With the exception of the Giralda, and part of the lower portions of the walls, the Moorish remains that are to be recognised in the cathedral are few and not remarkable. The Puerta del Perdon in the Calle de Alemanes was reconstructed by Alfonso XI., after the victory of Salado, and the plateresque ornamentations were added by Bartolome Lopez about 1522. But although the bronze-covered doors have been disfigured by paint, their Moorish character is still distinctly traceable. Through the gateway we enter the old Moorish courtyard, the Patio de los Naranjas (Court of Oranges), robbed of its former grandeur, but still distinguished by its beautiful Arabic fountain, with an octagonal basin, which occupies the centre of the court. From this spot we get a splendid view of the cathedral and the massive yet delicate Giralda tower, which has been declared to be even more to Seville than Giotto’s Campanile is to Florence, or that of St. Mark’s to Venice. “Long before the traveller reaches the city,” writes an imaginative admirer, “the Giralda seems to beckon him onwards to his promised land; during all his peregrinations through the intricate streets and lanes it is his trusted guide, always ready to serve him, soaring as it does far above all surroundings, it is a thing of unfailing beauty and interest as day by day he passes and repasses it, or wanders about its precincts; it tells him even afar off, how the day moves on, and how the night; and it dwells in his thoughts the fairest memory of his sojournings in the queen of the Southern cities.”
From the Court of Oranges to the Giralda the way leads through the Capilla de la Granada of the cathedral. A solitary horseshoe arch reminds us of the Moorish origin of the building; and the huge elephant’s tusk suspended from the roof, a bridle that tradition declares belonged to the Cid’s steed, and a stuffed crocodile, are Oriental rather than Christian relics. And the Giralda, in spite of its added belfry—its surmounting figure symbolic of the Christian faith—and the fact that it is under the special patronage of the two Santas Justa and Rufina, “who are much revered at Seville,” is still a Moorish monument. At its base the tower is a square of fifty feet, and it rises by a series of stages, or cuerpos, which are named after the architecture, decoration or use for which they are designed. At the Cuerpo de Campanas is hung a peal of bells, of which the largest, Santa Maria, eighteen tons in weight, and referred to in the vernacular as “the plump,” was set up in 1588 by the order of the Archbishop Don Gonzola de Mena, at a cost of ten thousand ducats. Above, we come to the cuerpo of the Azucenas, or white lilies, with which it is embellished; and, going still higher, we reach El Cuerpo del Reloj, the clock-tower, in which was erected, in 1400, the first tower-clock ever made in Spain. Portions of this old timepiece were employed by the Monk Jose Cordero in making, in 1765, the clock which is working to this day. The belfry, which is the home of a colony of pigeons and hawks, is girdled with a motto from the proverb, “Nomen Domini fortissima turris”—(“The name of the Lord is a strong tower.”) The
SEVILLE
GALLERY OF THE HOUSE OF PILATOS.
