Glass mosaic decorations were used throughout the medieval Mediterranean as a powerful medium to convey religious and political agendas, yet we know next to nothing about the source of the materials and the transmission of the necessary technical know-how. Mosaics are generally considered a Byzantine art form, not least due to their prominence in Byzantine church architecture and because medieval Islamic textual sources assert that the glass tesserae of some of the most important early mosques were of Byzantine origin. This article provides solid analytical evidence that glass used in the tenth-century mosaics of the Great Umayyad Mosque of Córdoba (Spain) came from Byzantium. Most of the tesserae have high boron contents, for which the only compositional match are Byzantine glasses made with raw materials from Asia Minor. In addition, some of the glass has a chemical fingerprint that suggests that it was prepared by mixing local raw materials with imported high boron glass, indicative of local mosaic glassmaking. Our study thus illustrates the value of analytical studies in re-assessing long-held assumptions about the making of mosaics as well as the movement of materials and people across cultural barriers. The presence of Byzantine materials and craftsmen in Córdoba demonstrates that Muslims and Christians were interacting the length of the Mediterranean, corroborating the close diplomatic ties between the Caliphate of Córdoba and the Byzantine Empire during the tenth century. Our findings further underscore the importance of glass in trade and diplomatic exchange, reflecting its cultural and economic value in the medieval world.

在整个中世纪的地中海时期，玻璃马赛克装饰被用作传达宗教和政治议程的有力媒介，但是我们几乎不了解材料的来源和必要的技术诀窍的传播。马赛克通常被视为拜占庭艺术形式，这不仅是由于其在拜占庭教堂建筑中的突出地位，而且由于中世纪的伊斯兰文字资料断言，一些最重要的早期清真寺的玻璃镶嵌是拜占庭起源的。本文提供了可靠的分析证据，表明科尔多瓦（西班牙）乌迈亚德清真寺（Umayyad Mosque）的10世纪马赛克中使用的玻璃来自拜占庭。大部分镶嵌物的硼含量都很高，唯一的成分匹配是使用小亚细亚的原材料制成的拜占庭玻璃。此外，一些玻璃具有化学指纹，这表明它是通过将本地原材料与进口的高硼玻璃混合制成的，这表明玻璃是本地镶嵌玻璃。因此，我们的研究说明了分析研究在重新评估关于镶嵌制作以及材料和人员跨越文化障碍的移动的长期存在的假设方面的价值。科尔多瓦的拜占庭人的材料和工匠的存在表明，穆斯林和基督教徒在地中海的整个长度中相互作用，证实了十世纪科尔多瓦的哈里发与拜占庭帝国之间的密切外交关系。我们的发现进一步强调了玻璃在贸易和外交交流中的重要性，反映了其在中世纪世界中的文化和经济价值。