A double interest is attached to the little church between the Puerta del Sol and the Puerta Bisagra, the Cristo de la Luz. It remains still a perfect mosque, where to-day a Mohammedan might pray and proclaim Allah the only God and Mohammed his prophet, and here the conquering Castillian, entering the city, stopped and ordered mass to be said, hanging up his shield upon the wall in memory of the first mass celebrated after the defeat of the Moors, 1035. There are traces of anterior occupation in Visi-Gothic days, and nothing more quaint, more curious, exists in Toledo. Legends are naturally attached to it. In the time of Atanagildo, there hung over the door a crucifix much venerated by the Toledanos, and it entered the minds of two foolish Jews, Sacao and Abisain, to outrage it. They pricked a lancet hole in the side, and instantly blood gushed forth. In consternation they carried off the cross to hide it in their dwelling, and the Christians, hunting everywhere for their stolen crucifix, traced it by the blood-marks to the house of these stupid Jews. The Jews were torn to pieces, of course, and a solemn procession led back the insulted image to its revered spot. Then the incorrigible Jews, to avenge the deaths of Sacao and Abisain, are said to have poisoned the feet of the statue, so that the Christians prompted to kiss them should be destroyed. A woman knelt to perform this pious action, when to her surprise and terror, the statue withdrew its foot from her kiss. The name Christ of the light comes from Moorish days. When the Moors took Toledo, the sacred image was hidden by an outer wall, with space enough to permit of a burning lamp being placed before it. This lamp, unreplenished, burnt the entire 370 years of Moorish dominion, and was discovered still aflame on May 25th, when Alonso VI. entered the town. Passing the hidden spot as he rode along the Valmardones, the king’s horse suddenly knelt, some say; some say it was the Cid’s. A warrior’s horse that performed such an action nowadays would receive the whip. In those days, everyone seems to have been on the look-out for miracles as natural events. The king and the Cid dismounted, the wall was instantly broken down, and discovered the crucifix and the burning lamp fixed in the wall of a Moorish mosque. Mass was said on the spot by the Archbishop Bernardo, and there being no cross above the altar, the king offered his shield, on which a large cross was painted, and there it hangs to-day, a fine martial offering. At that time the church lay beyond the town walls, at the vanished gate of Valmardon, whereas now the town entrance from the Vega begins at the Puerta Bisagra. The architecture is Moorish-Byzantine, quite the oldest and most perfect specimen of Moorish architecture in Spain, and, for that reason, one of the most interesting monuments of the Peninsula. The body of the church is 22 feet by 25, while the outside is 22 by 19 only. The whole building is white-washed, and gives an amazing impression of strength for so limited a space. It looks so small and simple, and yet is so fantastic, of an Oriental art so complete and finished. The six short naves cross each other under nine vaults, and in the middle are four strong low columns with sculptured capitals and twelve heavy horse-shoe arches. The walls above are pierced with arcades cusped in Moorish fashion and supported on shafts, each division crowned with a little vault. The forest of naves and arches of the mosque of Cordova is an enlarged and magnificent reproduction of this Oriental style. Above are smaller semicircular arches, some double resting on smaller pillars. Varied little cupolas complete the design, with the centre inevitable half-orange, and above the central arch is the shield of Don Alfonso (which may or may not be authentic) a white cross on a crimson ground with the inscription below: Esto es el escudo que dejo en esta ermita el Rey Don Alonso VI. cuando ganó à Toledo y se dijo aqui la primera misa. The Cristo de la Luz makes an admirable contrast with the later Arabian work, the more decorative period of the brilliant Morisco Granadian architecture of which it is a foil.
Another notable church is the oldest and most celebrated of Toledo, the basilica of Santa Leocadia, now called the Cristo de la Vega. Before King Sisebuth’s days it was a prætorian temple, and this monarch converted it into a Christian chapel in the sixteenth century. Here prelates and monarchs met to hold the earlier of the famous Councils of Toledo. It is said, I know not if upon authentic fact, that some of the wealth of this ancient church has been carried off to adorn the Cathedral choir, some to the School of Infantry which now oddly desecrates the Hospital of Santa Cruz. As early as the eleventh Council, an abbot of Santa Leocadia was named, which proves its early importance; and consecration for ever came with the apparition of the saint, in the reign of Recesvinthus. Juana le loca carried part of the body of the saint to Flanders, to a monastery in Hainault. The Archbishop of Sevilla paid 1000 ducats to the Flemish monastery for the return of these relics, which, in an explosion of universal joy, occurred in 1583. Philip II. sent troops to Cambrai under Miguel Hernandez, where they were met by a procession of abbesses and holy persons. Letters went between Cardinal Quiroga and Alexander Farnese, Prince of Parma, on the subject, and the matter was almost one of European importance. The relics were said to have been stolen by the Count of Hainault when he came to Spain to
