Some Account of Gothic Architecture in Spain Part 15

The princ.i.p.al church, "El Magistral," of SS. Just y Pastor--the tutelars of the city--is a large, late church of poor style. It has a nave and aisles of five bays, transepts and choir of one bay, and an apse of three sides. The aisle round the apse is contrived with three square bays and four triangular, and is evidently founded on the beautiful plan of the chevet of Toledo cathedral; but I must say that Pedro Gumiel "el Honrado," Regidor of Alcala, and architect of this church, has perfectly succeeded in avoiding any repet.i.tion of the beauties of Toledo; his work being thoroughly uninteresting and poor. The three western bays of the nave are open; the two eastern enclosed with screens and stalled for the Coro. A bronze railing under the Crossing connects the Coro with the Capilla mayor. There are no less than six pulpits here! two at the entrance to the choir for the Epistoler and Gospeller, two on the west of the Crossing, and two more opposite each other against the second column from the west in the nave. It looks just as though they had ordered a pair of pulpits as they did a pair of organs; and as preaching does not seem to be much the fashion now in Spain, I had no opportunity of learning how these many pulpits were to be used. There are two organs, one on each side over the Coro; that on the south so picturesque as to be worthy of ill.u.s.tration.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Organ, Alcala.]

Two great monuments--one in the nave, and one under the Crossing--are remarkable for the position of the effigies with their feet to the west.

On the south side of the south transept is a small chapel roofed with a most rich and delicate Moorish plaster ceiling; the whole was richly coloured. It did not appear to be earlier than the church, which is said to have been constructed between the years 1497 and 1509.

The University founded by Ximenes is in a wretched state of dilapidation; it is said to have been designed by the same Pedro Gumiel who built SS. Just y Pastor, but the work, so far as I saw it, was all Renaissance. The facade and court behind it were the work of Rodrigo Gil de Hontanon, between A.D. 1550 and 1553, and he destroyed Pedro Gumiel's work in order to erect it. By the side of the college stands the church of San Ildefonso, which I suppose must be the chapel built by Pedro Gumiel. It is, I believe, desecrated, and no one could tell me where the key was to be found, so that I was unable to do more than get a note of the curious Cimborio from the exterior. It is not a lantern, but rather a raising of the whole centre of the church above the remainder. It is constructed of brick and stone, and is evidently of late date. Under this Cimborio, I believe, is the monument of the great Cardinal.

[Ill.u.s.tration: Domestic Window, Alcala.]

There are considerable remains of the old walls, with circular towers rather closely set around them. The bishop's palace retains a fine tower, which seems to have been connected with the town walls. It is plain below, but has turrets picturesquely corbelled out on machicoulis over the centre of each side and at each angle. A wing of the palace which joins this tower has some very remarkable domestic windows, which deserve ill.u.s.tration. The shafts are of marble, the tracery and the wall below the sill of stone, but the wall of brick. The shafts are set behind each other, there is a good ball-flower enrichment in the label, and the mouldings are rich and good of their kind. Such a window seems to unite the characteristics of two or three countries, and is, indeed, in this, an epitome of Spanish art, which borrowed freely from other lands, and often imported foreign architects, yet, in spite of all this, is still almost always national in its character.

It is an easy journey from Alcala to Guadalajara; and though the latter place disappointed me much, it is still worthy of a few hours' delay to those who pa.s.s by it on the Madrid and Zaragoza railway. Seen from the distance it is an imposing city, and if it be seen as I saw it during fair time, full of peasants in gay costume, the general impression may be not unpleasant; but unfortunately, the early architectural remains are few and generally insignificant.

The church of Sta. Maria is the subject of a picturesque view in Villa Amil's book, and he deserves great praise for the skill with which he has created something out of nothing. I could find no feature worth recording save its two Moresque doorways, in one of which--that at the west end--the arch is of the pointed horseshoe form, and the archivolt is built of bricks, some of which are set forward from the face of the wall in the fashion of the rustic work in the execution of which certain schools of architects everywhere seem to take a grave pleasure, of which, perhaps, it would be unkind to wish to deprive them.

The church of San Miguel has a portion of the exterior built in a rich nondescript style--debased Moresque is, perhaps, the right term for it--in the year 1540, as an inscription on the church records. The lower part of the only original portion remaining is built of rough stone, the upper of brick; and it is argued by some, I believe, that the use of the two materials proves that the work was executed at different epochs. To me it seemed that the whole was uniform in style, and evidently the work of sixteenth-century builders. It has large circular projections at the angles, which are finished with fantastic cappings, and sham machicoulis below the ponderous overhanging cornices which ornament the walls both at the end and sides. These cornices have deep brick consoles at intervals, the s.p.a.ces between them filled with crosses on panels of terracotta. The rest of the church seems to be modernized. Both here and at Sta. Maria there are external cloister pa.s.sages outside the church walls, modern in style and date, but similar in object to those of Segovia and Valladolid already described. Another little church, called La Antigua, has an eastern apse of brick and stone, with window openings of many cusps formed very simply with bricks of various lengths. This work is similar to much of the Moresque work at Toledo, and it is rather remarkable how continuous the line of Moresque buildings from Toledo to Zaragoza seems to be.

[Ill.u.s.tration: No. 27.

GUADALAJARA. p. 203.

PALACE OF THE DUKE DEL INFANTADO.]

I saw no other old church here; but the very fine late Gothic palace del Infantado is well worth a visit. It is like so much Spanish work, a strange jumble of Gothic and Pagan, slightly dashed perhaps with Moorish sentiment, and with the somewhat strange feature that the most Gothic portion is above, and the most Pagan below. The facade has a rich late Gothic doorway, and the face of the wall is diapered all over with what look like pointed nail-heads. The two lower stages have windows of the commonest type, with pediments, whilst the upper stage has a rich open arcade, every third division of which has a picturesque projecting oriel, boldly corbelled forward from the face of the wall. Some Pagan windows have evidently been inserted here; and it is possible that some of the other details have been, but if so the work has been done so neatly that it is difficult to detect the alteration. The courtyard or _patio_ has seven open divisions on two sides, and five divisions on the others, and is of two stages in height. The lower range of columns has evidently been modernized, but in the upper they are very richly carved and twisted. The arches are ogee trefoils cusped, and their spandrels are clumsily filled with enormous lions cut in deep relief, and boldly standing on nothing, whilst they manage to hold up a diminutive coat of arms as a sort of finial to the arch. In the upper arcades griffins take the place of the lions, and the arches are again richly cusped. I noticed the date of A.D. 1570 on the capital of one of the columns, but this I have no doubt was the date of the Pagan alterations, and not that of the original fabric, which is said to have been erected in the year 1461.[195]

The Dukes del Infantado had a grand palace in this building, and though it has long been neglected and disused, it seems as if it were again about to be occupied, as I found workmen busily engaged in a sort of restoration of the sculptures in the _patio_, which they were repairing, if I remember right, with plaster.

The sight of a river is always pleasant in this part of Spain, and so, though there is not much water in the Henares, I looked gratefully at it, and at the trees growing by its banks, as I sauntered down to the railway station after a rather weary day spent in vainly trying to find enough to occupy my time and my pencil.

A railway journey of two or three hours carries one hence to a far pleasanter and more profitable city, Siguenza, whose cathedral is of first-rate interest, and, generally speaking, well preserved. It is, like so many of the Spanish churches, unusually complete in its dependent building's; and though these sometimes obscure parts of the building which one would like to examine, they always add greatly to the general interest. The plan[196] here consists of a nave and aisles of only four bays in length, but the dimensions are so considerable that the interior does not look short. Two western towers are placed at the angles, touching the main walls only at one corner, and giving consequently great breadth to the facade. There are transepts and an apsidal choir, with an aisle, or procession-path--and no chapels--all round it. The choir is old, the procession-path of Renaissance character, and it is clear that when first built this church had no choir-aisle with surrounding chapels, and it was, I have no doubt, terminated in the usual early Spanish fashion, with three eastern apsidal chapels.

I have not met with any notice of the foundation of this church, save that given by Gil Gonzalez Davila.[197] He says that the king Don Alonso, after having gained Toledo from the Moors, and appointed Bernardo archbishop, took Siguenza, Al-macan, Medina Celi, and other places of importance. He then restored the cathedral here, which was dedicated on June 19th, 1102, and appointed as first bishop Don Bernardo, a Benedictine monk, who had taken the habit at Cluny, and who was a native of France. The Archbishop of Toledo was his patron, and he was one of the many French bishops appointed at this time to Spanish sees through his great influence. The epitaph of D. Bernardo, given by Davila, records that he rebuilt this church, and consecrated it on the day of St. Stephen in the year 1123. This inscription, however, is not of much value, as it was written after the translation of the bishop's body in 1598. The second bishop was also a Frenchman, and a native of Poitiers.

[Ill.u.s.tration: No. 28

SIGuENZA CATHEDRAL p. 304.

INTERIOR OF NAVE AND AISLES LOOKING NORTH EAST]

A very small portion--if indeed any--of the work of the first bishop now remains. There is one fragment of early Romanesque work to the east of the cloister, which no doubt formed part of it; and it is just possible that the three enormous cylindrical columns, which still remain in the nave, are of the same age. If this be so, I should be inclined to a.s.sume that the choir only was consecrated in A.D. 1123, and that the nave was commenced and carried on very slowly, until, as the style developed, the simple cylindrical columns were abandoned for the fine groups of cl.u.s.tered shafts which are elsewhere used. The general style of the church is a very grand and vigorous first-pointed, early in the style, but still not at all Romanesque in character; and I know few interiors which have impressed me more with their extreme grandeur and stability than this. The truth is, that the somewhat excessive solidity of the work--as heavy and ponderous in substance as the grandest Romanesque--is singularly n.o.ble when combined as it is here with very considerable height in the columns and walls, and with fine pointed arches, early traceried windows, and good sculpture. Unfortunately this ma.s.sive grandeur is only a matter of envy to a wretched architect in the nineteenth century, whose main triumph, if he would prosper, must be to use as few bricks and as small fragments of stone as he can, to the intent that his work should certainly be cheap, and in forgetfulness, if possible, that it will also certainly be bad! Here, however, the architect wrought for eternity as far as was possible, and with a success which admits of no doubt and no cavil. He has been singularly fortunate, too, in the comparative freedom from subsequent alterations which his work has enjoyed. The Renaissance procession-path round the choir, which is the most important addition, certainly spoils the external effect; but it is hardly noticed in the interior, until you find yourself under its heavy and tame panelled roof, and outside the solid wall which still encircles the ancient apse.

The groining of the choir and transepts is s.e.xpart.i.te, but everywhere else it is quadripart.i.te; and the ribs, which are very bold in their dimensions, are generally moulded, but over the crossing are enriched with the dog-tooth ornament. The same decoration is also carved on the clerestory windows of the choir and transepts.

The original windows generally still remain. Those in the aisles are single round-headed lights of grand size, with double engaged shafts, both inside and outside: those in the clerestory are of more advanced character, some being of two and some of four lights, of the best early plate tracery, with pointed enclosing arches. The western bay of the choir has lancet clerestory windows, and the apse of seven sides has also a lancet in each face, with a sort of triforium below, which is now closed, but which before the addition of the procession-path was probably pierced. Below this quasi-triforium the wall of the apse is circular in plan, whilst above it is polygonal, and the difference shows the very gradual way in which the building was erected, one of the most usual points of distinction between the Romanesque and the early-pointed planning of an apse being that in the former it is circular, and in the latter polygonal.

In speaking of the windows, I have omitted to mention the finest, which are undoubtedly the roses in the princ.i.p.al gables. That in the south transept is one of the finest I know;[198] and whilst it is remarkable for the vigorous character of its design it is also to be noted for a peculiarity which I have before observed in early Spanish traceries.

This is the mode in which the traceries are, as it were, packed against each other. It is especially noticeable in the outer line of circles which are inserted like so many wheels ab.u.t.ting against each other, and without the continuous central moulding to which we are generally accustomed. Here, as well as in the interior, the dog-tooth ornament is freely used; and the outer mouldings of the circle are of good character.

The exterior of this church is of as great interest as the interior. The two western steeples are of the very plainest possible character, pierced merely with narrow slits, which light the small chambers in the interior of the tower.

The b.u.t.tresses are of enormous size; and in the angles between them and the walls are set engaged shafts, which run up to and finish under the arcaded eaves-cornices with which the walls are finished under the roof.

At the west end these shafts are carried up to a greater height, and support three bold arches, one in each division of the facade, corresponding in height pretty nearly with the groining inside. I find, on looking at my notes on this church, that I observed upon this as a feature which I recollected at Notre Dame, Poitiers; and there is some significance, therefore, in the record of the fact that the second bishop, in whose time probably this part of the church was built, was a native of that city.

The western door is round-arched, but the cornice over it has been destroyed; and the finish of the b.u.t.tresses and whole upper part of the west front have been modernized. The transept doors are not old, but seem to be in their old places, placed close to the western side, so as not to interfere with the placing of an altar against the eastern wall.

At Tudela cathedral the old doorways still remain just in the same place; and viewed in regard to convenience, and not with a view to making the most important and regular architectural elevation, there is no doubt as to the advantage of the plan.

In addition to the two western steeples there is also one of more modern erection and smaller dimensions on the east side of the south transept.

The other late additions to the church are some chapels on the south side of the choir, a grand sacristy on its north side, some small chapels between the b.u.t.tresses on the north side, and the Parroquia of San Pedro, running north and south, near the west end. This and the chapel on the south side of the choir are of late Gothic date, and of very uninteresting character. Indeed it is remarkable how little the work of the later Spanish architects ordinarily has in it that is of much real value. The early works always have something of that air of mystery and sublimity which is the true mark of all good architecture, whilst the later have generally too much evidence of being mere professional cut-and-dried works, lifeless and tame, like the large majority of the works to which a vicious system of practice has reduced us at the present day.

The cloister, to which also the same remark will apply, was finished in A.D. 1507 by Cardinal Mendoza, as we learn from an inscription in Roman letters with a Renaissance frame round them, which is let into the wall on the south side;[199] and I noticed that the very florid early Renaissance altar-tomb and door to the cloister, which fills a great part of the inside of the north transept, is inscribed to the memory of the same cardinal.[200]

The buildings round the cloister are not remarkable. The summer Chapter-house is of grand size, with a rather good flat painted ceiling, and pictures of the Sibyls against the walls. At the south end is a chapel with an altar, divided by an iron Reja from the Chapter-room.

A Renaissance doorway to another room on the east side of the cloister has the inscription, _Musis. sacra. domus. hec_, and leads to the practising-room for the choir.

The ritual arrangements here are of the usual kind. The bishop's stall is in the centre of the west end, and was made for its place; but the whole of the woodwork is of the latest Gothic, and proves nothing as to the primitive arrangement. Gil Gonzalez Davila[201] gives an inscription from the tomb of Simon de Cisneros, who died in 1326, and who is there said to be the bishop: "Qui hanc ecclesiam authoritate apostolica ex regulari in secularem reduxit ac multis aedificiis exornavit." I hardly know what buildings still remaining can be exactly of this date; but it is evident that the statement refers to subordinate buildings and not to the main fabric of the church.

The people of Sigueuza seem to be more successful than is usual in Spain in the cultivation of green things. The cloister garden is prettily planted, and has the usual fountain in the centre. There is a grove of trees in the Plaza, on the south side of the church; and a public garden to the north is really kept in very fair order, and looks pleasantly shady.

I saw no other old building here except a castle on the hill above the town, with square towers projecting at intervals from the outer wall; but it seemed to have been much modernized, and I did not go into it.

[Ill.u.s.tration: SIGuENZA: Ground Plan of the Cathedral &c. Plate XIII.

Published by John Murray. Albemarle Street 1865]

CHAPTER XI.

TOLEDO.

Toledo is now extremely easy of access from Madrid, a branch from the main line of the Alicante railway turning off at Castellejon, and reducing the journey to one of about two or three hours only, from the capital. Of old the road pa.s.sed through Illescas, and the picturesque church there, ill.u.s.trated by Villa Amil, made me regret that the less interesting railroad rendered the journey by road out of the question.

The country traversed by the railway is very uninteresting, and generally looks parched and arid to a degree. Near Aranjuez the waters of the Tagus have been so a.s.siduously and profitably used, that a great change comes over the scene, and the train pa.s.ses through woods where elms and other forest trees seem to thrive almost as well as they do in damp England; and one can easily understand how this artificial verdure in the plain must delight the Castilian, who otherwise, if he wishes to enjoy such sights, must leave the heat of the plain for the cold winds of the mountain ranges of the Guadarrama. Aranjuez is, however, but an oasis in this Castilian desert, and the railway, soon leaving it behind, wends its way along the treeless, leafless plain to the ecclesiastical capital of the kingdom. On the opposite or right bank of the Tagus, the hills rise to a considerable height, and here and there their dull brown outlines are marked, though hardly relieved, by large cl.u.s.ters of houses surrounding the lofty and apparently uninteresting churches which mark the villages, whose _tout ensemble_ seems everywhere on nearer inspection most uninviting to the eye. The banks of the Tagus are more refreshing, for here the water-wheels for raising water, which line the margin of the stream, suggest some desire on the part of the people to make the most of their opportunities, and they are rewarded by the luxuriant growth which always attends irrigation in Spain.

I looked out long and anxiously for the first view of Toledo, but the hills, which nearly surround it, conceal it altogether until one has arrived within about two or three miles distance; and here, with the Tagus meandering through its _vega_ in the foreground, the great ma.s.s of the hospital outside and below the city to the right hand, and the wall-encircled rock on which the city is perched, crowned by the vast ma.s.s of the Alcazar to the left, the view is certainly fine and impressive.

From most points of view, both within and without the city, the cathedral is seldom well, and sometimes not at all, seen, standing as it does on much lower ground on the side of the rock which slopes towards the least accessible part of the river gorge, and much surrounded by other buildings, whilst the Alcazar, which occupies the highest ground in the whole city, is so vast and square a block of prodigiously lofty walls (old in plan, but modern in most of their details), as to command attention everywhere. The other side of the river is edged by bold hills, and all along its banks are to be seen water-wheels so placed as to raise the water for the irrigation of the land on either side. It is not, however, until after more intimate knowledge of the city has been gained, that its extreme picturesqueness and interest are discovered.

The situation is, indeed, most wild and striking. The Tagus, winding almost all round the city, confines it much in the fashion in which the Wear surrounds Durham. But here the town is far larger, the river banks are more rocky, precipitous, and wild than at Durham: whilst the s.p.a.ce enclosed within them is a confused heap of rough and uneven ground, well covered with houses, churches, and monasteries, and intersected everywhere by narrow, Eastern, and Moorish-looking streets and alleys, most of which afford no pa.s.sage-room for any kind of carriage, and but scanty room for foot pa.s.sengers. It is, consequently, without exception, the most difficult city to find one's way in that I have ever seen, and the only one in which I have ever found myself obliged to confess a commissionaire[202] or guide of some sort to be an absolute necessity, if one would not waste half one's time in trying to find the way from one place to another.

The railway station is outside the city, which is entered from it by the famous bridge of Alcantara, which has a single wide and lofty arch above the stream, guarded on the further side by a gateway of the time of Charles V., and on the town side by one of semi-Moorish character. Above it are seen, as one enters, the picturesque apses of the old church of Santiago, and the tolerably perfect remains of the double _enceinte_ of the city walls; whilst on the opposite side of the river, as a further guard to the well-protected city, was the Castle of San Cervantes[203]

(properly San Servando), of which nothing now remains but a few rugged towers and walls crowning the equally rugged rocks.[204]

The road from the bridge, pa.s.sing under the gateway which guards it into a small walled courtyard, turns sharply to the right under another archway, and then rises slowly below the walls until, with another sharp turn, it pa.s.ses under the magnificent Moorish Puerta del Sol, and so on into the heart of the city.

The Alcazar is the only important building seen in entering on this side; but from the other side of the city where the bridge of San Martin crosses the Tagus, the cathedral is a feature in the view, though it never seems to be so prominent as might be expected with a church of its grand scale. From both these points of view, indeed, it must be remembered that the effect is not produced by the beauty or grandeur of any one building; it is the desolate sublimity of the dark rocks that bound the river; the serried phalanx of wall, and town, and house, that line the cliffs; the tropical colour of sky, and earth, and masonry; and, finally, the forlorn decaying and deserted aspect of the whole, that makes the views so impressive and so unusual. Looking away from the city walls towards the north, the view is much more _riant_, for there the Tagus, escaping from its rocky defile, meanders across a fertile _vega_, and long lines of trees, with here a ruined castle, and there the apse of the curious church of the Cristo de la Vega, and there again the famous factory of arms, give colour and incident to a view which would anywhere be thought beautiful, but is doubly grateful by comparison with the sad dignity of the forlorn old city.