Seville Cathedral occupies the site of the principal mosque built when the Almohads made the city an important center of their Iberian empire. Construction of that mosque began in 1172. Its large courtyard and prayer hall served communal worship, while a monumental minaret rose beside them in the 1180s and 1190s. After Ferdinand III of Castile conquered Seville in 1248, the mosque was consecrated as a Christian cathedral. Chapels and furnishings altered the interior, but the basic Islamic structure continued in use for more than a century and a half.

The cathedral chapter decided around 1401 to replace the aging mosque with an immense Gothic church. Builders retained the minaret and the courtyard now called the Patio de los Naranjos but dismantled most of the prayer hall. The new cathedral’s broad plan created five aisles, numerous chapels, high vaults, and a vast choir. Construction advanced through the fifteenth century and the main church was completed in the early sixteenth. A central crossing dome collapsed in 1511 and was rebuilt, one of several structural crises that required later reinforcement.

The former minaret became the Giralda bell tower. Its lower sections preserve Almohad brickwork, decorative lattice patterns, and internal ramps that allowed ascent without a conventional stair. After an earthquake damaged the earlier Christian top, Hernán Ruiz II designed a Renaissance belfry completed in the 1560s. A bronze figure representing victorious faith crowned the tower and gave it the name Giralda, from its ability to turn with the wind. The tower thus joins Islamic engineering and ornament with a highly visible Christian addition.

Seville’s wealth during the age of Atlantic exploration enriched the cathedral. After 1503, the city held a privileged role in trade with the Americas, and merchants, church officials, confraternities, and royal patrons commissioned art and endowed chapels. The enormous main altarpiece developed over generations into a gilded narrative of Christian history. Works by Murillo, Zurbarán, and other artists entered the complex. The tomb monument associated with Christopher Columbus was installed in the cathedral in the late nineteenth century after the remains attributed to him followed a long and disputed journey.

The cathedral remains the seat of the Archdiocese of Seville and a place of daily worship, major Holy Week ceremonies, music, and pilgrimage. Its archive, treasury, chapels, roofs, bells, and works of art require specialized conservation, while the Giralda and open spaces accommodate large visitor flows. UNESCO inscribed the cathedral with the adjacent Alcázar and Archivo de Indias in 1987. The ensemble’s significance lies in transformation: an Almohad mosque became a Gothic cathedral, its minaret became a Renaissance bell tower, and Atlantic-era patronage filled the resulting spaces without erasing the architecture of earlier rule.