VALENCIA.
From Toledo I took the railway to Valencia. But as the junction of the
Toledo branch with the main line is a small station of the meanest
description, and as there were three or four hours to dispose of before
the mail-train passed, I went back as far as Aranjuez, intending to dine
there. The station is close to the palace, a large, bald, and
uninteresting pile. The principal inn is kept by an Englishman with a
French wife, and as it was not the right season for Aranjuez we had
great difficulty in getting anything. In truth the French wife was a
tartar, and advised us to go back again; but finally, the husband having
interceded, she relented so far as to produce some eggs and bacon.
Aranjuez seemed to consist mainly of the palace and its stables, and to
be afflicted with even more than the usual plague of dust: but in the
spring no doubt it is in a more pleasant state, and may, I hope, justify
the landlord’s assertion that there is nothing in the world to compare
with it!
Late in the evening we started for Valencia: it was a bright moonlight
night, so that I was able, when I woke and looked out, to see that the
country we traversed was an endless plain of extremely uninteresting
character, and that we lost little by not seeing it. I should have
preferred leaving the railway altogether, and going by Cuença on my way
to Valencia; but time was altogether wanting for this détour, though I
have no doubt that Cuença would well repay a visit.
At Almanza, where the lines for Alicante and Valencia separate, there is
a very picturesque castle perched upon a rock above the town, and here
the dreary, uninteresting country, which extends with but short
intervals all the way from Vitoria, is changed for the somewhat
mountainous Valencian district, which everywhere shows signs of the
highest luxuriance and cultivation, resulting almost entirely from the
extreme care and industry with which the artificial irrigation is
managed. The villages are numerous, and around them are beautiful
vineyards, groves of orange-trees, and rice-fields; whilst here and
there clumps of tall palm-trees give a very Eastern aspect to the
landscape. The churches seemed, as far as I could judge, to be all
modern and most uninteresting. After passing the hilly country, a broad
plain is crossed to Valencia. Here the system of irrigation, said to be
an inheritance from the Moors, is evidently most complete. Every field
has its stream of water running rapidly along, and the main drawback to
such a system, so completely carried out, is that the beds of the rivers
are generally all but dry, their water being all diverted into other and
more useful channels. The Valencian farm-labourers’ dress is quite worth
looking at. They wear short, loose, white linen trousers and jackets,
brilliantly coloured _mantas_--generally scarlet--thrown over their
shoulders, coloured handkerchiefs over their heads, and violet scarfs
round their waists. They have a quaint way of sitting at work in the
fields, with their knees up to their ears, like so many grasshoppers;
and their skin is so well bronzed that one can hardly believe them to be
of European blood. They are said to be vindictive and passionate, but
they are also, so far as I saw them, very lively, merry, and talkative.
The farms appear to be very large, and when I passed the farmers were
hard at work threshing their rice. This is all done by horses and mules
on circular threshing-floors. In many of the farms eight or ten pair of
horses may be seen at work at the same time on as many threshing-floors,
and the effect of such a scene is striking and novel.
As we went into Valencia we passed on the right the enormous new Plaza
de Toros, said to be the finest in Spain. Railroads will, I suppose,
rather tend to develop the national love for this institution, and this
theatre must have been built with some such impression, for otherwise it
is difficult to believe that a city of a hundred and twenty thousand
inhabitants could build a theatre capable of containing about a tenth of
the whole population!
The national vehicle of Valencia is the _tartana_, a covered cart on two
wheels, with a slight attempt only at springs, and rendered gay by the
crimson curtains which are hung across the front. Jumping into one of
these, we soon found ourselves at the excellent Fonda del Cid, whose
title reminds us that we are on classic ground in this city of Valencia
del Cid.
The Cid took the city from the Moors after a siege of twenty months, in
A.D. 1094, established himself here, and ruled till his death, in A.D.
1099. The Moors then regained possession for a short time, but in A.D.
1238 or 1239 it was finally re-taken from them by the Spaniards.
It is hardly to be expected that anything would remain of Christian work
earlier than A.D. 1095, or, more probably, than A.D. 1239, and this I
found to be the case. The cathedral, dedicated to the Blessed Virgin, is
a church of only moderate interest, its interior having been overlaid
everywhere with columns, pilasters, and cornices of plaster, and the
greater part of the exterior being surrounded so completely with houses,
that no good view can be obtained of it.
The ground-plan is, however, still so far untouched as to be perfectly
intelligible. It has a nave and aisles of four bays, transepts
projecting one bay beyond the aisles, and a lofty lantern or Cimborio
over the Crossing. The choir is one bay only in length, and has a
three-sided apse. An aisle of the same width as that of the nave is
continued round the choir, and has the rare arrangement of two polygonal
chapels opening in each of its bays. The vaulting compartments in the
aisle are therefore cincopartite, those throughout the rest of the
church being quadripartite. A grand Chapter-house stands detached to the
south of the west bay of the nave, and an octagonal steeple, called “El
Micalete,” abuts against the north-west angle of the west front.
The ritual arrangements are all modern, and on the usual plan. The
western bay of the church is open; the stalls of the Coro occupy the
second and third bays; and metal rails across the fourth bay of the nave
and the Crossing connect the Coro with the Capilla mayor.
The evidence as to the age of the various portions of the building is
sufficient to enable us to date most of the work rather accurately. The
foundation of the church is recorded by an inscription over the
south-transept door to have been laid in 1262:[251] and some portion of
the exterior is, I have no doubt, of this date. The whole south-transept
front, a portion of the sacristy on the east side, and the exterior of
the apse, are all of fine early-pointed style, and, in the absence of
any specific statement of their date, might well have been thought to
belong to quite the commencement of the century. But I think a careful
examination of the detail will show that the work is possibly not so
early as it looks: and it has so much in common with Italian work of
the same age, that we need not be surprised to find in it features which
would nevertheless be inconsistent with its execution in the middle of
the thirteenth century in any work in the North of Europe. The south
transept façade consists of a round-arched doorway, with a horizontal
cornice over it, and a large and fine lancet-window above. The door and
window have respectively six and three jamb-shafts, and the abaci
throughout are square in plan. The archivolt of the doorway is very
rich: it includes five orders of enriched dog-tooth moulding, one order
of seraphs in niches, one of chevron, one of scalloping, and two of
foliage: good thirteenth century mouldings are also freely used. The
shafts are detached, and there is foliage on the jamb between them. The
abaci are very richly carved with animals and foliage, and the capitals
are all sculptured with subjects under canopies. The detail of the whole
of the work is certainly very exquisite. Undoubtedly in the north of
France such work would be assumed to have belonged to the twelfth rather
than the thirteenth century; but the quatrefoil diapering on the
capitals, the canopy work over the subjects in them, and the pronounced
character of the mouldings and dog-tooth enrichment, make it pretty
clear that the recorded date applies to this work. Indeed I do not know
how we can assume any other date for it without altogether throwing over
the extremely definite old inscription: for as it is evident that the
south transept and choir are of the same date, it is difficult to see
how it could have been possible to speak of the first stone, if all this
important part of the fabric were already in existence.[252] Close to
the transept on the east, in the wall of what is now a sacristy, is
another lancet window, of equally good, though simpler detail. Enough,
too, remains of the original work in the exterior of the apse to show
that it is of the same age as the south transept. The clerestory windows
seem to have been simple broad lancets; there are corbel-tables under
the eaves; and the buttresses are very solid and simple. On the interior
nothing but the groining has been left untouched by the pagan plasterers
of a later day.
[Illustration: No. 32.
VALENCIA CATHEDRAL. p. 263.
NORTH TRANSEPT AND CIMBORIO.]
I have found no evidence as to the date of the next portion of the
fabric, which is the more to be regretted as it is altogether very
important and interesting in its character. It includes the whole façade
of the north transept, a noble lantern at the Crossing, and a small
pulpit, and the whole of this is a good example of probably the latter
half of the fourteenth century. The north transept elevation is
extremely rich in detail. The great doorway in the centre of the lowest
stage--De los Aposteles--has figures under canopies in its jambs, and
corresponding figures on either side beyond the jambs. The arch is
moulded, and sculptured with four rows of figures and canopies, divided
by orders of mouldings. The tympanum of the door is adorned with
sculptures of the Blessed Virgin with our Lord and angels. Over the arch
is a gabled canopy, the spandrels of which are filled with tracery and
figures. Above, and set back rather from the face of the doorway, is a
rose window, the very rich traceries of which are arranged in
intersecting equilateral triangles; over it is a crocketed pediment,
with tracery in the spandrels and on either side, and flanked by
pinnacles. Every portion of the wall is panelled or carved. This front
affords an admirable example of that class of middle-pointed work which
was common in Germany and France at the end of the thirteenth and
beginning of the fourteenth centuries. The style prevailed for some
time, and it was probably about the middle of the fourteenth century
that this building was executed.
The pulpit is placed against the north-east pier of the Crossing; it has
evidently been taken to pieces and reconstructed, and it is not certain,
I think, that it was originally a pulpit. Many of the members of the
base and capital of its stem, and the angles of the octagonal upper
stage, are modern, and of bronze; the rest is mainly of marble. The stem
is slender, and the upper part is pierced with richly-moulded
geometrical traceries, behind which the panels are filled in with
boards, gilt and diapered with extremely good effect. A curious feature
in this pulpit is that there is now no entrance to it, and if it is ever
used for preaching, the preacher must get into it by climbing over the
sides!
The lantern or Cimborio, though in some respects similar to, is no doubt
later than the transept; it is one of the finest examples of its class
in Spain. Mr. Ford says that it was built in A.D. 1404, but I have been
unable to find his authority for the statement,[253] and though he may
be right, I should have been inclined to date it somewhat earlier. It is
an octagon of two rather similar stages in height above the roof.
Crocketed pinnacles are arranged at each angle, and large six-light
windows with very rich and varied geometrical tracery fill the whole of
each of the sides. The lower windows have crocketed labels, and the
upper crocketed canopies, and the string-courses are enriched with
foliage. From the very transparent character of this lantern, it is
clear that it was never intended to be carried higher. It is a lantern
and nothing more, and really very noble, in spite of its somewhat too
ornate and frittered character.[254]
[Illustration: The Micalete.]
The portion of the work next in date to this seems to have been the
tower. This, like the lantern, is octagonal in plan, and it is placed at
the north-west corner of the aisle, against which one of its angles is
set. A more Gothic contempt for regularity it would be impossible to
imagine, yet the effect is certainly good. The circumference of this
steeple is said to be equal to its height, but I had not an opportunity
of testing this. Each side is 20 ft. 8 in. from angle to angle of the
buttresses, so that the height, if the statement is true, would be about
165 feet. It is of four stages in height; the three lower stages quite
plain, and the belfry rather rich, with a window in each face, panelling
all over the wall above, and crocketed pediments over the windows. The
buttresses or pilasters--for they are of similar projection throughout
their height--are finished at the top with crocketed pinnacles. The
parapet has been destroyed, and there is a modern structure on the roof
at the top. The evidence as to the age of this work is ample. It is
called “El Micalete” or “Miguelete,” its bells having been first hung on
the feast of St. Michael.
Some documents referring to it are given by Cean Bermudez,[255] and are
as follows:--
I. A deed executed in Valencia before Jayme Rovira, notary, on the 20th
June, 1380, by which it appears that Michael Palomar, citizen, Bernardo
Boix and Bartolomé Valent, master masons, estimated what they considered
necessary for the fabric of the tower or campanile at 853 scudi.
II. From the MS. diary of the chaplain of King D. Alonso V. of Aragon,
it appears that on the 1st January, A.D. 1381, there was a solemn
procession of the bishop, clergy, and _regidors_ of the city to the
church, to lay the first stone of the Micalete.[256]
III. By a deed made in Valencia, May 18th, A.D. 1414, before Jayme
Pastor, notary or clerk of the chapter, it is settled that Pedro
Balaguer, an “able architect,” shall receive 50 florins from the fabric
fund of the new campanile or Micalete, “in payment of his expenses on
the journey which he made to Lérida, Narbonne, and other cities, in
order to see and examine their towers and campaniles, so as to imitate
from them the most elegant and fit form for the cathedral of Valencia.”
IV. By another deed, made before the same Jayme Pastor, September 18th,
A.D. 1424, it is agreed that Martin Llobet, stone-cutter, agrees to do
the work which is wanting and ought to be done in the Micalete, to wit,
to finish the last course with its gurgoyles, to make the “_barbacano_,”
and bench round about, for the sum of 2000 florins of common money of
Aragon,[257] the administration of the fabric finding the wheels, ropes,
baskets, &c.
An inscription on the tower itself, referred to by Mr. Ford (but which I
did not see), states that it was raised between A.D. 1381 and A.D. 1418,
by Juan Franck, and it is said to have been intended to be 350 feet
high.[258]
It is evident, therefore, that several architects were employed upon the
work, and I know few facts in the history of mediæval art more
interesting than the account we have here of the payment of an architect
whilst he travelled to find some good work to copy for the city of
Valencia. The steeple of Lérida cathedral will be mentioned in its
place, and it is sufficient now to say that it is also octagonal, of
great height, and dates from the commencement of the fourteenth century.
I know nothing at Narbonne which could have been suggestive to Pedro
Balaguer, but the city was Spanish in those days, and is probably only
mentioned as one of the most important places to which he went.
When the Micalete was built the nave of the church seems to have been
still unfinished, the choir and transepts and part of the nave only
having been built. In 1459, under the direction of an architect named
Valdomar, a native of Valencia, the work was continued, and the church
was joined to the tower. The authority for this statement is a MS. in
the library of the convent of San Domingo, Valencia, which says: “In the
year of our Lord 1459, on Monday, the 10th of September, they commenced
digging to make the doorway and arcade of the cathedral; Master Valdomar
was the master of the works, a native of the said city of
Valencia.”[259] Of Valdomar’s work in this part of the church nothing
remains, the whole has been altered in the most cruel way, and the most
contemptible work erected in its place. Valdomar appears to have died
whilst his work was in progress, and to have been succeeded by Pedro
Compte, who concluded the work in 1482. The manuscript already quoted
from the library of San Domingo is the authority for this statement, and
describes Pedro Compte as “Molt sabut en l’art de la pedra.”[260]
On the south side of the nave there is a Chapter-house, which is said by
Ponz[261] to be the work of Pedro Compte, and to have been built at the
cost of Bishop D. Vidal Blaues, in A.D. 1358. If this statement is
correct, it follows that there were two architects of this name, the
second having erected the Lonja de la Sedia, to which I shall have
presently to refer, in A.D. 1482. The tracery of the windows, and the
details generally of the Chapter-house, is so geometrical and good, that
it is probable that the date given by Ponz may be depended upon. It is a
square room nearly sixty feet in diameter, and groined in stone. The
vault is similar to those which I first saw at Burgos, having arches
thrown across the angles to bring it to an octagon, and the triangular
compartments in the angles having their vaults below the main vault. It
is lighted by small windows very high up in the walls on the cardinal
sides, and these are circular and spherical triangles in outline, filled
with geometrical tracery. On the south side is a very elaborate arcaded
reredos and altar, and on the west a pulpit corbelled out from the wall.
The design and detail of the whole are extremely fine, and I regret that
I was able to make but a very hurried examination of it, and no
sketches; meeting here, almost for the first time in Spain, with a
sacristan who refused to allow me to do more than look, the fact being
that it was his time for dinner and siesta!
In the old sacristy to the east of this room are still preserved two
embroidered altar frontals, said to have been brought from our own old
St. Paul’s by two merchants, Andres and Pedro de Medina, just about the
time of the Reformation.[262] They are therefore of especial interest to
an Englishman. They are very large works, strained on frames, and were,
I believe, hangings rather than altar frontals, as they are evidently
continuations one of the other. The field is of gold, diapered, and upon
this a succession of subjects is embroidered. On one cloth are
(beginning at the left) (1) our Lord bearing his Cross; (2) being nailed
to the Cross; (3) crucified, with the thieves on either side; (4)
descending from the Cross; (5) entombed. The next cloth has (1) the
descent into Hell; (2) the Maries going to the sepulchre; (3) the Maries
at the tomb, the angel, and (4) the Resurrection. The effect of the
whole work is like that of a brilliant German painting, and the figures
are full of action and spirit, and have a great deal of expression in
their faces. The diapered ground is made with gold thread, laid down in
vertical lines, and then diapered with diagonal lines of fine bullion
stitched down over it to form the diaper. The gold is generally
manufactured in a double twist, and borders and edgings are all done
with a very bold twisted gold cord. The faces are all wrought in silk,
and some of the dresses are of silk, lined all over with gold. The old
border at the edge exists on one only of the frontals. The size of each
is 3 ft. 1 in. by 10 ft. 2 in., and the date, as nearly as I can judge,
must be about A.D. 1450. There is also preserved here a missal which
once belonged to Westminster Abbey.
I could find no other church of any interest. There are several which
have some old remains, but they are generally so damaged and decayed,
that it is impossible to make anything of them. One I saw desecrated and
occupied by the military, and was unable to enter; and there is another
in a street leading out of the Calle de Caballeros, which has a very
fine round-arched doorway, with three shafts in the jambs, and good
thirteenth-century mouldings in the arch, and which is evidently of the
same age as the south door of the cathedral. The capitals have each two
wyverns fighting, and the abaci are well carved. The church, however,
was desecrated, and no one knew how I could gain admission to it.
[Illustration: Puerta de Serranos. Valencia.]
The walls and gates are of more interest. They are lofty, and generally
well preserved. The two finest gates are the Puerta de Serranos, and
that del Cuarte. The former, said by Ford[263] to have been built in
A.D. 1349, is a noble erection. Two grand polygonal towers flank the
entrance archway, which is recessed in the centre. Above this the wall
is covered with tracery panelling, and then a great projecting gallery
or platform, supported on enormous corbels, is carried all round the
three exposed sides of the gateway. The towers are carried up a
considerable height above this gallery, and it is probable that there
was originally a wooden construction over it, of the kind which M.
Viollet le Duc, in his treatise on military architecture, has shown to
have been commonly adopted in fortifications of this age. The Puerta del
Cuarte is of the same description, and has two circular flanking towers,
but is less imposing, and is said to have been built in A.D. 1444. Both
gateways are completely open at the back, enormous open arches, one
above the other, rendering them useless for attack against the city; and
the corbelled-out passages at the top are not continued across the back.
The domestic remains here are of some importance. One feature of rather
frequent occurrence is the window of two or three lights, divided by
detached shafts. The earlier examples have simple trefoil heads, and
sculptured capitals to the columns. In the later examples there are
mouldings round the cusped head, and the abaci and capitals are carved:
but it is a very curious fact, that wherever I saw any old towns on the
coast of the Mediterranean, there I always saw some specimens of this
later kind of window, with detail and carving so identical in character,
that I was almost driven to the conclusion that they were all executed
in the same place, and sent about the country to be fixed! Nevertheless,
they are always very pretty, so that one ought not to grumble if they do
occur a little too often. The shafts are generally of marble, and often
coupled one behind the other.
The Arabs had a name for this class of windows, and as we have not, and
want one, it may be as well to mention it. They are called _ajimez_,
literally windows by which the sun enters. The Arabs seem to have
supplied many of the architectural terms in use in Spain, and probably
we owe them in this case not only the name, but the design also. Among
other Arab words still in common use, I may mention Alcazar, Alcalá,
Tapia, and many more are given in vocabularies.
[Illustration: Ajimez Window. Valencia.]
[Illustration: No. 33
VALENCIA. p. 270.
THE CASA LONJA.]
One of the earliest of these _ajimez_ windows is in a house on the east
side of the cathedral; and a fine example of later date is in an old
house in the Calle de Caballeros, the internal court and staircase of
which are also picturesque, though hardly mediæval. All the houses here
seem to be built on the same plan, with the stables and offices on the
ground floor, arranged round an internal court, an open stone staircase
to the first floor, and the living-rooms above. The fronts towards the
streets are generally rather gloomy and forbidding-looking, but the
courts are always picturesque. The finest domestic building in the city
is the Casa Lonja, or Exchange, which was commenced on the 7th November,
1482, the year in which the works at the cathedral were completed by
Pedro Compte. There is no doubt, I believe, that he was the architect;
and on March 19, 1498, he was appointed perpetual Alcaide of the Lonja,
with a salary of thirty pounds (“libras”) a year. He was also “Maestro
Mayor” of the city, and was employed in several works of engineering on
the rivers and streams of the district.[264] The main front of the Lonja
is still very nearly as he left it, a fine specimen of late Spanish
pointed work. The detail is of the same kind as, but simpler than, the
contemporary works at Valladolid and Burgos, and there is a less
determined display of heraldic achievements; though the great doorway,
and the window on either side of it which open into the great hall, and
which are so curiously grouped together by means of labels and
string-courses, have some coats of arms and supporters rather
irregularly placed in their side panels. The great parapet of the end,
and the singular finish of the battlements, are very worthy of note,
and give great richness to the whole building. The principal doorway
leads into a fine groined hall, 130 feet long by 75 feet wide, divided
into a quasi nave and aisles of five bays by eight columns, sculptured
and spirally twisted. The portion of the building to the left of the
centre is divided into three chambers in height, the upper and lower
rooms being low, the central room lofty and well proportioned. The lower
rooms have plain square windows; the next stage, windows of much loftier
proportions, and with their square heads ornamented with a rich fringe
of cusping. There are pointed discharging arches over them. The upper
stage of this wing is extremely rich, the window-openings being pierced
in a sort of continuous arcading, the pinnacles of which run up to and
finish in the parapet. This parapet is enriched with circular medallions
enclosing heads, a common Italian device, betokening here the hand of a
man whose work was verging upon that of the Renaissance school. At the
back is a garden, the windows and archways opening on which are of the
same age as the front.
Valencia, though not containing any building of remarkable interest, is
nevertheless well worth a visit: it is a busy city, full of picturesque
colour and people. The _manta_ or rug worn by the peasants throughout
Spain is here seen in perfection: it is of rich and very oriental
colour, and charms the eye at every turn. I went into a shop and looked
at a number of them, and there were none which were not thoroughly good
in their colour; and, worn as they are by the sunburnt peasants, hanging
loosely on one shoulder, they contrast splendidly with their white linen
jackets and trousers, and swarthy skins. The river is, at any rate in
the autumn, the broad dry bed only of a river, with here and there a
puddle just deep enough for washerwomen. The water is all carried off to
irrigate the fertile country around, and troops of cavalry and
artillery, with their guns all drawn by fine mules, were hard at work
exercising where it ought to have been. On the side of the river
opposite to the city are some rather nice public gardens, with fine
walks and drives planted with noble trees. A drive which begins here
extends all the way to Grao, the port of Valencia, some two or three
miles off. In the afternoon it seems to be always thronged with
_tartanas_, carriages, and equestrians on their way to and from the sea:
and each _tartana_ is full generally of a lively cargo of priests and
peasants, men, women, and children, all laughing, cheerful, and
picturesque. I went to Grao to embark on the steamer for Barcelona.
There is nothing to see there save the usual accompaniments of a
sea-port, and the provision for a large and fashionable population of
bathers from Madrid during the summer months. For their convenience
small and very rude huts are put up on the beach, and left there to be
destroyed by the winter storms. Not much is sacrificed, as they are of
the very rudest description, and evidently devised for the use of people
who go to Grao to be amused and to bathe, and not merely to show
themselves off as fine ladies and gentlemen.
At Valencia the national love for the _mantilla_, which in courtly
Madrid seems to be now half out of fashion, finds vent in the positive
prohibition at one of the churches for any woman to enter who wears a
bonnet in place of it!