I will never reach Cordoba
—Federico Garcia Lorca

ONE day in 1152, Ibn Rushd was summoned by Amir Abu Yaqub Yusuf to Marrakesh, the capital of Morocco at the time. He did not know why. At the time he was just 27 years old. But he was extraordinary: he was born and raised in Cordoba, the center of learning in Europe of the 12th century, and had been brought up by an educated family...

So, to Marrakesh he went. In a palace chamber, he