Some Account of Gothic Architecture in Spain Part 18

Of colour on the walls, little, alas! remains. They have been whitewashed throughout, and in the choir coa.r.s.ely diapered with broad gilt masonry lines, edged with black. The internal tympanum of the south transept door has a tree of Jesse, and close to it is an enormous painting of S. Christopher; and the cloister walls had remains of paintings which used to be attributed (but without the slightest foundation, I believe) to Giotto, but these have now given way to new wall-paintings of poor design and no value of any kind.

The stateliness of the services here answers in some degree to the grandeur of the fabric in which they are celebrated. At eight o'clock every morning there appears to be ma.s.s at the high altar, at which the Epistle and Gospel are read from ambons in the screen in front of it, the gospeller having two lighted candles; whilst the silvery-sounding wheels of bells are rung with all their force at the elevation of the Host, in place of the single tinkling bell to which our ears are so used on the Continent.[248] The Revolution in Spain, among other odd things, has enabled the clergy here to sing the Lauds at about four o'clock in the afternoon instead of at the right time. The service at the Mozarabic Chapel at the west end of the aisle goes on at the same time as that in the Coro, and anything more puzzling than the two organs and two choirs singing as it were against each other can scarcely be conceived. There are neither seats nor chairs for the people; the wors.h.i.+ppers, in so vast a place, seem to be few, though no doubt we should count them as many in one of our English cathedrals. I always wish, when I see a church so used, that we could revive the same custom here, and let a fair proportion, at any rate, of the people stand and kneel at large on the floor. Our chairs, benches, and pews are at least as often a nuisance to their occupiers as the contrary; and for all parts of our services, save the sermon, all but superfluous. Some day, perhaps, when we have discovered that it is not given to every one to be a good preacher, we may separate our sermons from our other services, and may live in hopes of then seeing the floors of our churches restored to the free and common use of the people, whilst some chance will be given, at the same time, to our architects of exhibiting their powers to the greatest advantage.

It would be easy to elaborate the account which I have given of this cathedral, to very much greater length; for there are other erections in connexion with it besides all those that I have noticed, of a grand and costly kind, owing their foundation to the builders of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, and everywhere affording the same exhibition of magnificence and wealth; but these works are all worthless from the point of view which I have taken for my notes of Spanish architecture, and if I were to chronicle them I should be bound to chronicle all the works of Berruguete, Herrera, and Churriguera elsewhere, for which sad task I have neither s.p.a.ce nor inclination. I cannot, indeed, forgive these men, when I remember that to them it is due that what remained before their time of the original design of the exterior of this church was completely modernized or concealed everywhere by their additions.

The only other great Gothic work in the city, after the cathedral, seems to be the church of San Juan de los Reyes,[249] which was erected by order of Ferdinand and Isabella, in A.D. 1476, to commemorate their victory in the battle of Toro over the King of Portugal. Nothing can be much more elaborate than much of the detail of this church, yet I have seen few buildings less pleasing or harmonious. It was erected in the age of heraldic achievements, and angels with coats of arms are crowded over the walls. There is a nave of four bays, a Cimborio or raised lantern at the Crossing, roofed with an octagonal vault with groined pendentives, quasi-transepts (they are in fact mere shallow square recesses), and a very short apsidal choir of five unequal sides. The western bay of the nave has a deep groined gallery, of the same age as the church, and in which are the stalls and organs, with two small ambons in its western bal.u.s.trade: chapels are formed between the nave b.u.t.tresses. Other ambons are placed at some height from the floor against the north-west and south-west piers of the Cimborio. The lantern on the outside is octagonal with pinnacles at the angles and a pierced parapet.

The bald panelling of the external wall of the south transept is furnished with a ghastly kind of adornment in the chains with which Christians are said to have been confined by the Moors in Granada.

The ruling idea of the interior of this church is evidently that which, unfortunately I think, is somewhat fas.h.i.+onable at the present day--the bringing of the altar forward among the people without reserve or protection. The removal of the Coro to the western gallery, the shallow recess in which the altar is placed, and the broad, unbroken area of the nave, are all evidences of this, and could only have been adopted when all desire to interest the people in any but the altar services had been given up, and with it that wholesome reverence which, in earlier days, had jealously guarded, fenced around, and screened these the holiest parts of holy buildings.

A blue velvet canopy still hangs above the altar; it is a square tester, with hangings at the back and on either side. The velvet is marked with vertical lines of gold lace, and the eagle of St. John--the crest of Ferdinand and Isabella--is introduced in the embroidery.

The pulpit was against one of the piers on the south side of the nave; the door into it is now stopped up, and another pulpit has been erected below the Gospel ambon. There is a gallery corbelled out from the clerestory, in front of one of the south windows, the use of which did not seem to be at all clear, unless, indeed, it was similar in object to such an example as the minstrels' gallery at Exeter Cathedral.

The old cloister, though falling down through neglect and bad usage, is, on the whole, the finest portion of the whole work; it is groined throughout, and covered with rich sculpture of foliage and animals, and saints in niches. It has been much damaged, mainly, I believe, by French soldiers during the war, and is now used in part as a picture gallery, and in part as a museum of antiquities. The pictures, like those in most of the inferior Spanish collections, are very sad, ghastly, and gloomy; but among the antiquities are many of value, including a good deal of Moorish work of various ages. The cloister is of two stages in height, the lower having traceried openings, the upper large open arches in each bay.

The refectory also remains, with ogee lierne ribs on its groining: over the entrance to it is a great cross, recessed within an arch, with a pelican at the top, and statues of St. Mary and St. John[250] on either side, but without the figure of our Lord.

And now I bid farewell to Toledo. Few cities that I have ever seen can compete in artistic interest with it; and none perhaps come up to it in the singular magnificence of its situation, and the endless novelty and picturesqueness of its every corner. It epitomizes the whole strange history of Spain in a manner so vivid, that he who visits its old nooks and corners carefully and thoughtfully, can work out, almost una.s.sisted, the strange variety which that history affords. For here, Romans, Visigoths, Saracens, and again Christians, have in turn held sway, and here all have left their mark; here, moreover, the Christians, since the thirteenth century, have shown two opposite examples,--one of toleration of Jews and Moors, which it would be hard to find a parallel for among ourselves, and the other of intolerance, such as has no parallel out of Spain elsewhere in Europe.

I need hardly say that in such a city the post-Gothic builders have also left their mark. They have built many and imposing houses of various kinds, chief among which are the altered Alcazar, now destroyed and ruined, and the Convent of Sta. Cruz. But there was nothing in these works specially appropriate to the locality, and nothing, therefore, which takes them out of the position which their cla.s.s holds elsewhere in Spain.

I believe that Toledo, in addition to all its other charms, is a good starting-point for visits to several of the best examples of mediaeval Castilian castles. I have not been able to afford the time necessary for this work, and was unluckily obliged, therefore, to neglect it altogether; but the Spanish castles are so important that they deserve a volume to themselves; and it is to be hoped that ere long some one will undertake the pleasant task of examining and ill.u.s.trating them.

[Ill.u.s.tration: TOLEDO Ground Plan of Cathedral &c. Plate XIV.

W. West, Lithr.

Published by John Murray, Albemarle St. 1865.]

CHAPTER XII.

VALENCIA.

From Toledo I took the railway to Valencia. But as the junction of the Toledo branch with the main line is a small station of the meanest description, and as there were three or four hours to dispose of before the mail-train pa.s.sed, I went back as far as Aranjuez, intending to dine there. The station is close to the palace, a large, bald, and uninteresting pile. The princ.i.p.al inn is kept by an Englishman with a French wife, and as it was not the right season for Aranjuez we had great difficulty in getting anything. In truth the French wife was a tartar, and advised us to go back again; but finally, the husband having interceded, she relented so far as to produce some eggs and bacon.

Aranjuez seemed to consist mainly of the palace and its stables, and to be afflicted with even more than the usual plague of dust: but in the spring no doubt it is in a more pleasant state, and may, I hope, justify the landlord's a.s.sertion that there is nothing in the world to compare with it!

Late in the evening we started for Valencia: it was a bright moonlight night, so that I was able, when I woke and looked out, to see that the country we traversed was an endless plain of extremely uninteresting character, and that we lost little by not seeing it. I should have preferred leaving the railway altogether, and going by Cuenca on my way to Valencia; but time was altogether wanting for this detour, though I have no doubt that Cuenca would well repay a visit.

At Almanza, where the lines for Alicante and Valencia separate, there is a very picturesque castle perched upon a rock above the town, and here the dreary, uninteresting country, which extends with but short intervals all the way from Vitoria, is changed for the somewhat mountainous Valencian district, which everywhere shows signs of the highest luxuriance and cultivation, resulting almost entirely from the extreme care and industry with which the artificial irrigation is managed. The villages are numerous, and around them are beautiful vineyards, groves of orange-trees, and rice-fields; whilst here and there clumps of tall palm-trees give a very Eastern aspect to the landscape. The churches seemed, as far as I could judge, to be all modern and most uninteresting. After pa.s.sing the hilly country, a broad plain is crossed to Valencia. Here the system of irrigation, said to be an inheritance from the Moors, is evidently most complete. Every field has its stream of water running rapidly along, and the main drawback to such a system, so completely carried out, is that the beds of the rivers are generally all but dry, their water being all diverted into other and more useful channels. The Valencian farm-labourers' dress is quite worth looking at. They wear short, loose, white linen trousers and jackets, brilliantly coloured _mantas_--generally scarlet--thrown over their shoulders, coloured handkerchiefs over their heads, and violet scarfs round their waists. They have a quaint way of sitting at work in the fields, with their knees up to their ears, like so many gra.s.shoppers; and their skin is so well bronzed that one can hardly believe them to be of European blood. They are said to be vindictive and pa.s.sionate, but they are also, so far as I saw them, very lively, merry, and talkative.

The farms appear to be very large, and when I pa.s.sed the farmers were hard at work thres.h.i.+ng their rice. This is all done by horses and mules on circular thres.h.i.+ng-floors. In many of the farms eight or ten pair of horses may be seen at work at the same time on as many thres.h.i.+ng-floors, and the effect of such a scene is striking and novel.

As we went into Valencia we pa.s.sed on the right the enormous new Plaza de Toros, said to be the finest in Spain. Railroads will, I suppose, rather tend to develop the national love for this inst.i.tution, and this theatre must have been built with some such impression, for otherwise it is difficult to believe that a city of a hundred and twenty thousand inhabitants could build a theatre capable of containing about a tenth of the whole population!

The national vehicle of Valencia is the _tartana_, a covered cart on two wheels, with a slight attempt only at springs, and rendered gay by the crimson curtains which are hung across the front. Jumping into one of these, we soon found ourselves at the excellent Fonda del Cid, whose t.i.tle reminds us that we are on cla.s.sic ground in this city of Valencia del Cid.

The Cid took the city from the Moors after a siege of twenty months, in A.D. 1094, established himself here, and ruled till his death, in A.D.

1099. The Moors then regained possession for a short time, but in A.D.

1238 or 1239 it was finally re-taken from them by the Spaniards.

It is hardly to be expected that anything would remain of Christian work earlier than A.D. 1095, or, more probably, than A.D. 1239, and this I found to be the case. The cathedral, dedicated to the Blessed Virgin, is a church of only moderate interest, its interior having been overlaid everywhere with columns, pilasters, and cornices of plaster, and the greater part of the exterior being surrounded so completely with houses, that no good view can be obtained of it.

The ground-plan is, however, still so far untouched as to be perfectly intelligible. It has a nave and aisles of four bays, transepts projecting one bay beyond the aisles, and a lofty lantern or Cimborio over the Crossing. The choir is one bay only in length, and has a three-sided apse. An aisle of the same width as that of the nave is continued round the choir, and has the rare arrangement of two polygonal chapels opening in each of its bays. The vaulting compartments in the aisle are therefore cincopart.i.te, those throughout the rest of the church being quadripart.i.te. A grand Chapter-house stands detached to the south of the west bay of the nave, and an octagonal steeple, called "El Micalete," abuts against the north-west angle of the west front.

The ritual arrangements are all modern, and on the usual plan. The western bay of the church is open; the stalls of the Coro occupy the second and third bays; and metal rails across the fourth bay of the nave and the Crossing connect the Coro with the Capilla mayor.

The evidence as to the age of the various portions of the building is sufficient to enable us to date most of the work rather accurately. The foundation of the church is recorded by an inscription over the south-transept door to have been laid in 1262:[251] and some portion of the exterior is, I have no doubt, of this date. The whole south-transept front, a portion of the sacristy on the east side, and the exterior of the apse, are all of fine early-pointed style, and, in the absence of any specific statement of their date, might well have been thought to belong to quite the commencement of the century. But I think a careful examination of the detail will show that the work is possibly not so early as it looks: and it has so much in common with Italian work of the same age, that we need not be surprised to find in it features which would nevertheless be inconsistent with its execution in the middle of the thirteenth century in any work in the North of Europe. The south transept facade consists of a round-arched doorway, with a horizontal cornice over it, and a large and fine lancet-window above. The door and window have respectively six and three jamb-shafts, and the abaci throughout are square in plan. The archivolt of the doorway is very rich: it includes five orders of enriched dog-tooth moulding, one order of seraphs in niches, one of chevron, one of scalloping, and two of foliage: good thirteenth century mouldings are also freely used. The shafts are detached, and there is foliage on the jamb between them. The abaci are very richly carved with animals and foliage, and the capitals are all sculptured with subjects under canopies. The detail of the whole of the work is certainly very exquisite. Undoubtedly in the north of France such work would be a.s.sumed to have belonged to the twelfth rather than the thirteenth century; but the quatrefoil diapering on the capitals, the canopy work over the subjects in them, and the p.r.o.nounced character of the mouldings and dog-tooth enrichment, make it pretty clear that the recorded date applies to this work. Indeed I do not know how we can a.s.sume any other date for it without altogether throwing over the extremely definite old inscription: for as it is evident that the south transept and choir are of the same date, it is difficult to see how it could have been possible to speak of the first stone, if all this important part of the fabric were already in existence.[252] Close to the transept on the east, in the wall of what is now a sacristy, is another lancet window, of equally good, though simpler detail. Enough, too, remains of the original work in the exterior of the apse to show that it is of the same age as the south transept. The clerestory windows seem to have been simple broad lancets; there are corbel-tables under the eaves; and the b.u.t.tresses are very solid and simple. On the interior nothing but the groining has been left untouched by the pagan plasterers of a later day.

[Ill.u.s.tration: No. 32.

VALENCIA CATHEDRAL. p. 263.

NORTH TRANSEPT AND CIMBORIO.]

I have found no evidence as to the date of the next portion of the fabric, which is the more to be regretted as it is altogether very important and interesting in its character. It includes the whole facade of the north transept, a n.o.ble lantern at the Crossing, and a small pulpit, and the whole of this is a good example of probably the latter half of the fourteenth century. The north transept elevation is extremely rich in detail. The great doorway in the centre of the lowest stage--De los Aposteles--has figures under canopies in its jambs, and corresponding figures on either side beyond the jambs. The arch is moulded, and sculptured with four rows of figures and canopies, divided by orders of mouldings. The tympanum of the door is adorned with sculptures of the Blessed Virgin with our Lord and angels. Over the arch is a gabled canopy, the spandrels of which are filled with tracery and figures. Above, and set back rather from the face of the doorway, is a rose window, the very rich traceries of which are arranged in intersecting equilateral triangles; over it is a crocketed pediment, with tracery in the spandrels and on either side, and flanked by pinnacles. Every portion of the wall is panelled or carved. This front affords an admirable example of that cla.s.s of middle-pointed work which was common in Germany and France at the end of the thirteenth and beginning of the fourteenth centuries. The style prevailed for some time, and it was probably about the middle of the fourteenth century that this building was executed.

The pulpit is placed against the north-east pier of the Crossing; it has evidently been taken to pieces and reconstructed, and it is not certain, I think, that it was originally a pulpit. Many of the members of the base and capital of its stem, and the angles of the octagonal upper stage, are modern, and of bronze; the rest is mainly of marble. The stem is slender, and the upper part is pierced with richly-moulded geometrical traceries, behind which the panels are filled in with boards, gilt and diapered with extremely good effect. A curious feature in this pulpit is that there is now no entrance to it, and if it is ever used for preaching, the preacher must get into it by climbing over the sides!

The lantern or Cimborio, though in some respects similar to, is no doubt later than the transept; it is one of the finest examples of its cla.s.s in Spain. Mr. Ford says that it was built in A.D. 1404, but I have been unable to find his authority for the statement,[253] and though he may be right, I should have been inclined to date it somewhat earlier. It is an octagon of two rather similar stages in height above the roof.

Crocketed pinnacles are arranged at each angle, and large six-light windows with very rich and varied geometrical tracery fill the whole of each of the sides. The lower windows have crocketed labels, and the upper crocketed canopies, and the string-courses are enriched with foliage. From the very transparent character of this lantern, it is clear that it was never intended to be carried higher. It is a lantern and nothing more, and really very n.o.ble, in spite of its somewhat too ornate and frittered character.[254]

[Ill.u.s.tration: The Micalete.]

The portion of the work next in date to this seems to have been the tower. This, like the lantern, is octagonal in plan, and it is placed at the north-west corner of the aisle, against which one of its angles is set. A more Gothic contempt for regularity it would be impossible to imagine, yet the effect is certainly good. The circ.u.mference of this steeple is said to be equal to its height, but I had not an opportunity of testing this. Each side is 20 ft. 8 in. from angle to angle of the b.u.t.tresses, so that the height, if the statement is true, would be about 165 feet. It is of four stages in height; the three lower stages quite plain, and the belfry rather rich, with a window in each face, panelling all over the wall above, and crocketed pediments over the windows. The b.u.t.tresses or pilasters--for they are of similar projection throughout their height--are finished at the top with crocketed pinnacles. The parapet has been destroyed, and there is a modern structure on the roof at the top. The evidence as to the age of this work is ample. It is called "El Micalete" or "Miguelete," its bells having been first hung on the feast of St. Michael.

Some doc.u.ments referring to it are given by Cean Bermudez,[255] and are as follows:--

I. A deed executed in Valencia before Jayme Rovira, notary, on the 20th June, 1380, by which it appears that Michael Palomar, citizen, Bernardo Boix and Bartolome Valent, master masons, estimated what they considered necessary for the fabric of the tower or campanile at 853 scudi.

II. From the MS. diary of the chaplain of King D. Alonso V. of Aragon, it appears that on the 1st January, A.D. 1381, there was a solemn procession of the bishop, clergy, and _regidors_ of the city to the church, to lay the first stone of the Micalete.[256]

III. By a deed made in Valencia, May 18th, A.D. 1414, before Jayme Pastor, notary or clerk of the chapter, it is settled that Pedro Balaguer, an "able architect," shall receive 50 florins from the fabric fund of the new campanile or Micalete, "in payment of his expenses on the journey which he made to Lerida, Narbonne, and other cities, in order to see and examine their towers and campaniles, so as to imitate from them the most elegant and fit form for the cathedral of Valencia."

IV. By another deed, made before the same Jayme Pastor, September 18th, A.D. 1424, it is agreed that Martin Llobet, stone-cutter, agrees to do the work which is wanting and ought to be done in the Micalete, to wit, to finish the last course with its gurgoyles, to make the "_barbacano_,"

and bench round about, for the sum of 2000 florins of common money of Aragon,[257] the administration of the fabric finding the wheels, ropes, baskets, &c.

An inscription on the tower itself, referred to by Mr. Ford (but which I did not see), states that it was raised between A.D. 1381 and A.D. 1418, by Juan Franck, and it is said to have been intended to be 350 feet high.[258]

It is evident, therefore, that several architects were employed upon the work, and I know few facts in the history of mediaeval art more interesting than the account we have here of the payment of an architect whilst he travelled to find some good work to copy for the city of Valencia. The steeple of Lerida cathedral will be mentioned in its place, and it is sufficient now to say that it is also octagonal, of great height, and dates from the commencement of the fourteenth century.

I know nothing at Narbonne which could have been suggestive to Pedro Balaguer, but the city was Spanish in those days, and is probably only mentioned as one of the most important places to which he went.

When the Micalete was built the nave of the church seems to have been still unfinished, the choir and transepts and part of the nave only having been built. In 1459, under the direction of an architect named Valdomar, a native of Valencia, the work was continued, and the church was joined to the tower. The authority for this statement is a MS. in the library of the convent of San Domingo, Valencia, which says: "In the year of our Lord 1459, on Monday, the 10th of September, they commenced digging to make the doorway and arcade of the cathedral; Master Valdomar was the master of the works, a native of the said city of Valencia."[259] Of Valdomar's work in this part of the church nothing remains, the whole has been altered in the most cruel way, and the most contemptible work erected in its place. Valdomar appears to have died whilst his work was in progress, and to have been succeeded by Pedro Compte, who concluded the work in 1482. The ma.n.u.script already quoted from the library of San Domingo is the authority for this statement, and describes Pedro Compte as "Molt sabut en l'art de la pedra."[260]