famous sculptor, Filipe de Castro,[238] which is placed on the top of a tall pedestal and forms a sort of landmark for visitors. The houses of Noya are built of granite; I noticed that some of them had not only tiled roofs but also tiled walls. “To keep the wet out,” I was told.
The first church we visited was that of Santa Maria a Nova, which is the oldest church in Noya, and dates from the year 1327. Its cemetery contains many interesting horizontal gravestones, on which are cut the insignia of the office of the persons buried beneath them. On one we found a stone-mason’s hammer.
On the outer side of the right wall are three sarcophagi in arched recesses. The inscription on one is Era MCCC, which is equivalent to A.D. 1272; these are thought to have belonged to an earlier church, for the present one was completely rebuilt in the fourteenth century. I noticed one sarcophagus that rested on two stone lions, and had represented on its sides a bridge, and fish swimming beneath the name of the person buried there. In front of the church, in the little graveyard, is a sarcophagus with the recumbent effigy of a warrior with his sword by his side; he wears a tall fur-brimmed hat and a kind of kilt which is a curious example of the costume of his day.
Over the window beneath the three-arched portico of the church is a coloured statue of the Virgin, and the Adoration of the Magi, into which the archbishop Berigel, who built the church, is introduced. One of the kings is represented as an Ethiopian with black skin and rolling eyes; two angels are waving incense; their garments are bordered with gold, and the whole group is very Byzantine. To the right of the entrance is a dedicatory inscription and the name of the archbishop who built the church.
Inside the church there are two other sarcophagi with the effigies of rich Noya merchants and inscriptions with their names and dates.
The Sunday before Easter is a solemn day in Spain, and although the market in the morning was not interfered with, Noya dressed itself in sombre hues in the afternoon, and a solemn procession passed with music beneath our balcony at 4 p.m. We looked out and saw four men supporting on their shoulders a platform on which was a chair and the seated figure of a naked Christ, life size, and wearing a crown of thorns from which drops of blood were represented as streaming. Over the shoulders of this ghastly figure was a crimson velvet mantle bordered with gold; the hands were tied together with a cord. Another platform followed bearing a standing figure of the Virgin, also life size; her skirt was of plum-coloured velvet, and the velvet shawl which covered her head and shoulders was of violet bordered with gold. A great crowd of people followed, all very silent and subdued. Many of the women wore black or grey handkerchiefs over their heads.
The next day I called at the convent of the Trinitarian nuns to take a message to one of the inmates from her married sister in Santiago. The outer walls of this convent were a yard wide; opening into the dark porch was a large window with a revolving wooden shutter, concave in shape, like half a barrel. Through this opaque window I had to announce my name and the object of my visit to an invisible nun who had answered the bell by calling to me from the other side of the barrel. She began every sentence she uttered with “Ave Maria,” and then went to ask the Mother Superior if I might speak with the nun for whom my message was intended. When she came back she tapped the wood several times to let me know she was there, and then informed me with more “Ave Marias” that if I would came again after Easter I might perhaps speak with the nun, but not before. It ended in my having to return to Santiago without giving my message. I discovered afterwards that though these nuns appeared to be terribly shut in, they have, stretching far behind their convent, a beautiful garden, which they tended themselves with great industry. They also have a school for girls, where a speciality is made of fine needlework and embroidery.
The largest and the most important church in Noya is that of San Martin, which dates from the year 1434, and was built by Archbishop Lopez de Mendoza. This edifice has been singled out by Señor Lamperez as a fine and typical example of Galicia’s popular style of architecture, a style which, dominated by laws dictated by local common sense, abandoned the exotic styles which had preceded it, and boldly adopted both the traditions and the materials that were to be found on the spot. This popular architecture was divided into two branches, under the first of which may be classed the parish churches, and under the second those attached to the monasteries—the conventual churches;[239] these are two distinct types, but they have one characteristic in common, namely, the wooden roof, the kind best suited to the conditions