam as religion and civilization. So, to know the history of the past of Islam, the Mosque represents one of the most important materials.
The origins of the Islamic Mosques are in the Cathedrals of the Oriental Mediterranean which rassemble in many aspects so a basilical plan with an impair number of naves built towards the quibla. The naves usually used to be separated with Roman archs
and or horseshoe archs.
The main parts of a Mosque can be seen in the Aljama (Mosque) of Córdoba, and are the following:
The oratory or haram is a covered space where the prayer congregated for the pray, it is joined to a court (sahn) which is surrounded by archs (rivaq) in three side, the fourth
was the entrance to the oratory.
Before praying the believers had to make a ritual wash, so every Mosque has a pool, with or without fountains, that is situated in the middle of the court, and it is quite large to keep a lot of believers.
The Alminar or Minaret, is the tower, with its rectangular plan or round plan, it is situated in the North of washing court and from where the Muezzin or Almuédano, the person who calls the prayers for the pray (adhan) five times a day. All the oratories of the Mosques has to have a wall (qibla) oriented to the Mecca in whose central part the Mihrab is situated. The Mihrab isn’t sacred but it
gives the direction of the pray, towards the Mecca. The Mihrab is an empty wall, it is richely decorated and it is the center of every Mosque.
It has a semicircular plan and it is open to the qibla wall with a roman arch or horseshoe arch; many times it is covered with a vault.
The Minbar is situated on the right of the Mihrab and it is wooden frame with different height from which you can reach through some stairs to a little plataform with vaults. From its upper
part the iman leads the pray of the prayers (Jutba). This is a common element in big Mosques but it doesn’t exist in the small ones, in the country side or little sections due to its reduced size.
The Maqsura originally it was a detached part where the life of the Iman was protected because in the first period of the Islam, he used to be the Caliph or Governor, so his life was in danger of murder. The Maqsura was an elevated platform with wooden fence, for protecting the Caliph (Head of State). Then it turner into another structure, which raised the central nave generally wider then the others of the whole Mosque. 
From the aercheological to the point of view, the Mosque is recognizable for its orientation towards the mecca, the sacred city of the Islam.
Other elements are reorganizable such as: the galleries of the oratory, whose archs are plain in cimentacion; the Mihrab with its semicircular plan or horseshoe arch; the minarete with its squared plant; or the columns that indicate the localization of the Maqsura.
After the conquest of Al–Andalus by the Christians, many Mosques were reused for the Christian churches. Then it was usual to respect the number and internal distribution, however they modified its orientation. There are lot of examples in Spain (Seville or Toledo) but now we will concentrate on the Mosque of Córdoba.
Text: Jesús Pijuán.
Traslated by Sara Moretti