Some Account of Gothic Architecture in Spain

by George Edmund Street

[205] I must mention in this place one very curious collection of relics of the age of the Gothic kings of Spain. This is the marvellous group of votive crowns discovered in 1858 in a place called La Fuente de Guarrazar, in the environs of Toledo, and which were immediately purchased by the Emperor of the French for the Museum of the Hôtel de Cluny. They consist of five or six crowns, with crosses suspended from them, and three smaller crowns without crosses. They are of gold, and made with thin plates of gold stamped with a pattern, and they have gold chains for hanging them up by, and are adorned with an infinity of stones. They have been illustrated in a volume published by M. F. de Lasteyrie, with explanatory text. I cannot do better than quote the conclusions at which he arrives: “(1) The crowns found at Guarrazar are eminently votive crowns. (2) They have never been worn. (3) Their construction belongs probably to the age of Reccesvinthus and the episcopate of S. Ildefonso, who excited so great a devotion to the Blessed Virgin in Spain. (4) One of the crowns was offered by Reccesvinthus (whose name, formed in letters suspended from its edge, occurs on it); possibly the next in size may have been given by the queen, and the rest by their officers. (5) The place from which they came was a chapel called N. Dame des Cormiers. (6) All of the crowns, though found in Spain, appear to belong to an art of the same northern origin as the conquering dynasty which then occupied the throne. They certainly give the idea of an extraordinary skill in the gold-smiths’ art at this early period (circa 650-672), and it is probable that they had been buried where they were found at the time that the Moors entered Toledo as conquerors in A.D. 711.”—See Description du Trésor de Guarrazar, &c., par Ferdinand de Lasteyrie, Paris, 1860. Since this discovery some other crowns have been found in the same neighbourhood, and these are, I believe, preserved at Madrid. They have been described in a short paper in the Proceedings of the Society of Antiquaries, to which I must refer my readers. The crowns preserved at the Hôtel Cluny certainly form one of the greatest attractions in that attractive collection. They are in a singularly perfect state of preservation. Their workmanship is rather rude, and they all appear to be of as nearly as possible the same age and manufacture. There can be no question that M. F. de Lasteyrie is right in saying that they were never worn as crowns; they were designed for suspension before an altar, and most of them have crosses hanging from them. The largest crown—that of Reccesvinthus, is formed of two plates of gold, the inner plate plain, the outer pierced, beaten up, and set with very large stones. The plates of gold in many cases are stamped with a pattern. At the top and bottom of the plate which forms the coronet is a narrow band of cloisonnée gold, the spaces in which seem to have been filled with glass or red-coloured enamel. The largest crown is eight-and-a-half inches in diameter, and has a splendid jewelled cross suspended from its centre, and the name of the king in large Roman letters hung by chains from its lower edge, and formed of cloisonnée gold. When I see such work done in the seventh century, and then look at modern jeweller’s work, I am tempted to think that the much vaunted progress of the world is not always in the right direction. Gold and silver ornaments were exported from Spain to so considerable an extent, that the tiara of the Pope, being richly wrought with precious metal, was called Spanoclista.—Masdeu, Hist. Critica.

[206] “The Christians, in all matters exclusively relating to themselves, were governed by their own laws, administered by their own judges. Their churches and monasteries (rosæ inter spinas) were scattered over the principal towns, and their clergy were allowed to display the costume and celebrate the pompous ceremonial of the Romish religion.”—Prescott, Hist. of Ferdinand and Isabella, vol. i. p. 5.

[207] Sta. Justa (founded in 554), Sta. Eulalia (559), San Sebastian (601), San Marcos (634), San Lucas (641), San Torcuato (700), and Nuestra Señora del Arribal were the churches so granted for the use of the Mozarabic Liturgy. See D. Manuel de Assas, ‘Album Art. de Toledo,’ Art. II., and D. Sisto Ramon Parro, ‘Toledo en la Mano,’ p. 167 et seq.

[208] “The most remarkable buildings which illustrate the Mahomedan architecture in Toledo are the following:—The Mosque, now church of Cristo de la Luz, the Synagogues Sta. Maria la Blanca and El Transito, the church of San Roman—probably once a Mosque or Synagogue—the gateways De Visagra and Del Sol, and one on the Bridge of Alcantara, the Alcazar, the Palace of D. Diego, the Casa de Mesa, the Taller del Moro, the Temple (No. 10, Calle de San Miguel), the College of Saint Catherine, the house No. 17, Calle de las Tornerias, the ruins of the Palace of Villena, those of St. Augustine, of San Ginés, the Baths de la Cava, the Castle of San Servando (or Cervantes), the Palace of Galiena, and finally the Churches of SS. Ursula, Torcuato, Isabel, Marcos, Justo, Juan de la Penitencia, Miguel, Magdalena, Concepcion, Sta. Fé, Santiago, Cristo de la Vega (or Sta. Leocadia), SS. Tomé and Bartolomé.”—D. Manuel de Assas, Album Artist. de Toledo, and Toledo Pintoresca, Don J. Amador de los Rios. There are other remains, and among them a very fine room behind the house, No. 6, Calle la Plata.

[209] Ponz, Viage de España, vol. i. p. 210, gives a view of the considerable remains of a Roman aqueduct. I believe these have now entirely disappeared.

[210] There is a view in Villa Amil’s work of this interior, but the scale of the figures introduced is so much too small as to increase largely the apparent size of the building; otherwise the drawing is fairly correct. The illustration which I give is borrowed from Mr. Fergusson’s ‘Handbook of Architecture,’ and is from a drawing by M. Girault de Prangey.

[211] I find that Archbishop Rodrigo consecrated the church of San Roman on the 20th of June, 1221. See his Historia de Rebus Hispaniæ, in España Sagrada, vol. ii. p. 23.

[212] San Vicente Ferrer is said to have converted more than 4000 Toledan Jews in one day in the year 1407; and in 1413 a vast number were converted in Zaragoza, Calatayud, and elsewhere in the north of Spain. One cannot but fear that coming events in this case cast their shadows before them, and that the Jews had a shrewd suspicion of the coming of the edict of 1492, by which 170,000 Jewish families were ordered to leave the kingdom if they would not be baptized. The establishment of the Inquisition was the necessary consequence of such an edict. See Don J. Amador de los Rios, Estudios sobre los Judios de España, pp. 84, 106, 156.

The illustration which I give of the interior of this synagogue is borrowed from Mr. Fergusson’s ‘Handbook of Architecture.’ The original view is in M. Villa-Amil’s work, and gives a fairly correct representation of the general effect of the building.

[213] Said to have been so called on account of the passing-bell rung at the death of any of the Knights of Calatrava, to which it belonged after A.D. 1492; but more probably owing to its possession of a picture of the Assumption, the church having sometimes been called Nuestra Señora del Transito. It is also called San Benito. See D. Man. de Assas, Alb. Art. de Toledo.