The sacristy is an ornate Renaissance structure, richly gilded and painted. The alabaster retablo over the altar of St. Barnabas is the work of a genius whose name unfortunately has not been handed down. The chamber also contains some curious fifteenth-century paintings relating to the life of St. Peter. Here may be seen the superb monstrance of Juan de Arfe, dated 1574, and therefore among his earliest works.
The cloister on the south side of the cathedral was built in the early sixteenth century on the site of an earlier one. There was an attempt made at the same time to restore, more or less at haphazard, all the tombs and epitaphs left from earlier times. At the angles are chapels, one of which, the Piedad, contains some good stained glass and iron-work. East of the cloister is the spacious apartment called the Cardinal’s Chapel, after Cardinal Davila y Mujica, whose tomb it contains. Here met the Junta of the Comuneros. The fine stained glass in the windows shows the skill of Juan de Santillana and Juan de Valdevieso, two famous glass-workers of Burgos.
In some respects more interesting than the cathedral, and probably more ancient, taken as a whole, is the Romanesque church of San Vicente, outside the walls, near the Segovia gate. It marks the site of the martyrdom of Vicente and his sisters, Sabina and Cristeta, who had taken refuge here to escape the persecution of Dacian, at the beginning of the fourth century. Their religion having been discovered, they were again apprehended, and put to death by their skulls being battered against the rocks. Their bodies were left unburied, but a great serpent came out of a hole near by and protected them from insult. A Jew approached the spot, led by spiteful curiosity, and was seized by the monster, which wound its coils about him. The terrified Hebrew invoked the name of Christ and was released. He was baptized, and secretly gave the martyrs honourable burial, subsequently raising a church over the scene of their martyrdom. So runs the tradition. These dissenters from the state religion of the Roman Empire are remembered and revered to this day, and magnificent fanes are rightly raised over their graves. Their ashes are preserved in reliquaries more costly than royal thrones, and kings kneel before their shrines. But no monuments are erected, no reverence paid tothe equally high-minded and courageous dissenters from the state religion of the Spanish monarchy, who perished in the flames kindled by the Inquisition. The very city which delighted to honour Vicente and his sisters, and recorded its detestation of the lawful authority that put them to death, was the seat of the dreadful tribunal of Torquemada and the scene of cruelties worse than any perpetrated by the Romans.
The basilica raised by the converted Jew was swept away by the Moors, and the relics of the martyrs seem to have been transported elsewhere. They were recovered, at least in part, at the time of the resettlement of the city, and the present church was built by St. Ferdinand in 1252 to contain them; though parts of the fabric certainly seem, despite the absence of documentary evidence, to date from a century earlier. The church is built on sloping ground, the difficulties of the site being admirably overcome. The plan is cruciform, the nave and aisles terminating in apses. The crossing is surmounted by a square lantern, and the western front flanked by steeples. An open cloister runs along the outside of the south aisle.
The western front is very beautiful. The southern tower or steeple wants a third or upperstory, which was added to the north tower only in the fifteenth century. The second stories are arcaded, and splayed at their angles. On the third gable-like story of the north steeple are hung the bells, one of which bears the date 1158. These towers open only into the westernmost bay of the nave, which forms the porch of the church, opening on the outside with a high-pointed arch, and into the interior through a superb double doorway. Street speaks of this porch as follows: ‘The whole effect is fine, and the light and shade admirable and well contrasted; but the charm of the whole work seemed to me to lie very much in the contrast between the noble simplicity and solid massiveness of the architecture generally, and the marvellous beauty and delicacy of the enrichments of the western doorway, which is certainly one of the very finest transitional works I have ever seen.’ The shaft dividing the doors is sculptured with a figure of Christ seated on a pedestal. Statues of the twelve Apostles occupy the jambs. Over each door a round arch springs from luxuriantly carved capitals, flanked by the heads of bulls and lions. The tympana are occupied with representations of Dives and Lazarus, and the Release of a Blessed Spirit.The round arch which encloses the whole portal exhibits a marvellous profusion of delicate and rich ornamentation. A Spanish writer truly observes that the foliage looks as if the faintest breeze would stir it; the beasts seem ready to spring, and the birds as if, with the least effort, they might disentangle themselves and fly from the branches. Over the arch is a parapet and string-course, and a round-arched window opening into the nave.
The church is usually entered by the south door opening into the aisle beside the transept. The seven orders of the archivolt are almost devoid of ornament, but the capitals are carved with curious figures of wild beasts fighting. The monogram of Christ on the keystone of the innermost arch is rare in Castilian churches, and the rude sculptured figures on the capitals are very primitive and unsymmetrical. On one of the jambs the Virgin and the Angel Gabriel are sculptured; on another a curious mitred personage representing, it is believed, one of the ancestors of the Messiah.
This porch is older by two centuries than the cloister running along the south side of the church. It is in twelve semicircular arches, with a buttress between every three. Made ofpurple granite, it contrasts strikingly with the sandstone of the main edifice.
The north front is very plain and severe. The massive buttresses excited the enthusiasm of Street. The north door is of corresponding simplicity. Beside it, as at the side of the south door, are a couple of tombs, which seem to prove that the space round the church was at one time used as a burial-ground.
The eastern end is the most interesting part of the building. The central apse is larger and loftier than the adjoining apses. All three are divided perpendicularly by slender engaged shafts, terminating in capitals under the eaves; and horizontally by carved or moulded string-courses. The central apse has three round-headed windows; the lateral apses, two each. The capitals and corbels are everywhere very finely carved. There are few better examples of Romanesque work in the Peninsula. The square lantern is pierced on each side with a three-light window of Gothic design. At its angles it is surmounted by stone crosses.
The interior is impressive and thoroughly Romanesque. The piers are square, and rest on round bases. The capitals are carved with oak leaves. The arches are semicircular, andthe vaulting pointed. Between two string-courses runs a triforium of round-arched openings, the windows of the clerestory being likewise rounded and of one light. The windows of the aisles have been closed up. The church is undergoing extensive repairs. The piers of the lantern seem to be of later date than the foundation of the church, and seem to indicate that the original lantern had at one time fallen in. The interior is octagonal, and pierced with four lancet stained-glass windows. On the chancel side is a fine fourteenth-century painting of the Crucifixion, with the Virgin and Disciples.
The interior of the central apse is occupied by the High Altar, with an ugly baroque retablo which unfortunately conceals the graceful windows.
The shrine of San Vicente and his brethren is placed on the south side of the crossing. In the ages of faith this was an object of extraordinary sanctity. Men were sworn on the tomb, and it was universally believed that the arms of those who bore false witness thereon withered away. The practice was forbidden by law under Ferdinand and Isabel. Notwithstanding, grave doubts existed as to the actual whereabouts of the martyrs’ bodies. To set thematter at rest, the Bishop Martin de Vilches, in the reign of EnriqueIII., decided on a thorough examination of the tomb. Having celebrated Mass, he caused the sarcophagus to be opened. Dense vapour immediately issued forth, and the bishop thrust in his hand, to withdraw it a second later, convulsed with a violent pain, and covered with blood. He proceeded no further with the investigation, and ordered the tomb to be closed, satisfied that it contained the holy relics. The imprint of his blood-stained hand was left on a tablet placed inside the arches on which the sarcophagus rests. This appears to date from the thirteenth century, and is carved with interesting reliefs. The baldachino covering it is carried on four bold columns, and was added by Bishop de Vilches, whose arms it bears. The figure at the apex appears to represent San Vicente.
In the south transept is a tablet with an inscription declaring that there lie the remains of the Jew who gave the martyrs decent burial. Close by is the shrine, executed by Francisco de Mora, of San Pedro del Barco, a saint of absolutely unknown antecedents, and mentioned as far back as 1302.
The crypt has been modernised. On it maybe seen the rock on which the tutelary saints suffered martyrdom, and a miraculous image, called Nuestra Señora de la Sotteraña, which is obviously far from possessing the antiquity its devotees claim for it.
Characteristics very similar to San Vicente are exhibited by the church of San Pedro in the picturesque Mercado Grande. Dating from the latter part of the twelfth century, we find here also the apsidal east end, the square lantern, and the entrances at the west end and beside the transepts. The western porch is very fine, and above it is a very beautiful wheel-window. The north doorway is more richly sculptured, and is later than the rest of the fabric. There are a few points of difference between this church and that previously described. There is no triforium, and the clerestory windows are of a single light, and much larger than those of the nave. As at San Vicente, the apsidal chapels have been spoilt by injudicious painting. In the transept are the tombs of the rival families of Blasco Jimeno and Esteban Domingo, distinguished by shields of six and thirteen bezants respectively. The church is in every respect a noble edifice, but loses interest after you have visited the almost identicalbasilica of San Vicente. Nor will your attention be long engaged by the modern monument to the illustrious natives of Avila in the centre of the market-place, crowned by the statue of Santa Teresa. Here took place in 1491 theauto da féof the Jew, Benito Garcia, found guilty of murdering a Christian child, and stealing a consecrated Host for the purpose of sacrilegious rites. It should be added that no particular child could be put forward by the prosecution as having been murdered, and the suppositious victim went down to posterity simply as the Niño de la Guardia—la Guardia being the village where the crime was supposed to have taken place. The body was conveniently assumed to have been taken up to heaven. Its disappearance did not benefit the luckless Hebrews, two of whom, before the execution of Garcia, were torn to pieces by red-hot pincers.
The town proper having always been regarded as an acropolis, the greater number of churches are situated outside the walls. Several of these, like those already described, are of considerable interest. The doughty Nalvillos is said to lie beneath the flags of the church of Santiago. San Andrés is an interesting Romanesque structure,spoilt, however, by the addition of an incongruous sacristy. To the north-west of the town, near the river (Adaja), is the curious little sanctuary of San Segundo, with a wooden roof, and rather suggestive of Norman architecture. It marks the spot whereon fell an unfortunate Saracen, who was pushed over the turret above by the sainted Secundus. Some of the ashes of that muscular Christian are preserved here, beneath the fine alabaster statue which represents him kneeling with an open book before him. The sanctuary is believed to occupy the site of the earliest Christian church of Avila. The actual edifice is not nearly so old as the ruined and abandoned church of San Isidore, now fast crumbling away.
One of the most important monuments of the city is the church of the Dominican monastery of Santo Tomás (now used as a missionary college). It was founded in 1478 by Doña Maria Davila, wife of a Viceroy of Sicily, and completed in 1493. Torquemada, the Grand Inquisitor, interested the Catholic sovereigns in the work, and the cost was met by the confiscated property of Jews and heretics. The cloisters and conventual buildings are devoid of interest. The west front is in a poor late Gothic style, and distinguishedby richness rather than beauty. The two massive flanking buttresses are outlined with a ball ornament, and end in eaves, corbel tables, and paltry pinnacles. Beneath the gable is a huge escutcheon, and beneath this again a round window. The doorway is within a deep porch; the archivolt is pointed and elaborately fluted and carved; on either side of the doorway are statues of saints of the Dominican order beneath canopies. The interior is more interesting. The chancel is almost square, the transept short; and, curious to relate, not only is the choir placed in a gallery in the western nave, but the altar is correspondingly elevated at the eastern end. Street thought the effect of this arrangement very fine, an opinion which all are not likely to share. The reredos is tastefully carved and painted. The choir stalls are good, as usual in Spain, particularly the royal chairs, which have splendid canopies, and bear the device of the yoke and sheaf of arrows.
Interest here, however, centres mainly in the superb Renaissance monument to the Infante Juan, eldest son of Ferdinand and Isabel, who died at Salamanca in 1497, aged nineteen. Ferdinand, to soften the blow, caused his wife to be informed that he and not the prince had perished; and such, in Isabel’s temperament, wasthe excess of conjugal over maternal affection, that her relief when the real state of things was revealed to her enabled her to bear the loss of her son with comparative composure. The tomb was the work of Domenico Alessandro the Florentine, specimens of whose skill we have seen in the cathedral. At the corners of the sarcophagus are eagles; the sides are covered with reliefs of the Virgin and the Baptist, and of the Cardinal and Theological Virtues. On the edge of the upper slab are carved escutcheons, angels, trophies, and garlands. The recumbent effigy of the prince, crowned, and with sword and mantle, is marvellously well done. The sculptor has expressed adolescence in stone. This rightly ranks among the finest works of art in Spain. Hardly inferior is the tomb of Juan Davila and his wife, Joana Velazquez de la Torre, the prince’s attendants, also by the Florentine. Don Juan is shown clad in somewhat fantastic armour; a page kneeling at his feet holds his helmet. Sphynxes are placed at the corners of the sarcophagus, the sides of which bear medallions representing St. James destroying infidels, and St. John the Divine in a cauldron of boiling oil.
In the sacristy is a tomb more impressive thaneither of these, but in a very different sense. A plain slab covers the body of Tomás de Torquemada, Grand Inquisitor of Spain. He lies here in the temple reared on the fortunes of the men and women he had plundered and burned. There is no inscription to tell us who rests here; but Torquemada is as little likely to be forgotten as Attila or Nero. Few things in Avila create a deeper, sadder impression than the tomb of this strange, sinister priest.
His was one phase of the religious temperament, not perhaps more difficult of comprehension to us modern northerners than Teresa’s. We execrate the one and revere the other, and understand neither. Still, we know enough to see that the Inquisitor and the Nun stand respectively for what is worst and best in the Spanish character. And, happily, the woman’s fame has far outshone the man’s.
We may assume that no one who visits Avila is ignorant of the leading events in her career, or needs to be told what manner of woman she was. What we have to do is to follow her footsteps through her native city. The house in which she was born on March 28, 1515, has been converted into an ugly church (Nuestra SeráficaMadre Santa Teresa de Jesus). The exterior is in the baroque style. The room in which she first saw the light is now a chapel in the worst taste, and contains her rosary, sandals, and even one of her fingers. It was from this house that she stole away with her brother Lorenzo, determined to seek martyrdom at the hands of the Moors. Here she indulged in those ‘worldly conversations’ and that light reading which to her carefully polished conscience in after years appeared fraught with such dire peril. Here her vocation was born; and to this house she returned from the cloister in after years to watch by the deathbed of her father, Alonso de Cepeda.
It was in the Carmelite convent of the Incarnation, north of the city, that Teresa took the veil on All Souls’ Day 1533. Nothing remains of the structure as it was in her day. More interesting is the convent of ‘Las Madres,’ which occupies the site of the first foundation of the reformed order. The poor chapel of St. Joseph gave way in 1608 to the present handsome church designed by Francisco de Mora, who spared the tomb and chapel of Teresa’s brother, Lorenzo. Other fine monuments are those of Bishop Alvaro de Mendoza, and of Francisco Velazquez and his wife. In the garden of theconvent is shown an apple-tree planted by the saint. Her body does not rest here, but at Alba de Tormes, where she expired on October 15, 1582.
You may also visit, for her sake, the church of San Juan in the Mercado Chico, where she was baptized on April 7, 1515.
Attached to the Dominican convent is the sumptuous chapel of Mosén Rubio de Bracamonte, which was founded by Doña Maria de Herrera in 1516. The architecture represents the transition from late Gothic to Renaissance. The interior is richly adorned with marbles, the semicircular windows with stained glass. The tomb of the patron (Mosén Rubio, lord of Fuente del Sol) and his wife is in keeping with the splendour of the edifice, which is further enriched by two ancient paintings of Saints Jerome and Anthony of Padua. The reredos dates from the early seventeenth century.
The dark granite of which the houses of Avila are built gives them a spurious air of antiquity. Very few date from before the age of CharlesV.Near the cathedral is the mansion of the Marquis de Velada, whose ancestor, Gomez Velada, entertained the Emperor here in 1534. Opposite is an interesting doorway, with the figure of anarmed knight, surrounded by escutcheons and enclosed within a trefoil arch. A magnificent doorway, likewise sculptured with armed figures and overhung by a kind of bartizan, leads into the fine courtyard of the palace of the Condes de Polentinos. An interesting house is that of the Davilas of Villafranca. The escutcheon with thirteen bezants between two chained slaves, supported by mounted heralds, was won by the family in an expedition to Ronda. At the side is a picturesque window with a grating, above which is the inscriptionPetrus Davila et Maria Cordubensis uxorMDXLI., and beneath, in Spanish, ‘Where one door shuts another opens.’ The houses of the Bracamontes and of the Counts of Superunda deserve notice.
Whilecertain cities may lay claim to having been at one time or another the capital of the united kingdom of Leon and Castile, and while, in fact, two often held the rank at the same time, Zaragoza, from its reconquest by the Christians to the unification of the Spanish monarchy, was the undisputed capital of the kingdom of Aragon. We must not expect on that account to find that it was any more amenable to the royal authority, or any less turbulent than the cities of the sister state. On the contrary, nowhere in the Peninsula was liberty more highly prized or more strenuously vindicated, than in the chief city of Aragon. And it holds what out of Spain, at any rate, will be considered the honourable distinction of having offered the most determined resistance to the establishment of the Inquisition. Many cities in the dominions of His Catholic Majesty are entitled to style themselves ‘most heroic.’ None assuredly deservethe description better than this, the Numantia of modern Spain.
An Iberian town seems to have existed here from the remotest times, and to have been known as Salduba. On its annexation by the Romans, it was rechristened Caesaraugusta, and under that name is referred to by Pompeius Mela as the most famous of the inland cities of Tarraconensis. Christianity took root here at an early date. Bishops of Caesaraugusta are mentioned by St. Cyprian, and the local martyrology includes the names of Saints Valerus, Vincent, and Engracia. When, in the year 542, Zaragoza was besieged by the Franks under Childebert, the exposition of the relics of these martyrs is said to have sufficed to propitiate the enemy and to preserve the town from destruction.
In the year 713 the city opened its gates to Muza, the Moorish invader, without, as Don Francisco Codera believes, striking a blow. The Crescent reigned over Zaragoza for four centuries. During that time there were many changes of rulers. The blood of martyrs again watered the soil under the cruel Wali, Othman Aben Nasr, though generally throughout the period of Muslim domination the Christians enjoyed the same freedom as their co-religionists, under the sameyoke, in other parts of Spain. Their principal church having been converted into a mosque, San Pablo was, during this period, their place of worship.
In the year 778 occurred the famous expedition of Charlemagne, around which an almost impenetrable veil of poetry and legend was woven through the Middle Ages. Hoseya al Arabi having been superseded in the government of the city by order of the Khalifa, Abd-ur-Rahman, appealed for assistance to the great Emperor of the West, who, for motives which remain obscure, entered Spain with a considerable force. On reaching Zaragoza, he found that Al Arabi had already regained possession of the city; and either on that account, or because his late ally refused to open the gates, he retraced his steps towards the north. In the pass of Roncesvalles his rearguard was attacked and cut up by the mountaineers—a reverse which has been immortalised as the occasion of the death of the Paladin Roland, and commemorated in the legendary lore of nearly every European tongue.
At the latter end of the ninth century Zaragoza (or Sarakusta, as it was called by the Moors), shook off the yoke of the Khalifas, and under the sway of the renowned Hafsûn became for a shorttime an independent state. More lasting was the monarchy set up at the close of the eleventh century, on the break-up of the Spanish Khalifate, by the vigorous Almundhir Ben Hud, whose power extended from Lerida to Guadalajara, from the mountains of Biscay to the Mediterranean. His son and successor, Suleyman, made the mistake of dividing his dominions among his four sons, Sarakusta being assigned to the eldest, Ahmed Almuktader. But, united or disunited, the Moors of north-eastern Spain were incapable of offering an effective resistance to the ever-growing power of the Christian kingdom of Aragon. In the spring of 1118, Alfonso el Batallador appeared before the walls of Zaragoza with a formidable host. The city held out till the garrison witnessed the total defeat of an army sent to their relief by the Almoravides. All hope being then gone, the gates were opened on December 18, 1118, and Zaragoza became the capital of the kingdom of Aragon.
As such, it was endowed with a very liberal charter—thefuero, of which we read so often in Aragonese history. The defence of these liberties was intrusted to twenty magistrates, who were invested with authority to deal in the most summary and drastic fashion with evildoers, whatever might be their station. Nor did they hesitate, in after years, to raze the castles of any barons who threatened the peace of the city. Domestic affairs were regulated by twelve jurates, representing the twelve parishes. PedroII.amplified these privileges, and decreed that the municipality should not be responsible for its acts even to the sovereign.
The history of Zaragoza during the twelfth, thirteenth, and fourteenth centuries is full of instances of civil strife, of faction fights, and of struggles with the royal authority. The citizens refused to recognise AlfonsoIII.as king till he had been crowned within their walls. They paid dearly for their arrogance under PedroIV., who hanged thirty of their number at the Toledo gate, and burnt the articles of the Union—a pact extorted from one of his predecessors—in a public assembly.
Under FernandoI.the city’s privileges were further curtailed. But as licence and disorder showed no signs of abating, a kind of vigilance committee was formed in 1454, headed by Jimeno Gordo. This worthy put down all disturbances with iron hand, and waged war on the neighbouring barons. His career was cut short in 1474 by Ferdinand the Catholic, who caused him to bepublicly executed. All the disorderly elements of the city rejoiced at his death.
The introduction of the Inquisition met with much opposition in several Spanish towns, but nowhere more than at Zaragoza. Deputations were sent from the states of Aragon to wait on the king at Valladolid, to urge upon him the withdrawal of the obnoxious tribunal, without avail. Such contemptuous indifference to the laws and wishes of the people of Aragon roused the Zaragozans to a dangerous pitch of exasperation. About midnight, September 14, 1485, a party of six men entered the cathedral, and found the Inquisitor, Pedro de Arbues of Epila, in prayer before the altar. They at once transfixed him with their swords and knives, but only a few of the blows struck home, thanks to the shirt of mail which the victim, like most of the Inquisitors, wore beneath his cassock. The deed, of course, only riveted the chains of the Holy Office more firmly upon the Aragonese.
Most of the assassins were captured, and perished in the flames. De Arbues was canonised in 1664. There can be no question that the Inquisition was established contrary to the laws of the country, and that the man met his death through presuming to discharge unlawful functions. He died for having broken the law, his executioners for having vindicated it.
The persistent encroachments of the Crown upon their constitutional rights during the next century met with strenuous resistance from the people of Aragon. The long-impending storm burst in 1590. Antonio Pérez, having incurred the anger of PhilipII., fled to Zaragoza, and invoked the protection of the states. According to thefueros, he was then confined in the prison of the Manifestacion pending his trial. But the Holy Office impudently removed him from the custody of the law, and threw him into their prison of the Aljaferia. A popular tumult followed. Pérez was released and taken back to his first prison. The Viceroy, the Marqués de Almenara, died of chagrin, it is said, at the insults he had received from the crowd. Four months later a fresh riot broke out, and enabled Pérez to make good his escape to France.
Philip now sent an army of 14,000 men into Aragon to re-establish his authority on the ruins of the constitution. The Justiciary, Juan de Lanuza, summoned the people to defend their country. But the Castilians dispersed this hastily collected force at the first encounter, and entered Zaragoza unopposed on December 12. Juande Lanuza and many other persons of note were judicially murdered; the leaders of the aristocracy were imprisoned, and the city sacked from end to end.
Never again did Zaragoza raise its head in defiance of the King of Spain. Thefueroscontinued nominally in force till 1707, when they were formally abrogated by PhilipV.in revenge perhaps for the defeat sustained before the walls at the hands of Stanhope and Stahremberg. But the spirit of the people was far from being crushed. They might bow before their own king, but they would not bend the knee to a foreigner. Zaragoza’s defence in 1808 is one of the most glorious episodes in the history of the nation. When the revolution broke out at Madrid on May 2, the citizens expelled the Governor, Guillelmi, and elected as leader Don Jose Palafox, a young noble of great personal courage and charm. He was assisted by a priest named Santiago Sas, his secretary Boggiero, who is said to have penned all his proclamations, and by three peasant leaders, ‘Tio’ Jorge, ‘Tio’ Marin, and Mariano Cerezo. All their equipment for war consisted at the outset of 220 men, a few muskets, and sixteen guns; yet when Lefebvre Desnouettes arrived before theplace on June 15, he met with so stubborn a resistance that he was compelled to proceed cautiously. He reduced the city indeed to a heap of ruins, but he had not taken it when Dupont’s surrender at Bailen obliged him, on August 15, to raise the siege.
The French reappeared in December 1808, to the number of 18,000 men, under the command of Marshals Lannes, Moncey, Mortier, and Junot. The city was attacked on two sides at once, but more especially from the Jesuit convent on the left bank of the Ebro, which the Spaniards had neglected to secure. What followed may be read in the pages of Napier. The besiegers breached the wall near the convent of Santa Engracia, and the combat was continued day after day in the streets of the town. Every house was held as a fortress, every few yards of street was defended by a barricade. In answer to the summons to surrender rang Palafox’s defiant ‘War to the knife and to the last ditch!’ The women in many cases fought beside the men. When Maria Agustin saw her sweetheart fall at his post, she took the linstock from his hand and fired the gun herself. The fame of this ‘Maid of Saragossa’ has penetrated everyland. For twenty-one days the fighting continued in the streets. Finally, on February 21, 1809, the defenders capitulated on honourable terms. The town was a smoking heap of ruins and of dead. Zaragoza had shown an astonished world that the spirit of Saguntum and Numantia yet lived in Spaniards. And, we doubt not, it still lives.
The city soon arose from the ashes. It rapidly recovered its prosperity, which took a fresh impetus on the opening of the four railways, east, west, north, and south. Here you see both the Old and the New Spain—the one with its heroic, glorious memories, the other with its promise of things as great and happier.
Zaragoza stands on the right bank of the Ebro in an oasis in the desert of Aragon. Nothing could be more attractive than the immediate environs, or more desolate than the country a few miles farther out. Such a situation was familiar to the Berber conquerors, who made themselves at home here and left their mark on the architecture of the city long after the last ‘Tagarin’ Moor had been expelled. Not, of course, that Zaragoza is to be compared asregards Musulman architecture with Seville, Cordova, Granada, and Toledo; but the Moor has left behind him unmistakable evidences of his presence, and an interesting monument called the Aljaferia, which endures, though oft and oft restored, to this day.
The name seems to be derived from Jaffir, a not uncommon name among the Moors, and borne perhaps by one of the Beni Hud dynasty, for whom the building served as a palace. At the conquest in 1118 it was allotted by Alfonso the Battler to the Benedictine order. In the fourteenth century it again became the residence of royalty, and doubtless was entirely transformed and repaired. It was the scene of great splendour at the coronation of King Martin, and of several of his successors. To-day it presents a sad and dilapidated appearance. The imposing staircase, decorated with fine stucco work, is the creation of the Catholic sovereigns, who seem to have had some idea of reconstituting the past glories of the palace in true Moorish style. The ceilings of some of the chambers are in the artesonado style—the work of fifteenth-century artificers. The most beautiful is to be seen in the Salon de la Alcoba, where was born in 1271 the sainted Princess Isabel, afterwards Queen of Portugal,and persistently confounded by English writers with St. Elizabeth of Hungary. Everywhere among the decorations appear the devices and mottoes of Ferdinand and Isabel.
Genuine Moorish work is to be seen in a little octagonal chamber opening off the patio. Of the eight arches, two are in horseshoe shape, and the others formed by irregular and capricious curves. The columns are almost hidden in the walls. The ceiling is modern, and unfortunately cuts off the view of the elegantajimecesand arabesques of the upper stage. The ornamentation recalls that of the Alhambra. This chamber—said by some, on no particular authority, to have been a mosque—was the seat of the Inquisition down to 1706. The guide points out a cell called La Torreta, in which—according to Verdi’s operaIl Trovatore—Manrico was confined. The opera is founded on a legend of Zaragoza, and the libretto was written by Garcia Gutierrez, a native of the city.
Some may enjoy the beautiful view of the Pyrenees obtained from the Aljaferia more than the building itself.
Probably only a few fragments of this old palace are older than the Cathedral of La Seo.This is the name commonly given in Aragon to the cathedral church, and comes, of course, from the Latinsedes, like our own word ‘See.’ Zaragoza became the metropolitan city of Aragon in 1318, and the archiepiscopal dignity was reserved as far as possible to the illegitimate sons of the kings. The city has now two cathedrals, which are used for alternating periods of six months. The Seo is the older of these, and occupies the site of the Moorish mosque—some say, even of an earlier Christian temple dating from Roman times. The church was, at all events, entirely rebuilt between 1188 and 1432, several Moorish names being mentioned among the architects. It can hardly be said to have been completed till the year 1550. Here were crowned the Kings of Aragon, and here, as we have related, was slain the Inquisitor, Pedro de Arbues.
The west front was completed as late as 1685 by Julian Garza and Juan Bautista Contini. It is in the classical style of that period, and is in two stages separated by a broad entablature. The lower stage is adorned with massive Corinthian columns, and pierced with three doorways; the upper story is decorated with three statues of Christ and the Apostles Peter and Paul, by Giral, placed in niches; above is apediment finished with an ugly finial. This front is flanked by an octagonal tower of four stages, each smaller than the lower one, and is therefore not inaptly compared by Ford to a telescope. This structure is in the same style and reveals the same want of taste as the adjoining façade. The third stage contains the belfry. The whole is surmounted by a weather-vane and steeple, perched on a Moorish-looking dome. The statues of the Apostles on the belfry are by Acali. There is no other façade worthy of notice; but the Puerta de la Pavostria is in the better and earlier classic style of the sixteenth century. It derives its name from a functionary known as the Pavorde, who here distributed alms.
Street, who did not consider this cathedral in general interesting, has much to say about a portion of brickwork at the north-east angle, inlaid with small tiles in diapers, red, blue, green, white, and buff on white. The eminent architect sees in this an interesting specimen of Moorish work, and praises the grave quiet of the whole decoration (Gothic Architecture in Spain, xvii. 372).
The church is of unusual breadth, there being two aisles and a row of chapels on each side of the nave. ‘The nave and aisles,’ says theauthority we have just quoted, ‘are all roofed at the same level, the vaulting springing from the capitals of the main columns, and the whole of the light is admitted by windows in the end walls, and high up in the outer walls of the aisles. In this respect Spanish churches of late date almost always exhibit an attention to the requirements of the climate, which is scarcely ever seen in the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries; and this church owes almost all its good effect to this circumstance, for it is in light and shade only, and neither in general detail nor in design that it is a success.’
The vaultings are adorned with gilded pendants and bosses, very much in the Moorish style. The light red marble pavement, with rays diverging from the yellow marble bases of the columns, appears to have been intended to suggest a reflection of the roof with its ogive vaultings above. The decoration is tasteful and not elaborate. The capitals are sculptured withputtiupholding escutcheons with animals and foliage.
Over the chancel is the lantern, octagonal in plan, which replaced an earlier one in the first quarter of the sixteenth century. The work was undertaken by Enrique de Egas, only at theexpress command of the king. The lower part is adorned with statues in niches, and with the canting arms (the half-moon) of the family of Archbishop de Luna.
The reredos of the High Altar is of alabaster and in the Gothic style. It was executed at the order of (and not by, as we have seen erroneously stated) Archbishop Dalmacio de Mur (1430-1456). The seven compartments are filled with compositions representing the martyrdom of St. Lawrence, the burial of St. Vincent, and episodes in the history of St. Valerus; with statues of the two latter saints, angels, and New Testament scenes. In all, the expressions and the draperies are exquisitely rendered. Don J. M. Quadrado is of opinion that this superb work was executed by Pedro Johán of Cataluña, Ans, Gombao, Caspar, and Gil Morlán successively.
Before the High Altar the coronation took place, and the king, robed like a deacon, prostrated himself before the primate. On the gospel side is the wooden coffin which contains the ashes of Maria, daughter ofJaime lo Conqueridor, who died in 1267. At her side is the noble marble tomb of Archbishop Don Juan de Aragon, brother of Ferdinand the Catholic, withstatues of the Mater Dolorosa, attended by Saints Jerome, Martin, and Francis. Here are also the tombs of Archbishop Don Alonso, natural son of Ferdinand the Catholic, and of his natural son, also Archbishop, Don Fernando. The first-named did not take orders till after the birth of his son and successor, and only celebrated one mass, deeming himself unworthy of the sacerdotal functions. Beneath a tablet is deposited the heart of the Infante Baltasar Carlos, eldest son of PhilipIV., carried off by smallpox at the age of seventeen. His portrait is familiar to students of Velazquez.
The choir occupies two of the five bays west of the crossing. It is in the Gothic style, and closed by a modern railing. In the centre is the tomb of Archbishop de Mede, from whose time the choir dates. The stalls are of Flemish oak. The fine lectern dates from 1413. Thetrascoro, or back of the choir, is a gorgeous plateresque affair in marble and stucco, the work of Tudelilla of Tarazona, who flourished about 1538. His are the statues of the martyrs Vincent and Laurence, the four reliefs illustrating their martyrdom, and that of San Valero, and the groups of cherubim. The tabernacle is in a not untasteful baroque style, and has side columns of black marble anda good crucifix. This figure of Christ is said to have addressed Canon Funes, afterwards Bishop of Albarracin, who is shown on his knees regarding it. The sides of the choir are adorned with statues of saints, including that of Pedro de Arbues, on the very spot where he was slain.
Few of the chapels are of interest, and all but one have been disfigured with baroque portals. In the chapel of San Bernardo is the fine tomb and effigy by Morlánes of Archbishop Don Fernando de Aragon, above being a retablo representing the Betrayal and the Crucifixion. Close by lies Doña Ana de Gurrea, mother of the prelate (died 1527). The chapel of San Gabriel, founded by Gabriel de Zaporta, is notable for its fine bronzerejaand plateresque adornments. In the chapel of San Dominguito del Val are preserved ‘the remains of the third child crucified by the Jews in hatred of Christ towards the year 1250’; and the chapel of San Pedro de Arbues contains that worthy’s body, his kneeling effigy by José Ramirez, and paintings by Jimenez of Tarazona. In the chapel of Nuestra Señora de la Blanca are collected the tombs of sundry archbishops. The chapel of San Miguel owes its origin to a ghastly legend. Passing through the pine grove of Villaroya, the Archbishop DonLope de Luna heard a voice calling him. He turned and saw that it proceeded from a severed head which came leaping towards him. The decapitated man had called on the Archangel at the moment the axe descended, and life was miraculously preserved in his head till he had made his confession, and was absolved by the primate. De Luna’s tomb is a triumph of Gothic art. He is shown with mitre and crozier, reclining on a sarcophagus which is sculptured with twenty-eight figures of friars in various attitudes. In niches in the wall surrounding the tomb are beautifully carved figures of ecclesiastics and grandees, full of vigour and expression. The name of the sculptor of this fine work is unhappily unknown.
In the sacristy is to be seen the Gothic cross of gold and jewel-work, on which the kings of Aragon swore to observe thefueros. Some of the vestments are very fine. A casulla is said to have come from old St. Paul’s, London, at the time of the Reformation. There is a magnificentcustodia, dating from 1537, and a fine silver reliquary, sent from Avignon in 1405 by BenedictXIII.(the anti-pope, De Luna). In the Sala Capitular are pictures attributed to Ribera and Zurbarán. The fine tiled pavement of this room is modern.
The church of Santiago is mentioned as far back as 1121, and retains a few Romanesque features. Here the saint is said to have lived on his visit to Spain; and in the porch the magistrates of the city used to assemble and to administer justice.
The most important church in Zaragoza after the Seo is, in Street’s estimation, that of San Pablo, built in 1259. The octagonal steeple is faced with tiles in much the same way as the part of the cathedral wall above described, and is certainly a later addition to the structure. The nave is of four bays and terminates in a five-sided apse. The aisle is continued all round the church, and communicates with the nave by pointed arches in an extraordinarily thick wall. In the left aisle are five early and highly interesting Gothic retablos. The elaborate reredos of the High Altar, with its reliefs of the Passion and of the Acts of St. Paul, is hardly worthy of the master—Damian Forment—to whom it has been hastily attributed. Ford suggests that it is the work of one of his pupils.
The church of Santa Engracia, which figured prominently in the great siege, commemorates the massacre of a number of Christians of both sexes by the soldiery of Dacian. The bodies ofthe saints, Engracia and Lupercius, having been discovered here in 1389, the church already built on the spot was enlarged, and finally rebuilt with great splendour by Ferdinand the Catholic. A terrific explosion on August 13, 1808, completely wrecked the fabric, leaving little more than the plateresque portal, believed to have been designed by Morlánes. The entrance is through a round arch recessed within another, and surrounded by a retablo-like arrangement of niches containing groups. The outer arch is flanked by four statues of doctors of the Church in niches, and surmounted by statues of Ferdinand and Isabel.
The existing church, clumsily restored by the Hermits of St. Jerome, contains some interesting tombs of the martyrs. They appear to date from the fifth century. One is decorated with reliefs in the rudest Byzantine style, the subjects being Adam and Eve and the Serpent, and the sixteen martyrs, whose relics are enclosed. The pillar is shown at which Santa Engracia was flogged by order of Dacian, and a well which is believed to contain the bones of innumerable martyrs.
It is curious and painful how constantly the memorials of religious fanaticism confront one in this beautiful country. Here we are shown the spot where a Christian suffered for his faith;there where a Jew perished; there where a Moor died for conscience’ sake. Persecution naturally engenders a vindictive and intolerant temper in its victims, and these, become the masters, are hardened, not softened, by affliction. Religion, too, in Spain was almost always identified with race. The Moor, the Jew, and the Lutheran were not only infidels or heretics, but aliens—the political and racial enemies of the Spaniard. In fact, religious intolerance in the Peninsula cannot be said to have assumed such unnatural forms as in France and Germany, where men of the same blood and language cut each other’s throats, and vied with each other in doing the most harm to their native lands.
To the dawn of the sixteenth century also belonged the famous leaning tower at Zaragoza, the Torre Nueva, now demolished; while the Lonja or Exchange commemorates the reign of Juana la Loca, or as the inscription states, of her and her son, Don Carlos, ‘conregnantes’ (1551). This is one of the many buildings scattered over Spain and Europe generally which were intended to accommodate brokers and business men, who resolutely refuse to swarm in the appointed spots—witness our own Royal Exchange, the Lonjas of Seville and Granada, etc. The exterior belongsto no recognised style. The round-headed door is flanked by two windows of similar shape; above runs a sort of imitation gallery, then two more rows of round-headed windows, finished off with a fine eaves-cornice. The soffits of the arches are elaborately carved. At each corner of the edifice is a little tower, roofed with white and green tiles. The interior is divided into a nave and aisles by twenty-four columns, of which seventeen are embedded in the walls. From their Ionic capitals spring seventeen arches, which at the points of intersection are studded with gilt bosses. The Lion of Zaragoza may be distinguished among the decorations, and over the door and on the walls the arms of Spain. O’Shea says that the ‘gigantones’—gigantic figures representing the four quarters of the globe, carried about in processions—are kept here.
A great many of the fine old mansions (solares) of the aristocracy and merchants of Zaragoza disappeared in the siege, or to permit of modern improvements. Those which remain date mostly from the sixteenth century. The finest, on the whole, is the Casa de la Infanta, so-called as having been the residence of La Vallabriga, a lady banished from Madrid for marrying theInfante Don Luis. The house was built by a rich merchant named Gabriel Zaporta in the middle of the sixteenth century. A square entrance admits to a court, round which runs a gallery, upheld by columns on fluted pedestals, and formed of caryatide figures interlocked. On these rest the capitals, elaborately carved with masks, and on these again is borne the gallery, the arches and parapet of which are enriched with medallions, masks, grotesques, and foliage. The decoration is a fine specimen of the plateresque style. The staircase, in the same style, is worthy of note.
The fine old Casa de Comercio, described in several guide-books of recent date, no longer exists. The noble mansion of the Counts of Sastago housed PhilipIII.in 1599; and the Audiencia occupies the site of the ancestral home of the De Luna family, to which belonged the anti-pope BenedictXIII.and the wicked Count in Verdi’s opera.
We have left almost to the last that ambitious but meretricious memorial of the decadence, the new cathedral, or Iglesia del Pilar. The Apostle James (Santiago), according to tradition, visited the city forty years after the birth of Christ. He was favoured by a vision of the Blessed Virgin,poised on a pillar of jasper, and attended by angels. He built a modest chapel on the spot, which soon became a great resort of pilgrims. This was replaced in the thirteenth century by a large church, which was demolished to make room for the present building, erected in 1686 by Don Francisco Herrera. The design, bad enough in itself, was made worse by Ventura Rodriguez seventy years later. The exterior hardly merits description, though the domes or cupolas with their brilliant green, yellow, and white tiling are not without a certain bizarre beauty.
Spanish writers are as severe as others in their condemnation of this spacious edifice: ‘The baroque style’ (says Don J. M. Quadrado), ‘as timid and clumsy in the general proportion of the work as it was audacious and presumptuous in detail, gave space not repose to the Pilar—size without grandeur. The eye measures vainly this square of 1500 feet, and observes the nave and aisles equal in dimensions; it rests on the twelve square piers—enormous masses which might serve for the bases of towers, recoils from the bare vault, from the thick cornice, from the ridiculous foliage of the capitals, the arches, etc. This disagreeable impression is intensified by the strange and confused disposition of thetemple, which, divided into two by the Shrine and the High Altar, presents two centres of attraction, and obstructs the nave with objects masking each other.’
The only objects of particular interest in this vast edifice are those just named, which stand back to back. The Shrine or Capilla Santa constitutes a chapel within a chapel, the exterior being rectangular, the interior elliptical. Overhead is an oval dome borne on four Corinthian columns, with capitals richly gilded, and over this again another cupola or lantern painted by a namesake (not a relative) of Velazquez. There are four smaller domes painted by Goya and Bayeu. The profusion of rich marbles, the elaboration of the architecture, the brilliancy of the frescoes, and the multitude of statues give this chapel a sumptuous and not inartistic appearance. Around are hung banners taken from the infidels. The Sacred Pillar is almost entirely concealed, but there is a hole in the casing through which the devout may kiss it. On each side of the chapel imposing staircases lead to the crypt, in which lie several archbishops and canons, and the heart of Don Juan José of Austria, brother of CarlosII.
The High Altar of the cathedral is of alabaster and in the Gothic style, the work of one Damian Forment, an early sixteenth-century artist. The lower reliefs, separated by slender pilasters, represent the Espousals of the Virgin, the Annunciation, the Visitation, the Nativity, the Adoration of the Magi, the Crucifixion, and the Resurrection. Above, in canopied niches, are the Assumption, the Nativity, and the Presentation. The canopies are richly adorned with the figures of saints. At the sides are two large statues of St. James and St. Braulio—objects of special devotion—and at the apex of the altar-screen are two angels supporting Our Lady of the Pillar. The whole is undoubtedly the finest work of art in the cathedral.
The choir stalls merit attention. They were designed by the Navarrese Estebán de Obray, and carved by the Florentine Giovanni Moreto and Nicolás de Jobato between 1542 and 1548. The infinite number and variety of the designs, the delicacy and intricacy of the work, suggest that it was accomplished in two or more generations rather than in six years. Equally admirable is the bronzerejaby Juan Tomás Celina (1574) on a marble base, sculptured by the Majorcan artist, Guillermo Salvá.
The sacristy contains an immense variety ofofferings to the shrine by pilgrims from all parts of the world. These had been accumulating for centuries, and the Chapter were able some years ago to raise a sum of £20,000 by disposing of only a portion of them. Without profanity we might perhaps say that the Virgen del Pilar is to Zaragoza what Diana was to the Ephesians. Hundreds make a living by selling pictures and models of the shrine, and a surprising number of silversmiths do a roaring trade in images and medals. Yet it is not quite wise or safe for the traveller to scoff at a devotion which largely inspired the heroic defence of 1808, and supplied the place of arms, strategy, and able leadership.
Close by, the yellow Ebro is spanned by the seven arches of the Puente de Piedra. Its origin is of unknown antiquity. It was here in 1435, when one of the arches collapsed—presaging the destruction by the Genoese of the Aragonese fleet which sailed that day; and the inscription mentioning AlfonsoV., and the date 1437, can only refer to its reconstruction. And across this bridge we pass into the stern, desert country of Aragon, and so on to the distant, gleaming Pyrenees.