Communicating with the north transept is the Capilla del Rey Casto. This chapel, founded by Alfonso the Chaste, was entirely rebuilt in the eighteenth century by a bishop named Melaz in the worst baroque style. This was the pantheon of the early kings of Asturias, and some tombs, probably containing their remains, are certainly here; but the inscriptions are merely the result of guess-work. Only one sarcophagus can be identified, and that, it appears from the inscription, is the resting-place of one Ithacus. Who this personage was, and what he had done to merit sepulture in the royal vault, are riddles to which history supplies no answer.
The cloister, begun in the fourteenth and finished in the fifteenth century, is in good Gothic style. The pointed arches looking on the court are divided by four or five slender shafts, which support elegant tracery. Among the statues that of Alfonso XI. Is the best preserved. The capitals and corbels are curiously and richly carved with such subjects as King Favila hunting the bear, the duel of Froila, and what Mr. O’Shea very rightly calls ‘a series of comical pictorial reviews of the times.’ There are many tombs in the cloister, belonging to various epochs, mostly earlier than the fourteenth century. They are of all styles, but Don J. M. Quadrado points out that the epitaphs are almost uniform in style. The famous Bishop Pelayo’s tomb (died 1153) is here.
The chapter-house is a fine specimen of thirteenth-century architecture. The archives adjoining contain some documents and codices of the greatest value. Here is preserved the Libro Gotico of the twelfth century, a beautifully illuminated manuscript, throwing light on the costumes and customs of that day.
The other churches founded by Alfonso the Chaste and his predecessors in the town itself have either been demolished or so often restored, rebuilt, and renovated, that they cannot be considered worth a visit. The earliest foundation of all, San Vicente, was modernised in 1592, and is interesting as containing the bones of the Abbot Feijoo, a man greatly esteemed by his contemporaries for his learning and sanctity (died 1764).
The Gothic church of San Francisco, now attached to a hospital, was founded by Fray Pedro, a companion of the great Francis of Assisi himself. This is the burying-place of the great family of Quirós, which claimed, in a not very reverent distich, to rank in point of dignity and antiquity next to the Divinity (‘Después de Dios, la casa de Quirós’). In the chancel lies Gonzalo Bernaldo de Quirós the Older, the youthful friend of Enrique of Trastamara, who died, wearing the religious habit, in 1575. Within a sepulchre upheld by lions which bear escutcheons crossed by the bar sinister, are the ashes of another Gonzalo Bernaldo, a distinguished illegitimate scion of the house. He is shown clad in armour, and at his feet a dog—symbolical, possibly, of the fidelity and tenacity with which he watched over the interests of his family during the minority of its chiefs. Close by is the vault of the house of Valdecarzana; a modern inscription informs us that during the interment of one of that family, a live cow must be present in the church—why or wherefore not being stated.
The church of Santa Maria de la Vega, outside the town, was the chapel of a Benedictine nunnery founded by Gontroda, mistress of Alfonso VII., who took the veil here in 1154. She was joined in her retirement, it is believed, by her daughter Urraca, sometime Queen of Navarre, and afterwards of Asturias. A century later another interesting penitent sought an asylum here: Doña Sancha Alvarez, mistress of the greatest noble in Spain, Rodrigo Alvarez de Asturias. The two ladies’ tombs lie close together. The sarcophagus of Gontroda is adorned with Romanesque reliefs of birds, and of hounds chasing deer, in curiously crude and conventional attitudes; Sancha’s tomb shows Gothic influence, and is sculptured in low relief. The epitaphs extol the virtues and amiability of the departed ladies.
The two most interesting monuments in the district are the ancient churches of Santa Maria de Naranco and San Miguel de Lino, both outside the walls. The former was rebuilt by Ramiro I., and is, therefore, well over a thousand years old. Attached to it were a palace and baths, every trace of which has long since disappeared. The architecture presents curious local peculiarities. The church is situated on a slope, and is composed of a single nave resting on a crypt or substructure. The only entrance is by a porch on the north side, which is on the level of the nave and approached by steps. The whole exterior is severe and simple, strong buttresses running up the walls to the sloping roof. In the west front three stages may be distinguished: the lowest is formed by the substructure entered in the middle by a round arch; above this the nave terminates in a portico of three round arches, which spring from four palm-like pillars with Corinthian capitals; in the middle of the third stage is a window of three lights, also round arched. The interior has remained practically unchanged since Ramiro’s day. The chancel and choir occupy opposite ends of the nave, and are raised by one and three steps respectively above the level of the flooring. Both are shut off by three round arches, the middle one being higher than the others; and an arcade of closed arches runs along the side-walls of the nave. These arches are rudely constructed, and rest upon, rather than spring from, octagonal capitals, quaintly carved with figures of priests and lions. The columns are composed each of four engaged shafts, of the same pattern as those of the western portico. The ribs of the waggon-vaulted ceiling spring from corbels, beneath which are reliefs representing the two orders of society in Asturias in the ninth century—knights engaged in combat, and toilers carrying loads. Under these again are circular medallions, filled with conventional foliage, and having in the centre reliefs of lions and birds. The church was probably intended to be open at both ends, as it is now, that the congregation assembled on the hillside might be able to assist in divine worship. It is one of the most valuable architectural monuments of Spain.
The little basilica of San Miguel de Lino was built near Santa Maria by King Ramiro about the year 850. The name was originally de ligno, i.e. of the wood, and was derived quite possibly from a fragment of the True Cross preserved here. Here we have a cruciform church in miniature, with transepts, lantern, and apsidal chapels, of a height which seems out of proportion to their other reduced dimensions. The apsidal chapels formed a semicircle at the foundation, but have been squared off since. The roofs are tiled and pitched. The buttresses resemble those of the Naranco church. The walls are pierced, here and there, with windows of three lights, with round arches, columns spirally fluted, and columns cut into leaves; above these is an elaborate geometrical tracery, suggestive of Moorish influence. The jambs of the round-arched western porch are rudely carved with curious groups. One of these is irresistibly grotesque. A man is shown balancing himself with his hands on the top of a pole and his legs in the air, exactly like the familiar monkey on a stick of our childhood; with head downwards, he grins into the jaws of a lion, which stands on its hind legs agape with surprise or indignation. Behind the gymnast another man appears to be indulging in some sort of dumb-bell exercise. This amazing composition is averred by some authorities to represent the martyrdom of a saint! The floral designs which border it are skilfully, even delicately, executed.
The chancel is on a lower level than the nave, which is reached on each side by a flight of steps, in a chapel projecting from the transept. The lantern has one of the earliest attempts at a domed roof, now unfortunately concealed by a later flat ceiling. The columns and arches are Byzantine in style, and the capitals carved with rosettes in medallions and strapwork. The nave is waggon vaulted and lower than the transept.
The modern buildings of Oviedo present few features of interest. The old walls have almost entirely disappeared, and few of the palaces or noblemen’s houses date further back than the seventeenth century. The University, founded in 1608 by the executors of Archbishop de Valdés, is a dignified building in the classical style—such as one might see in any fair-sized town in southern Europe. The Ayuntamiento, uninteresting in itself, contains a charter granted by the sixth and confirmed by the seventh Alfonso. Those who have had the opportunity of studying it say that it illustrates the transition from Latin to Spanish—just as the history of Oviedo illustrates the development of the Goth into the Spaniard.