I left Veruela with regret that I was unable to obtain more accurate notes of such portions of the monastic buildings as probably still remain overlaid with the poor additions of a too wealthy convent during the last three centuries. It is, however, easily accessible, and the plan which I give of the church will no doubt soon induce others to complete my examination wherever it has been defective.
On the ride back to Tarazona, we made a shortdétourto look at what seemed to be an important church and village. Neither could well have been less so! The church was without anything worth remark save a band of tiles, set chevron fashion, in the cornice, and not harmonizing at all well with the walls. The village was wretched in the extreme.
At Tarazona I was much struck by the extremely good character of the common crockery in use in the inn and elsewhere. It is all painted by hand, never printed; and the result is that, even when simple diapers only are used, there is far greater life, variety, and vigour in the drawing than there ever is in our machine-made work. The colour seems generally tobe used in such a way as that when burnt it varies charmingly in tint and texture. Every plate is different in pattern; and I fear that, uncivilized as we might think these good Spaniards in some things, they would be justly shocked were they to see the wretchedly inferior patterns with which, after many years of talking about art, we are still satisfied to decorate our earthenware. These people excel, too, just as much in form as in ornament. Their jugs are always quaint and good in outline, and made with the simplest regard to what is useful.
[larger view][largest view]VERUELA ABBEY: Ground Plan of the Church Plate XXIII. W. West, Lithr. Published by John Murray, Albemarle St. 1865.
FROMZaragoza the railway to Pamplona passes by Tudela. The line is carried all the way along the valley of the Ebro, the southern side of which is a fairly level open country, whilst on the north bold, barren hills, stream-worn and furrowed in all directions, rise immediately above the river. The broad valley through which the railway passes is well covered with corn-land, which, when I first passed, was rich with crops. To the south, as Tudela is approached, are seen the bold ranges of the Sierra de Moncayo, whilst in the opposite direction, far off to the north, soon after leaving Zaragoza the grand and snowy outlines of the Pyrenees come in sight.
Alagon is the only considerable town passed on the road, and there seems to be here an old brick belfry of the same character as the great steeple of Zaragoza, and, like it also, very much out of the perpendicular.
The cathedral dedicated to Sta. Maria at Tudela is one of the same noble class of church as those of Tarragona and Lérida, and quite worthy in itself of a long pilgrimage. It is said by Madoz to have been commenced in A.D. 1135, and consecrated in 1188, and was at first served by Regular clergy, but Secularized in 1238. It is slightly earlier in date than the churches just mentioned, yet some of its sculpture, as will be seen, has, perhaps, more affinity to the best French work, and is indeed more advanced in style, than that with which the other two churches are decorated. This may be accounted for, most probably, by its more immediate neighbourhood to France. Its scale is fairly good without approaching to being grand, and thus it affords a good illustration of the great power which the mediæval architects undoubtedly possessed, of giving an impression of vastness even with very moderate dimensions, and of securing a thoroughly cathedral-like effect in a building much smaller in all its dimensions than the ordinary cathedral of the middle ages. No power is more to be desired by an architect; none marks more distinctly the abyss between the artist and themere mechanical builder; and none has been more lost sight of during the three centuries which have elapsed since the eclipse of the Pointed style in the sixteenth century. We see here the usual subdivisions of parts, all well-proportioned and balanced. The nave[392]is of four bays only in length, and this is now, and perhaps was always in great part, occupied by the Coro: but, on the other hand, the proportions of the transept are very fine, and its internal perspective compensates in great degree for the loss of that of the nave. Out of this transept five arches in the east wall open to the choir and to four chapels, two on either side: and it is remarkable that two of these have square east ends, whilst all the rest have circular apses.
The plan of the columns is almost identical with that seen at Tarragona and Lérida: but it is one of which the eye is never satiated, inasmuch as it is well defined in its outlines, strong and massive-looking, and evidently equal to all that it has to perform. The vaulting is all quadripartite, except in the two eastern chapels on each side of the centre apse, or Capilla mayor, which are roofed with semi-domes, the Capilla mayor having its apse groined in five bays, with very bold groining ribs.
The arches are all pointed, very simply moulded with bold, broad, flat soffeits, generally of only one order, and with labels adorned with dog-tooth. The bases and abaci of the capitals are all square. The former have the transition from the circular members to the square managed with admirable skill, tufts of foliage occupying the angles. The latter throughout the church are deep and boldly carved, as also are the capitals themselves. These seem to be of different dates: all those on the eastern side of the transept, and all the lower capitals of the nave, save the west end and first column, being very classical in their design, and probably dating from early in the thirteenth century, whilst the remainder appear to be generally of the latter part of the same century. In the earlier capitals the abaci are all set square with the walls, whereas in the later work they are set at right angles to the arch which they have to carry, and often, therefore, at an angle of 45° to the walls.
No 50. TUDELA CATHEDRAL. INTERIOR OF CHOIRNo 50.TUDELA CATHEDRAL.INTERIOR OF CHOIR
The groining ribs are very bold, and well moulded. There is no triforium, and the clerestory windows come down to a string-course just above the points of the main arches. They are of two lights, with a circle in the arched head, and their rear arches are moulded and carried on engaged jamb-shafts. Thetransepts have rose-windows in the bays next the choir, and lancet-windows in the north and south bays, and the carved abacus is carried over these as a label. There seem to have been rose windows round the principal apse at a lower level than the other clerestory windows; but only one of these is visible on either side, owing to the reredos: and I found it impossible to get any near exterior view of the east end, owing to the way in which it is built against by houses.
The west front had a large rose-window, which has been blocked up, and it still retains a noble doorway, of which I shall have to speak more in detail presently.
The north transept is now the least altered part of the church, and in the extreme simplicity of its bold buttresses, the refined beauty of its sculptured doorway, and the well-proportioned triplet which fills the upper part of the wall, it recalls to mind an English building of the thirteenth century. Unfortunately the gable has been destroyed, and the walls and buttresses are now finished with the straight line of the eaves. Almost the only peculiarity in the detail here is the wide, external splay of the windows between the glass and the jamb-shafts in the centre of the monials. The south transept has a triplet similar to that in the north transept, and has also lost its gable, and, being more shut in than the other, is perhaps the most picturesque in effect. A narrow lane leads up to it along the east wall of the cloister, and this, turning abruptly when it reaches the church, passes under a broad archway, which forms the south front of a porch, and then, out of an eastern archway, the street goes on again, twisting and turning in a fashion which is not a little eccentric. The exterior of the eastern apse retains its buttresses of slight projection, which run up to, and finish under, the eaves-cornice, which is carried, as all the cornices throughout the church are, upon boldly-moulded corbels.
It is only at some distance from the cathedral that anything is well seen of the turrets and tower, which give it most of the character it possesses. The west end had, I think, two small square towers, finished with octagonal turrets of smaller diameter than the towers. Of these the south-western still remains, but on the north side a lofty brick steeple was erected in the eighteenth century. Another turret is strangely placed over the centre of the principal apse. This is octangular in plan, with lancet-windows in the cardinal sides, and the sides of its spire pierced with two rows of small lights. The tile-roofof the apse slopes up on all sides from the eaves to the base of this turret; and, novel as its position is, it seemed to me to be well chosen and effective.[393]Other turrets rise out of the chapels which have sprung up round the church, and these, with the altered form of almost all the roofs, give a strange, informal, and disjointed look to the whole cathedral, which is eminently the reverse of attractive. Nevertheless the old work is there, and only requires a moderate amount of attention in order to understand the whole general character of the original scheme.
There are three grand doorways, one to each transept, and one at the west end. The former are not placed in the centre of the gable, but close to the western side of the transept, either, as is most probable, from a proper desire to leave space in front of the altars of the small transept chapels, or because then, as now, the ground was covered with houses, which made it impossible to place them centrally.
The finest of the three doorways is in the centre of the west front of the church, and its opening is more than nine feet in the clear, each of the jambs having eight shafts in square recesses. Two corbels support the tympanum, which has now no sculpture, nor any signs of ever having had any, and the arch has eight orders of sculptured moulding. The capitals of the columns in the jambs are all sculptured with subjects in a very exquisite fashion. There is here no grotesqueness or intentional awkwardness, but extreme beauty of design, simplicity of story, and fitness for the position chosen. The abaci are carved throughout with conventional foliage, well arranged and delicately cut. I know little even of French carving of the thirteenth century which surpasses this beautiful work, and none anywhere which more entirely deserves our admiration, or which may more worthily kindle our emulation. It is true, indeed, that here as elsewhere the cold formal critic may come and prove to his own satisfaction that some portions of the work are not academically correct: on the other hand, it is equally true that it is not academically cold and soulless, for the men who wrought here wrought of their love and enthusiasm, and not merely because they were drilled and paid, and they afford us, therefore, an example not to be despised of the truths, that in art enthusiasm is worth more than skill, and feeling more than knowledge; truthsspecially valuable in these days, when men fancy they can convert all who call themselves architects into artists, not by making them rejoice in their work, but simply by teaching them how to draw.
The subjects in the capitals are arranged in the following order:—Nos. 1 to 8 are those in the left or northern jamb, and Nos. 9 to 16 those in the right or southern jamb. Nos. 1 and 9 are next the opening, and Nos. 8 and 16 the extreme capitals right and left of the centre.
The two corbels which support the tympanum have on their face angels blowing trumpets, and under them two lions, eating, one of them two wyverns, the other a man. The archivolt has a series of eight figures carved on key-stones at its intersection. These are—beginning with the lowest—(1) the Agnus Dei, (2) the Blessed Virgin, (3) an angel, (4) a martyr, (5) a king, (6) a bishop, and (7) another king. On the sides the archivolt has on the left the Resurrection, and the happiness of the blessed, who are all represented in pairs; and on the right, the tortures of the damned, full of terror and horror of every kind. In the first rank of these unhappy ones are two bishops and an abbat learning the truth of our Lord’s aweful saying, “Where their worm dieth not, and their fire is not quenched”—a saying practically ignored by our sculptors and carvers at the present day, who seem to believe in no Last Judgment, no masculine saints, and nothing but female angels; so far, at least, as one can judge by the figures with which they cover so profusely the walls of some of our new churches. The outer order of the archivolt has angels all round it, with crowns and sceptres in their hands. There can be little doubt, I suppose, that the tympanum was intended to have a sculpture, or, perhaps, had a painting of a sitting figure of our Lord in Judgment; without this figure the whole scheme wants the key-note, to give tone and significance to all its varied story. With it there would be few doorways which would be altogether finer or more worshipful than this.
The transept-doors are rightly much more simple than thewestern door, and the character of their sculpture has so much Byzantine feeling that there can he no doubt they are of somewhat earlier date.
The north transept doorway has on its eastern capitals: 1, The Baptism of our Lord by St. John; 2, Herod’s Feast; 3, The head of St. John brought in a charger;—and on its western capitals: 4, St. Martin giving his cloak to a beggar; 5, Our Lord holding a cloth (?). and two angels worshipping; 6, St. Nicolas restoring the two children to life. The door-arch is pointed, and all its orders and the label are very richly carved, but with foliage only. The south transept door is round-arched, and its tympanum is not filled in. On the capitals of the western jamb are: 1, St. Peter walking on the Sea; 2, The Last Supper; 3, The Charge to St. Peter;—and on the eastern jamb: 4, The Incredulity of St. Thomas; 5, The Walk to Emmaus; 6, The Supper at Emmaus.
The west front has two large square turrets, one of which only is carried up above the line of the roof. Its highest stage is octagonal, with a lancet opening on each face, and is finished with a low spire. A bold row of corbels is carried round the turret between the octagonal and square stages, as if for the support of a projecting parapet which no longer exists. The western rose-window was inserted under a broadly-soffeited and bold pointed arch, which spans the whole space between the turrets and rises nearly to the top of the walls.
The internal furniture of this church is not interesting. The metal screens are of the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries. The Coro occupies the second and third bays of the nave, and iron rails are placed from its eastern door to the doorway in the Reja or screen of the Capilla mayor, so as to preserve a passage for the clergy. The reredos of the high altar contains sixteen paintings, enclosed within a complicated architectural framework of buttresses, pinnacles, and canopies. In the centre is an enormous canopy and niche, in which is a modern effigy of the Blessed Virgin. This combination of rich architectural detail with paintings is not satisfactory to the eye; and it is evident that sculptured subjects would have been much more in harmony with the framework.
In the south-east chapel of the south transept there is a magnificent monument to the “Muy Hoñorable Señor Môsen Francis de Villia Espepa, Doctor, Cabalero, et Chanceller de Navarre,” and his “Muy Hoñorable Duenya Doña Ysabel,” who died in 1423. The two effigies lie under a deeply-recessed archfilled in with tracery, the recess being adorned with sculptured subjects on its three sides. There are eight Weepers in the arcade on the side of the tomb. It was too dark to see what all the subjects were; but at the back our Lord is seated and censed by angels; and below this He is represented in His tomb, with His arms bound, with a weeping angel on either side.
I have left to the last all notice of the beautiful cloister on the south side of the nave. The arcades, which open into the cloister-court, are carried on columns, which are alternately coupled and tripled or quadrupled; larger piers are introduced in the centre of each side, in order to give additional strength. The arches are generally simple and pointed, but on the north and south sides they are chevroned on the inside. The engraving which I give of the south-east angle of this cloister will show how elaborate the whole of the work is. The capitals throughout are carved with subjects and foliage, and most of the latter is of extremely delicate character. The acanthus-leaf is largely introduced. I had not time to catalogue the subjects carved in the capitals; but so many of them are concealed and so many damaged, that I fear it would be almost impossible at present to do so at all completely.
Angle of Cloister, Tudela.Angle of Cloister, Tudela.
I may with safety class this small church at Tudela among the very best it has been my good fortune to visit in any part of Europe; and there is much in its Iconography and in its sculptured detail which would reward a much more lengthened examination than I was able to afford.
I saw but one other old church here—that of la Magdalena, in the Calle de Sta. Cruz. It consists of a nave and choir, vaulted with a pointed waggon roof, with bold transverse ribs carried on carved capitals built in the side-walls. The chancel makes a very decided bend to the north. There is a simple tower on the north side, with a round-arched window of two lights in thebelfry stage, and a window of one light in the stage below it. The west doorway is very fine: it is round-arched, and has in the tympanum our Lord seated in a quatrefoil, surrounded by the emblems of the four Evangelists. The label is carved, and the orders of the arch are in part carved with acanthus, and in part with figures. Among the latter are the twelve Apostles and (apparently) the Descent of the Holy Ghost. The capitals are also storied.[394]
From Tudela I availed myself of a special train on the railway to Pamplona, which ran solely for the purpose of carrying the passengers of a diligence from Madrid, and in which the station-master obligingly gave me a seat. On the road we passed the towns of Olite and Tafalla, the view of the former of which gave so much promise that I returned there in order to examine its remains properly.
Tafalla and Olite were of old called the Flowers of Navarre. Olite now is dreary, desolate, and ruinous; and though Tafalla looks a little more thriving, it too has lost all its former claim to the title of a flower!
In Olite there are the extensive remains of a very fine castle, which was built as a palace by the kings of Navarre, and two interesting parish churches, Sta. Maria and San Pedro. Sta. Maria consists of a wide nave of four bays in length, and a small apse at the east end. On the west side is a small cloister in front of the principal entrance, which gives great picturesqueness to the whole work. The cloister is a work of the fifteenth century, an irregular square in plan, and arcaded with a good simple open arcade. The east side has been destroyed, in order to allow of the grand western doorway of the church being seen. This is protected by a penthouse roof, supported on two tall columns, which have taken the place of the old arcade. The church was built within the walls of the castle, but the cloister seems to have been thrown out beyond their line on the town side. There is a tower on the south of the nave, finished with a gabled roof, and pierced with some good early-pointed openings.
[larger view][largest view]TUDELA: Ground Plan of Cathedral: Plate XXIV. W. West, Lithr. Published by John Murray, Albemarle St. 1865.
The west front is a very elaborate work of the fourteenth century. It has a central doorway, and a row of niches with figures on each side of it, above a stringcourse, which is on the same level as the springing of the doorway. The tympanum of the door has sculptures of the Blessed Virgin Mary and our Lord under a canopy in the centre; on the (proper) right, theBaptism, the Flight into Egypt, and the Massacre of the Innocents; and on the left, the Presentation, the Annunciation, and the Nativity. The carving of the archivolt is rich, mainly of foliage, but with two or three figures under niches introduced capriciously in its midst. The jambs, too, are covered with carvings of subjects arranged in the oddest way;e.g.there are in succession an Agnus Dei, an Annunciation, the Creation of Eve, Adam tilling the ground, wyverns, an elephant and castle, the Fall, a pelican vulming its breast with a goat standing on its hind-legs and looking on; and so on with subjects which seem to exhibit nothing but the odd conceits of the workman, and to be arranged in no kind of order. The carving is all of that crisp, sharp, clever kind, so seldom seen in England, but so common in the fourteenth-century buildings of Germany, and in which some of the Spanish sculptors were unsurpassed by all save perhaps their own successors in the latest period of Gothic art, whose works I have already described at Burgos, Miraflores, and Valladolid. There are extensive traces of old painting on the stonework of this doorway; and I noticed that the detached shafts (of which there are four in each jamb) were covered with a trailing branch of ivy, with green leaves and red stems.
The interior of Sta. Maria is not very interesting, though its scale is good, the groined nave being 36 feet wide by 108 feet in length. The groining-shafts are commendably bold and dignified. There is the usual late western gallery, and a modern chapel and large irregular porch on the south side.
Sta. Maria stands, as I have said, partly within the walls of the ancient castle or palace. This was dismantled in the course of the Peninsular war, but is still an imposing ruin, with a vast extent of enclosing wall, out of which rise several fine towers. These are generally very simple, but lofty, and capped with projecting machicoulis. I give an illustration of one in which the finish is unlike any that I remember to have seen.[395]The window here is a good example of a traceried domestic window, a straight stone transome being carried across under the tracery, so as to make the window-opening square-headed.
Two grand towers on the eastern face of the castle are octangular in plan, and one of them rises in three stages, each slightly within the other, and each finished with fine corbelled machicoulis.
The gateways have extremely small and low pointed arches, looking like little holes in the great walls. Some of the walls are finished with the common Arab type of battlement, the coping of which is weathered to a point. The keep is a large pile, with square towers at the angles; and near it is a large hall with battlemented side-walls, which has the air of being the earliest part of the castle, but into which I was unable to gain admission.
Castle, and Church of San Pedro, Olite.Castle, and Church of San Pedro, Olite.
At the other extremity of the town (or village as it ought rather to be called) is the church of San Pedro. This forms an important feature in the picturesque view of the place, owing to its fine and peculiar tower and spire. This is built against the south side of the church, is quite plain until it rises above the roof, and then has two stages each pierced with windows; above this a pierced overhanging parapet, carried upon very bold corbels, and then a low octagonal stage, each side surmounted by a crocketed gable, and the whole finished with a spire, the entasis of which is very distinctly marked. An original design, such as this is, deserves illustration. The height of the spire bears, it will beseen, but a small proportion to that of the tower, as is often to be observed in the case of good steeples; but the most unusual feature is the enormous parapet, and taking into account the position of the church just at the extreme angle of the town, it may be supposed to have been built with some view to military requirements. The greater part of the steeple is a work I suppose of the fourteenth century—much later than the church, which, saving modern additions, is a fine work of quite the beginning of the thirteenth century, if not earlier. The west doorway is round-arched, having three shafts in each jamb, with sculptured capitals, and an arch of six orders alternately carved and moulded. The tympanum is sculptured with our Lord and two censing angels, and below are subjects from the life of St. Peter: (1) His commission; (2) His walking on the sea; (3) His trial; and (4) His crucifixion. Above the doorway is a stringcourse carved in the fourteenth century, and in the gable a wheel window within a pointed enclosing-arch. The plan of the nave and aisles is of the same kind as that of the church at Tudela, though on a smaller scale. A curious difference in the design is the carrying up of the aisle groining almost to the same level as that of the nave, whilst the transverse arches across the aisle are at a much lower level, and have fine pointed and circular windows pierced in the walls between the arches and the groining. The eastern part of the church is all modern and very bad.
Olite is a very squalid and miserable place; but a few hours may be well spent here; and the castle in particular, which has been very badly treated within a few years, ought to be carefully examined and drawn before it is too late. I was there on a hot day in June,—so hot as to make it difficult to work,—and yet on the summit of the hills, lying to the south-south-west of the town, a good deal of snow was lying, and in the evening, as the sun went down, the cautious Spaniards put on their great cloth cloaks, and stole about muffled up to the eyes as though it were mid-winter.
From Olite to Tafalla there was once, or was once intended to be, a continuous subterraneous communication. The distance must be some three or four miles, so that the story would appear to be rather improbable. The intention of Charles III. of Navarre to make such a communication between the great palace he was building at Tafalla and the already existing castle of Olite, is mentioned by Cean Bermudez under the date of 1419; but he gives no authority for his statement.
I was unable to stop at Tafalla: it is a more important place than Olite, and has two churches, both apparently of the latest Gothic, with square-ended transepts, and windowless apsidal choirs like those of the late Burgalese churches.
After leaving Tafalla the country becomes at every step wilder and more beautiful. The hills rise grandly on either side, and are bare and rocky. The railway passes under an aqueduct, which in height, length, and simple grandeur of design, is worthy to be ranked among the finest European aqueducts. It was built at the end of the last century by D. Ventura Rodriguez. The only old church I saw on this part of the road was close to Las Campanas station. Its west front had a good doorway, and above this a great arch rising almost to the point of the gable, with a circular window pierced within it. The same design is repeated in one of the churches of Pamplona.
The towers and walls of Pamplona are seen for some time before they are reached. The railway follows the winding of a pretty stream, and the city stands well elevated above it. The situation is indeed very charming, the whole character of the country being thoroughly mountainous, and the city standing on an elevated knoll rising out of an ample and prosperous-looking valley surrounded by fine hills.
The views from the cathedral and walls are very beautiful, and as the town is large and rather handsomely laid out with a grand arcaded Plaza in the centre, it gives a very favourable impression of Spain to those who make it their first resting-place on a Spanish tour.
No. 51. PAMPLONA CATHEDRAL EXTERIOR FROM THE NORTH-EAST.No. 51.PAMPLONA CATHEDRALEXTERIOR FROM THE NORTH-EAST.
The cathedral stands on the outside of the city and close to the walls. It was commenced inA.D.1397 by Charles III. of Navarre, who pulled down almost[396]the whole of the old church (built circaA.D.1100). The planning of this church is both ingenious and novel. Its chevet is entirely devised upon a system of equilateral triangles, and, as will be seen by reference to my plan,[397]the apse has only two canted sides, having a column in the centre behind the altar; and though it is perfectly true that this two-sided apse is in itself not a very graceful scheme, it is at the same time equally true that the combination of the chapels with the central apse is very ingenious and clever. The distortion ofthe chapel next to the transept is very objectionable, and seems to be without reason or necessity. There are transepts and a nave and aisles of six bays in length, with side chapels along the greater part of the aisles. The extreme shortness of the constructional choir makes it certain that the church was planned for the modern Spanish arrangement of the Coro, which now occupies two bays of the nave, leaving one bay between its eastern Reja and the Crossing. The Reja of the Capilla mayor is under the eastern arch of the Crossing, so that the low rails marking the passage from the Coro to the Capilla mayor are very long. The detail of all the architecture is characteristic of the late date at which the church was built. The columns are large, but composed of a succession of insignificant mouldings, so as to produce but little effect of bold light and shade: those in the choir are cylindrical, with clusters of mouldings supporting, and continued on as, the groining ribs, and they all lack that definiteness of arrangement and plan which is one of the surest tests of the difference between good and bad Gothic architecture generally, as it is between the work of men of the thirteenth and fifteenth centuries almost everywhere.
The internal effect of the cathedral is certainly very fine. The peculiar scheme of the apse allows of the erection of a Retablo of unusual height with less interference with the architectural features than is common; and the whole design has the merit which I have so often had to accord to the latest school of Gothic artists in Spain, of having been schemed with an evident intention of meeting and providing for the necessities of the climate; and one consequence of this is that almost all the windows are left as they were originally designed, and have not been blocked up in order to diminish the glare. The clerestory windows throughout are small, those in the transepts are only small roses, and owing to the steep slope of the aisle roofs there is a great space between these openings and the main arcades. The three eastern bays of the nave have geometrical traceries, whilst in the western bays and the choir they are flamboyant in character; but I do not imagine that this slight difference in character betokens any real difference in their age. They all, in short, have somewhat of late middle-pointed character, though their actual date and their detail would make us class them rather with works of the third-pointed style.
The stalls in the Coro are of Renaissance character, but founded closely on the older models; and the Reja, to the east of them, is of wrought iron, old, but with a Renaissance cresting.The Reja in front of the Capilla mayor is much finer; it is of wrought iron, and is made, as is so usual, with vertical bars, set rather close together, and alternately plain and twisted. What the lower part lacks in ornament the cresting more than atones for; it is unusually ornate, consisting of interlacing ogee arches with crocketed pinnacles between them, all very elaborately hammered up. The horizontal bars and rails are also all covered with traceries in relief, and at regular intervals on these there are small figures under canopies. The whole stands upon a moulded and panelled base of stone. The total height of this screen is not less than thirty feet, of which the cresting is about a third.
Of the other furniture I may mention some of the glass in the clerestory, which is fine; and the old Retablos. Two of these in the south chapel of the chevet are especially worthy of notice. One of them has a crucifix (with the figure draped in modern drapery) which has the feet half plated with silver, and behind it are twelve prophets in rows of four over each other, and all of them with inscriptions referring to the Crucifixion—such as the texts beginning “Foderunt manus,” “Vere languores nostros ipse tulit,” “Post ebdomadas sexaginta dies occidetur,” “Quid sicut plage iste,” &c.
The western front is a poor Pagan work utterly out of keeping with the remainder of the fabric, and erected in the last century from the designs of D. Ventura Rodriguez. The rest of the exterior is Gothic, but not at all striking. It was once well garnished with crocketed pinnacles above its flying buttresses, but they have now for the most part disappeared. The roofs are flat and tiled, and hipped back in an ungainly fashion even at the transepts. The north transept door has an unusually fine example of a latch-handle or closing ring: the handle has writhing serpents round it, and the plate is perforated all over with rich flamboyant traceries.
This cathedral is fortunate in retaining many of its old dependent buildings in a very perfect state, but unfortunately I have spent only one day in Pamplona, and I did not see by any means all that is to be seen. For Cean Bermudez[398]says that some portions of the first cathedral, founded in A.D. 1100, still remain; particularly the small cloister and some of the buildings attached to it. This was the last cathedral in Spain that observed the rule of St. Augustine, and the canons always lived in common; the refectory,said to be of the thirteenth century, the kitchen and offices, all still remain. Of about the same age as the cathedral are the beautiful cloisters on its south side, and the Chapter-house to the east of the cloister. It is said, indeed, that a part of this cloister had been built some seventy years before the fall of the old cathedral rendered it necessary to rebuild it from the ground, and the style of much of the work encourages one to believe the statement. It is certainly a very charming work in every way: it is a square in plan, each side having six traceried windows towards the centre court, and a small chapel breaks out into this at the south-west angle. The windows are all of four lights, filled with geometrical traceries, with crocketed labels to some and canopies to others, and delicate buttresses and pinnacles dividing the bays. The low wall below the open windows is covered with small figures in niches, and the walls above the windows with panelling, as is also the parapet of the modern upper cloister. The general conception is very ornate, and at the same time very delicate and light in its proportions; and it is rendered very interesting by the number of rich doorways, monuments, and sculptures with which the walls are everywhere enriched. The door called “Of our Lady of the Refuge” opens from the transept to the cloister; its front is in the cloister, of which it occupies the north-western bay. In its tympanum is a sculpture of the burial of the Blessed Virgin, whose statue, with the figure of our Lord in her arms, occupies the post of honour against the central pier. The reveals of the jambs are filled with little niches and canopies in which are figures and subjects; and below the bases, in a band of quatrefoils, are on the one side the Acts of Mercy; on the other, figures playing on instruments. Angels in the archivolt bear a scroll on which is inscribed—“Quæ est ista que ascendit de deserto deliciis affluens, innixa super dilectum suum? Assumpta est Maria in cœlum.” Against the east wall of the cloister is a sculpture of the Adoration of the Magi, and next to this the grand triple opening to the Chapter-house—a richly moulded door with a two-light window on either side. In the southern alley are a fine tomb of a bishop, the door of the Sala Preciosa adorned with a series of bas-reliefs from the life of the Blessed Virgin, and another door with the Last Supper and the Entry into Jerusalem; and close to the latter, but in the western wall, is a doorway with the Crucifixion, and the Maries going to the Sepulchre. Between these sculptured doorways the walls are all arcaded with tracery panels corresponding to the windows;and as all the mouldings are rich and delicate in their design, and the proportions of the cloister very lofty, it will be seen that I cannot be very far wrong in considering this to be, on the whole, one of the most effective and striking cloisters of its age. The projecting chapel on the south-west angle is exceedingly delicate in its construction, and is screened from the cloister with irongrilles. A quaintly trimmed box-garden occupies the cloister-court to the no small improvement of its effect.
On the eastern side is the Chapter-house; a very remarkable work of probably the same age as the cloister, though of a simpler, bolder, and much more grand kind of design. It is square in plan, but the vault is octagonal, the angles of the square being arched and covered with small subordinate vaults below the springing of the main vault. Buttresses are placed outside to resist the thrust of each of the eight principal ribs of the octagonal vault; and these buttresses, being all placed in the same direction as the ribs, abut against the square outline of the building in the most singular and, at first sight, unintelligible manner. They are carried up straight from the ground nearly to the eaves, where they are weathered back and finished with square crocketed pinnacles; whilst between them an open arcade is carried all round just below the eaves. On the exterior this Chapter-house seems to be so far removed from the east end of the church as to have hardly any connection with it; they are separated by houses built up close to their walls, and present consequently a not very imposing effect from the exterior; and standing, as the Chapter-house does, just on the edge of the city walls, it is strange that it has fared so well in the many attacks that have been made on Pamplona. The interior is remarkable only for the grand scale and proportions of the vault with which it is covered.
There are several other old churches here which deserve notice, though none are on a very fine or grand scale. That of San Saturnino—the first Bishop of Pamplona—is remarkable chiefly for the very unusual planning of its eastern end, which has three unequal sides, out of which three unequal polygonal chapels open.[399]My impression is that there was never any altar under the great apse, but that the high altar stood in the central chapel, at its east end. The Coro is, and probably was always intended to be, in the western gallery, the underside of which is groined, and any arrangement of stalls on the floor of such a church would be obviously inconvenient and out of place. Two towers are built against the eastern bay of the nave. The window tracery is of good geometrical middle-pointed character, and the mouldings and other details all seem to prove that the church was built about the middle of the fourteenth century. The south doorway has the rare feature at this period of capitalshistoriés; on the left hand are the Annunciation, the Salutation, the Nativity, and the Flight into Egypt; and on the right our Lord bearing His Cross, the Descent from the Cross, the Resurrection, and the Descent into Hell. The Crucifixion forms the finial of the canopy over the doorway, and three or four other subjects are concealed by the modern framework round the door. There seems to be no reason why the idea of such a plan as this should not be adopted again: the termination of the nave by a kind of apsis, from one side of which the chancel projects, is extremely good, and perhaps, on the whole, the best way of effecting the change from the grand span of so broad a nave to the moderate dimensions (just half those of the nave) of the chancel. Such a church would probably hold about six hundred worshippers, all in sight of the altar, and might, with advantage to its proportions, be lengthened by the addition of another bay; and, simple as all its parts would be, it would be a relief to eyes wearied by the flimsy weakness of our modern Gothic work to look upon anything which could not possibly be constructed without solid walls, massive buttresses, and some degree of constructive skill.
The church of San Nicolas is of Romanesque date, but much altered and added to at later periods. It consists of a nave and aisles of three bays, a Crossing, and a short eastern polygonal apse. The nave aisles retain their original waggon vaults, with transverse ribs at intervals; but the other vaults are all quadripartite. The clerestory of the nave, too, consists of broad unpierced lancets, which are probably coeval with the arcades below them.
The exterior of this church is very much obscured by modern additions and excrescences, but still retains some features of much interest. There is a fine early western door, and above this a rose window filled with rich geometrical tracery, over which is a very boldly projecting pointed arch, which abuts against a tower on the north and against a massive buttress on the south. The walls appear to have been finished at the eaveswith very bold machicoulis. At a much later date than that of the church a lofty open cloister, with plain pointed arches, was added on the western and northern sides.
On either side of the apse of this church, in front of the Retablo and altar, are what look like two tabernacles for the reservation of the Sacrament: but I had no opportunity of learning the object of this double arrangement.
The views from the walls of Pamplona are eminently lovely; I remember looking across to the east, over the flat which stretches away from them to where the mountains begin to rise boldly beyond; and, as my eyes wandered on, I began to turn my thoughts eagerly homewards, and much as I had enjoyed the Spanish journey which ended at Pamplona, there was perhaps no part of it which I enjoyed more than this, where I was ungrateful enough to Spain to allow everything to be seasoned by the near prospect of home.
[larger view][largest view]PAMPLONA:—Ground Plans of the Cathedral:—and of San Saturnino: Plate XXV. Published by John Murray, Albemarle St. 1865.
ITis time, now that I have described so many Spanish Gothic buildings in detail, to undertake a somewhat more general classification of them, both in regard to their history and their style. Hitherto I have spoken of each building by itself, only endeavouring to give so clear and concise an account of each as was necessary in order that their general character might be understood. But this kind of account would be incomplete and almost useless without a more generalizing and more systematic summary of the whole. And to this I propose to devote this chapter.
There are, indeed, few parts of Europe in which it is more easy to detect the influence of History upon Art than it is in Spain. I dismiss from consideration the period of the Visigothic rule, which lasted fromA.D.417 to 717; for though it is possible that some works of this age still exist, ase.g.part of the walls of Toledo, and the metal votive crowns of Guarrazar, they do not really come within the scope of my subject, inasmuch as there is no kind of evidence that they exercised any influence over the architecture of the Christian parts of the country after the Moorish interregnum.
From the first invasion by the Moors inA.D.711 down to their expulsion from Granada inA.D.1492, their whole history is mixed up with that of the Christians; and, as might be expected, so great was the detestation in which the two races held each other, that neither of them borrowed to any great extent from the art of the other, and accordingly we see two streams of art flowing as it were side by side at the same time, and often in the same district,—a circumstance, as I need hardly say, almost, if not quite, unknown at the same period in any other part of Europe. The Mosque at Cordoba in the ninth century, the Alcazar and Giralda at Seville in thirteenth, the Court of Lions in the Alhambra in the fourteenth, some of the houses in Toledo in the fifteenth century, are examples of what the Moors were building during the very period of the Middle Ages inwhich all the buildings which I have described and illustrated were being erected; the only exception to be made to this general statement being, that when the Christians vanquished the Moors they usually continued to allow them to build somewhat in their own fashion,—as, for example, they did in Toledo,—whilst on the other hand, the Moors seem never to have imitated this example, though they were of course utterly unable to suppress all evidence in their work of any knowledge of Gothic buildings.
The reason of this was, no doubt, that throughout this period any contrast drawn between the Moors and Christians in regard to civilization would generally, if not always, have been in favour of the former. They were accomplished both in art and science: their architectural works would have been impossible except to a very refined people, and their scientific attainments are evidenced even to the present day by the system of artificial irrigation which they everywhere introduced, and which even now remains almost unaltered and unimproved. The Christians, on the contrary, were warlike and hardy, and in the midst of constant wars had but scant time for the pursuit of art; and finally, when they had re-established their supremacy, they wisely allowed the Moors to remain under their rule when they would, and employed them to some extent on the works in which they could not fail to see that they excelled.
Again, the subdivision of the country into several kingdoms, administered under varying laws, owing no common allegiance to any central authority, and inhabited by people of various origin, might well be expected to leave considerable marks on the style of the buildings; though, at the same time, the antipathy which the inhabitants of all of them felt for the Moors rendered this cause less operative than it would otherwise have been. Some portions of the country had never been conquered by the Saracens: such were the regions of the Pyrenees lying betwixt Aragon and Navarre, the Asturias, Biscay, and the northern portion of Galicia.[400]And though it was by degrees that the other states freed themselves from their conquerors, it happened fortunately that the Christian successes generally synchronized as nearly as possible with that great development of Christian art which at the time covered all parts of Europe with the noblest examples of Pointed Architecture. Toledo was recovered by the Christians in A.D. 1085, Tarragona in 1089, Zaragoza in 1118, Lérida in 1149, Valencia in 1239, Seville in 1248,whilst Segovia, Leon, Burgos, Zamora, and Santiago suffered more or less from occasional irruptions of the Moors down to the beginning of the eleventh century, but from that date were practically free from molestation. By the middle of the fifteenth century the number of states into which the country had been divided was reduced to four, Castile, Aragon, Navarre, and the Moorish kingdom of Granada. Of these Aragon and Castile are the two of which I have seen the most, and, I may venture to add, those in which the History of Gothic Architecture in Spain is properly to be studied. For though it is true that Seville was recovered in the thirteenth century, and Cordoba about the same time, it is equally so that most of their buildings are Moorish or modern, the Gothic cathedral in the former not having been commenced untilA.D.1401, and the Moorish mosque in the latter still doing service as the Christian cathedral; and generally throughout the South of Spain, so far as I can learn, there are but few early Gothic buildings to be seen; whilst the late examples of the style were designed by the same architects, and in precisely the same style, as those which were erected in the parts of Spain which I have visited.
Of these two great divisions of the country, Aragon included the province of that name, together with Cataluña and Valencia; and owing to the great political freedom which the Catalans in particular enjoyed at an early period, to the vast amount of trade with Italy, the Mediterranean, and the East carried on along its extensive seaboard, and to its large foreign possessions—which included the Balearic Isles, Naples, Sicily, and Sardinia—the kingdom of Aragon possessed great wealth and power, and has left magnificent architectural remains.
The kingdom of Castile in course of time came to include, in addition to the two Castiles, Leon, Biscay, the Asturias, Galicia, Estremadura, Murcia, and Andalusia: and here there was not only a larger Spanish territory, but one peopled by a much more varied population than that of Aragon, and which naturally, I think, left a less distinct architectural impress than we see in the other.
Each of these kingdoms of course inherited a certain number of buildings erected under the rulers who had formerly held the country. It is possible that some portion of the walls of Toledo were built by the Goths; and at any rate we know by the fortunate discovery of the crowns at Guarrazar,[401]that, whatever may have been the state of the people in respect of other arts, that of working in precious metals was in an advanced state.
The Moors who succeeded them undertook undoubtedly large works in many parts of the country. They first built the Bridge of Alcantara across the Tagus at Toledo, and enclosed several towns with strong walls, among others Valencia and Talavera. They erected mosques and other public buildings, and before the Christian conquests of the eleventh century had no doubt imported much of a very advanced civilization into the country which they ruled. The mosque “Cristo de la Luz,” at Toledo, is a remarkable example of delicate skill in design and construction, and certainly in advance of the coeval Christian works. The ingenuity of the planning of the vaults is extreme, and though, at the same time, there is to our eyes an error in trying to do so much in so very small a space—nine vaulting compartments covered with varied vaults being contrived in a chamber only 21 feet square—it is to be observed that this is just one of the mistakes which arises from over-great education and skill, and is in marked contrast to the kind of design which we see in the simple, grave, but rude buildings which the less cultivated Christians were erecting at the same period.
Of the early Christian buildings I think there can be but little doubt that some at least still exist. There is no one year in Spanish history which can be used as that of the Norman Conquest is in England. Here people are accustomed to argue as though before and afterA.D.1066 two entirely different styles existed, with few, if any, marks of imitation of one from the other, though of course both must have had the same common Roman origin. This cannot be said in Spain; and where we find distinct and good evidence of the erection of churches in the ninth and tenth centuries, and the buildings still standing, with every architectural evidence of not being more modern than the eleventh century, I see not why we should doubt their greater antiquity. For looking to the solid way in which all these early works were built, it seems to be extremely unlikely that they should have required rebuilding so soon, or that, if they were rebuilt, not only should older stones with inscriptions recording the dates be inserted in the new walls, but also that no kind of evidence—documentary or other—should be forthcoming as to their reconstruction.
Several inscriptions on foundation-stones are given by Cean Bermudez,[402]and I regret never having been able to examine the buildings in which they occur. One of the earliest of these, Sta. Cruz de Cangas, is described as having a crypt; and along inscription, with the date 739, on a stone in it is given by Florez.[403]But I gather from Mr. Ford that the church has now been modernized. Cean Bermudez describes it as “strong, arched, and without ornament.” Another church at Santiañes de Pravia has a labyrinthine inscription ofA.D.776, recording its erection by the King Silo. This church was very small, but had a Capilla mayor, two side chapels, a Crossing, and three naves; in fact, was in plan completely and exactly what the Spanish churches of the twelfth century were; and in this case it may, perhaps, be doubted whether the inscription referred to the church described, and was not taken from some older building. But the most interesting probably of these early churches is that of Sta. Maria de Naranco, near Oviedo. This is described and illustrated by Parcerisa,[404]and is undoubtedly a most remarkable example, though unfortunately I can find no reliable evidence as to its probably very early date. It seems to be planned with a view to a congregation outside the church joining in the worship within, there being galleries and open arches at the ends through which the altar might be seen. I confess that the details which I have seen, as well as the plans and views of this church, and of some portions of Oviedo Cathedral, to which a similarly early date is ascribed, do not give me the impression of work which is sufficiently distinct in style to be pronounced, as the Spanish writers have it, “obra de Godos,” or work of the Goths. Yet it is undoubtedly of early date, and probably, at any rate, not later than the tenth or eleventh century. The detail is Romanesque, and the modification of plan in such a building seems to point to some special use for it rather than to some special age for its erection. On the other hand, there is some reason to suppose that the church at Santiago, which existed before the erection of the present cathedral, was very similar in its plan;[405]and if so, it would seem to fortify the claim for a very early date for Sta. Maria de Naranco.
I have thought it right to refer to these buildings on account of the great age ascribed to some of them; but I have done so with some hesitation, because I have not seen them myself, and it is impossible to form any good opinion upon such questions as arise in connexion with them without careful personal examination.
It is a relief, therefore, to turn now to more certain ground, and to speak of churches which I have myself seen. I think the earliest of these are the two old churches of San Pablo andSan Pera, at Barcelona, said to have been built inA.D.914 and 983. I see no reason whatever to doubt these dates; at least it is improbable that if San Pablo was built in 914 it should have required rebuilding before the end of the next century; and no one I suppose would suggest a later date for it than this. In any case it is a valuable example. The ground-plan is cruciform, with a central lantern and three eastern apses; and the roofs are all covered with waggon vaulting and semi-domes. The plan is quite worthy of very attentive consideration, since with more or less modification of details it is that which more than any other may be said to have been popular in Spain in the twelfth and thirteenth centuries.
The question as to the quarter from whence it was derived is one of the greatest possible interest, and admits, I think, of but little doubt. It must be remembered that in considering these questions there are no Pyrenees. The towns on what is now the French side of the mountains were not then French; and such places as S. Elne were not only really Spanish, but so intimate was the connexion existing between them and places at a greater distance (ase.g.Carcassonne), that for our purpose they may fairly be considered as being in the same country. The plan which we see in San Pablo del Campo is one which, having its origin in the East, spread to the north of Italy, was adopted largely in Provence, Auvergne, and Aquitaine, and was probably imported from thence to Barcelona. The central lantern and the three eastern apses are rather Byzantine than Romanesque in their origin; and though they are not common in Italy, they are occasionally met with; whilst in the parts of France just mentioned they are of frequent occurrence. The church which I coupled with this—San Pedro de las Puellas, in the same city—was consecrated inA.D.983; it is also cruciform, but has no chapels east of the transepts. Here, too, we have waggon-vaults, and a central dome.
The little church of San Daniel,[406]at Gerona, not much later probably in date than those first mentioned, is mainly remarkable for the apsidal north and south ends of its transepts. This common German arrangement is most rarely seen in Spain, and deserves especial notice. Here it is coupled with a central octagonal lantern, which has a very good effect. It is repeated very nearly in the church at Tarrasa, and so far as the apses at the end of the transept in the church of San Pedro, Gerona;and there is considerable similarity between the latter and the cathedral at Le Puy en Velay.
The succeeding century shows us the same type of plan becoming much more popular, and developed again in such close imitation of some foreign examples as to make it almost impossible to doubt its foreign origin. In these buildings the nave has usually a waggon-vault, and this is supported by half barrel-vaults in the aisles. There is no clerestory; a central lantern rises to a moderate height; and three eastern apsidal chapels open into the transepts, and are roofed with semi-domes. San Pedro, Huesca—probably not later in date thanA.D.1096-1150—is a remarkably good and early example of the class; and will be found to be extremely similar to some of the churches built about the same time on the other side of the Pyrenees. The plan of the steeple[407]—which is hexagonal—deserves special record; and it may not be amiss to observe, that at Tarbes, in the Pyrenees, the principal church not only has three eastern apses, but also a central octagonal steeple; and the same type is again repeated at San Pedro, Gerona—said to have been commenced inA.D.1117—though here there are two apses on each side of the principal altar, and all the detail of the design is very Italian, or perhaps I should rather say Provençal, in its character. If we compare some of these churches with the earlier portions of the cathedral at Carcassonne, we shall find them to be almost identical in character and detail, and cannot avoid coming to the conclusion that they were all designed by the same school of architects or masons. Carcassonne Cathedral has a nave and aisles divided by columns formed of a square block, with an engaged shaft on each face: the covering of the nave is a waggon-vault with square ribs on its under side, and that of the aisles is a quadrant. It is, in fact, almost identical with San Pedro at Gerona. Go farther east, and in the church at Monistrol, between Le Puy and S. Etienne, the same design precisely will be seen in a remote French village far from Spain.
About this period a type of church varying but little from this became extremely common in Aquitaine and Auvergne; and this again evidently influenced at least one of the Spanish architects very much indeed: I allude to such churches as those of Notre Dame du Port, Clermont Ferrand, and S. Sernin at Toulouse—to name two only out of a large number. In these the ground-plan has usually nave and aisles, transepts, central lantern, and a chevet consisting of an apsidal choir with a surroundingaisle, and chapels opening into it, with spaces between each chapel. This plan, as I have already shown, is absolutely repeated at Santiago with such close accuracy that one can hardly avoid calling it merely a reproduction of S. Sernin at Toulouse.[408]It is the more remarkable because for some reason the early Spanish architects almost always avoided the erection of a regular chevet, and adhered strictly to their first plan of separate apsidal chapels on the eastern side of the transept. But whilst the early French chevet was only copied at Santiago, the other features of the French churches to which it belonged were copied not unfrequently—these are the waggon-vaulted nave, supported by half waggon-vaults over the aisles, and the central lantern. Gradually the design of these various parts was developed into a sort of stereotyped regularity, the instances of which extend so far across to the Peninsula as to be very surprising to those who have noticed the remarkable way in which local peculiarities generally confine themselves to the particular districts in which they originated. In course of time the groining was varied, and in place of the round barrel-vault, one of pointed section was adopted, and in place of it again the usual quadripartite vault. The examples which I have described, and which belong to this class, are—San Isidoro, Leon; San Vicente and San Pedro, Avila; several churches in Segovia; the old Cathedral at Salamanca; Lérida old Cathedral; Sta. Maria, Benevente; and Santiago, la Coruña. Other churches of precisely similar character exist at Valdedios, near Gijon; Villanueva and Villa Mayor, near Oña; San Antolin de Bedon, between Ribadella and Llanes; Sandoval, on the river Esla; San Juan de Amandi and Tarbes, on the French side of the Pyrenees. Those in Segovia may be accepted as the best examples of their class, and they are so closely alike in all their details as to lead naturally to the belief that they were all executed at about the same period, and by the same workmen. The sack of the city by the Moors in 1071, when it is said that thirty churches were destroyed, seems to point to the period at which most of these churches were probably erected to take the place of those that had been destroyed; and it seems to be certain that their leading features remainedgenerally unaltered until about the end of the twelfth, if not far into the succeeding century. Indeed it is remarkable in Spain, just as it is in Germany, that the late Romanesque style, having once been introduced, retained its position andprestigelonger than it did in France, and was only supplanted finally by designs brought again from France in a later style, instead of developing into it through the features of first-pointed, as was the case in England and France.
In this general similarity there are several subordinate variations to be observed. At Santiago, for instance, we see an almost absolute copy of the great church of S. Sernin, Toulouse, erected soon after its original had been completed. At Lugo it is clear, I think, that the architect of the cathedral copied, not from any foreign work, but from that at Santiago: he was probably neither acquainted with the church at Toulouse, nor any of its class. At San Vicente, Avila, again, though we see the Segovian eastern apses repeated with absolute accuracy, the design of the church is modified in a most important manner by the introduction of quadripartite vaulting in place of the waggon-vault, and the piercing the wall above the nave arcades with a regular triforium and clerestory. The same design was repeated with little alteration at San Pedro, in the same city; and in both it seems to me that we may detect some foreign influence, so rare was the introduction of the clerestory in Spanish buildings of the same age. Sta. Maria, la Coruña, again, though it evidently belongs to the same class as the cathedral at Santiago, has certain peculiarities which identify it absolutely with that variation which we see at Carcassonne and Monistrol:[409]for here there are narrow aisles; and the three divisions of the church are all covered with waggon-vaults, those at the sides resisting the thrust from the centre, and, owing to their slight width, exerting but slight pressure on the outer walls. The distinction between this design and one in which the aisles are covered with quadrant-vaults is very marked; and the erection of the cathedral at Santiago would not have been very likely to lead to the design of such a church as this.
In all these churches the proportion of the length of the choir to that of the nave is very small. Usually the apses are either simply added against the eastern wall of the transept, or else, whilst the side apses are built on this plan, the centralapse is lengthened by the addition of one bay between the Crossing and the apse. It is very important to mark this plan, because, however it was introduced—whether in such churches as that of the abbey of Veruela, where the conventual arrangement of Citeaux was imported, or in those earlier churches of which San Pedro, Gerona, may be taken as an example, in which from the first no doubt the choir was transferred to the nave, and the central apse treated only as a sanctuary—the result was the same on Spanish architecture and Spanish ritual. The Church found herself in possession of churches with short eastern apses and no choirs; and instead of retaining the old arrangement of the choir, close to and in face of the altar, she admitted her laity to the transept, divorced the choir from the altar, and invented those church arrangements which puzzle ecclesiologists so much. In our own country the same system to some extent at first prevailed; but our architects took a different course; they retained their choirs, prolonged them into the nave, and so contrived without suffering the separation of the clergy from the altar they serve, which we see in Spain.[410]In one great English church only has the Spanish system been adopted, and this, strangely enough, in the most complete fashion. Westminster Abbey, in fact, will enable any one to understand exactly what the arrangement of a Spanish church is. Its short choir, just large enough for a sumptuous and glorious altar, its Crossing exactly fitted for the stalls of the clergy and choir, its nave and transepts large enough to hold a magnificent crowd of worshippers, are all mis-used just as they would be in Spain; whilst the modern arrangements for the people—much more mistaken than they are there—involve the possession of the greater part of the choir by the laity, and the entire cutting off by very solid metal fences of all the worshippers in the transepts from the altar before which they are supposed to kneel, and the placing of the entire congregation between the priest and the altar.[411]
This digression will be excused when it is remembered how universally this tradition settled itself upon Spain, and how completely the perseverance in Romanesque traditions has affectedher ritual arrangements, and with them her church architecture from the twelfth century until the present day. The long choirs which were naturally developed in England and France were never thought of there; the choir was merely the “Capilla mayor”—the chapel for the high altar; and the use of the nave as the people’s church was ignored or forgotten as much as it was—very rightly—in some of our own old conventual churches, where the choir was prolonged far down into the nave, and the space for the people reduced to a bay or two only at its western end.
I must now bring this discussion to a close, and proceed with my chronological summary; and here the Abbey Church at Veruela ought to be mentioned, if regard be had to the date of its erection—circaA.D.1146-1171—though I must say that I have not been able to discover that it exercised any distinct influence upon Spanish buildings. It is in truth a very close copy of a Burgundian church of the period, built by French monks for an order only just established in Spain, under the direction probably of a French architect, and in close compliance with the rather strict architectural rules and restrictions which the Cistercians imposed on all their branches and members.[412]The character of the interior of this church is grand and simple, but at the same time rather rude and austere; but the detail of much of the exterior is full of delicacy; and the design of the chevet, with its central clerestory, and the surrounding aisle roofed with a separate lean-to roof, and the chapels projecting from it so subordinated as to finish below its eaves, recalls to memory some of the best examples of French Romanesque work.[413]The beauty and refinement of the little Chapter-house here lead me to suppose that it cannot be earlier than the end of the century.
There are some of these churches which require more detailed notice as being derived to some extent from the same models, but erected on a grander scale, and if documentary evidence can be trusted, whose erection was spread over so long a time as to illustrate very well indeed the slow progress of the development in art which we so often see in these Spanish buildings. The old cathedral at Salamanca was building fromA.D.1120 to 1178; Tarragona Cathedral was begun in 1131;Tudela, commenced at about the same time, was completed in 1188; Lérida, whose style is so similar to that of the others as to make me class them all together, was not commenced until 1203, nor consecrated until 1278; and Valencia Cathedral, of which the south transept of the original foundation still remains, was not commenced untilA.D.1262. Yet if I except the early and Italian-looking eastern apse at Tarragona, most of the features of these churches look as though they were the design of the same man, and very nearly the same period; and it is altogether unintelligible how such a work, for instance, as Lérida Cathedral could be in progress at the same time as Toledo and Burgos, save upon the assumption that the thirteenth century churches in an advanced Pointed style, such as these last, were erected by French workmen and artists imported for the occasion, and in a style far in advance of that at which the native artists had arrived.