PADRON
An emporium of Phœnician trade--From Padron to London--Iria
Flavia--Landing of St. James--Drive from Santiago to Padron--A
sacred mountain--_La Virgen de la Esclavitud_--Santa Maria de
Iria--A Byzantine statue--The rock beneath the altar--Where St.
James preached--The monastery of Herbon--Statue of St. Francis of
Assisi--Cæsar’s bridge--The Ulla mentioned by Ptolemy--An
interesting conversation--The house where Rosalia Castro
died--Changing scenery--The towers of Augustus--A village festival
Very few of the pilgrims who journeyed to Santiago de Compostela during
the Middle Ages failed to include in their pilgrimage a visit to Padron.
There is an ancient refrain which says--
“Quien va á Santiago
E non va al Padrón
O faz romeriá ó non.”
Padron, _Iria Flavia_, is a town with a long history. Not only can she
boast of having been a flourishing Roman settlement in the days of
Augustus, but she is believed by Spanish archæologists to have been the
site of one of the great emporiums of Phœnician trade.[223] The town is
situated on the right bank of the river Ulla and on the left bank of the
river Sar, nineteen kilometres from Santiago and sixteen from the sea,
with which it is connected by a ria (loch). In 1836, Borrow found it a
flourishing little port, with rather an extensive commerce, “some of its
tiny barks occasionally finding their way across the Bay of Biscay, and
even as far as the Thames and London.” A story was in circulation that
some twenty years before Borrow’s visit, certain Padron fishermen, who
had found their way to England, had been converted to Protestantism
during their stay there, and not only brought Bibles back with them, but
actually began to speak with irreverence of the bones of St. James, with
a result that a commission was despatched to punish them and burn their
books. We often speak of separation caused by the sea, but in reality it
has always been a far closer link than land.
The Roman name for Padron was _Iria Flavia_, and it belonged to the
_Convento Lucense_; it was raised to the rank of a municipal town by the
Emperor Vespasian in the year 69. Flavia was Vespasian’s family name; it
occurs a number of times in Galicia. Iria is mentioned in the Itinerary
of the Emperor Antoninus, and Ptolemy also speaks of it; there is also a
reference to this town in the _Ravenate_, the anonymous manuscript of
Ravenna. Pliny mentions a river and a town of the name of Iria in
Italy.[224] Several interesting Roman inscriptions have been found in
the neighbourhood of Padron; there is one which tells that a senator of
Iria died at the age of fifty.[225] A stone with an inscription to the
Emperor Gratian (375-379) has also been discovered, and another bearing
the name of Sulpicius Severus.[226] Coins of the reigns of Augustus and
Constantine have recently been turned up with the soil; it is more than
probable that extremely interesting excavations might be made
there.[227]
Iria was, without doubt, one of the most flourishing and important
of the towns which existed before the days of Christianity in the
territory which we now call Galicia. One of Spain’s most noted
archæologists--Fita--thought that the so-called _castro de la Rocha_, or
rock fortress, where St. James is supposed to have resided, was in the
old capitol of Iria, and therefore the most suitable spot for the
commencement of excavations. Villa-Amil points out that the tradition of
St. James’s having preached from the _Rocha de Padron_ is a very old
one. Castella Ferrar thought that the original cathedral of Iria had
stood within this _castro_, and believed that he had discovered some of
the ruins of its eastern wall; and others have thought that this was the
site of the episcopal palaces of the diocese. There are numerous
references to _la Rocha Blanca del Padron_ in historical documents of
the Middle Ages. All that remains of it to-day is a trench eight or nine
yards long enclosing a circle of about fifty yards in diameter, most of
which is now planted with potatoes and other garden produce.
We have seen in a preceding chapter how popular is the belief that the
boat which brought the body of St. James from Joppa to Spain landed it
at Padron. To this event is attributed the fact that one of the first
bishoprics in Galicia was founded at Iria. The arms of Padron are a
boat, with the body of the Apostle, and two disciples, one at the prow
and the other at the stern.
It takes about an hour to go by train from Santiago to Padron, but we
preferred to drive, as the road is excellent and the scenery delightful.
It was the last week in March, and many of the trees were still in bud,
but the furze (_ulex europæus_), which covered great stretches of the
undulating country through which we passed, was a mass of brilliant
yellow blossom; there were as yet no leaves upon the oak trees, but they
did not look bare, for ivy covered their stems, and ferns luxuriated
among their gnarled branches, while fresh green fronds spread out in all
directions, with as much grace as if they had been specially arranged by
the hand of an artist; even the tallest trees were decorated in this
way, and the crannies in which the ferns nestled were often eight or ten
yards above the ground.
The fields were a beautiful green, some pale with waving maize almost
ready to be harvested, others covered with fresh grass or young
potatoes. In many a plot of green we passed a peasant woman in charge of
two or three cows, all attached to a rope which she held in her hand. As
we passed the villages we noted behind every house a quaint Gallegan
maize barn (_Gal. horreo_), raised on four or six stone pedestals, and
built like a diminutive stone house with a gabled roof. The trellis
porch of almost every cottage was covered with a vine, and vine-covered
verandahs hid most of the lower walls; the vine leaves had not begun to
appear, but their knotted and spreading branches were very picturesque.
Spring flowers were peeping from the banks beneath the hedges, and we
descended several times from our carriage to gather flowers we had never
seen in England, and of which we did not know the names. Ever and anon
we passed groves of chestnut and walnut trees, and apple orchards not
yet in blossom, while behind them rose green hills alternating with
rocky mountain crags, which had for their background the blue outlines
of more distant mountains. The highest peak that we could see on this
journey was the Pico Sacro,[228] whose pointed cone looks at a little
distance somewhat the shape of Fugiama; the view from its summit amply
rewards the climb. Some think that the name _Monte Sacro_ or _Pico
Sacro_ is of earlier date than the introduction of Christianity into
Galicia, and as this mountain has numerous dolmens and other prehistoric
ruins on its slopes, it has been suggested that the Celts may have once
made it a centre of their religious worship: even in our own day the
peasants have many superstitious notions connected with it. Lopez
Ferreiro wrote in 1868 that sick people used to take an offering of
bread up to one of its high ridges, and leave it there after calling on
the mountain to cure them with the following words:--
“Picosagro, Picosagro,
Saname este mal que eu trago.”
Molina, quoting Justin, says that the ancients considered it unlawful to
touch this mountain with iron, and they had a tradition that great
sheets of gold were found upon its surface; these were supposed to
result from the fact that the mountain was constantly struck by
lightning, which turned everything it touched into gold. Molina
attributes another name that this mountain went by--_Mons acer_--to the
violent tempests which raged around its cone, and which, he adds, “make
the fortress that is built upon it quite uninhabitable.” Old documents
bear witness to the fact that there was, in the eleventh century, a
monastery upon one of its slopes, and that its church was called _San
Sebastian del Pico Sacro_; on its summit there are still the ruins of a
strong fortress built there by Archbishop Alonso Fonseca
(1463-1506).[229]
The nearest mountain to Padron is green to its summit even in winter;
while I was there some ladies climbed to the top in a little less than
three hours. Below stretches the valley of the Ulla, one of the most
fertile valleys in the province. Everything seems to thrive
there,--flax, maize, wheat, the walnut, the filbert and the chestnut,
the orange, the lemon, and almost every kind of European fruit tree;
bamboos are also grown there; the trellis-work over which the vines are
trained is mostly made of them, but the two things that are chiefly
grown there are onions and flax. A great deal of linen is spun by the
poor women of Padron, but all by hand, not by machinery.
About half-way between Santiago and Padron we stopped to look at a
church which faced the road, the church of _La Virgen de la
Esclavitude_. We found its inner walls covered with pictures, or rather
glaring daubs, representing sick people in bed. The bedsteads were of
all kinds, wooden beds, iron beds, and children’s cots; all these were
thank-offerings brought by people who had been cured in answer to
prayer. One picture, representing a sick man in bed, had a prancing
horse standing by the bed, because, I was told, the invalid had
recovered after making the church a present of a horse; beside another
bed three nuns were praying. People make pilgrimages to this church in
such crowds that special trains have to be run for them.
As we approached the town we passed comfortable-looking houses on both
sides of the road with gardens attached. In the gardens we noted fine
rhododendrons and tulip trees covered with blossom; the cherry and apple
trees were also in blossom. Padron, lying much lower and being much more
sheltered than Santiago, is nearly a month ahead in spring-time. We saw
orange trees with oranges that looked ripe enough to pick.
At length we reached a church with pyramidal towers like the one over
the treasury of Santiago Cathedral; this was the _Colegiata de Iria,
Santa Maria de Iria_. From the earliest days of Christianity in Galicia
this church, or the one that preceded it on this spot, has been the seat
of a bishopric; it numbers the names of many illustrious men among its
bishops. It was a bishop of Iria, _Teodomiro_, who discovered the
sepulchre of St. James. In the days of Miro, King of the Sueves
(569-583), there was a bishop here with the name of Andrew, who played a
conspicuous part in the church councils of Lugo and Braga.[230] The
principal entrance of this edifice, which is Romanesque, does not date
further back than the thirteenth century, and the rest of the building
(all but the sarcophagi in the _capilla major_ and the towers) is work
of the eighteenth century. There was formerly a bishop’s palace
attached, but not a trace of it now remains. Twenty-eight bishops who
fled here for refuge at the time of the Mohammedan invasion are buried
inside the church. On the chief altar there is a very old Byzantine
statue of the Virgin, in stone. An archbishop of Santiago, Rodrigo de
Luna, was also buried here (1450-1460); his sarcophagus is opposite that
containing a bishop of Orense, which is much more ancient.
Beneath the chief altar of the church is preserved the rock to which the
disciples are supposed to have fastened their boat when they brought St.
James’s body from Joppa. On the rock are some letters of a Roman
inscription to which various archæologists have devoted much time and
thought. Pilgrims to Santiago hold this boulder in great veneration,
and feel it their bounden duty to visit it; the name for it is _el
pedron_, the big rock, and some derive the name of the town from it,
though it is more likely that Padron is from _el padron_, _i.e._ St.
James the Apostle. Close to the church is the bank of the river to which
the disciples moored their boat; it is still called _Barca_ in memory of
that event.
Rising from the slope of the mountain on the opposite side of the river
is a hillock, or ridge, on which stands a little chapel to mark the spot
where St. James is supposed to have dwelt during his sojourn in Iria;
below the altar is a spring of delicious pure water: Morales remarked he
had not tasted better water in all Galicia; its flow never ceases summer
or winter. The townsfolk informed me that St. James preached to the
people of Iria from this spot. Sanchez relates that in 1484 the
traveller Nicolas Popiélovo came here to see the spring; and he gives
his readers the traveller’s own words about his visit. A little higher
up the mountain, which is called _Monte San Gregorio_, is the actual
boulder upon which St. James stood when he preached. There is an opening
here between two pieces of rock through which a thin person can manage
to pass, and the Portuguese, who come here in great numbers, believe
that good fortune will befall those who can get through, consequently it
sometimes happens that fat persons also try to get through, but get
stuck in the middle and find it difficult to extricate themselves. There
are many legends connected with this rock, one of which is that it
opened on several occasions to receive and shelter St. James when he was
chased by the pagans. Another rock a little farther on is known as the
Altar of St. James, and he is there supposed to have offered up
bloodless sacrifices; and yet another rock is shown as St. James’s
couch. The view of Padron from here is very beautiful among its fields
and gardens, and with its two rivers, the Sar and the Ulla.[231] The
highest building in the town is an old Carmelite nunnery, now inhabited
by Dominican friars.
To the south-east of Padron, at a distance of about a mile, is situated
the _Convento de San Antonio de Herbon_, a Franciscan monastery founded
in the end of the fourteenth century by Gonzolo Mariño, a relative of
the first Count of Altamira. Among its monks may be reckoned the famous
_trovador_ poet, _Rodriquez de Padron_, who retired thither in his old
age and adopted the conventual garb. When the monks were all expelled,
this monastery became for a time an ecclesiastical seminary. In the
church there is a beautifully carved wood statue of St. Francis of
Assisi, which some think to be the work of Adolfo Cano; there is
wonderful character in the face, and for that alone its celebrity would
be deserved.
Opposite the monastery and on the other side of the river are the
remains of an ancient fortress, whose walls are two yards and a half
wide. Sanchez calls it Castro Valute, and states that an _ara_ was found
there in which there was a cavity to receive the blood of victims
sacrificed.[232]
We drove on beyond Padron for about a couple of miles, crossing the
bridge over the Ulla near the village of Cesures, which in the _Historio
Compostellana_ is called Cesuris. Some think that this fine old Roman
bridge is from the time of Octavius Augustus, and that it was called, in
his honour, Cæsar’s Bridge, and they believe this to be the origin of
the present name. The Ulla is an historic river. It is mentioned by
Ptolemy, and by Pomponius Mela, and its name occurs in numerous Gallegan
documents of the Middle Ages, for on its waters were borne the ships
that brought both Moorish and Norman invaders into Galicia, invaders
against whom the fighting archbishops defended their people most
courageously.
About two miles beyond Cesuris there stands on a ridge in the slope of a
green hill a quaint little church belonging to a little village called
Janza. I particularly wished to see it, because I had heard
archæologists say that on account of its elegant simplicity and
beautiful proportions it was thought to be the work of Mateo, the
architect of the _Pórtico de Gloria_, or at least that of one of his
pupils. I got out of the carriage, and, meeting the village priest’s
maid-of-all-work, asked her to show me the easiest path by which I could
ascend to the church. As we went along, my guide, who had dropped her
boots over the hedge into a field, and was proceeding barefoot, informed
me that, as the priest’s servant she had a great many duties, one being
to fetch all the water required for household purposes from a
neighbouring spring. It was a beautiful day, and the air and scenery
resembled that of some of the finer parts of the Yorkshire moors.
“How exhilarating it is here,” I remarked.
“Yes, you are right,” replied the maid. “It’s very beautiful. A _Padre_
who came here a few weeks ago preached us a sermon about it, and said
that, for any one whose heart was right with God, there could not be a
more beautiful or a
[Illustration: PADRON]
[Illustration: BRIDGE OF ALONSO, WHERE THE TAMBRE JOINS THE RIA DE
NOYA]
more healthful spot than this. But why have you come so far to see such
a poor little church as ours? And where have you come from?”
“I have come from England,” I replied.
“Have they any religion in England?” she asked.
“Oh yes,” I answered; “we have both religion and churches.”
“But do they worship God there--and confess?”
“Yes.”
“Then it must be in France where they have no religion!” she cried.
“Why do you think that?” I asked.
“Because they have turned all their monks and nuns out of the country,
and now they have no church and no religion.”
“But the churches are there still,” said I.
“I know all about it,” she replied. “Some of the nuns they turned out
came to live in a _palacio_ near here for a time. Now they have a home
in Madrid.”
“And some of the nuns came to England,” said I.
“And did the English give them shelter?” she asked eagerly.
“Yes.”
“Ah, of course, and so they should. Poor things! Poor things! How
dreadful to turn them out like that!”
Entering the tiny church, I found that its granite walls were painted,
and, worse still, the sculpture of its granite capitals was decked out
in glaring colours. To paint stone in this way was a fashion peculiar to
the eighteenth century. At one time the Cathedral of Santiago was thus
painted over. It is only since 1840 that the colour has been removed; we
still see red and white stripes where the blocks of granite are joined.
As I was returning to the carriage, some children presented us with some
branches covered with cherry-blossom which they had picked from their
garden in their wish to please us; they were indignant when we offered
them silver in return.
Returning to Padron, we lunched at the little inn, and found a salad
made of red peppers particularly cool and refreshing after rather a hot
drive. Then we went to see the pretty spot on the river-bank where the
market is held, and the house where Rosalia Castro died, with its tablet
to her memory. Padron seemed to me an ideal place for a poet to live and
die in; its beauties are so varied, its outlines so delicate, and the
blue haze upon its surrounding hills so romantic. One great charm about
this miniature beauty is, that at every few steps, whether you walk or
drive, the scene changes; nothing is so big as to appear unchanged when
the observer has moved on. In the great valleys of Switzerland and the
Tyrol you may walk long distances without getting any perceptible change
in the picture, but in Galicia, and especially in places like Padron,
the scenery may almost be termed kaleidoscopic--only that the employment
of such a word suggests suddenness, and there is nothing sudden here--it
is a gradual melting process, where no beauty is so large and coarse as
to obstruct another or become monotonous. Macìas, the Poet of True Love,
was born near Padron, and Juan Rodriquez was born at Herbon: we have
already seen that it was in the monastery there that this _trovador_
chose to end his days. Rodriquez wrote, _El Siervo Libre de Amor_, “The
Free Slave of Love.” He flourished in the first quarter of the fifteenth
century. He is sometimes called _Rodriquez de la Camara_.[233]
On the bank of the river near the monastery where Rodriquez breathed his
last is the summer residence of the Archbishop of Santiago, standing in
a beautiful garden with luxuriant trees. On one side of the house is a
tall cypress and on the other a still taller palm. Near Padron, but seen
better from the train than from the road, are the picturesque ruins of
two ancient towers, the _Torres de Oeste_ (a corruption of Turres
Augusti).[234] Molina[235] said they were among the greatest antiquities
of Spain, that there were five of them close to the river at sea level
and very strongly built, and from them a great chain used to be thrown
across the river to guard the water passage from the sea by way of the
ria (loch). These towers are close to the spot where the Sar flows into
the Ulla.
The sun was setting as we drove back to Santiago, and we saw it
reflected like brilliant fires in the cottage windows; when it had quite
set and the road was getting dark, we passed through a village where the
people were all dressed in their best, and lined the road on both sides;
the women and girls were on the right and sat on the bank four rows
deep, all dressed in their gayest attire with coloured handkerchiefs on
their heads. The men on the other side formed a dark lined crowd round a
party of musicians who were about to strike up for a dance. As we
approached Santiago we saw rockets and other fireworks that were being
let off in honour of St. Joseph’s Day.