Some Account of Gothic Architecture in Spain Part 10

Published by John Murray, Albemarle St. 1865.]

It is pretty clear that the work was commenced upon the scheme which we still see in the bays next the crossing, and carried on gradually with alterations as the work went on, and probably as it went on the architect discovered the mistake he was making in confining himself to waggon-vaulting in the aisles. It is somewhat remarkable that, with the example of Santiago so near, such a scheme should ever have been devised, unless, indeed, the work was commenced earlier than the date a.s.signed, of which I see no evidence.

The choir shows the same gradual variation in style; and I have considerable difficulty in a.s.signing a precise date to it. It is clear, however, that the whole of it is of much later date than the original foundation of the cathedral; and it is probable, I think, that it was reconstructed in the latter half of the thirteenth century. The windows in the chapels of the chevet are of two lights, with a small quatrefoil pierced in the tympanum above the lights. The mouldings of the groining are extremely bold and simple. The aisle-vaulting, too, is very simple and of early-pointed character, whilst the cl.u.s.tered columns round the apse look somewhat later. There is, however, no mark of alterations or additions; and I think, therefore, that the whole of this work must be of the same date, and that the difference visible between the various parts of it may be put down to the long lingering of those forms of art which had been once imported into this distant province, and to the consequent absence of development. The sculpture of the capitals in the chevet is nowhere, I think, earlier than about the end of the thirteenth century, though that in the chapels round it, being very simple, looks rather earlier.

Unfortunately all the upper part of the choir was rebuilt about the same time that the eastern chapel was added. It has strange thin ogee flying b.u.t.tresses, large windows, and a painted ceiling.

Here, as at San Isidoro, Leon, the Host is always exposed, and, as I have mentioned before, two priests are always in attendance at faldstools on each side of the Capilla mayor in front of the altar.

The interior, of course, has been much damaged by the destruction of the old clerestory of the choir. It is, nevertheless, still very impressive, and much of its fine effect is owing to the contrast between the bright light of the nave and the obscure gloom of the long aisles on either side of the Coro. The length of the nave, too, is unusually great in proportion to the size of the church; and though much of the sculpture is rude in execution, it is still not without effect on the general character of the building.

On the north side of the nave a chapel has been added, which preserves the external arrangement of the windows and b.u.t.tresses in the earliest part of the building, as they are now enclosed within and protected by it. The simple and rather rude b.u.t.tresses are carried up and finished under the eaves' corbel-tables with arches between them, so as to make a continuous arcade the whole length of the building on either side.

The north doorway is of the same age as the early part of the church, and has a figure of our Lord within a vesica in the tympanum, and the Last Supper carved on a pendant below it. The head of the door-opening is very peculiar, having a round arch on either side of this central pendant. The door has some rather good ironwork. The porch in front of it is a work of the fifteenth century, or perhaps later, and is open on three sides.

The only good external view of the church is obtained from the north side. Here the tower rises picturesquely above the transept, but the belfry and upper stage are modern[135] and very poor. The bells are not only hung in the windows, but one of them is suspended in an open iron framework from the finish the centre of the roof.

The cloister and other buildings seem to be all completely modern, and are of very poor style.

There are two old churches here--those of the Capuchins and of San Domingo--both of them in or close to the Plaza of San Domingo. The church of the Capuchins is evidently interesting, though I could not gain access to its interior, which appears to be desecrated. It has transepts, a low central lantern, a princ.i.p.al apse of six sides, and two smaller apses opening into the transepts. These apses are remarkable for having an angle in the centre, whilst their windows have a bar of tracery across them, transome fas.h.i.+on, at mid-height. It is certainly a very curious coincidence, that in both these particulars it resembles closely the fine church of the Frari at Venice; and though I am not prepared to say that the imitation is anything more than the merest accident, it is certainly noteworthy. The eaves are all finished with moulded corbel-tables; and there is a rather fine rose-window in the transept gable. The circles in the head of the apse windows are filled in with very delicate traceries, cut out of thin slabs of stone, a device evidently borrowed from Moresque examples; and it is somewhat strange to meet them here so far from any Moorish buildings or influence.

The church of San Domingo is somewhat similar in plan. It has a modernized nave of five bays, a central dome, which looks as though it might be old, but which is now all plastered and whitewashed, a princ.i.p.al apse of seven sides, transepts covered with waggon-vaults, and small apses to the east of them. The capitals have carvings of beasts and foliage; but none of these, or of the mouldings, look earlier than the fourteenth century; yet the capitals are all square in plan, and the arches into the chapels have a bold dog-tooth enrichment. There is a fine south doorway to the nave, in which chevrons, delicate fringes of cusping, and dog-tooth, are all introduced. In such a work the date of the latest portion must be the date of the whole; and so I do not think it can be earlier than the rest of the church, though at first sight it undoubtedly has the air of being more than a century older.

Gil Gonzalez Davila[136] says that Bishop Fernando gave permission for the foundation of the convent of San Domingo in A.D. 1318, and that _circa_ A.D. 1350-58 the Dominican Fray Pedro Lopez de Aguiar founded it; and this date appears to me to accord very well with the peculiar character of the work.

There is little more to be seen in Lugo. The old walls, though they retain all their towers, have been to some extent altered for the worse to fit them for defence in the last war; they have been also rendered available as a broad public walk,--very pleasant, inasmuch as it commands good views of the open country beyond the city.

The people here and at Santiago all go to the fountains armed with a long tin tube, which they apply to the mouths of the beasts which discharge the water, and so convey the stream straight to their pitchers placed on the edge of the large basins. The crowd of water-carriers round a Spanish fountain is always noisy, talkative, and gay; and many is the fight and furious the clamour for the privilege of putting the tube to the fountain in regular order.

I travelled between la Coruna and Lugo by night, so that I am unable to say anything as to the country or scenery on the road, save that for some distance before reaching Lugo it is cold, bare, and unattractive.

Betanzos, the only town of importance on the road, has two or three good churches, which I missed seeing by daylight. They are of early date, with apsidal east ends, and somewhat similar, apparently, to the churches at la Coruna, though on a larger scale.

La Coruna is charmingly situated, facing a grand landlocked bay, but on the inner side of a narrow ridge, a short walk across which leads to the open sea, which is here very magnificent. The views of the coast, and the openings to the grand bays or rios of Ferrol, Betanzos, and la Coruna, are of unusual beauty, and it is rarely indeed that one sees a more attractive country. But there is not very much to detain an architect. The town is divided into the old and the new; and in the former are two old churches, which, though small, are interesting; whilst in the latter there is absolutely nothing to see but shops and cafes.

The Collegiata of Sta. Maria del Campo was made a parish church by King Alonso X. in A.D. 1256, and in A.D. 1441 was made collegiate: it has a nave and aisles of five bays, and a short chancel, with an apse covered with a semi-dome vault.[137] The nave and aisles are all covered with pointed waggon-vaults springing from the same level; and as the aisles are narrow, their vaults resist the thrust of the main vault, without exerting a violent thrust on the aisle walls. The capitals are rudely carved with foliage, and the arches are perfectly plain. The bay of vaulting over the chancel is a pointed waggon-vault, with ribs on its under side, arranged as though in imitation of a s.e.xpart.i.te vault.[138]

[Ill.u.s.tration: Churches at LA CORUnA:--SEGOVIA:--LeRIDA: and BENAVENTE: Plate VIII.

W. West, Lithr.

Published by John Murray, Albemarle Street 1865.]

The western doorway has a circular arch, with rudely carved foliage in the outer orders; and ten angels, with our Lord giving His blessing in the centre, in the inner order. The tympanum has the Adoration of the Magi. The abaci and capitals are carved, but everywhere the carving is overlaid with whitewash so thickly as to be not very intelligible. The south door has storied capitals, and angels under the corbels, which support the tympanum over the door-opening; this has a figure with a pilgrim's staff, probably Santiago, and there are other figures and foliage in the arch. The abacus is carried round the b.u.t.tresses, and a bold arch is thrown across between them above the door. An original window near this door is a mere slit in the wall, and not intended for glazing. The north door is somewhat similar to the other, with a sculpture of St. Katharine in the tympanum.

The apse has a very small east window, engaged columns dividing it into three bays, and a simple corbel-table.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Sta. Maria, la Coruna.]

The west front is quaint and picturesque. It has a bold porch--now almost built up by modern erections--and two small square towers or turrets at the angles. Of these the south-western has a low, square stone spire, springing from within a traceried parapet, and with some very quaint crockets at the angles. A tall cross, with an original sculpture of the Crucifixion, stands in the little Plaza in front of the church. The Coro here is in a large western gallery, but both this and the stalls are Renaissance in style.

The other church is that of Santiago. This has a broad nave, forty-four feet wide, into the east wall of which three small apses open.[139] The nave is divided into four bays by bold cross arches, which carry the wooden roof; and of the three eastern arches, the central rises high above the others, and has a circular window above it. The west front has a very fine doorway, set in a projecting portion of the wall, finished with a corbel-table and cornice at the top. This has a figure of Santiago in the tympanum, and statues in the jambs. The north doorway has heads of oxen supporting the lintel, and rude carving of foliage in the arch. One of the original windows remains in the north wall. This is roundheaded and very narrow, but has good jamb-shafts and arch-mouldings. The detail of the eastern apse is of bold and simple Romanesque character, with engaged shafts supporting the eaves-cornice.

There is not, so far as I know, any evidence as to the exact date of these churches; but I think that the character of all their details proves that they were founded about the middle of the twelfth century.

They are evidently later than the cathedral at Santiago, and tally more with the work which I have been describing in the nave of Lugo Cathedral. And though the dimensions of both are insignificant, they appear to me to be extremely valuable examples, as showing two evident attempts at development on the part of their architect, who, to judge of the strong similarity in some of their details, was probably the same man.

Three barrel-vaults on the same level as at Sta. Maria are seldom seen; and the bold cross arches spanning Santiago are a good example of an attempt in the twelfth century to achieve what few have yet attempted to accomplish in the revival of the present day--the covering of a broad nave in a simple, economical, and yet effective manner.

In the church of Santiago there is preserved a fragment of an embroidered blue velvet cope. The sprigs with which it is diapered are so exactly similar in character to those of some of our own old examples--the Ely cope in particular--as to suggest the idea that the work is really English.

[Ill.u.s.tration: No. 16.

LA CORUnA. p. 138.

CHURCH OF SANTIAGO.]

From La Coruna to Santiago the road is, for the first half of the way, extremely pleasant, and pa.s.ses through a luxuriant country; gradually, however, as the end of the great pilgrimage is reached, it becomes dreary and the country bare; still the outlines of the hills are fine, and some of the distant views rather attractive. But Santiago is too important a city, and its cathedral is too grand and interesting, to be described at the end of a chapter.

CHAPTER VII.

SANTIAGO DE COMPOSTELLA.

The journey from Lugo to Santiago is pleasant so far as the country is concerned, and there is one advantage in the extremely slow and grave pace of the diligences in this part of the world, that it always allows of the scenery being well studied. Moreover, in these long rides there is a pleasure and relief in being able to take a good walk without much risk of being left behind, which can hardly be appreciated by the modern Englishman who travels only in his own country. The general character of the landscape is somewhat like that of the Yorks.h.i.+re moors, diversified here and there by beautiful valleys, the sides of which are generally clothed with chestnut, but sometimes with walnut, oak, and stone-pines.

The heaths were in full flower, and looked brilliant in the extreme, and here and there were patches of gorse. The road is fine, and has only recently been made. The country is very thinly populated, so that we pa.s.sed not more than two or three villages on the way, and in none of them did I see signs of old churches of any interest. It is difficult to picture anything more wretched than the state of the Gallegan peasantry as we saw them on this road. They were very dirty, and clothed in the merest rags: the boys frequently with nothing on but a s.h.i.+rt, and that all in tatters; and the women with but little more in quant.i.ty, and nothing better in quality. The poorest Irish would have some difficulty in showing that their misery is greater than that of these poor Gallegans.

My journey to Santiago was quite an experiment. I had been able to learn nothing whatever about the cathedral before going there, and I was uncertain whether I should not find the mere wreck of an old church, overlaid everywhere with additions by architects of the Berruguetesque or Churrugueresque schools, instead of the old church which I knew had once stood there. In all my Spanish journeys there had been somewhat of this pleasant element of uncertainty as to what I was to find; but here my ignorance was complete, and as the journey was a long one to make on speculation, it was not a little fortunate that my faith was rewarded by the discovery of a church of extreme magnificence and interest.

The weary day wore on as we toiled on and on upon our pilgrimage, and it was nearly dark before we reached the entrance of the city, and after much delay found ourselves following a porter up the steep streets and alleys which lead up from the diligence Fonda to the princ.i.p.al inn, which happens fortunately to be very near the one interesting spot in the city--the cathedral. The next morning showed us not only the exterior of the city, but enabled us also to form a good idea of its surroundings. It stands on the slope of a steep hill, with great bare and bleak hills on all sides, rising generally to a great height. From some of them the views are no doubt very fine, and the town with its towers and walls may well look more imposing than it does on a nearer view.

For, to say the truth, if the cathedral be left out of consideration, Santiago is a disappointing place. There is none of the evidence of the presence of pilgrims which might be expected, and I suspect a genuine pilgrim is a very rare article indeed. I never saw more than one, and he proclaimed his intentions only by the mult.i.tude of his scallop-sh.e.l.ls fastened on wherever his rags would allow; but I fear much he was a professional pilgrim; he was begging l.u.s.tily at Zaragoza, and seemed to have been many years there on the same errand, without getting very far on his road. And there is not much evidence in the town itself of its history and pretensions to antiquity; for, as is so often the case in Spain, so great was the wealth possessed by the Church in the seventeenth and early part of the eighteenth century, that all the churches and religious houses were rebuilt about that time, and now, in place of mediaeval churches and convents, there are none but enormous Renaissance erections on all sides; and as they are bad examples of their cla.s.s, little pleasure is to be derived from looking at them, either outside or inside.

Perhaps some exception ought to be made from this general depreciation of the buildings at Santiago in favour of the _entourage_ of the cathedral; for here there is a sumptuous church opening on all sides to Plazas of grand size, and surrounded by buildings all having more or less architectural pretension. Steep flights of steps lead from one Plaza to another, a fountain plays among quarrelsome water-carriers in one, and in another not only does an old woman retail scallop-sh.e.l.ls to those who want them, but a tribe of market people ply their trade, cover the flags with their bright fruit, make the ear tired with their eternal wrangle, and the eye delighted with their gay choice of colours for sashes, headgear, and what not.

The whole record of the foundation of this cathedral is a great deal too long to enter upon here; but fortunately enough remains of its architectural history to make the story of the present building both intelligible and interesting, and to this I must now ask the attention of my readers.

There seems to have been a church founded here in or about the year 868,[140] which is said to have been completed in thirty-one years,[141]

and consecrated in A.D. 899. Of this church nothing now remains; but the contemporary deed of gift to the church by the King Alfonso III., and the account of the altars and relics existing in it at the time, are of considerable interest.[142]

I need hardly say how much store was laid by the clergy of Santiago on their possession of the body of the Apostle. Mr. Ford[143] gives only too amusing, if it is, as I fear, only too true, a version of the story of the Saint's remains. Suffice it here to say, that there no longer seem to be great pilgrimages to his shrine, and that even in Spain the old belief in the miracle-working power of his bones seems now practically to have died out.[144] Nothing could, however, have been stronger than the old faith in their patron, and the extreme wealth brought to the church by the pilgrimages made of old to his shrine from all parts of Europe would no doubt have involved the entire destruction of all remains of the early church, in order to its reconstruction on a far grander scale, had it not been destroyed, so far as possible, in the century after its erection, by the Moors under Almanzor.

From the end of the tenth century I find no mention of the cathedral until the episcopate of Diego Gelmirez, in whose time Santiago was made an archbishopric. He was consecrated in the year 1100, and died in A.D.

1130, and the history of his archiepiscopate is given in great detail in the curious contemporary chronicle, the 'Historia Compostellana.'[145]

Here it is recorded that, in A.D. 1128, "forty-six years after the commencement of the new church of St. James," the bishop, finding that the subordinate buildings were so poor that strangers absolutely "wandered about looking for where the cloisters and offices might be,"

called his chapter together, and urged upon them the necessity of remedying so grave a defect, finis.h.i.+ng his speech by the offer of a hundred marks of pure silver, thirty at once, and the rest at the end of a year.[146] This would put the commencement of the new cathedral in the year 1082, during the episcopate of Diego Pelaez, though, as will be seen, the same History elsewhere says that the church was commenced in A.D. 1178, a date which occurs also on the south transept door-jamb; and the works must have been carried on during the time of his successors, Pedro II. and Dalmatius (a monk of Cluny), to its completion under Gelmirez.[147] It was in the time of this bishop, in the year 1117, it is recorded in the Chronicle, that during a violent tumult in the city, in which both the bishop and queen hardly escaped alive, the cathedral was set on fire by the mob; but its construction is so nearly fireproof, that doubtless it was the furniture only that was really burnt; for, eleven years later, in A.D. 1128, the bishop, in his speech to the chapter, already mentioned, speaks of the church as being extremely beautiful, and, indeed, renowned for its beauty.[148] In A.D. 1124 two canons of Santiago were collecting money for the works at the cathedral, in Sicily and Apulia,[149] and the cloister, which was commenced in A.D.

1128, seems to have been still unfinished in A.D. 1134.[150] From this date until A.D. 1168 I find no record of any alteration; but in this year Ferdinand II. issued a warrant[151] for the payment of the master of the works--one Matthew--and twenty years later, the same master of the works put the following inscription on the under side of the lintel of the western door:--