PLATE 37 TOLEDO PUENTE DE SAN MARTIN MDW 1869
AMIROLA[24]has given us an excellent account of the origin of this noble mediæval bridge, upon which the following short statement is mainly based. Near to the site on which the bridge of St. Martin now stands at Toledo, there was formerly a fine Roman bridge. This having been entirely destroyed for useful purposes, by a tremendous flood which rose, according to the most ancient annals of Toledo, in the year 1212, the city determined upon building another bridge upon a better site. Having erected abutments of vast strength, which were ultimately crowned and weighted with two towers for defence, and having bedded two solid piers in the line of the stream, their master of the works, Rodrigo Alfonso, proceeded to span it with one of three lofty arches, two of which are shown in my sketch. This magnificent arch of one hundred and forty Spanish feet in width, and ninety-five in height was destroyed in the terrible struggle between the King Don Pedro, and his brother Don Henrique, in the year 1368. It was shortly after rebuilt, and the bridge generally repaired by the great Don Tenorio, Archbishop of Toledo. Villa Franca, Alcala de Heñares, and the neighbourhood of Alamin, all boasted of bridges put up by the same Rodrigo Alfonso, who designed the bridge of San Martin at Toledo.
Beyond the bridge, in my sketch, appears on the crest of the hill the mass of the beautiful, though somewhat over florid church, San Juan de los Reyes. Having been erected by Ferdinand and Isabella, in a period as late as 1476, it fails to enlist the sympathies and approbation of some; others have praised it enthusiastically, and certain it is, that if it may have possessed faults when complete, scarcely anything can be more picturesque as a ruin.
PLATE 38 TOLEDO MOORISH GATEWAY BY THE BRIDGE OF ALCANTARA. MDW 1869
NEAR to the bridge of Alcantara (sketch No. 36) on the road leading up from it to the city, stands the celebrated Moorish gateway of the "Puerta del Sol." This strong, large, and well fortified approach to the city, I found to labour under two marked disadvantages for my sketch-book, viz., it had been too often illustrated, and its curious details had been so vigorously "restored" (when Spaniards do "restore" there is no mistake about it), as to have lost in a great degree its original and authentic characteristics. I looked about, therefore, in the immediate vicinity of the bridge, for other vestiges of the antiquity of the city. These I soon came upon in the old gateway of which I give a sketch, and to the construction of which, both Roman and Moor have contributed. As the poor heavily laden mules laboured up the dusty stony road, with the patience of, in Spain, a much-abused race, it was impossible not to speculate upon the generations upon generations which had followed in the same track up the same road, on the same duty, through every vicissitude of occupation of the Gateway, through which they swayed monotonously from side to side.
PLATE 39 TOLEDO ARCO DEL ZOCODOVER MDW 1869
ALTHOUGH as appears from the steps shown in my sketch rising up through this archway, which is known as that of the Zocodover, or more properly Zocodober, which means in Arabic, according to Cean Bermudez, "a place upon a lower level," the archway is situated uponan ascent, it by no means follows that there may not be a higher plane to which it may still be adescent.Such is the case in the Zocodover of Toledo, which is really the "Place" of the city in the usual French, or the "Piazza" in the Italian, sense. It is reached from without the walls by the steps shown, and is yet literally the "lower Place" when compared with the platform of the Alcazar or "Royal Residence." Of great strength, it must in its time have been the scene of terrible struggles, and blood shedding, as it dates from the days when Moors ruled in the North of Spain, and had to be wrested from the descendants of its builders only by many a tussle between the upholders of the Crescent and the Cross. On the inside of the city to the market place it has been modified, and Italianised, but to the thousands who pass up it daily from the lower parts of the outskirts, it wears its original Oriental aspect.
Ford gives to the word "Zocodover" quite another meaning and derivation. He explains it as "the square market." Whether he or Bermudez may be right, I know not, but, certain it is that either meaning may be aptly fitted to describe the spot to which our gateway leads—a spot of no comfortable memories—since it still reeks with the cruelties of genuine Spanish diversions, "Autos da Fe," and "Fiestas de Toros."
PLATE 40 TOLEDO TALLER DEL MORO MDW 1869
FROM the spring of the year 712, when Tarik, with his renegade Jews and Berbers, wrested the city from its Gothic rulers, to the spring of the year 1085, when Alfonso VI.—the Emperor as he styled himself after having won his laurels—reconquered the city for the Christians, Toledo remained altogether an Oriental city. As such, it was inhabited by Berbers, strict Mahommedans and Jews, the last named being occasionally tolerated and occasionally persecuted as they had been by the Goths, and subsequently were by the Castilian Christians. The duration of this tenure of power has to be borne in mind continually, in the endeavour to assign dates to the Moorish monuments of this city, of which there are a great number. It is of course true that long after the date of Alfonso's conquest the Moorish artificers worked for the Christians, but such was their constant condition of subjection that it is not to be credited that any one of them could have been allowed to live in the wealth and luxury, in which the inhabitants of such a Moorish house, as that known as the "Taller del Moro," a beautiful fragment of which forms the subject of the fortieth sketch, must have lived. I can, therefore, have no hesitation in repudiating for the date of its origin, as late a period as 1350, which has been assigned to it. On the other hand, I am no less confident that Señor Escosura, who has written of it as of "between the ninth and tenth centuries," is also in error. What I believe is, that this elegant set of chambers was really one of the latest works in the city immediately preceding its capture by Alfonso, in 1085. The style of its work is certainly later than any of that executed under the Khalifate of Corduba while in the hands of the Ummeyàh family. It belongs, I believe, to the school of the Almohades, and reflects some of the novelties in complicated geometry introduced by the Arabs of Damascus, in advance of the Ummeyàhs. They held to earlier types, as may be seen in all the works at Corduba, including even those ascribed to the author of the splendid Mih-ráb or sanctuary, the Sultan Al-Hakem II., who completed the "cubba," or Cupola of the Mih-ràb (the most complicated piece of design in all Cordova) in the year A.D., 965.
All that is left at present of this once sumptuous mansion consists of a central chamber, (fifty-four feet long by twenty-three feet wide), approached from a court-yard, the usual Moorish Alfagia, (no doubt, by the doorway shown on the right hand side of my sketch), and of two chambers, one at each end of the central one. Traces of colour and gilding have almost entirely disappeared, but the stucco ornamentation, where not wilfully or heedlessly destroyed, retains all its original sharpness and beauty. I found the "Taller del Moro" in full use, or rather abuse, as a carpenter's workshop.
PLATE 41 TOLEDO LA MAGDALENA MDW 1869
TOLEDO is, or rather has been, a city of peculiar devotion. Its Christian mediæval architecture Mr. Street has fully illustrated, but he has passed hurriedly over some of the remains of that peculiar mixed style in which Christians usually gave the order, and Moors did the work. I have, accordingly, sketched two Christiano-Moorish campaniles which he has not given, and one which he has, but from a different point of view.
The steeple of La Magdalena is, I fancy, of two periods, the construction from the ground to the base of the belfry being of one class, and the belfry itself of another. It has all the appearance of having been the old tower of a mosque previous to the conquest of Toledo by King Alfonso, and of having been subsequently taken down to a certain level, and the belfry chamber and bells added, on the christianising of the structure.
It is built almost entirely of brick, and although simple to the extent of rudeness, its mass yet groups well with the long roof lines of the convents by which it is as it were hemmed in.
As the student wanders through these old streets of Toledo, rendered so picturesque by remnants of old Moorish use and ceremony, his mind is naturally attracted to the days when the "mezquita" took the place of the church, and was thronged by the worshippers of the "One God and Mahomet his Prophet," by day and by night. The description given of the comparatively modern Moors in the account of Commodore Stewart's embassy to the Emperor of Morocco, in the year 1721, seems to carry us back to the days when Toledo, and many other cities of Spain, owned no other faith than that defined by the Koran. "The Moors," says the writer,[25]"seem not (as we do) to observe the day for business, and the night for sleep, but sleep and wake often in the four-and-twenty hours, going to church by night as well as day, for which purpose their Talbs call from the top of the mosques, (or places of worship) having no bells, every three hours throughout the city. In going to church they observe no gravity, nor mind their dress; but as soon as the Talb begins to bellow from the steeple, the carpenter throws down his axe, the shoemaker his awl, the tailor his shears, and away they all run like so many fellows at football; when they come into church, they repeat the first chapter of theAlcoranstanding, after which they look up, and lift up their hands as much above their heads as they can, and as their hands are leisurely coming down again, drop on their knees with their faces towards theKebla, (as they call it) or East and by South; then touching the ground with their foreheads twice, sit a little while on their heels muttering a few words, and rise up again. This they repeat two or three times, after which, looking on each shoulder, (I suppose to their guardian angels) they say,Selemo Alikoon (i.e.,) Peace be with you; and have done. When there are many at prayers together, you would think they were so many gally-slaves a rowing, by the motion they make on their knees."
PLATE 42 TOLEDO TOWER OF SAN PEDRO MARTIRE MDW 1869
PLATE Forty-two presents us with another type of Christiano-Moorish Campanile from that given by the last sketch. In this case the usual fashion of the mediæval church builders of dividing the total height of the tower into several compartments, pierced with largish openings on more than one floor, has been followed. The regular Arabian praying-tower is generally simply the inclosure of a staircase, with a gallery, or open chamber, only at the summit, from which "the faithful" are duly summoned by the Imaum to their devotions. The conversion of one or more stories into belfries, however, indicates (where the work is clearly that of a Mahommedan artificer), that he has been working only for the performance of the behests of a Christian, as in the case of the Tower of San Pedro Martire at Toledo. The Church itself exhibits only a clumsy and overgrown Palladian style of a thoroughly commonplace description, gloomy and uninteresting.
PLATE 43 TOLEDO SANT' JAGO DEL LA VEGA MDW 1869
THIS Church appeared to me to retain more of the primitive "Mezquita," or mosque, than any other in Toledo, excepting the celebrated "Christo de la Luz." Its aspect is most picturesque as one descends from the city towards the Vega, or once rich and lovely plain. I could not help recognizing in it how good an effect might be produced in our ordinary street architecture by the use of common brick, provided that the masses of the construction should be artistically disposed, and used without the appearance of pinching here and paring off there, which spoils many of our usually too ambitious efforts.
In all such work as this in Spain, one is reminded only of the "bottom of the purse" when the work remains unfinished. With us the aspect of the "fond-du-sac" begins generally with the beginning, with the first lines of the disposition of the plan, and ends only with the end of the whole. As far as appearances go in this structure, differences of style from those of the rest of the building shown in my sketch in the belfry, and in the apsidal end of the choir of the Church, and in one or two other parts, seemed to point to those features of the design as being of considerably later date than that of the rest of the building. If the primitive Moorish work may have been of the middle of the eleventh century, the Christiano-Moorish may have been of the end of the thirteenth.
PLATE 44 TOLEDO HOSPITAL OF THE HOLY CROSS
DESCENDING from the main Piazza of the city, through the gateway shown by the thirty-ninth sketch, the great "Hospedal de la Santa Cruz" is speedily reached. This is generally considered the finest example of Plateresque (literally silversmith's) Architecture left in Spain. Its founder was the all powerful Cardinal D. Pedro Gonzalez de Mendoza, "Tertius Rex," of Castile, Consolidator of the Monarchy, and Father of the absolute supremacy of the Catholic Church in Spain. The style of this building, and the circumstances of the birth and training of its architect, raise the important question of the extent to which the Plateresque style in Spain may, or may not, have been of national origin? It appears that in 1459, a certain Anequin de Egas de Bruselas (or Brussels) of the Cathedral of Toledo, in his capacity of "Maestro Mayor," with his assistant Juan Fernandez de Liena, executed the façade of the main southern transept of that Cathedral, and the entrance familiarly known as "de los Leones." In this work, the architecture is of florid Burgundian-Gothic, with scarcely a trace of Renaissance about its original design. Anequin died in 1494, and his son Henrique was appointed, by the Chapter of Toledo, to succeed his father as "Maestro Mayor," the duties of which office he performed until his death in 1534. Henrique was the favourite architect of the King D. Fernando, and of his son, the Archbishop D. Alonso, who actually disputed, in 1505, as to which of them should for awhile avail themselves of his exclusive services. He was called in to every important consultation of architects of his time, and was evidently "au courant" of the great changes of style which had been developed in Italy, and which were in course of development in France, and in and about his father's native place. His influence as a naturalizer of the exotic details of which models were furnished to artists by the prints and portable works of the "petits maîtres," is clearly manifested when we recognise the early dates at which his florid Renaissance buildings were executed. For instance, in those designed for Cardinal Mendoza, the dates of which are well known, we find Renaissance features well carried out with scarcely any admixture of Gothic. The earliest of these is the vast "Colegio Mayor" de Sta. Cruz at Valladolid, which Henrique began in 1480 and completed in 1492, and the second the splendid Hospital for Foundlings at Toledo (1504 to 1514) from which the sketch, now under consideration, and the two which follow it have been taken. In describing the second of these sketches, we shall resume our consideration of the Plateresque style generally from the point at which it is now left. It may be well, however, with relation to this sketch, to state that it shows the principal portal or great entrance to the Hospital, and that the top story appears to be of later date and coarser execution than the portal and the two elegant windows of the first floor. The carving in the lunette of the doorway represents, in very good style, the "invention of the Cross" with Sta. Helena and the Founder. The colour of the stone, and the quality of the workmanship leave nothing to be desired.
PLATE 45 TOLEDO SANTA CRUZ MDW 1869
IT is in the interior rather than on the exterior of the Toledo Foundling Hospital, that Henrique de Egas has best shown his command over the Plateresque style. It was no longer in designing the former a question of adding on ornament in fanciful door and window dressings, as it was in the latter, but a necessity to adapt from existing models, or originate essential parts of the structure, executing important functions of use and stability. The columns, arches, and interspacing of the arcading of the Patios evidence by their proportions, quite as much as by their details, that Henrique's and his employer's backs had been turned upon Gothic, and that a new style had been inaugurated for Spanish architecture, as the successes of Ferdinand and Isabella, and the discovery of America, had laid the foundations of an entirely new era for Spain.
The construction of the building under notice was begun by Cardinal Mendoza, under Henrique, in 1504; the year in which those Sovereigns ascended the throne, and completed in the year 1514. Simultaneously with the commencement of the great Hospital for the "Tertius Rex," Henrique designed a still more extensive and magnificent Hospital which the "Reyes Catolicos" proposed to construct at Santiago, and entered upon many other great architectural works in other parts of Spain. Ford, who was no mean judge, says of the Hospedal de la Santa Cruz, that its "position overlooking the Tagus is glorious, and the building is one of the gems of the world; nor can any chasing of Cellini surpass the elegant Portal."
There is little doubt that Egas was stimulated to great exertion by the rivalry of many competitors, few of whom, however, designed in exactly his style. The work which most resembles his, I believe, will be found in the detail of the wonderful Plateresque Town Hall at Seville, and that of the Cathedral at Plasencia.
That so magnificent a Palace (for such it is) should have been thought necessary, or at any rate should have been indulged in, for the reception of foundlings, is to be partially accounted for by an old assertion I have met with, that the Spaniards, not knowing the parentage of the "niños perdidos," gave them "the benefit of the doubt," and considered them all as children of Hidalgos, a questionable compliment to the boasted morality, or at any rate austerity, of the upper classes.
PLATE 46 TOLEDO HOSPITAL OF THE HOLY CROSS. MDW 1869
THE facts that Moorish workmen should have been found in Toledo, Segovia, and elsewhere in Spain, to modify their national style, in their Mudejar work, and to incorporate freely in it many features of late mediæval work; while they scarcely ever lent themselves to any expression of Renaissance form, although they occasionally laboured in buildings of that style, have been supposed to imply a greater affinity between Arabian and Gothic modes of design, than between the Arabian style and Plateresque. This may, to some extent, account for the presence of this Mudejar work, assimilating in no way with the last-mentioned style, in a building of so distinctly a Renaissance character as this one possesses. The fact is, however, rather thus—that after the expulsion of the Moors, and the institution of the Inquisition (the period of the construction of this Hospital), the Moorish artificers diminished very rapidly in number, and lost their individuality almost entirely in Northern and Central Spain; and that, whereas, during several centuries they had lived there in cities in which Gothic architecture was practised by Christians, and had thus made themselves partially acquainted with its details, they had but a short term of scarcely tolerated national existence wherein to learn the novelties which were beginning to be taken up by the Spaniards, at the commencement of the sixteenth century.
My sketch, while it indicates the elaboration of this late specimen of Mudejar stucco-work, shows by the figures I have introduced (from life) the class to whose tender mercies this gem is now confided. Let it be hoped that the "Genius loci," may protect it, for the respectable Spanish soldier of the nineteenth century can scarcely be regarded as a satisfactory Conservative element.
PLATE 47 TOLEDO GREAT DOORWAY OF THE ALCAZAR MDW 1869
THE Royal residence, for such is the meaning of the word "Alcazar," of Toledo, is one of the two great Palaces which Charles V. caused to be constructed in order that Spain might, for the first time, have "Royal Residences" commensurate with her grandeur and wealth. He appears to have chosen the same architect for both in the person of Alonso de Covarrubbias. This distinguished artist was born in the locality, in the diocese of Burgos, from whence he derived his name. At an early age he allied himself with the family of the Flemish Egas, distinguished in the highest degree as architects in the persons of Anequin and his son Henrique. The wife of Alonso de Covarrubbias was a certain Maria Gutierrez de Egas, and by her he became the father of several sons, who in different ways (not in architecture) achieved great distinction and consideration. To return to the architectural career of Covarrubbias. Through the interest of Henrique de Egas, and probably in succession to him, Alonso Covarrubbias was appointed "Maestro Mayor" of the Cathedral of Toledo, whereupon he settled himself altogether in that city with his brother Marcos. His great work in Toledo Cathedral was the famous Chapel "de los Reyes nuevos," which he completed in the year 1534. He is then said to have given some plans to Cardinal D. Alonso de Fonseca, for the improvement of the Archbishop's Palace at Alcala de Heñares (see my notes on that structure, Sketches, Nos. 33 and 34). He subsequently occupied himself, until 1537, in designing and carrying out the splendid entry to the Colegio Mayor (known as that of the Archbishop) in Salamanca, and other works.
In the last mentioned year he was appointed, by Charles V., with another architect, Luis de Vega, to make plans for rebuilding the Royal Palaces of Toledo and Madrid. This commission was subsequently modified, giving to Covarrubbias the works of Toledo, and to de Vega those at Madrid. The Alcazar of Toledo had been originally built by King Alonso VI., on the highest point of the city, when he took it from the Moors in 1085. It had been added to at various dates, chiefly by the powerful Alvaro de Luna, and lastly by the Reyes Catolicos. What Charles V. caused to be built, consisted of a façade of great extent, a magnificent vestibule, court-yard and staircase, on all of which he placed his insignia. The Portal I have sketched, is stated by Cean Bermudez, from whom most of the above mentioned facts have been derived, to have been constructed by Henrique de Egas,[26]under the direction of Covarrubbias who closed an honourable life, much favoured by his Sovereign, in 1570.
The Spaniards are justly proud of the noble simplicity and grand style of Covarrubbias, which has none of the coldness and heaviness of Herrera's; and this is one of the rare cases in which they have made, of late years, a really splendid and not over-loaded restoration. Upon the whole, the Alcazar at Toledo is one of the few buildings existing in Spain which reflects, particularly in its grand Cortile, the "magnificenze" of the Italian Renaissance, in their completest form.
PLATE 48 TOLEDO HOSPEDAL DE TAVERA PATIO MDW 1869
THE great Cardinal Primate, whose name this gigantic Hospital still bears, was a worthy successor to Mendoza and Cisneros. In 1542 he employed the Architect Bartholomé de Bustamente to design and construct the four façades of this enormous pile. Not particularly attractive from without, internally the extent, fine proportions, and simplicity of its great Patios are very striking. It is one of the most regular pieces of Italian architecture I met with in Spain, and would have produced a highly satisfactory effect if its upper arches had been semi-circular instead of elliptic. The Hospital is dedicated to St. John the Baptist, and is placed without the walls of the city, whence its cognomen of "a fuera." The Church of the Hospital is older in style if not in date than the rest of the structure. Here in the room beneath the clock died the famous Berruguete in 1561, shortly after completing the portal of the Church and the marble monument within it which commemorates the cardinal virtues of the illustrious founder.
PLATE 49 CORDOBA CASA CABELLO MDW 1869
THIS pretty entrance to a Spanish nobleman's house of the latter part of the sixteenth century has, like most of its class, little story to tell, and that little, could I but unravel it, would probably turn out to be only of the dullest. Let us see, therefore, from a contemporary witness, what manner of life was ordinarily led by the class of nobles for one of whom it may have been fitted up in the fashion of the century succeeding that in which it was built. "In the morning as soon as they are up they drink water cooled with ice, and presently after chocolate. When dinner time is come, the master sits down to table; his wife and children eat upon the floor near the table; this is not done out of respect, as they tell me, but the women cannot sit upon a chair, they are not accustomed to it; and there are several ancient Spanish women who never sat upon one in their whole life. They make a light meal, for they eat little flesh; the best of their food are pigeons, pheasants, and their olios, which are excellent; but the greatest lord has not brought to his table above two pigeons, and some very bad ragoust, full of garlick and pepper; and after that some fennel and a little fruit. When this little dinner is over, every one in the house undress themselves and lie down upon their beds, upon which they lay Spanish leather-skins for coolness; at this time you shall not find a soul in the streets; the shops are shut, all the trade ceased, and it looks as if every body were dead. At two o'clock in the winter and at four in the summer they begin to dress themselves again, then eat sweetmeats, drink either some chocolate or water cooled in ice, and afterwards everybody goes where they think fit, and indeed they tarry out till eleven or twelve o'clock at night; I speak of people that live regularly; then the husband and wife go to bed, a great table-cloth is spread all over the bed, and each fastens it under their chin. The he and she-dwarfs serve up supper, which is as frugal as the dinner, for it is either a pheasant-hen made into a ragoust, or some pastry business, which burns their mouth it is so excessively peppered; the lady drinks her belly full of water, and the gentleman very sparingly of the wine; and when supper is ended each goes to sleep as well as they can."
PLATE 50 SEVILLE LA FERIA
"LA FERIA" in Seville, has been time out of mind the essence of all that is most "Picaresque" in the city. Not quite so thronged with Gitanos and Gitanas as the suburb of Triana, it makes up for shortcomings in that element of rascality and picturesqueness, by majos and majas, rustic beaux and belles, bull-fighters and beggars, dogs and donkeys, mules and muleteers, rags and tatters, and abundance of the most gloriously coloured fruits under the sun—and, above all, there reign such a sun and such a sky as denizens of the North have really little or no notion of. As if these elements of the picture were not enough, by way of background, stands a church in which the "battle of the Styles" seems to have been fairly fought out, with the victory now inclining to Moor, and now to Christian, while over all is seen a little of the Renaissance, with more than a suspicion, in the heavy scrolls of the highest belfry, of "Churriguerismo."
While I sat on a door-step making this poor little sketch, I think I must have seen Murillo's by the dozen, and John Phillips' by the hundred, not on canvas, but glowing with Nature's own light, and life, and colour.
PLATE 51 SEVILLE SAN MARCOS MDW 1869
SOME notion of the richness of Seville, in the remains of old Moorish mosques converted into Christian churches, may be formed from the fact that this edifice, in which we trace the two styles blended in the most interesting way, finds no mention in the pages of Ford, O'Shea, Mellado, or any other guide books of Spain I have been able to meet with, except Bradshaw's. In that, Dr. Charnock thus briefly alludes to San Marcos. "Note," says he, "its beautiful western façade which has served as a model for several churches; the Retablo of the Altar de las Animas, contains a painting by D. Martinez; the tower rising to the left of the Church in imitation of the Giralda, is a fine monument of Arabian architecture." It is, of course, to the grand portal, rather than to the whole façade, that Dr. Charnock alludes, since the former from the purity of its apparently late fifteenth century work, merits his praise, while the latter cannot certainly be regarded as other than a "barbarismo."
The tower, particularly pleasing in the style of its Mudejar additions, has been engraved in elevation in "los Monumentos Arquitectonicos." It is about seventy-five feet high by ten feet wide.
PLATE 52 SEVILLE LA FERIA MDW 1869
THE habit of the Moors was almost universally to make their exterior architecture plain, and to reserve richness and elaboration for the interiors of their houses. The fact that what is commonly internal architecture has been used by Moorish workmen on the external façade of the little house, which forms the subject of this fifty-second sketch, would be sufficient of itself to prove that it had not been executed for a Moor, even if the Gothic mouldings and ornaments of the buttresses, imposts, cornices, and string courses failed to assert the Christianity of those for whom the house may have been built. The date of its construction, judging from style, was probably about the middle of the fifteenth century, at which period, in Spain, Renaissance features had in nowise affected the integrity of either Gothic or Moorish architecture. In this case all the mason's work is Gothic, and all the stucco-work is Moorish; and this distinction of style, according to the technical mode of construction, is not an uncommon feature of Mudejar work. It was not only in stucco that the traditions of Moorish art-workmanship enriched all Spain, since both in metal-work and wood-work, the Moors continued to be employed long after their subjugation, preserving very many of their old and excellent types of form throughout many phases of transition. To this subject I may have occasion to recur. I was myself fortunate enough to meet with a beautiful little walnut-wood box, covered with Mudejar ornament, in the midst of which a Moorish workman of the sixteenth century had carved the I.H.S. of Christianity, and the sword of Sant' Iago.
PLATE 53 SEVILLE FONDA DE MADRID MDW 1869
THIS window which is of the class known as "Ajimez," or literally "through which the sun shines,"i.e.in an external wall, is a specimen of Mudejar work left as a "waif" in a part of Seville which, with this exception, has been entirely modernised. It belongs to exactly the house where one would least expect to find it, viz., one of the best hotels, if not the best hotel, in Seville, the "Fonda de Madrid." All of this pretty window is made of brickwork, once covered apparently in Moorish fashion with thin plaster, excepting the column which is of white marble. The room it lights is an ordinary nineteenth century inn bedroom, with square casements, and not a vestige of the fifteenth century left about it. I could learn nothing about this relic, or perfect reproduction of the past, from any one in the hotel, so that all I could do was to sketch it. While doing so, I could not but wonder how with so sensible, and, at the same time, so pretty a window ready to their hands as a model, the builders of the Fonda could have been contented to execute the regular expressionless square-headed windows I found everywhere else. After a few minutes moralising in this vein, I began to ask myself whether, as an Englishman, I was not assiduously "plucking the mote from my brother's eye," with a beam all the time in my own?
PLATE 54 CASA DE PILATUS SEVILLE MDW 1869
THE principal monument of Moorish magnificence still left in Seville, is, of course, the "Royal Residence," the "Alcazar," commenced in 1181, by Jalubi, the architect of Toledo. Next to it in importance is the "Casa de Pilatus," as it is called, from which this sketch, and the succeeding one have been taken. From the first named of these buildings I did not sketch at all, feeling myself entirely baffled by the extreme elaboration of all that was most interesting and admirable in the old Moorish, Mudejar and Plateresque work. Such a building can be in no wise now satisfactorily illustrated, excepting by one who may be in a position to devote much time and study to the task. "Restoration," and the adaptation of the structure to the necessities of nineteenth century life have so mystified the work and intention of the original designers, that although one may readily admire, it becomes exceedingly difficult to analyse, all that meets the eye. I have, therefore, preferred giving my attention, so far as this publication is concerned, to other, although less noteworthy, specimens of the domestic architecture of Seville.
The student of the Fine Arts, and even the ordinary traveller, are sure, without any urging on my part, to visit and enjoy the Alcazar, as a Royal Palace; but may possibly, and, indeed, unless advised on the subject, probably, may overlook the great beauty and curiosity of the old, and now sadly neglected, Moorish and cinque-cento garden which lies in the rear of the building. How to make a garden a delight the Mahommedans learnt from the Persians, and taught by example, if not by precept, to the Christians. Throughout these antique, orange, lemon, box, and myrtle, groves, the Moors carried their system of irrigation. Fountains and fishponds, baths and open water channels, even in the hottest summer, still cool the favourite haunts. Many of these, Pedro "el Cruel" caused to be formed in 1364 by architects specially brought from Granada to rebuild a large portion of the Palace, for his accommodation and that of his celebrated and beautiful mistress, Maria de Padilla. Much more modern, and far less beautiful, gardening was done by Charles V, but it is to the Moors the spot owes all its great charm.
To return to the "Casa de Pilatus," so called from an old tradition, that it was intended as a reproduction of the house of Pilate at Jerusalem. It was built in 1533, by Fadrique Henriquez de Ribera, after his return from a pilgrimage to Jerusalem in 1519. From him the Palace, for such it was, has descended (and, oh, how much descended!) to its present owner, who is said to rarely visit it, a Duke of Medina Cœli. From the Señor Duque, it has againdescendedto his Administrador, who does his best to keep it (for Spain) clean, and in tolerable order. My sketch has been taken in the upper gallery of the third Patio.
PLATE 55 SEVILLE HOUSE OF PILATUS MDW 1869
THIS sketch represents, to a larger scale, a portion of the doorway shown upon a small scale in the preceding sketch. It illustrates two of the special points of architectural value in this fine old Palace, viz., the entirely Moresque character of the stucco-work at a comparatively late date, and the profuse use of "Azulejos" or coloured tiles. Some of these may be recognized, although in a sketch in black and white, it is not easy to make them apparent, in the coverings of the lower part of the door jamb. It is, however, in and about the splendid staircase, that this charming tile lining, of the use of which we have here of late years commenced a very satisfactory revival, asserts its value as a beautiful mode of introducing clean and permanent polychromatic decoration—the only mode, indeed, as I believe, suitable for our changeful climate, and smoky ways.
I regret that my sketch is not sufficiently minute to show a favourite habit of the Moors of Granada and Seville, in the technical working of their stucco, by the use of which they give an appearance of extraordinary elaboration to their decorations. It consists in working different patterns on different planes of the same piece of stucco-work. At a distance the dominant lines of the pattern only are apparent, on a nearer approach the pattern comes into sight which fills up the bold openings left between the dominant lines of the top pattern; and on a still closer inspection, a third series of forms running counter to the main lines of the pattern on the second plane and filling up the interstices of it may be traced. I am inclined to believe, from their peculiar sharpness, that few, or none, of the repeats of these patterns were done from moulds by the operation of casting, but that wire, or cut metal stencils, were used as guides for the pointed tools and knives, by which superfluous plaster was removed, whilst the whole was yet in a plastic state.
This method of shaping semi-plastic stucco with sharp tools, was, I have no doubt, derived by the Arabs from Roman tradition, as I have seen many examples of a similar mode of working at Rome, Pompeii, Naples, and elsewhere in Italy.
PLATE 56 SEVILLE CASA ALBA MDW 1869
"HOW are the Mighty fallen," is the predominant sensation, as one wanders through these "banquet halls deserted." One may fairly paraphrase Byron, and declare that "in Seville Alba's echoes are no more." Ford and O'Shea, whose notes on the relics of domestic edifices in Spain are invaluable, both tell us that this still beautiful, though sadly destroyed, whitewashed, and dilapidated, old Palace, once "contained eleven patios, nine fountains, and one hundred marble columns." Of the elaboration of its workmanship, my sketch may serve to give some idea. It was probably next to the Alcazar, the most important residence in the City, far surpassing in extent the "Casa de Pilatus."
This house presents one of the rare instances in Spain, in which the Moorish stucco-workers have lent themselves to the rendering of Renaissance details. For these, no doubt, they were furnished with drawings or models, since in other parts of the same building, and especially in many beautiful rooms in the interior, where they have apparently been left to themselves, they have reverted partly to Mudejar work, and partly to the old types of geometrical enrichment, which may be regarded as specifically their own. Much of this is almost reduced to a flat surface by repeated coats of whitewash. I was very much pleased, however, to meet with one Spanish gentleman, occupying a suite of rooms in the house, who was fully alive to the beauty of the Palace he lived in; and who had, with his own hands, cleared off some of the whitewash, and restored much of the fine ornamental detail of his rooms to its original sharpness. Would that there were more like him in Spain!