PLATE 71 GRANADA THE ALHAMBRA FROM THE HALL OF THE AMBASSADORS BLACK ON WHITE FULL SIZE GLASS INLAY MDW 1869
THIS little pattern which forms the centre, or eye—the point of departure in fact—of an elaborate geometrical mosaic has been most carefully traced and copied from the original, which yet remains in the centre of the dado on the side of the window on the right of the Sultan's throne in the Hall of the Ambassadors. It may thus be said to occupy an especial post of honour and so to challenge, as it were, curiosity and admiration. Both these a close inspection thoroughly justifies, since in all the history of the manufacture of vitrified substances I know nothing more curious and puzzling. The pattern is in bluish-black on a white ground; and both ground and inlay are made apparently in two separate pieces of glass, and in two only. The most minute inspection shows no joint whatever on the surface of either coloured material; at the same time it establishes the fact that the ground has been made with the whole pattern sunk "en creux," and that the inlay has been made in one piece—practically a specimen of glass lace—and fixed into the cavity of the ground with a very fine calcareous cement, made probably of lime and white of egg. To inlay glass in glass involves little difficulty, if ground and inlay are as it were fused together; but to produce a ground apparently in glass, and to inlay it with so fine a pattern, both "au froid," is a perfect marvel in vitreous manufacture.
The only way in which I can imagine that such an effect could be produced is as follows, but in offering any such explanation I desire to do so with all due deference to practical glass-workers. I believe that two metal-moulds were made, one with the ornament in relief, and the other with the same ornament sunk in intaglio. From each mould, glass reproductions having been made of about equal substances (so as to contract equally in cooling), and, with the exception of a black film in one case, of the same glass, the two reproductions were stuck together firmly by the calcareous cement. The black glass in "cameo" would then be encased within the white glass in "intaglio;" and the pattern would of course be invisible, the two reproductions being firmly stuck together face to face, making apparently one white glass tessera of double the requisite thickness. The back of the cameo side would then have to be ground away, probably at a lapidary's wheel, until the back of the black pattern in cameo should be reached. At the same moment the face of the white intaglio would be exposed; and the tessera, being reduced to its proper thickness for insertion with the rest of the adjoining glass mosaic, would be fit to permanently combine with it; showing an elaborate black pattern held in by calcareous cement, on a white face, exactly as it now appears.
Any such resolution of a difficult technical problem exhibits the Moors to us as excelling in two of their favourite Arts, viz., inlaying and glass manufacture.
For much of their knowledge of both of these arts there is no doubt that the Moors were indebted to the Arabians. The Arabians were in their turn inheritors from the Byzantine Greeks of many of the traditions of manufacturing excellence once practised by the Romans. Amongst these were, no doubt, almost every process of glass-working and mosaic.[43]Considerable doubts exist as to the inheritance by the Greek of the lower empire of the process of inlaying from the Romans, and to their originality in adapting the process to their architecture. The first building in which it appears to have been freely used by the Greeks was the Mosque of Santa Sofia, built by Justinian. For that building he is known to have invoked the assistance of Persian designers and artificers; and from the divergence in the patterns of those inlays from any patterns usual in Roman contemporary work, I am inclined to believe that they represent the foreign element to which I have alluded. A most interesting comparison may be made, by the student, of the patterns from the Aya Sofia given in Salzenburg's great work, with those of the principal of the Cairene Mosques drawn by Mr. James Wild and given in the "Grammar of Ornament."
PLATE 72 GRANADA THE ALHAMBRA HALL OF THE AMBASSADORS MOSAIC FULL SIZE MDW 1869
IN the description of the last sketch I alluded to the sources whence the Moors derived much of their knowledge of glass-making and mosaic-working. In the specimen now given, the full size of the original, on the opposite page, a considerable advance is shown upon what was usual in the contemporary, "Opus Grecanicum," as executed, either in Italy or in Greece itself. The advance is principally to be seen in this particular, that whereas in the last mentioned work, every complicated pattern is made up out of tesseræ, or glass strips cut into squares, oblongs, triangles, or other simple figures; in the Moorish work, arbitrary shapes of considerable geometrical complexity are given to each separate piece of mosaic. When these tesseræ, so shaped, are brought together, their combination immediately results in the formation of perfect patterns, such as the one now illustrated. Tesseræ of this description were no doubt formed by squeezing plastic clay into metal moulds, and almost perfect identity was obtained between the tesseræ obtained from the same mould. These, after firing, were then apparently covered with coloured vitreous glazes by a subsequent operation.
In illustration of the advantages possessed by the Moors over the Greeks, in working such mosaics as the one I have sketched, it may be noted, that while a Greek would have required one hundred and nineteen separate pieces to make up what is shown, the Moor wanted only forty-nine. Moreover, instead of having to chip every one of the one hundred and nineteen pieces to a definite size and shape, and then to place them slowly so as to ensure the truth of his angles of forty-five and twenty-two and a half degrees, as the Greek or Italian had, the Moor had only to place one of his forty-nine pieces with precision; and, provided he never took any of the eleven patterns, of which his repeats are composed, out of their right turn, his mosaic would work itself with scarcely any other attention on his part. Another source of anxiety was saved to him; viz., constant heedfulness as to the working of the interlacement of his lines—i. e., their running, as it were, under and over one another. The result, in this particular, is far clearer and more effective in the Moorish, than according to the Greco-Italian method; since, while in the former there are no joints which do not help to define an interlacement, according to the latter, the joints occurring on the line of mitre of every angle become confused with the joints which express interlacement. A comparison of the Sicilian, with the Alhambrese, geometrical mosaics, would show in a moment the superiority of the last mentioned method.
No people, except perhaps the Chinese, have ever equalled the Moors in devising patterns of most complicated appearance, in which colours were, as it were, counterchanged by combining tiles, or tesseræ, of similar geometrical forms, but made in different tints or tones.
Beautiful examples are given in profusion in the works of Mr. Owen Jones, M. Girault de Prangey, Herr Hessemer, M. Coste and many others.
PLATE 73 THE ALHAMBRA LA SALA DE LAS DOS HERMANAS MDW 1869
THAT the Moors themselves were fully conscious that in creating the Alhambra they were creating types of beauty for all generations, would be clearly manifest from the inscriptions of the Hall of the two Sisters, (from which our illustration is taken), even if every other of the hundreds of inscriptions the building contains in other apartments were destroyed.
"I am the garden, and every morning do I appear decked out in beauty. Look attentively at my elegance, and thou wilt reap the benefit of a commentary on decoration."
"Indeed, we never saw a palace more lofty than this in its exterior, or more brilliantly decorated in its interior; or having more extensive apartments—markets they are, where those provided with money are paid in beauty, and where the judge of elegance is perpetually sitting to pronounce sentence."
"Here is the wonderful cupola, at sight of whose beautiful proportions, all other cupolas vanish and disappear."
Such inscriptions are not all of them of this hyperbolic stamp, since some of them serve to record the names of illustrious founders, and to explain the uses of various parts of the structure. To an inscription of this kind we are indebted for an accurate knowledge of the uses of such niches as the one represented in my sketch. Many travellers and writers had supposed that their purpose had been to hold the slippers of the visitors, but this theory was entirely dispelled, when M. Pasqual de Gayangos read the inscription of the left niche of the Hall de las dos Hermanas.
"Praise to God! With my ornaments and tiara[44]I surpass beauty itself, nay the luminaries in the Zodiac out of envy descend to me.
"The water vase within me, they say, is like a devout man standing towards the Kiblah of the Mihrab,[45]ready to begin his prayers."
The idea that these niches were used to hold water-bottles is further strengthened, as Mr. Owen Jones has justly remarked, by the existence of the mosaic linings amid the plaster work by which they were surrounded; as well as by the white marble slabs which serve for their base or floor. The wall and pier dados, which extend from these marble slabs to the beautiful Azulejos floor, are all made in elegant mosaic. Above the niche in the sketch appears the ingenious pendentive impost from which spring the great arches carried by the piers, with the characteristic ingrailed fringe work which was almost always retained even, as we see at Seville, in the latest Renaissance Mudejar work.
PLATE 74 MDW 1869 GRANADA THE ALHAMBRA SALA DEL TRIBUNAL BORDER FULL SIZE
THE correctness of this sketch, as to dimension at least, has been ensured by the mode in which it was obtained, viz., by gently pressing a piece of paper against the surface of the piece of ornament (so as to obtain a slight impression of its outline,) then marking it faintly with pencil, pressing it out again quite flat, and finishing it in ink on the spot. It may be looked upon, therefore, as giving, as nearly as is possible on a plane surface, an accurate transcript of the elegant ornament from the Sala del Tribunal selected for illustration. My reason for this selection was, chiefly because I desired to show the minute scale and extreme delicacy of much of the decoration in relief with which the walls of the principal apartments of the Alhambra are covered. It was partly also because this particular specimen retained faint tracing lines drawn, most likely with a silver or lead point, and a free hand, upon the flat surfaces of certain parts of the ornament in relief. These served as guide lines for the yet more delicate labour of the painter, who carried the subdivision of parts, by means of the application of contrasting colours and gilding, into yet more microscopic superficial enrichment.
As this is the last illustration I have to offer of the Alhambra, it may be well to direct the reader's attention briefly to the general system upon which such Art as the Moors practised, and most dearly loved, was based. Those who would know "all about it," must give themselves diligently to a study of all Owen Jones' works; from the ponderous "Alhambra," with its magnificent illustrations, to the little guide to the "Alhambra Courts of the Crystal Palace," not forgetting to test his theory by his practice in the beautiful reproductions of Moorish Art he has created for their edification at Sydenham. In the pages of the smaller volume they will find the system epitomised simply and delightfully in nine propositions under the following heads.
First, to decorate construction, never to construct decoration.
Second, to let all lines grow out of each other in gradual undulations—always so as to conduce to repose.
Third, to care first for general forms and then for harmonious subdivisions and fillings.
Fourth, to balance straight, inclined, and curved forms so as to produce harmony and repose by contrast.
Fifth, to let all lines flow out of a parent stem, traceable throughout its course.
Sixth, either radially (as in nature with the human hand or in a chestnut leaf.).
Seventh, or tangentially,—as stems from branches.
Eighth, to avoid the simpler curves and use only those of a higher order.
Ninth, to treat all ornament conventionally,i.e., not in direct imitation of Nature, but in a mode of imitation subordinated to the architectural conditions of the surface or form to be ornamented.
PLATE 75 GRANADA MDW 1869 CATHEDRAL FROM THE BACK OF THE HIGH ALTAR
IT is always interesting to watch the first rays of light which dissipate clouds of darkness or prejudice; and this, by the aid of the annals of the early printing press, we are enabled to do (with comparative certainty as to chronology) in the case of the dawn of the revival of classical architecture in every country of Europe except Italy. In that favoured land, the sacred fire of Roman tradition was never quite extinguished, and in its great cities the renascent flame was already lambent, and gaining strength, before Sweynheim and Pannarz started their celebrated press at Subiaco.
The first edition of the ten books of Vitruvius printed by G. Herolt at Rome,circa1486, was immediately followed by the edition of Florence, under the editorship of Leon Baptista Alberti, bearing the imprint of the previous year. At least two other editions were exhausted in Italy before the close of the century, and succeeded by many more previous to the middle, of the sixteenth century.
Alberti's own admirable writings on Architecture and the other Fine Arts moved all Italy, giving a thoroughly practical direction to the lessons somewhat obscurely inculated by Vitruvius; whose writings, without Alberti's comments, would have been of little practical use in countries in which ample remains of classical art were not at hand for reference and study.
The first French edition of the text of Vitruvius is of 1523; the first German is of 1543. The first French translation dates from 1547; the first German from 1548, published at Nuremburg. It was "volgarizzato" in Italy from 1521.
The Latin text was translated into Spanish by Miguel de Urrea and printed after his death at Alcala de Heñares in 1587. Its publication had however been long preceded in Spain by the digest of the views of Vitruvius under the tide of "las Medidas del Romano o Vitruvio," published by Diego de Sagredo in 1526. Sagredo had no doubt been stimulated to such studies, (as Alberti had previously been) by his admiration of the vestiges of Roman architectural greatness, still abounding on the soil of his native land.
What oral tradition could teach previous to the publication of these texts in Spain, no doubt the architect of the Cathedral of Granada, Diego de Siloe, had learnt from his father, Gil, the even more celebrated Sculptor of Burgos; whose monuments to Don Juan II., his Queen, Donna Isabel, and the Infante Don Alonso, and whose "Retablo" in the Cartuja of Miraflores in the outskirts of that city, have never been surpassed in tasteful elaboration.[46]From whatever source Diego de Siloe may have obtained his knowledge, certain it is that he must share with Alonso Covarrubbias, the honour of having been the earliest revivers of classical architecture in Spain: not in its details only as had been attempted by the early Plateresque architects, but in its structural proportions and in its symmetrical arrangements of great leading features. The following is the account of the construction of this Cathedral given by Amirola.[47]
"It was begun," he says, "on the 15th of March, 1529, and consists of three naves, the principal of which terminates in the choir after the Gothic manner. It is four hundred and twenty-five feet (Spanish) long, and two hundred and forty-nine wide. The order is Corinthian, but defective in its true proportions, since the principal nave is only forty-five feet wide, its height is one hundred and twenty." It would profit us but little to follow Amirola through his straight-laced criticisms on a design the beauty of which he was unable to apprehend; and it may be well to take a larger and juster view of its merits. The following which, I heartily endorse, is the verdict of a far better judge.[48]"Looking at its plan only, this is certainly one of the finest churches in Europe. It would be difficult to point out any other in which the central aisle leads up to the dome, so well proportioned to its dimensions, and to the dignity of the high altar which stands under it, or one where the side aisles have a purpose and a meaning so perfectly appropriate to the situation, and where the centre aisle has also its functions as perfectly marked out and so well understood. All this being so, it is puzzling to know how it has been so neglected."
My sketch has been taken from the "Ambulatory" at the back of, and surrounding, the choir. Its dimensions, as will be at once apparent, are enormous. The arches, which separate the choir from the ambulatory, and through one of which in my sketch the high altar is seen, are of very great interest. They form the earliest examples I have ever seen (out of Italy) of artificial perspectives, "guocchi di prospettiva." The arches next to the choir are narrower and lower than those next to the ambulatory; the distance between the two, owing to the necessities of supporting and distributing the weights of the vast cupola, being very considerable. The two archways are connected by falling lines of impost mouldings and converging lines of coffering. The consequence is that, as appears in the sketch, the archways, which really occupy only about five and twenty feet in depth, look at least double that dimension.
PLATE 76 GRANADA THE REJA OF THE REYES CATOLICOS MDW 1869
IWAS tempted to sketch this magnificent screen for four reasons:—
Firstly, because it is, I believe, entirely of iron, which most of the Spanish Rejas are not.
Secondly, because it is, I also believe, the earliest specimen of anything like equal importance in Spain.
Thirdly, because of its historical interest in enclosing the tombs of "the Catholic Sovereigns" on the spot before which the greatness of their lives had been achieved.
Fourthly, because I considered it to be the best in design of all I saw.
It is by no means the richest, but it appeared to me to be arranged upon the justest principles. Its chief merits, as compared with many others, I considered to be as follows:—
Firstly, itstransparency. One of the most important qualities any such screen should possess, is that of due subordination to the great architectural features of the locality in which it is placed. Where ornament is spread all over the surface of a screen, or where the main lines wander about in capricious directions, the eye is arrested by the metal work as a plane surface; and if not actually stopped by it, is at least led off in wayward directions, and fails to pass beyond it. In this case, the rectangularity of the whole gives great repose; the plain vertical bars almost disappear; while the splendidly ornamented portions of the screen seem as if suspended in mid air, and in no wise injure the effect of the architecture,[49]or diminish the apparent space of the locality they decorate.
Secondly, itsstabilitywithout heaviness. The subdivision of the whole surface into regular compartments allows of a concentration of strength in the skeleton lines, and gives great constructional stiffness without too much formality.
Thirdly, itspropriety of design. Its author has simply, as it were, asserted the principle of "serve God and honour the King;" instead of, as is usual, "look at me, and see what a fine fellow I am." At the summit of his design he has represented the Crucifixion; immediately beneath, the leading incidents of Gospel history, making conspicuous (in compliment no doubt to the triumph of the Church in the entry into Granada of his sovereigns), Christ's entry into Jerusalem. As the central object, not much less than twenty feet square, he has grouped in masterly style the full heraldic insignia of those whose remains are deposited in the chapel beyond. The lower portion of his design has evidently been intended simply to give stability to the upper part, and to close the access to the magnificent marble and alabaster monuments of Ferdinand and Isabella, and of Philip of Burgundy and "Juana la Loca," without interfering with the facilities for seeing them of those who might gain access to the Antechapel, but be refused it to the Mausoleum itself.
The name of the admirable artist, "el Maestre Bartholomé," who wrought this Reja in the year 1522, is inscribed upon it, near to the keyhole of the great central gates.
PLATE 77 GRANADA L'ARZOBISPADO MDW 1869
ACAREFUL contrast of this stately old mansion in which, if not the hand, at least the influence of the architect, Henrique de Egas, (son of Anequin de Egas de Bruselas, so greatly patronized by the celebrated Cardinal Mendoza,) may be clearly traced, with the great Palace of Charles V., ascribed to the artist Machuca, (both at Granada,) may afford a useful lesson to the architectural student. In the earliest of the two monuments—the Arzobispado—a window of which I now offer a slight sketch, the florid Plateresque style, as exemplified by the celebrated Hospedal de la Santa Cruz, at Toledo, (Sketches 44, 45, 46) is at once recalled to the memory. In the latest, we find a marked sympathy with the symmetrical style of the then fashionable Italian architects. The Circular Cortile of Vignola's masterpiece at Caprarola, is exceeded in dimension, and indeed in dignity of style, by the vast round Patio of the Palace of Charles V., with which it is probably nearly contemporary.
Such sober architecture, though enriched by the chisel of sculptors who, like Berruguete, had been ardent admirers of Florentine and Roman models, was the form of Plateresque which, intervening between the first form of Renaissance, founded on French and Burgundian models, and the austere Italian of Herrera, found special favour in the eyes of the most judicious critics in Spain.
How far the best designers of Spain, amongst whom must certainly be reckoned Juan de Arfe y Villafañe, acknowledged their dependence upon the great Italian masters for all they considered most excellent in style, may be gathered from the curious account of the development of good art in his time[50]that he gives in his celebrated Treatise on Sculpture and Architecture. After dwelling upon what he curiously enough calls the "obra moderna," with which the great cathedrals of Spain had been, as he considers, built, he observes, "Thisbarbarous work, having arrived at its end, its disuse having commenced in our times, gave place to the ancient styles of the Greeks and Romans. Although this style of work had been revived at an earlier period in Italy by the diligence and study of Bramante, Master of the Works of St. Peter's at Rome, Baldassare Perruzzi and Leon Baptista Alberti, celebrated architects, it also began to flourish in Spain through the industry of the excellent Alonso de Covarrubbias, Master of the Works of the Cathedral at Toledo, and of the Royal Palace, father of the most famous doctor, Don Diego Covarrubbias, President of the Supreme Council of his Majesty and Bishop of Segovia, and of Diego Siloe, Master of the Works of the Cathedral and Palace of Granada. These masters began to use this kind of work in many places wherever they built, although always with some admixture of the modern work (Gothic or early Plateresque) which they could never entirely forget."
PLATE 78 GUADALAXARA PALACE OF THE DUQUÉ DEL INFANTADO MDW 1869
THIS is unquestionably one of the most important of the Palaces of the ancient nobility left in Spain, worthy of the renown of the Mendozas, long Seigneurs of Guadalaxara. In spite of its present picturesque aspect, however, architecturally speaking, it is a strange jumble of incongruities; and offers but a ghost of the beauty it must have possessed upon its first construction towards the end of the fifteenth century from 1461 onwards. Splendour it must have possessed in perfection at the date at which it excited warm admiration in the breast of the captive sovereign, Francis I. of France, who was here magnificently entertained by the then Duque del Infantado. The top story with its remains of continuous arcading and balconies, the walls, the splendid doorway, and above all the Patio, with the exception probably of the top cornice and the Doric columns of the ground-floor arcade, all belong to the original construction. These remains afford sufficient indication of what has been destroyed to make way for Italian decoration and barbarous repair, to enable the practised eye to see the whole as it once existed; before a vulgar desire for novelty, and especially for foreign novelty induced the desecration of the integrity of the design. One might have fancied that every true Spaniard would have regarded this palace almost as a holy place, from its having received the last breath of the great Cardinal Mendoza—the "Rex tertius," whom Felipe Vigarny, or some other dextrous sculptor, portrayed in the carvings of the Cathedral at Granada,[51]riding with Ferdinand and Isabella, and receiving the keys of the Alhambra from the hands of the unfortunate "Boabdil el Chico."
The interior of this Palace is fully as rich and remarkable as the exterior. The Patio which is about eighty feet long by fifty-six wide, (about two-thirds of the size of the court-yards of the Royal Exchange and the India Office), is surrounded by arcades of two stories, each about twenty feet in height. Both series of arches are of a Gothic and fantastic form, with spandrels filled in on the lower story with lions, and on the upper with winged griffins. Between each arch are columns, surmounted with armorial bearings, eagles, and grouped finials. The whole, if coarsely, is very spiritedly carved, and produces a stately and simple, though rich effect. The saloons are large and lofty, with remains of beautiful half Moorish ceilings, and much effective Italian fresco decoration of good colour and enriched with harmonious Arabesque ornament.
The state of this once splendid structure is unfortunately as dilapidated as the national finances. What more can or need be said? Everything going to pieces for want of that "stitch in time," which nowhere, and in nothing, in Spain, seems ever likely "to save nine."
PLATE 79 GUADALAXARA SAN MIGUEL MDW 1869
IN and about Guadalaxara may be found many indications of the traditional preservation, long after the expulsion of the Moors, not only from New Castille, but from Spain generally as well, of their excellence in the technical arts, amongst which brick-making, combining, and laying were conspicuous. Hence, especially throughout the two Castilles, Aragon, and Andalucia, the common method of using brick-work is peculiarly Oriental and effective. The entrance doorway to the Monastery of San Miguel, which forms the subject of our seventy-ninth sketch, illustrates this mixture; as well it may, since traces are yet to be found of the structure having been originally a mosque converted, probably, shortly before the year 1500 to Christian uses. The round instead of square buttresses, with conical terminations, the segmental arch, with its ponderous archivolt, the great strength and almost heaviness given by the regular rectangular setting out of the woodwork—and a coarseness and yet spirit in the execution of carving, are marked features of Aragonese style; the echoes of which may not unfrequently be met with at Naples, especially in the entrance gateways to many an old house. I well remember being puzzled by several of those which I sketched there, and which appeared to me to differ from ordinary contemporary Italian architecture in other localities. I subsequently recognized similar features in Palermo, and elsewhere in Sicily.
PLATE 80 GUADALAXARA CASA DEL DUQUÉ DE RIBAS MDW 1869
THE traveller who takes his seat for an hour or so before some old portal of a Spanish provincial mansion, garnished with heraldic insignia, proclaiming the rank, if not the dignity, of the possible owner, can scarcely fail to be struck by the usual incongruity between the assumption of the structure, and the modesty, not to say meanness, of those who pass in and out of it generally at long intervals. The sketcher's operations naturally, after a little while, attract the attention of some few, and "their name is legion" throughout Spain, of those who have nothing to do; or who, at any rate, do nothing, but wander lazily but restlessly up and down to while away the time. After a compliment or two, and probably a request that the spectators will not stand exactly between the artist and the object he may be drawing, an inquiry very generally follows as to "whose house that may be?" If the answer extends beyond the usual "Quien sabe Caballero?" it may chance to be "del Señor Duqué," or "del Señor Marques," something or other, or at any rate of a "Señor somebody," "somebody," "somebody." To the next inquiry, as to where the Hidalgo, if he be such, may be? the usual answer will be "Madrid" or "Paris," or at any rate the "chef-lieu" of the Province. The next demand may likely enough be, "Who lives there then, now?" If the answer is not the usual "No puedo decir a Usted," it may possibly be, "El Señor Administrador," the Steward, or "Algunos Pobres," or "Don Manoel, the shoemaker," or "Don Juan, the carpenter."
Where the nobility live, if they are not all absentees, it seems very difficult to find out; and hence it is that instead of ladies and gentlemen, and liveried servants, who pass in and out of these grand looking "portone," the sketcher usually sees only extremely picturesque poverty. Sometimes this presents itself in the shape of a ragged girl or two, carrying antique-shaped earthen water-jars, sometimes an old woman with a heap of long-haired unkempt children sitting down to spin, or reel off yarn, or lolling against the wall, distaff in hand; and sometimes, possibly, two or three boys or young men assemble, who, after smoking out some cigarrilos or stumps of cigars, coil themselves up on the threshold, and go off into a comatose condition closely resembling sleep.
Such were my experiences whilst trying to gain some local information as to the mansion of the very noble, the Duqué de Ribas at Guadalaxara.
PLATE 81 GUADALAXARA DOOR HANDLE CALLE DEL BARRIO NUEVO Nº 10 MDW 1869
THE outskirts of Guadalaxara are very picturesque, and the traveller who wanders about in quest of beauty, old or new, cannot fail to be rewarded; not only by glimpses of scenery, but by the discovery of many quaint little fragments of art which have escaped the attention of the many despoiling locusts—native as well as foreign—who have done their best at different times to "devour the land." Of such, a specimen is given in the "knowing" little knocker, or door-handle illustrated in my eighty-first sketch. It is no doubt a joke on the part of some cunning smith, of the last century, mindful of the still greater cunning of his handicraft, traditions of which may have descended to him, from the days when the armourers of Spain rivalled those of Milan and Augsburg.
PLATE 82 SARAGOSSA PALACIO DELLA INFANTA MDW 1869
PONZ speaks with great complacency of the sumptuousness of the houses of Saragossa—particularly those with columns, (such as that of the Marques de Monistol) and those the Patios of which are adorned with sculptures—"such costly and sumptuous works," he says, "as no one undertakes now a days." Amongst these he particularises the house which forms the subject of the present sketch. Before his time it appears to have belonged to the Citizen Gabriel Zaporta, "muy distinguido y rico," as Ponz calls him. From him it was bought by the widow of a certain Don Gabriel Franco. At the close of the last century it was the home of the Infante Don Luis, (uncle of Charles IV. of Spain), a Cardinal and Archbishop of Toledo! who married "La Vallabriga," earning exile to Saragossa for his pains. She lived here with him, and procured for the house its popular and best known name, la Casa de la Infanta. Their eldest daughter was bestowed, as an Infanta of Spain, upon the detestable Godoy—"Prince of Peace,"—the recognised lover of her first cousin by marriage, the Queen, wife of Charles IV., thus crowning a double mésalliance.
"On the ground floor," says Ponz,[52]"of the Patio are twelve arches supported on columns wrought with a thousand fancies, as are those also of the first floor. On the lower floor of this house is a painter's studio. Both floors are enriched with medallions representing kings, fanciful foliage, and infinite labour in cornices, mouldings, &c." Similar elaboration, now much defaced, is to be seen in the staircase with vaulting, and handrail with medallions recalling those of the first floor.
Amongst the most important palaces, next to the house of Zaporta or de la Infanta, and that of the Marques de Monistol, were those known as the "Castel-Florit," which belonged in Ponz's time to the Count Aranda—and another the property of the Duqué de Hijar. The "Casa de Comercio" which forms the subject of my eighty-fifth sketch was less important as to quantity, but more important as to quality, than those last mentioned appear to have been. As a general rule, the Saragossan houses appear very large but coarsely treated as to detail, even in the richest, such as those with showy windows behind the Seminario, in the Plazuela de San Carlos.
My sketch sufficiently shows the "base uses" to which the truly palatial Casa de Zaporta, or de la Infanta, has "come at last." It is well that as many as possible of the rising generation of art-students should see it, for it is not likely that any of it will be left for their children.
PLATE 83 ZARAGOZA CASA DE LOS INFANTES MDW 1869
THIS sketch gives to an enlarged scale some of the architectural features represented in little in the preceding sketch. Many of the arches which were once open in a beautiful arcading are now closed up in lath and plaster; with a heartless indifference to everything else than getting as much room as possible to let to the poor lodgers who swarm in this once splendid Palace. The whitewash brush goes recklessly over any surfaces with which it is brought into contact at the command of sanitary inspectors, who enforce perfunctory cleansings from time to time of at least the "outside of the platter." As I sat sketching and "poking about" for some hours in this apparent "rabbit warren" of a house, I could not but become conscious that the Arragonese had by no means lost their old character for devotion, not to say bigotry. "Our Lady of the pillar," the tutelary of Saragossa in spite of all alleged pilferings from her shrine, seemed still at a premium in popular estimation; and casts of her in the poorest plaster were multiplied even in the poorest tenements. In fact, this seemed to be the very place for meeting with the truly Spanish couple of the lower middle class, so well sketched by the German Fischer in his travels at the close of the last century. "I cannot conclude this letter," says he, "without saying a word or two of my hosts. Both the man and his wife are originals not to be met with but in Catholic countries; both bigots to excess, but each in a different way. In the husband, this disposition has assumed a silent and gloomy cast of character, while in his wife it bears all the symptoms of tenderness. The husband has filled the whole house, and especially his own apartment, with images of saints, resembling an entire collection of the little Augsburg toys so well known in Germany. In fulfilment of a vow, he mutters his prayers three times a day before these idols, an occupation which daily employs two full hours. He also imposes on himself very painful mortifications, talks very little, reads gloomy books, and remains whole hours with his eyes shut, so that he is on the high road to become either a madman or a saint. The wife's fanaticism is much more social, and her pious imaginations bear the stamp of the mildness and softness of her sex. She has got herself received a "slave of the Holy Trinity" (esclava de la Santissima Trinidad), of which she has obtained a certificate in form from her confessor, and in consequence of which she is bound every day to decorate a large picture with flowers and tapers, to repeat a certain number of prayers before it, and to pay a certain sum weekly to her confessor, an agent of the Trinity; yet all this does not seem to her sufficient for salvation, and she has besides an image of the Holy Virgin, which she very punctually supplies with all the necessary habiliments, both for day and night, besides tapers, flowers and all that can contribute to ornament the happy idol.
"This devout esclava is a little woman very affable and complaisant, whose religious sentiments do not at all interfere with other terrestrial feelings, while her impassive husband seems to have arrived at all the spirituality of the blessed."
PLATE 84 SARAGOZA LA LONJA MDW 1869
THERE is something about the exterior of this fine building essentially Florentine in style. The bold overhanging and crowning cornice, the Ricardi-Palace kind of windows, the simplicity of the Mezzanine, and indeed the introduction of a Mezzanine at all, associated with the severity of the rectangular structure, massive in a noble simplicity, rather recall the work of the grand masters of Tuscan Architecture at the end of the fifteenth century, than any styles, Plateresque or Greco-Roman, one recognises as peculiarly Spanish.
The name of the architect appears to have been lost, but there is no question as to the date of its erection, which is given by an inscription which runs beneath a cornice in the interior, and states that it was completed in "1551, reynando Donya Jona y Don Carlos su hijo."
The "Lonjas," or Exchanges, of Spain, constitute an important and interesting class of buildings, dating, from mediæval times in the most commercial of the towns on the seaboard, and from the Renaissance period in those of the interior. The term Lonja, originally only implied a "long place" or platform, the sort of spot in a town on which merchants would meet, as on "the flags" at Liverpool. In process of time the Lonjas came to be covered in, and converted into handsome "Exchanges." The earliest structure of this class is, or rather was, at Barcelona. All the fine old building of 1383, Mr. Street tells us, has "been completely destroyed, with the one exception of its grand Hall, which still does service as of old. This consists of three naves, divided by lofty and slender columns, which carry stilted semi-circular arches. The ceiling is flat ... and the dimensions about one hundred feet by seventy-five." The "Casa Lonja" of Valencia, which Mr. Street has also fully illustrated[53]is one of the prettiest of the late Gothic buildings in Spain. It was erected between 1482 and the close of the fifteenth century. The next important Lonja in point of date was the Saragossan of 1551. The last was that of Seville built by Herrera between 1585 and 1598, and certainly one of his best works. It was avowedly built in rivalry with Gresham's Royal Exchange—completed in 1571.
To the interior of the fine building under notice I could not obtain access, and have therefore to trust to Ponz's description of it. "It forms," he says, "a splendid saloon with an internal double gallery of Doric columns and arches, to the number of fifty." Within it are erected an altar to, and statue of, the guardian angel, in fact the building had its Lararium. Ponz mentions, further, many paintings. These appear no longer to exist, since all I could learn by personal inquiry on the spot was that the place, having long been used as a carpenter's shop and warehouse was now absolutely empty and unused. I fear therefore that the "Angelo Custode" has had too much to do, and has broken down under his task.