مدينة الزاهرة

A city built by the chamberlain al-Mansur ibn Abi Amir as his residence, which he named al-Zahira. He moved the treasuries of money and weapons into it, and sat in it on the throne of kingship. ¹

al-Maqqari reports that al-Mansur ordered it built in the year 368 AH, when his affair had grown strong and he feared for himself in entering the sultan's palace. He set it up at the edge of the city on the greater river of Cordoba, and most of it was raised in two years. ²

In the year 370 he moved into it with his household and his people, and he established the offices and granaries in it. He granted the land around it to his ministers, secretaries and commanders, until its suburbs joined the suburbs of Cordoba. al-Maqqari says that he left the caliph nothing of anything but the name of the caliphate. ²