The Royal Collegiate Church of San Hipólito is a Catholic church located between Avenida del Gran Capitán and the streets Menéndez Pelayo, Alonso Aguilar and Plaza de San Ignacio de Loyola.
It was founded in 1343 on the initiative of Alfonso XI of Castile. The church was ceded in perpetuity by the Diocese of Cordoba to the Society of Jesus. The monarchs Ferdinand IV and Alfonso XI are buried there.
The Collegiate Church was part of a monastery founded by Alfonso XI, King of Castile and León, in 1342. The monarch founded the monastery in gratitude for his victory in the Battle of Salado, fought in 1340, and also to use the monastery church as a royal pantheon, as Alfonso XI wished the remains of his father, King Ferdinand IV, who had died in 1312 and was buried in Cordoba Cathedral at the time, to be buried there, and also because he wished his own mortal remains to rest there. On 17th July 1343, during the siege of Algeciras, Alfonso XI ceded to the monastery of San Hipólito various goods that had belonged to Martín Pérez and Ruy Pérez de Castro, and which at that time were in the hands of the king's chamber, and the sovereign entrusted Fernán Rodríguez, his chief steward, with their administration.
The church has a single nave with a transept and polygonal chancel. The head of the church is Gothic, dating from around 1350, and consists of an octagonal apse, preceded by two bays, and covered with a ribbed vault with ribs decorated with houndstooth and burgundy spine. The main arch, with diamond-shaped points, is supported by Gothic capitals and covers the medieval work. The Gothic windows are covered with contemporary stained-glass windows depicting different saints of the Jesuit order. Below the windows are two neo-Gothic doorways that provide access to the church's sacristy.
The Gothic transept, which was remodelled in the 18th century, is covered with ribbed vaults, and the body of the church was built in the 18th century, when work was resumed in order to complete the church, and consists of a single nave with side chapels of four bays, covered by a barrel vault with lunettes.6 Above the chapels there are tribunes facing the central nave of the church. The elevation of the nave of the church uses pilasters crowned with cut-out plaques.
In the transept, on the left, there is a Baroque altarpiece of the Immaculate Conception, decorated with Solomonic columns, which was made in 1735 by Teodosio Sánchez Cañada and Martín López. The Mannerist images of the Santos Juanes (Saints John and John the Baptist) can be found in the altarpiece's interspaces, and the 18th century image of the Immaculate Conception can be found in the central street. The altarpiece's attic contains a canvas depicting Saint Raphael the Archangel. On the side walls of the transept there are two canvases. One of them represents King Ferdinand III of Castile, and is from the 18th century, and the other one represents Saint Nicholas of Bari, and was made in the 19th century.
Opposite the altarpiece of the Immaculate Conception is the altarpiece of the Sacred Heart of Jesus, of similar characteristics to the previous one, with which it forms a pair, with the images of the Sacred Heart of Jesus in the centre, the work of Sánchez Castíñez, and the images of San Francisco Javier and San Francisco de Borja, which are in the side streets. In the attic of the altarpiece is a canvas representing San José Pignatelli. Next to the altarpiece, and placed on a pedestal, is a sculpture of Saint Ignatius of Loyola, founder of the Society of Jesus, who is shown carrying a banner with the emblem of the Society.
The sculpture of Saint Ignatius of Loyola is the work of Domingo Sánchez Mesa, and was made in 1952. On the side wall, next to the altarpiece and statue described above, are the tombs of the González de Aguilar y Fernández de Córdoba family. The stone tombs are decorated with grotesques and the noble coats of arms of those buried there. In front of them stands a door that connects the church with the sacristy, and above it is a Baroque style canvas representing Calvary.
On the left side of the nave of the church is the chapel of the Cristo de la Buena Muerte (Christ of the Good Death), which is quadrangular in shape and covered with a vaulted ceiling. In the corners of the vault there are cartouches depicting the Lamb, loaves of bread, vines and a fountain. In the centre of the chapel is a rose window, decorated with vegetal motifs and the dove of the Holy Spirit. The chapel's altarpiece, in the Baroque style and made around 1755, is made of unpolychromed carved wood and has a concave shape that adapts to the semicircular arch of the chapel in which it is placed. It consists of a bench, body and attic, and in the central street, above the tabernacle, there is a carving of the Ecce Homo, dating from the first half of the 17th century.6 The main body has three aisles, and in the central niche is the image of the Virgin of Sorrows and, in the intercolumniations, there are pedestals on which are placed figures of saints from the same period in which the altarpiece was made. The attic of the altarpiece is a poly-lobed moulding flanked by carved plant motifs. On the side walls of the chapel are the images of the Christ of the Good Death, which imitates the homonymous model by Juan de Mesa, and that of Our Lady Queen of the Martyrs, both images being the titular images of the Confraternity of the same name. They were sculpted by the sculptor Antonio Castillo Lastrucci in 1945 and were restored by Miguel Ángel González Jurado in 1993.
On the left side of the nave are two 18th century altarpieces. One of them is dedicated to Saint Joseph and the other to the Virgin of Fatima.7 At the foot of the church, in the choir, there are two 19th century canvases representing Alfonso XI and his wife, Queen Maria of Portugal, which are protected by plasterwork frames. At the level of the tribunes is a 17th century canvas by Antonio Palomino, depicting Saint Jerome.
On the right side of the nave of the church is the chapel of the Virgen del Pilar, which was previously dedicated to Santa Concordia. It has a quadrangular floor plan and is covered by a hemispherical vault. It was built in 1772, and was erected on land ceded by the city of Cordoba for this purpose, according to a tombstone on the exterior wall of the church. The altarpiece of the chapel of the Virgen del Pilar, carved in marble, was made in the 18th century, and it contains the images of the Virgen del Pilar, San Acisclo and Santa Victoria, Santa Concordia and a relief representing the baptism of San Hipólito by San Lorenzo, and in two niches on either side of the altarpiece are placed the images of San Ignacio de Loyola and San Estanislao de Kostka.
On the right side of the nave of the church are two Baroque altars dedicated to Saint Barbara and Saint Hippolytus. On the altar of St. Barbara are the images of St. Barbara, St. Expeditus and St. Michael the Archangel, all of which are modern. On the altar of San Hipólito, the image of the patron saint, made in the 19th century, is venerated.