The Guadalquivir is the fifth longest river in the Iberian peninsula and the second longest river with its entire length in Spain. The Guadalquivir is 657 kilometers long and drains an area of about 58,000 square kilometers. It begins at Cañada de las Fuentes in the Cazorla mountain range (Jaén), passes through Córdoba and Seville and ends at the fishing village of Bonanza, in Sanlúcar de Barrameda, flowing into the Gulf of Cádiz, in the Atlantic Ocean.
The name comes from the Arabic al-wādi al-kabīr 'The Great River'. Classical Arabic Wadi is pronounced in present-day Maghreb as Oued. The Phoenicians named the river Baits, later Betis (or Baetis) from pre-Roman times to the Al-Andalus period, giving its name to the Hispania Baetica Roman province. An older Celtiberian name was Oba (gold river), leading to the assumption that etymologically Córdoba means city on the Oba (Cart-Oba), but it is actually derived from the Phoenician qorteb meaning "oil press".