The Arts and Crafts of Older Spain, Volume 2 (of 3)

by Leonard Williams

MOSAIC-WORK AND TILES

The art of colouring and glazing earthenware was practised by various peoples of the ancient eastern world, and passed, in course of time, through Egypt to Phœnicia, Greece, and Rome, and, later still, to Mussulman peoples of north-western Africa.

Glazed earthenware was possibly produced in Roman Spain, although the specimens of it which have been discovered are singularly and, indeed, significantly few. Their colour is commonly green or lightish yellow. Gestoso makes particular mention of a small jar now preserved in the museum of Seville, describing it as “of an ordinary shape, but finely made.” He admits, however, that no trace of glaze exists in any of the broken Visigothic vessels (copied, as Saint Isidore tells us, from the Roman-Spanish pottery) that were found some years ago among the ruins of Italica. Thus it is not decided whether the Spanish potters learned to glaze, or whether this development of their craft remained familiar to the Spaniards of that period through imported objects merely.

As with glazed earthenware, the origin of mosaic must be looked for in the East. Greece, who had doubtless borrowed it from Egypt, communicated it to Rome at least two centuries before the Christian era, and from this time the Romans used it freely in the decoration of their buildings. The Greek mosaic was composed exclusively of stone. The Romans modified this usage by the introduction of diminutive cubes of clay, painted and baked like porcelain; and later, in the reign of Claudius, dyed these cubes with various colours.

Roman mosaic-work (commonly in the tessellated style and not the opus sectile) has been unearthed in many parts of the Peninsula. Such are the two “mosaics of the Muses,” discovered at Italica on December 12th, 1799, and June 12th, 1839;[65] other mosaics, to the number of some thirty, discovered from time to time among the same ruins; another, discovered at Majorca in 1833; that of the Calle Batitales at Lugo (the Roman Lucus Augusti), discovered in 1842; those of Palencia, Gerona, Merida, Milla del Rio (near León), Rielves (near Toledo), Duratón, Aguilafuente, and Paradinas (near Segovia), and Carabanchel, three miles from Madrid. The mosaic found at Lugo is believed to have formed part of a temple dedicated to Diana. The decoration is partly geometrical, and consists of the head of a man between two dolphins, with other fishes swimming along the border. Laborde describes another mosaic which existed, early in the nineteenth century, in a hall of the archbishop's palace at Valencia. “The pavement of this hall demands particular attention; it is formed of antique pavements, discovered in the month of February, 1777, three hundred paces north-east of the town of Puch, between Valencia and Murviedro; some were entire, others were only fragments. They were separated with care, and placed on the floor of this hall, where they are carefully preserved. They are different mosaics, formed by little stones of three or four lines in diameter, curiously enchased. They are distributed into seven squares in each of which medallions and divers designs have been drawn: their compartments are of blue on a white ground. We observe in one of these squares an imitation of the pavement of Bacchus, discovered at Murviedro, and of which there remained but very few vestiges; it was copied in a drawing-book which a priest of this town had preserved; it is executed with such art and exactness, that no difference can be observed between this modern work and that of the Romans. In another we see Neptune seated in a car, in one hand holding a whip, and in the other a trident and the reins of the horses by which his car is drawn: these appear to be galloping.”

“In the same hall are also seen other pavements, of which only fragments could be preserved. Some serve for borders and ornaments to the preceding pavements. On these are represented a tiger, fishes, birds, houses, flowers, and garlands, well executed. There are particularly five stuck on wood and shut up in a closet; on these are birds, fruits, and flowers, figured in different colours, the execution of which is very curious; they are perhaps the most precious of the whole.”

The same author says elsewhere: “In digging to make a road from Valencia to Murviedro in 1755, at the entrance of the latter town a mosaic pavement was discovered; it was entire, and of such beauty that it was thought worthy of preservation. Ferdinand the Sixth caused it to be surrounded with walls; but the king's intentions were not properly fulfilled; the gates were suffered to remain open, and every one carried away some part of the pavement, which consequently soon became despoiled; it was rectangular, and measured twenty-four feet by fourteen. There are still some fragments of it in several houses at Murviedro. A priest of that town, Don Diego Puch, an antiquarian, took a drawing of it, which he afterwards had painted at Valencia on the tiles fabricated there, and paved an apartment of his house with them. It was likewise copied with the greatest exactness, with small stones perfectly similar, in an apartment of the library belonging to the archiepiscopal palace, as we have already stated.”

Swinburne also mentions a mosaic pavement which he saw at Barcelona, upon the site of what he believed to have been a temple of Neptune. In it were represented “two large green figures of tritons, holding a shell in each hand; between them a sea-horse, and on the sides a serpent and a dolphin.”

In October of 1901 a very important and beautiful mosaic was discovered at Italica. It is known as “the mosaic of Bacchus,” the worship of which deity, says Señor Quintero, was probably general in Andalusia, owing to her wealth of vines. This mosaic was found at a depth of six feet six inches below the surface of the soil, and measures twenty-one feet square. It is believed to have formed the pavement of a Roman dining-chamber.

Mosaic in the manner of the Greeks and Romans seems in Spain to have disappeared with the Visigoths. That it was known to these is told us by Saint Isidore:—“Pavimenta originem apud graecos habent elaboratae arte picturae, litostrata parvulis crustis ac tesselis tinctis in varios colores.”[66]

LI
DOOR OF THE MIHRAB
(Showing mosaic-work. Cordova Cathedral)

It is impossible to affirm with any confidence that glazed earthenware, whether in the form of tiles or other objects, was manufactured by the Spanish Moors during the Cordovese Caliphate, or the period of the kinglings of Taifa. No trace of it has been discovered among the scanty ruins of Medina Az-zahará[67] and Az-zahira—ancient palaces of Cordova—or in the marvellous mosque. We know, however, that towards the seventh century the Arabs borrowed from Byzantium the mosaic-work of tessons known as psephosis fsefysa, and this, or something similar, was used, though probably to a small extent, among the Muslims of the Spanish Caliphate. Although, towards the middle of the thirteenth century, the historian Aben-Said, a native of Granada, recorded that in Al-Andalus “is made a kind of mofassass which is called in the East alfoseifesa,” remains of this elaborate product only exist to-day at Cordova, where patches may yet be seen lining the dome of the mirhab in the vast aljama (Plate [li].). The mosaic in question is stated to have been a gift from the Byzantine emperor to the sultan Al-Hakem, and was set in place by a skilled workman, a Greek, who, like the offering itself, proceeded from Constantinople.

During his stay at Cordova this Greek was helped by certain of the Sultan's slaves, who thus acquired the secrets of the craft, and practised it thereafter.[68]

Rodrigo Amador de los Rios contends, however, that this decoration is in no sense a true mosaic, but just a tempera painting executed on the wall and overlaid with cubes of glass. In any case, no other specimen of such work has been discovered in any part of the Peninsula.

By the time of the Almohade invasion or very shortly after—that is, towards the twelfth century,—the Spanish Moors had grown acquainted with glazed earthenware. Indeed, the Almohades are believed by some authorities to have actually introduced it. Gestoso, on the contrary, suggests that Spain may have transmitted it to Africa. However this may be, the Almohades used it largely in the decoration of their homes and public buildings in Andalusia; first as aliceres or bands composed of smallish pieces running round a room, and subsequently in the more effective and more useful form of azulejos proper. The Spanish Moors employed the word almofassass to designate both aliceres and azulejos. Nevertheless, the two were not identical, although Riaño takes them to be so. He says: “The earliest tiles or azulejos made in Spain are composed of small pieces let into the wall, forming geometrical patterns.” These, in fact, were aliceres. It is not so easy to define an azulejo. We read in Aben-Said, quoted by Al-Makkari: “There is another kind of work employed for paving houses. It is called azzulechí and resembles mofassass. It has wonderful colouring, and replaces the coloured marble used by the people of the East to decorate their chambers.”

This definition is not completely clear. Those of the Christian-Spanish writers are not more satisfactory. Covarrubias calls these objects “small bricks, square and of other shapes, used for lining chambers in the mansions of the wealthy, or in garden paths.” Nebrija calls them tessela pavimenticia, adding that they bear the name of azulejos because the earliest ones were of a blue colour—a statement which Dozy supports by instancing the Persian-Arabic zaward or “blue stone.”

Gestoso resolves the question sufficiently for our purpose by showing that the term azulejo is usually applied to square tiles of a largish size, the length of whose sides varies between eleven centimetres and eighteen centimetres, aliceres being properly the smaller strips or pieces (technically known as cintas or verduguillos) used in a bordering or frieze. Other decorative pieces of small dimensions, invented in the fifteenth century, were called olambres or olambrillas, and served to lend variety to the red or yellow brickwork of a pavement or a floor.

The production of azulejos in Spain may thus be traced to as far back as the twelfth century. By far the most important centre of the craft was Seville. Here, from the twelfth until the fourteenth century, was made the glazed and decorative tiling which consisted of small pieces of monochrome earthenware—black, white, green, blue, or yellow—cut one by one, and pieced together in the manner of a true mosaic. This process, says Gestoso, was lengthy, difficult, and dear. In the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries the same mosaic would often take the form of a series of narrow, white, ribbon-like strips, with coloured interspaces. Specimens of this “ribbon-work tiling” exist to-day in the Patio de Las Doncellas of the Alcázar (Plate [lii].). Towards the sixteenth century the Sevillano potters discovered a simpler way of making effective and artistic azulejos, which they called the cuerda seca process. This novel method consisted in pressing a wood or metal mould upon the unbaked tile, in such a manner that the outline of the pattern remained in slight relief. This outline was next brushed over with a mixture of manganese and grease, which turns, in baking, very nearly black. The body of the pattern was then filled in with the various colours, which the greasy line completely separated, and thus prepared, the tile was rendered permanent by firing.

LII
MOSAIC OF THE PATIO DE LAS DONCELLAS
(Alcázar of Seville)

This process, in which the patterns are nearly always geometrical, remained in general use until about the year 1550, when it began to be superseded by two others, known respectively as the processes of “cuenca” and “Pisano”.

The cuenca tile was simple and of excellent effect. The pattern, stamped from a metal mould, remained in bas-relief,—a characteristic which caused these objects to be also known as azulejos “de relieve”. The shelving border of each hollow stamped into the tile thus formed a kind of natural barrier which kept the colour there deposited from mingling with its neighbours. When of a larger size, and joined in pairs to form between each two a single motive (ladrillo por tabla), these azulejos were often employed for decorating roofs and ceilings.

The tiles which bear the name of their inventor, Francesco Niculoso Pisano the Italian, who lived and worked for many years at Seville, date from about the same time as the “cuenca” azulejos. In the case of the Pisano tile, there is no indentation caused by the imprint of a mould, the surface being merely coated with a monochrome glaze, painted upon and fired, the decoration thus remaining flat all over. Commonly the ground is white or yellow, with the colour of the pattern shaded blue, or black, or deepish purple. This process, which lent itself to most elaborate and effective schemes of ornament, remained in vogue until the eighteenth century, and was practised, not only by Pisano himself, but by a long succession of his pupils, followers, and imitators.

LIII
ANDALUSIAN NON-LUSTRED WARE
(A.D. 1480–1495. Osma Collection)

Such were the processes in use among the azulejo-makers of old Seville. Specimens of their craftsmanship which yet survive and illustrate the various styles and epochs may be thus enumerated:—

(1) Mosaic tile-work, such as appears in Seville at the time of the Almohade invasion. A fragment of this kind of work forms part of the collection of Señor Osma, and proceeds from the church of San Andrés. Tiles and smaller pieces of mosaic-work, coloured in malachite green and white, were also found in 1899 and 1900, in the upper walls of the renowned Torre del Oro, or “Golden Tower,” erected in the year 1220, and which is popularly thought to derive its venerable title from the sparkle of the sun upon its azulejos. Another piece of primitive mosaic, measuring rather less than a yard square, and containing star-shaped geometrical devices, was found in 1890 beneath the floor of the cathedral; while mosaics of a later age, including the more elaborate lacería patterns that resemble ribbon, are preserved in the Patio de las Doncellas of the Alcázar, in the Casa de Olea, and in the parish churches of San Estéban, San Gil, and Omnium Sanctorum.

(2) A small group of curious tiles, believed to be anterior to the reign of Pedro the First, has come to light some years ago, in the churches of San Andrés and Santa Marina, and in the Claustro del Lagarto of the cathedral. Those of San Andrés are of white earthenware, glazed in the same colour and stamped from a mould with the figures of two wolves in fairly bold relief (see tailpiece to this chapter). Traces of a glaze of malachite green are on the bodies of these wolves. The azulejos of the church of Santa Marina, also discovered recently, are examined by Señor Osma in his pamphlet Azulejos sevillanos del siglo xiii (Madrid, 1902). They measure about three and a half inches square, and bear devices of a castle and an eagle, stamped in the diagonal direction of the tile, showing that this was fixed upon the wall in lozenge fashion. The tiles are bathed upon their surface with what is termed by Osma “the semi-transparent, caramel-coloured glaze peculiar to the pottery of Moorish Spain.”[69] Upon this ground is stamped the decoration,—the eagles in the blackish purple of baked manganese, the castles without additional colour, so as to be distinguished only by their outline from the yellowish surface of the tile.

The azulejos of the Claustro del Lagarto of the cathedral are three in number, and were found in 1888. Two of them are stamped with a castle of a single tower described within a shield, and the third with a Greek cross. These are considered by Osma to be the only tiles existing at this moment which date from the latter third of the thirteenth century. In fact, he places their manufacture between the years 1252 and 1269.

LIV
CUENCA TILES
(Alcázar of Seville)

(3) Cuerda seca tiles. Handsome zocalos or dadoes of these tiles are in the Casa de los Pinelos, and in the chapels of the palaces of the Dukes of Alba and Medinaceli. Gestoso attributes them to the end of the fifteenth century or the beginning of the sixteenth. Detached cuerda seca tiles are preserved in the municipal museum of archæology, while a fine pair (Plate [liii].) of this class of azulejos belongs to Señor Osma, who considers they were made between 1480 and 1495. They are thus coeval with the no less interesting dish of the time of Ferdinand and Isabella, of which a reproduction is given opposite page 190.

(4) Cuenca tiles. Quantities of these, dating from the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, may yet be seen in many parts of Seville; for instance, in her churches or her convents, in her superb Alcázar, or in the mansions of her old nobility. Probably the most remarkable of all are those in the gardens of the Alcázar, and lining the walls of the Pavilion of Charles the Fifth. The devices on these polychrome azulejos (16th century; Plate [liv].) are very numerous, including men and animals, centaurs and other monsters, the Pillars of Hercules, and imitations of elaborate dress fabrics.

(5) Pisano tiles. Although some facts have been unearthed concerning the Italian Francesco Niculoso Pisano, we do not know precisely in what year he came to Seville, or in what year he died. Davillier thought it probable that he had studied at Faenza or at Caffagiolo. At all events, it was Pisano who broadly launched the art of the Sevillian potters on the stream of the Renaissance.[70] I have stated that the tiles which bear his name are painted on a white or yellow ground. Consequently their surface is flat, without the ridges and depressions of the cuenca or the cuerda seca methods. We find Pisano tiles applied to various objects, such as tombs, altars, friezes, and archivolts. This artist, says Gestoso, further introduced the use of two new colours,—violet and rose. Several of his best productions are still intact, including the doorway of the church of the monastery of Santa Paula (in which he was assisted by a Spanish master, Pedro Millan), and the altar of the Catholic Sovereigns in the Alcázar. Both these masterpieces were executed in the year 1504, and bear Pisano's signature. The doorway of Santa Paula is described by Gestoso as consisting of a single body of masonry, distinct from that of the building itself, though resting against it, and constructed of bricks of uniform size, which show us, by their perfect symmetry, how skilful were the masons of that time, with whom the Moorish craftsmanship was yet a living power. The doorway is formed by a series of concentric Gothic arches resting on slender pillars. The space which forms the outer archivolt is most remarkable. Upon a ground of azulejos which copy the colour of the brickwork, we see a number of Plateresque designs of exquisite beauty, painted in white and blue, with occasional touches of other colours. Among the devices are chimeras, war-trophies, volutes, chaplets, parapegms, antelopes, masks, and others which are characteristic of the Florentine Renaissance. Upon this ground, and enclosed by circular garlands in high relief, consisting of polychrome fruits and flowers, are seven medallions containing figures of male and female saints, except the one which is upon the keystone, and which represents the birth of Christ. In this medallion the figures are enamelled in white upon a cobalt-blue ground, recalling, as also do the garlands, the work of the celebrated della Robbia.[71] In the rest of the medallions the figures are glazed in brilliant colours. In the three medallions upon the left, beginning with the lowest one, we see, upon the first, Saint Helen; upon the second, two saints in monkish dress; and upon the third, Saint Peter and Saint Paul. On the medallions of the other side are another saint dressed as a monk, San Cosmé, San Damián, and San Roque. The spaces on either side of the archivolt are covered with tiles which represent a landscape. In each of the upper angles is an angel holding a large tablet with IHS in ornamental Gothic character upon a black ground. These letters, and also the angels and the frames of the tablets, are enamelled in gold. Beneath each tablet is an angel standing with extended wings upon a bracket of lustred earthenware, and holding an open book. The brickwork of the door is closed by a plain impost supporting a small battlement covered with cuenca tiles, and crowned with a cornice of flamboyant ornaments alternating with the heads of cherubs glazed in white, and with a white marble cross in the centre. The tympanum is embellished by a superb shield carved in high relief upon white marble with the arms of Castile, León, Aragon, and Sicily, surmounted by a royal crown and the eagle with the nimbus. Beside this shield are two smaller ones of azulejos painted with the yoke and sheaf of arrows, and the motto TĀTO MŌTA. The ground on which are executed these three shields occupies the whole tympanum, and is covered with Plateresque devices including two tablets, on one of which we read the letters S.P.Q.R., and on the other, PISANO. Above the first of these tablets is another of an oval shape, bearing the word NICULOSO. Lastly, at the base of the archivolt, and on the left-hand side of the spectator, is a very small rectangular tablet with this inscription:—

NICVLOSO
FRANCISCO-I-
TALIANO-MEF
ECIT INELAGNO DEI
· 154 ·

The altar in the Alcázar of the same city, and which is known as that of the Catholic Sovereigns (Plate [lv].), is entirely covered with “Pisano” azulejos measuring sixteen centimetres square. Imbedded in the centre is a picture, also of painted tiles, representing the visit of the Virgin to Saint Elizabeth. This picture measures five feet in height by three feet eight inches in breadth. Beneath it is the figure of a patriarch resting his head upon his hand. Boughs with large flowers issue from his breast, and among the flowers are half-length figures of the prophets, together with those of Jesus and the Virgin, the whole of this decoration forming a frame to the central picture. The rest of the altar is profusely decorated with designs in the Renaissance style, consisting of vases, animals, genii, and the emblems of Ferdinand and Isabella. In the centre of the tiling which forms the altar-front is a circular picture made of azulejos surrounded by a garland of fruits and laurel leaves, and representing the Annunciation, garland and picture being supported by two monsters with the tails of dragons and the upper parts of women. Large flaming torches rest between the out-stretched arms of the monsters, and round about or springing from them are flowers, animals, cornucopias, and other decoration. The entire retablo is painted lightish blue and white upon a yellow ground, except the larger picture and its decorative border, which is of a deeper blue. A small tablet beneath the Virgin's feet contains the words NICULOSO FRANCESCO ITALIANO ME FECIT, and on the pilaster represented on the left hand of the same picture is added the date, 1504. As Gestoso, Davillier, and others have remarked, it is evident that while the rest of the altar is pure Renaissance-Plateresque, the pictures copied on the tiles are of a northern school. Probably they were designed for Niculoso by one of the various German or Flemish masters who at that time were resident in Seville.

LV
ALTAR OF THE CATHOLIC SOVEREIGNS
(Alcázar of Seville)

Another altar which was formerly in the same palace, but which has disappeared, was also painted by this craftsman. It was described by Cean Bermudez as containing scenes from the life of the Virgin, the Trinity, and the two Saints John, and bore the same date as the altar which is yet existing, namely, 1504.

Among the other works of Niculoso are the altar of the church of Tentudia, the tomb of Iñigo Lopez in the church of Santa Ana in the quarter of Triana, and a tile-picture representing, similarly to the one which forms the centre of the altar in the Alcázar, the Virgin's visit to Saint Elizabeth. This picture formerly belonged to the kings of Portugal, and is now in the museum of Amsterdam.[72]

Such were the decorative azulejos which made the potteries of Seville famous throughout Europe, and which are known to have been exported to Italy, Portugal, and even England.[73] The names of several hundred mediæval and post-mediæval makers of these Seville tiles have been exhumed and published by Gestoso.

The general title of the Spanish potter was ollero, a comprehensive term which reaches from the most ambitious azulejero to the maker of the meanest kitchen-ware. The olleros of older Seville produced for centuries, not only glazed and coloured tiling by the processes already indicated, but countless other objects such as brims of wells, apothecary's jars, baptismal fonts, and dishes of every shape and size. They used a general mark (the tower of the Giralda) to stamp their pottery; but private marks are nearly always absent. The facts that have appeared in recent years concerning these artificers are seldom interesting. The mere mention of a name is meaningless, or even perplexing, seeing that a Moor or Mudejar would frequently assume the name and surname of a Christian. Nevertheless, Gestoso has brought to light important notices concerning one or two, and in particular a document dating from the reign of Ferdinand and Isabella, relating to a celebrated potter of that period named Fernan Martinez Guijarro. This document, which is dated 1479, describes Martinez as “a very great master in the art of making azulejos, fonts, and all the things pertaining to his trade, insomuch that none other in all this kingdom is like unto him,” and subsequently, “considering him to be so excellent a craftsman that persons come hither from Portugal and other parts to purchase and to carry off his ware.” It is further stated that Martinez Guijarro was in wealthy circumstances (“hombre rrico e de mucha rrenta e fasyenda”). His talleres or workshops were in the barrio of Triana, and included (as we learn from one of the documents copied by the same investigator) a separate department for the manufacture or storage of lustred ware.

Unfortunately, even Gestoso is unable to point to any piece of tiling or other pottery now existing, as being unquestionably executed by this master.

Another Sevillian potter of exceptional merit was Cristóbal de Augusta, who worked in the latter half of the sixteenth century, and left his name upon the azulejo dadoes of the Halls of Charles the Fifth in the Alcázar. The style of these most brilliant tiles is pure Renaissance, and forms a worthy continuation of the splendid work of Niculoso. Augusta, indeed, is termed in the Archives of the Alcázar “master of making tiles in the Pisano manner” (del pisano).[74] Some tilemakers of little note succeeded him, but even the names of these are carefully recorded by Gestoso.

Seville was thus the principal centre of the craft of decorative tile-making. Azulejos were also made at Barcelona and other towns in Cataluña, at Talavera de la Reina, Burgos, Toledo, Granada, and Valencia, in several towns of Aragon, and probably at Cordova. Riaño quotes a letter written about the year 1422, from the wife of the Admiral of Castile to the abbess of the nunnery of Santo Domingo at Toledo, requesting that a number of azulejos be sent to her. “She alludes, in the same letter, to painted tiles, and says she was expecting a master potter from Seville to place the tiles in their proper places. This shows us” (continues Riaño) “that it was only in the province of Andalusia that the art was known of cutting these tiles into geometrical sections and mosaic patterns.”

The meaning of this passage is obscure. Riaño speaks of painted tiles and azulejos as though they were distinct objects, and yet they are essentially the same. Again, if only Andalusia was able to produce such tiles, why did the Almirante's wife order them from Toledo? Perhaps the faulty English of Riaño's handbook is responsible, but, as it stands, this passage tells us practically nothing. In any case, abundant evidence exists to show that large quantities of Mudejar and Renaissance tiles were manufactured at Toledo. In general appearance, they are similar to those of Seville.

Ramírez de Arellano believes that decorative tiles were manufactured at Cordova in the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries, and quotes, in proof of this, the names of “maestros de hacer vidriado” or makers of glazed ware, who resided at this ancient capital. One of these craftsmen was Alonso Rodriguez the younger, who, on June 7th, 1574, sold to a canon of the cathedral ten thousand white and green tiles of a common kind (ladrillos), probably employed for roofing. The price was three ducats the thousand. On April 10th, 1598, Juan Sanchez engaged to supply the same temple with the same quantity of glazed tiles (tejas) for roofing, coloured white, green, and yellow, at sixteen maravedis each tile.

Azulejos were certainly made at Granada in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries, and probably earlier.

LVI
THE GATE OF WINE
(Showing polychrome tiling. Alhambra, Granada)

In a passage of the Alhambra palace leading from the Patio de la Alberca to the Cuarto Dorado, a space was laid bare not many years ago, containing the original mostagueras or small tiles used for flooring, glazed in two colours; and in the same building, although in constantly diminishing quantities, are large numbers of tiles which date from the time of the Spanish Moors. There has been a good deal of discussion as to whether the roofs of the Alhambra were originally covered with decorative tiles. Swinburne (who must not, however, be taken as the safest of authorities) wrote that “in Moorish times the building was covered with large painted and glazed tiles, of which some few are yet to be seen.”

Indifferent Renaissance tiles, made in the reign of Philip the Fifth, are still preserved in parts of the Alhambra.

Excellent polychrome cuerda seca tiles (fourteenth century), in white, green, yellow, blue, and black, are over the horseshoe archway of the Gate of Wine of the Alhambra (Plate [lvi].). According to Gómez Moreno,[75] they were manufactured here, as were the Moorish azulejos, yellow, black, white, violet, and sky-blue, in the Mirador de Daraxa.[76] The archives of the Moorish palace also state that towards the close of the sixteenth century Antonio Tenorio, whose pottery was situated in the Secano, and consequently within a stone's-throw of the Casa Real, made several sets of azulejos for the Hall of the Abencerrajes. Good Morisco tiles, dating from the same period and wrought by craftsmen such as Gaspar Hernandez, Pedro Tenorio, and the members of the Robles family, are in the Sala de Comares, and in one of the rooms of the Casa de los Tiros.

From the thirteenth century until the eighteenth, excellent azulejos were made in Cataluña. Specimens of every period exist in the collections of Don Francisco Rogent and Don José Font y Gumá, of Barcelona, and Don Luis Santacana, of Martorell. The tiles belonging to these gentlemen proceed from the cathedral and other temples of Barcelona, and from the monasteries or castles of Poblet, Santas Creus, Montserrat, Marmellá, San Miguel de Ervol, Centellas, Torre Pallaresa, San Miguel del Fay, and Vallpellach.[77]

Another region which has long been celebrated for its azulejeria is the kingdom of Valencia. Even in the eighteenth century, when this craft was generally in a state of great decadence, Valencian tiles were thoroughly well made, although the patterns on them were defective. Laborde pronounced them “the best executed and most elegant in Europe,” and further said of this locality; “the painted earthenware tiles or azulejos are used in the country, but only a small part of them; a great many are sent into the interior of Spain as well as to Cadiz, where they are shipped for Spanish America, and to Marseilles, whence they are conveyed into Africa.”

The same writer inserts an interesting account of the manufacture of these azulejos. “It is at Valencia that the tiles of earthenware are made, with which they incrust walls and pave apartments: those tiles are of a clayey earth, which is found in the territories of Quarte near Valencia; they harden the earth long after soaking it in water; the tiles are formed in moulds, and are dried in the sun; they are then beaten with a piece of square wood of the dimensions of which they are wanted. They are then put into the oven, where they undergo a slight baking. As soon as they are done they are glazed, and are afterwards painted in water colours with whatever subject is intended to be represented. The tiles are then replaced in the oven so as not to touch one another, and that the action of the fire may penetrate them all equally: as the colours change by baking, the workmen apply them anew in proportion to the changes that take place; the red alone alters entirely. The varnish with which they are glazed is made with lead, tin, and white sand. These three substances are ground in a mill to powder, which is mixed with water, to form a paste, and baked in the oven; it is again pounded and put into the oven, where it crystallises: being once more reduced to powder and diluted with water, it becomes varnish. There are two kinds of it; one is whiter than the other, though the same materials are used: the mode of mixing alone makes the difference; the whiter, the clearer the tiles. It takes a certain number of tiles to form a picture: they are of different dimensions; the smallest are three inches nine lines, the largest seven inches nine lines. The price varies according to the size of the tile, the beauty of the varnish, and the variety of the drawings: the lowest price is eight pesos (25s.) a thousand, and the highest 100 pesos or £15, 12s. 6d. There is a considerable demand for them; they are superior both in beauty and strength to those used in Holland.”

LVII
TILES OF THE DECADENT PERIOD

Bourgoing, author of the Nouveau Voyage en Espagne, described, in 1789, the same product in the following terms: “L'industrie des Valenciens tire d'ailleurs parti de toutes les productions de leur sol. Il contient une espèce de terre dont ils font ces carreaux de faïence colorée, connus sous le nom d'Azulejos, et qu'on ne fabrique qu'à Valence. On en pave les appartements, et on en revêt leurs lambris; on y peint les sujets les plus compliqués, tels par exemple qu'un bal masqué, une fête de taureaux. La couleur rouge est la seule qui ne puisse être fixée sur cette espèce de faïence; elle s'altere entièrement par la cuisson.”[78]

For the amusement of my readers, I insert an illustration of common Spanish tiles of the decadent period (Plate [lvii].), displaying considerable liveliness combined with reckless ignorance of draughtsmanship. A class of these degenerate tiles, made in large quantities at Seville in the eighteenth century, is known as azulejos de montería or “hunting-tiles,” since episodes of the chase form one of the favourite themes of their design.

Although it passed through a long period of prostration, embracing the greater part of the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, at no time has the manufacture of decorative Spanish tiles succumbed completely. Of recent years it has revived surprisingly at Seville, Barcelona, and Segovia; and at the first of these cities the older azulejos, and particularly those in the cuenca style, are imitated to perfection.

In the cheapest kinds of modern tiling, such as is used for corridors and kitchens, a common device is a series of repeated curves and dots which evidently has its source in Arabic lettering. Indeed, the ornamental and attractive written characters of the Spanish Moors, rendered familiar to their rivals through long centuries of intercourse, seem to have constantly found favour with the Christian Spaniards. The fuero of Jaca, dated a.d. 1064, tells us that a Christian prince of Spain, Don Sancho Ramirez, was accustomed to write his signature in Arabic lettering. Meaningless inscriptions in the same language, and evidently executed by a Christian hand, are engraved on objects in the Royal Armoury; and Señor Osma describes in an interesting pamphlet (Los letreros ornamentales en la cerámica morisca del Siglo XV.) how, in the pottery of older Spain, a word in Arabic such as alafia (“prosperity” or “blessing”) would often be corrupted by Morisco craftsmen into a motive of a purely ornamental character, and which would only in this sense be comprehended and appreciated by the Christian.[79]