west of the entire composition are decorated with the enormous imperial
shields of Charles V, overshadowing in their vulgar predominance all the
exquisitely proportioned and delicate detail adjacent to them.
Some of the bays on the southern side of the Cathedral can be better
seen, as a small courtyard separates them from the adjacent building,
the episcopal palace. The others are choked by the Capilla del Pulgar,
the Royal Chapel and the sagrario.
This side of the church exhibits in its balustrades, its ornamentation
and the crocketed terminations and finials to the exterior buttresses,
what is far more interesting in the Plateresque style of Spain than the
purely borrowed and imitative features of the west and northern fronts.
Here appear in jeweled play of light and shade, in all their imaginative
and exquisite intricacy, those forms of carved string courses which were
developed by the Spanish Renaissance and were essentially Spanish and
national. You feel somewhere back of it the Moorish influence. It
presents all the richness, the magnificence and exuberant fancy which
characterizes the spirit in which its masters worked. The labor it
involved must have been enormous. The splendor of the solid lacework ten
to twelve feet high is thrown out by contrast with the naked walls which
it crowns.
The Capilla del Pulgar, which blocks the most westerly corner of the
south elevation, was named in honor of Hernan Peres del Pulgar, the site
of whose brave exploit it marks. In 1490, during the last siege of
Granada, he determined on a deed which should outdo all feats of heroism
and defiance ever performed by Moslem warriors. At dead of night, some
authorities say he was on horseback, others that he swam the
subterranean channel of the Darro, he penetrated to the heart of the
enemy's city and fastened with his dagger to the door of their principal
mosque a scroll bearing the words "Ave Maria." Before this insult to
their faith had been discovered, he had regained Ferdinand's camp.
A double superimposed arcade faces the southern side of the sagrario:
the lower story has been brutally closed and defaced by modern
additions, almost concealing its original carving. The upper story,
however, which forms a balcony, strongly recalls by its fancifully
twisted shafts, elliptical arches and Gothic traceried balustrade,
similar early Renaissance work at Blois, where the Gothic and early
Italian work were so charmingly blended.
The Royal Chapel is entered through an Italian Renaissance doorway of
good general design and decoration, but the Spanish cornice and
balustrade crowning the outer walls are much more interesting in
details. The principal member consists of a band of crowned and
encircled F's and Y's, the initials of the Catholic Kings. It is broken
over the window by three gigantic coats-of-arms. To the left is
Ferdinand's individual device of a yoke, the "yugo," with the motto
"Tato Mota" (Tanto Monta) tantamount, assumed as a mark of his equality
with the Castilian Queen; to the right Isabella's device of a bundle of
arrows or "flechas," the symbol of union. In the centre is the common
royal shield, proudly adopted after the union of the various kingdoms of
the Peninsula had been cemented. The Eagle of Saint John the Evangelist
and the common crown surmount the arms of Castile and Leon, of Aragon,
Sicily, Navarre, and Jerusalem and the pomegranate of Granada.
[Illustration: Photo by J. Lacoste, Madrid
CATHEDRAL OF GRANADA
The reja enclosing the Royal Chapel and tombs of the Catholic Kings]
The various roofs of the Cathedral are covered with endless rows of
tiles, which in the furrowed, overlapping irregularity of their surfaces
add to the general play of light and shade. Above them all spreads the
umbrella-shaped dome which crowns the Capilla Mayor.
At the period when Gothic church-building was disappearing, we find not
a few edifices where the old and new styles are curiously blended. A
Renaissance façade added in later days might encase a practically
complete Gothic interior. In Granada, with the exception of the Royal
Chapel, very little of the interior contained traces of the expiring
style. In the Cathedral proper, it is principally found in a groined
vaulting of the different bays, which is covered with varying and most
elaborate schemes of ornamental Gothic ribs, which seem strangely
incongruous to the architect as he looks up from the classical shafts in
the expectation of finding a corresponding form of building and
decoration in the later vaulting.
The general plan of the church is more Renaissance than Gothic,
exhibiting rather the form of the "Rundbau" than the "Langbau" of the
Latin cross. Its main feature is likewise the great dome rising above
and lighting the Capilla Mayor. The Spanish cimborio has at last reached
its fullest development in the Renaissance lantern.
The church is divided into nave and double side aisles, outside of which
is a series of externally abutting chapels. East and west it contains
six bays. The choir blocks up the fifth and sixth bays of the nave, and
in the customary Spanish manner it is separated from the high altar in
the Capilla Mayor by the croisée of the transept. Back of this, forming
the eastern termination, runs an ambulatory.
The vaulting, one hundred feet high, is carried by a series of gigantic
white piers consisting of four semi-columns of Corinthian order with
their intersecting angles formed by a triple rectangular break. The
vaulting springs from above a full entablature and surmounting
pedestals, the latter running to the height of the arches dividing the
various vaulting compartments. The church is about 385 feet long and 220feet
wide.
The choir is uninteresting; the carving of its stalls and organs in
nowise comparing with the "silleria" of Seville or Burgos. The Capilla
Mayor, the principal feature of the interior, is circular in form, and
separated from the nave by a splendid "Arco Toral." The dome, which
rises to a height of 155 feet, is carried by eight Corinthian piers. In
general scheme it is pure Italian Renaissance, of noble and harmonious
proportions and very richly decorated. At the foot of the pilasters
stand colossal statues of the Apostles. Higher up there is a series of
most remarkable paintings by Alfonso Cano and some of his pupils. Cano's
represent seven incidents in the life of the Virgin,--the Annunciation,
Visitation, Nativity, Assumption, etc. Though some of his carvings, and
especially the dignified and noble Virgin in the sacristy, are
admirable, still, to judge from this series, it was as a painter that he
excelled. They show, too, how essentially Spanish he was, like his great
master, Montañez. The careless, lazy quality of his temperament is
sufficiently apparent, but he cannot be denied a place among the great
masters of Spanish painting who immediately preceded the all-eclipsing
glory of Velasquez, Murillo, and Ribera.
The lights of the dome which rises over the paintings are filled with
very lovely stained glass, representing scenes from the Passion by the
Dutchmen, Teodor de Holanda, and Juan del Campo. On the two sides of the
choir below are colossal heads of Adam and Eve carved by Cano and
kneeling figures of Ferdinand and Isabella.
There are endless chapels outside the outer aisles, but, in spite of
some good bits of sculpture and painting here and there, one longs to
sweep them out of the way and free the edifice from their encumbrance.
The interior of the great sagrario is an expressionless jumble of the
later Renaissance decadence,--and it is a shame that no more fitting
architecture surrounds the tomb of the good Talavera, here laid to rest
by his friend Tendilla, the first Alcaide of the Alhambra, with the
inscription over his tomb, "Amicus Amico."
The general color scheme in the interior of the Cathedral is white and
gold. One feels that it is handsome, even harmonious and magnificent,
but that all the mystery and religious awe that pervaded the great
churches of the previous centuries have vanished forever.
The Royal Chapel, although the oldest part of the building, should be
considered last of all, as it is by far the most interesting portion and
leaves an impression so vivid as to overshadow all other parts of the
great edifice. It is situated between the sagrario and the Sacristia and
is entered through the southern arm of the transept. The chapel itself
is the very last Gothic efflorescence from which the spirit has fled,
leaving only empty form. It consists of a single big nave flanked by
lower chapels. The ornamentally ribbed vaulting with gilt bosses and
keystones is carried by clustered shafts engaged in its side walls. The
shafts are too thin and the capitals too meagre. A broader and more
generous string course runs, at the height of the capitals, across the
wall surfaces between the upper clerestory and the lower arcades.
Portions of this reveal a strong Moorish influence, as the manner in
which the great Gothic lettering is employed to decorate the band.
Similarly to the invocations to Allah running round the walls of the
Alhambra, we read here that "This chapel was founded by the most
Catholic Don Fernando and Doña Isabel, King and Queen of the Españos[d],
of Naples, of Sicily, and Jerusalem, who conquered this kingdom and
brought it back to the faith, who acquired the Canary Isles and Indies,
as well as the cities of Ican, Tripoli, and Bugia; who crushed heresy,
expelled Moors and Jews from these realms, and reformed religion. The
Queen died Tuesday, November 26, 1504. The King died January 25, 1516.
The building was completed 1517." Enrique de Egas had, at Ferdinand's
order, commenced building two years after Isabella's death. The grandson
enlarged it later, finding it "too small for so much glory."
The high altar with its retablo and the royal sarcophagi are separated
from the rest of the chapel by the most stupendous and magnificent iron
screen or reja ever executed. Spaniards have here surpassed all their
earlier productions in this their master craft. Not even the screens of
the great choir and altar of Seville or Toledo can compare with it. With
the possible exception of the curious Biblical scenes naively
represented by groups of figures near the apex, which still tell their
story in true Gothic style, it is a burst of Renaissance, or Plateresque
glory. It is not likely that the crafts, with all their mechanical
skill, will ever again produce a work of such artistic perfection. It
represents the labor of an army of skilled artisans,--all the sensitive
feeling in the finger-tips of the Italian goldsmith, the most cunning
art of the German armorer and a combination of restraint and boldness in
the Spanish smith and forger. The difficulty naturally offered by the
material has also restrained the artisan's hand and imagination from
running riot in vulgar elaboration. The design, made by Maestro
Bartolomé of Jaen in 1523, is as excellent as the technique is
astonishing. It may be said that in grandeur it is only surpassed by the
fame of the Queen whose remains lie below. The material is principally
wrought iron, though some of the ornaments are of embossed silver plate
and portions of it gilded as well as colored. Bartolomé's design
consists in general of three superimposed and highly decorated rows of
twisted iron bars with molded caps and bases. Each one must have been a
most massive forging, hammered out of the solid iron while it was red
hot. The vertically aspiring lines of the bars are broken by horizontal
rows of foliage, cherubs' heads and ornamentation, as well as two broad
bands of cornices with exquisitely decorated friezes. Larger pilasters
and columns form its panels, the central ones of which constitute the
doorway and enclose the elaborate arms of Ferdinand and Isabella and
those of their inherited and conquered kingdoms. The screen is crested
by a rich border of pictorial scenes, of flambeaux and foliated
Renaissance scrollwork, above which in the centre is throned the
crucified Saviour adored by the Virgin and Saint John. The crucifix
rises to the height of the very capitals which carry the lofty vaulting.
Inside the reja, a few steps above the tombs, rises Philip Vigarny's, or
Borgoña's, elaborate reredos. To the Protestant sense this is gaudy and
theatrical, a strikingly garish note in the solemnity and grandeur of
the chapel. To the right and left of its base are, however, most
interesting carvings, among them the kneeling statues of Ferdinand and
Isabella. Behind the former is his victorious banner of Castile. The
figures are vitally interesting as contemporaneous portraits of the
monarchs, aiming to reproduce with fidelity their features and every
detail of their dress. There is also a series of bas-reliefs portraying
incidents in the siege of Granada,--the Cardinal on a prancing charger,
behind him a forest of lances, the lurid, flaming sky throwing out in
sharp silhouette the pierced walls and rent battlements. The Moors, very
much like dogs shrinking from a beating, are being dragged to the
baptismal font;--the gesticulating prelates hold aloft in one hand the
cross and in the other, the sword, for the tunicked figures to make
their choice. The scene has been described by Sir W. Stirling Maxwell,
who tells us "that in one day no less than three thousand persons
received baptism at the hands of the Primate, who sprinkled them with
the hyssop of collective regeneration."
Again, in another, the cringing Boabdil is presenting the keys of the
city to the "three kings." Isabella is on a white genet, and Mendoza,
like the old pictures of Wolsey, on a trapped mule. Ferdinand is there
in all his magnificence; the knights, the halberdiers and horsemen, all
the details of the dramatic moment, full of the greatest imaginable
historic and antiquarian interest, perpetuated by one who was probably
an eye-witness of the scene.
[Illustration: Photo by J. Lacoste, Madrid
CATHEDRAL OF GRANADA
The tombs of the Catholic Kings, of Philip and of Queen Juana.]
At the foot of the altar, in the centre of the chapel, stand the tombs
of Ferdinand and Isabella and of Philip and Joan. They are as gorgeous
specimens of sepulchral monuments as the reja is of an ecclesiastical
iron screen. Both sarcophagi are executed in the softest flushed
alabaster; that of Ferdinand and Isabella by the Florentine Dominico
Fancelli; that of their daughter and her son by the Barcelonian
Bartolomé Ordenez, "The Eagle of Relief," who carved his blocks at
Carrara. The tomb of poor crazy Jane, and the unworthy, handsome husband
whom she doted on to the extent of carrying his body with her throughout
the doleful wronged insanity of her later years, is somewhat more
elevated than that of the Catholic Kings, though its general design is
very similar. Philip of Austria sleeps vested with the Order of the
Golden Fleece.
Isabella's celebrated will begins with her desire that her body may be
taken to Granada and there laid to rest in the Franciscan monastery of
Santa Isabella in the Alhambra, with a simple tomb and inscription: "but
should the King, my lord, prefer a sepulchre in some other place, then
my will is that my body be there transported, and laid where he can be
placed by my side, that the union we have enjoyed in this world, and
which through the mercy of God may be hoped for again when our souls are
in heaven, may be symbolized by our bodies being side by side on earth."
The humble burying-ground designated by Isabella, and where she was
first laid to rest with the simple rites she desired, was, however, no
fitting place for the grandparents of Imperial Charles. Here, in the
Cathedral's principal chapel, he had them laid in the year 1525.
The sarcophagus consists of three stages, containing the ornamental
motives so characteristic of the best sculpture of the Italian
Renaissance. No other form of statuary brought out their skill and
genius so fully as a sepulchral monument. Medallions, statues, niches,saints,
angels, griffins and garlands are all woven into a magnificent
base to receive the recumbent effigies. Apostles and bas-reliefs of
scenes from the life of Christ surround the base, while winged griffins
break the angles. Above are the four Doctors of the Church, the arms of
the Catholic Kings and the proud and simple epitaph, "Mahometicē
sectē prostratores et hereticē pervicaciē extinctores:
Fernandus Aragonium et Helisabetha Castellē, vir et uxor unanimes,
catholici appelati, marmoreo clauduntur tumulo."[22] In tranquil crowned
dignity above lie Ferdinand in his mantle of knighthood, his sword
clasped over his armored breast, and Isabella with the cross of her
country's patron saint. The recumbent figures are extremely fine; the
faces, which are portraits, convey all we know of their prototypes'
characteristics. Ferdinand's proud, pursed lips whisper his selfish
arrogance, his iron will, and the greatness and fulfillment of his
dreams. The hard, masterful jaw confirms the character given him by the
shrewd French cynic as one of the most thorough egotists who ever sat on
a throne, as well as that of his English son-in-law, who knew enough to
call him "the wisest king that ever ruled Spain."
Beside Ferdinand sleeps his lion-hearted consort. It is her lofty soul
which broods over the sepulchre and heightens the feeling of reverence
already inspired by reja and sarcophagus. She is still the brightest
star that ever rose in the Spanish firmament and shone in clear radiance
above even the lights of Ximenez, of Columbus, or the Great Captain. Her
smile is now as cold and her look as placid as moonlight sleeping on
snow.
Noble, tender-hearted and true, dauntless, self-sacrificing and
faithful, she rose supreme in every relation of life and the great
crisis of her people's history. "In all her revelations of Queen or
Woman," said Lord Bacon, "she was an honour to her sex, and the corner
stone of the greatness of Spain."
Standing before her tomb, on the battlefield of her victorious armies,
the clear perspective and calm judgment of four centuries still declare
her "of rare qualities,--sweet gentleness, meekness, saint-like,
wife-like government, the Queen of earthly queens."
BOOKS CONSULTED
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BAEDEKER, KARL. _Spain (Guidebook)._
BERMUDEZ, CEAN. _Descripcion Artistica de la Catedral de Sevilla._
BERMUDEZ, CEAN. _Noticias de los Arquitectos y Arquitectura de España._
CAVEDA, JOSÉ. _Ensayo Historico sobre los diversos Generos de
Arquitectura._
DIDIER. _Année en Espagne._
DUMAS, ALEXANDRE, PÈRE. _De Paris à Cadiz._
ELLIS, HAVELOCK. _Macmillan's_, May, 1903 (vol. 88).
FORD, RICHARD. _The Spaniards and their Country._
FORD, RICHARD. _Gatherings in Spain._
GAUTIER, THÉOPHILE. _Voyage En Espagne._
HARE, A. J. C. _Wanderings in Spain._
HAY, JOHN. _Castilian Days._
HUME, M. A. S. _The Spanish People._
HUME AND BURKE. _History of Spain._
HUTTON, EDWARD. _The Cities of Spain._
HUTTON, EDWARD. _Studies in Lives of the Saints._
IRVING, WASHINGTON. _Alhambra._
JUNGHAENDEL, MAX. _Die Baukunst Spanien's._
LAMPEREZ Y ROMEA, D. VICENTE. _Estudio sobre las Catedrales Españas._
LAMPEREZ Y ROMEA, D. VICENTE. _Historia de la Arquitectura Cristiana
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INDEX
Aaron, 54.
Abel, 110.
Abu Jakub Jusuf, 203, 231.
Abraham, 153.
Acropolis, 240.
Acuna, Bishop of, 48, 49, 62.
Adaja, 67.
Adam, 227, 259.
Adriatic, 201.
Africa, 194.
Aguero, Campo, 184.
Alava, Juan de, 22, 177, 207.
Alcides, 193.
Alcaide, 127, 259.
Alcantara, Bridge of, 123.
Alcantara, Order of, 128.
Alcazar of Avila, 84.
Alcazar of Segovia, 169, 171, 172, 173.
Alcazar of Seville, 209, 230.
Alcazar of Toledo, 123.
Alcazerias, Toledo, 129.
Aleman, Christobal, 228.
Alfaqui Abu Walid, 154.
Alfonso, architect of Toledo, 135, 141.
Alfonso I, 68, 127, 243.
Alfonso III, 37.
Alfonso IV, 129, 130, 156.
Alfonso VI, 5, 7, 37, 61, 68, 69, 91, 96, 127, 220.
Alfonso VII, 155.
Alfonso VIII, 73, 154.
Alfonso IX, 5, 6, 74, 96.
Alfonso X, The Wise, 47, 70, 97, 169, 219, 225, 231.
Alfonso XI, 36, 155, 171.
Alfonso, King, 34.
Alfonso de Cartagena, Bishop, 49, 52, 62.
Alfonsinas, Tablas, 219.
Alhambra, 240, 241, 244, 259, 260, 263.
Alleman, Jorge Fernandez, 207.
Almanzor, 95.
Almeria, 194.
Almohaden, 203, 243.
Almorvides, 243.
Alpujarras, 241.
Alvarez of Toledo, Juan, 44.
Alvaro, Maestro, 23.
Amiens, Cathedral of, 25, 43, 93, 94, 124, 131, 163, 201.
Andalusia, 122, 191, 192, 194, 201.
Andino, Cristobal, 51.
Angelo, Michael, 153, 251.
Angers, Bishop of, 20.
Angevine School, 40.
Anna, Sta., 41, 48.
Antonio, St., 222.
Apostles, 144, 229.
Aquitaine, 7, 10, 15.
Aragon, King of, 48, 127.
Aragon, Province of, 19, 122, 143, 207, 256.
Arge, Juan de, 107.
Arnao de Flanders, 229.
Astorga, 20.
Asterio, Bishop of, 61.
Asturias, 34, 69, 70, 94, 95.
Augustus, Emperor, 94.
Avila, Cathedral of, 65-87.
Aymar, 70.
Ayuntamiento, Toledo, 129.
Azeu, Bernard of, 91.
Bacon, Lord, 265.
Badajoz, Juan, 22, 97.
Bagdad, 127.
Bætica, Provincia, 193.
Bætis, 193, 215.
Baldwin, Maestro, 107.
Banderas, Seville, Patio de las, 201.
Bandinelli, Baccio, 153.
Barcelona, 228.
Bartolomé of Jaen, 261.
Basle, Council of, 49, 62.
Baudelaire, 214.
Bautizo, Seville, door of, 208.
Beatrice of Suabia, 53, 223.
Beauvais, Cathedral of, 93.
Belgium, 162.
Bellini, Giovanni, 162.
Bellver, Riccardo, 208.
Benavente, Cathedral of, 142.
Benedict, St., 5.
Benedictines, 37, 220.
Benilo, 70.
Berenzuela, Queen, 92.
Bermudez, Cean, 44, 45, 69, 134, 199.
Bernard, Archbishop of Toledo, 7, 130, 154, 156.
Berroqueña, 138, 141.
Berruguete, Alfonso, 79, 134, 151, 153, 250.
Berruguete, Pedro, 79.
Blanche of France, 47.
Blas, Gil, 169, 252.
Blasquez Dean Blasco, 74.
Blois, 256.
Boabdil, 243, 262.
Boldan, 227.
Bologna, University of, 6.
Bordeaux, 93.
Borgoña, 224.
Borgoña, Juan de, 79, 134.
Borgoña, Philip, 151, 152, 177, 262.
Boston, 18.
Bourges, Cathedral of, 94, 134.
Brizuela, Pedro, 187.
Bruges, Carlos de, 229.
Brunelleschi, 176.
Brussels, 247.
Bugia, 260.
Burgos, Cathedral of, 30-63, 80, 81, 86, 93, 97, 101, 105, 106, 111,
131, 132, 134, 141, 177, 183, 199, 207, 224, 258.
Burgos, Bishopric of, 122.
Burgundy, School of, 10, 13.
Burne-Jones, 50.
Cadiz, 194.
Cæsar, Julius, 193.
Calderon, 6.
Caliphs, 4.
Calix, 157.
Calatrava, Order of, 128.
Calixtus III, Pope, 8.
Campaña, Pedro, 195.
Campero, Juan, 22.
Campo, Juan del, 259.
Canary Isles, 260.
Cano, Alfonso, 195, 227, 248, 258, 259.
Cantabria, 70.
Capulet, 138.
Capitan, Calle del Gran, 201.
Carlos de Bruges, 229.
Carmona, 82.
Carpentania, 124.
Casanova, 208.
Castanela, Juan de, 44, 45.
Castile, Province of, 6, 19, 30, 33, 34, 68, 72, 74, 92, 95, 122, 127,
135, 136, 143, 159, 171, 172, 178, 207, 215, 219, 243, 244, 256, 264.
Catalina, Toledo, Puerta de Sta., 145.
Catarina, Burgos, Chapel of, 41, 60.
Catharine Plantagenet, Queen, 159.
Catholic Kings, 20, 128, 143, 172, 217, 242, 256.
Caveda, 199, 200.
Cebrian, Pedro, 97.
Celandra, Enrique Bernardino de, 229.
Cellini, 152.