Moorish House
From a construction point of view, the Moorish house did not have a typified design. This could be due to the heterogeneity of the invading peoples. In fact, in most cases the Arabs adopted the building techniques and models of the invaded.
What does prevail in this residence, however, are two basic social principles, namely the concept of the residence as a protective place, where priority was given to privacy, and the seclusion of the woman in her own quarters, separate from those of the rest of the family.
A typical house -dar- consisted of a number of rooms that comprised the family home. It was a refuge for its inhabitants, their source of strength, and it never had windows looking onto the streets. The exterior was protected by Roman concrete walls with wooden formwork, a technique very much used in the Iberian Peninsula.
The classical residence was built around a central courtyard surrounded by rooms in consonance with the design of the Roman house. All the windows of the rooms looked onto this courtyard and an Arab residence never opened directly to the outside world, thereby protecting its privacy.
Most Arab houses were initially small, but were always built with a view to possible extensions. They were accessed by a passageway from the bailey in order to conceal from the eyes of the passers-by the way of life of their inhabitants. This led to a courtyard that could have several porticos or arcades of columns or pillars. Most of these courtyards had a reservoir with a well or cistern.
