While speaking of these doors, we should remember that Moorish craftsmen were employed to decorate or to repair the mosque of Cordova long after it had been converted to the worship of the Christians. When he was acting as viceroy in the year 1275, the Infante Don Fernando confirmed a letter of his father, King Alfonso, remitting tolls and taxes that would otherwise be leviable upon four Moors who worked in the cathedral. The Infante's confirmation, after recording that “one (of the four Moors) is dead and the other blind, in such wise that he can work no more,” consents to the engagement of another two, Famet and Zahec by name, to fill their places, and who also are hereby exempted from the payment of all dues. Five years afterwards this privilege was reconfirmed by King Alfonso, and we are further told on this occasion that two of the Moorish four were albañís, or masons, and the others añaiares, or carpenters. As time progressed, the situation of the vanquished and humiliated Mussulmans grew more irksome. On October 25th, 1320, the Infante Don Sancho, who had usurped the throne, proclaimed, in ratification of a letter issued by his father, that all the Moorish carpenters, masons, sawyers, and other workmen and artificers of Cordova must work in the cathedral (presumably without a wage) for two days in every year.[94]
BRONZE CRUCIFIX
(12th Century)
In the latter half of the sixteenth century, Bartolomé Morel, a Sevillano, produced some notable work in bronze.[95] Three objects by his hand—namely, the choir lectern and the tenebrarium of Seville cathedral, and the weathercock or Giraldillo which crowns the celebrated tower of the same enormous temple—are specially distinguished for their vigour and effectiveness.
The least important of these objects is the choir lectern, for which Morel was paid six hundred ducats. The decoration is of statuettes and rilievi, well designed and better executed. The tenebrarium, aptly defined by Amador as “an article of church furniture intended to make a show of light,”[96] is more ambitious and original. “It was designed and made by Morel in the year 1562. Juan Giralte, a native of Flanders, and Juan Bautista Vazquez helped him to make the statues at the head of this candelabrum, and Pedro Delgado, another noted sculptor of Seville, worked at the foot of it. It is eight and a half yards high, and the triangular head is three yards across. Upon this upper part are fifteen statues, representing the Saviour, the apostles, and two other disciples or evangelists. In the vacant space of the triangle is a circle adorned with leaves, and in the centre of this circle is a bust of the Virgin in relief, and, lower down, the figure of a king. All of this part is of bronzed wood, and rests upon four small bronze columns. The remainder of the candelabrum is all of this material, and the small columns are supported by four caryatides, resting upon an order of noble design decorated with lions' heads, scrolls, pendants, and other ornamentation, the whole resting upon a graceful border enriched with harpies.”
THE PUERTA DEL PERDÓN
(Seville Cathedral)
This description of the Seville tenebrarium is translated from Cean Bermudez, and is the one most commonly quoted, though Amador complains that it is not precise, and fails to dwell upon the symbolism of this mighty mass of bronze.[97] Thus, what Cean affirms to be the bust of a king is declared by Amador to be the head of a pope, probably Saint Gregory the Great. Metal, as Cean remarks, is not employed throughout. In order to preserve its balance, the upper part of the tenebrarium, containing the triangle which is said by some to symbolize “the divinity of Jesus as God the triple and the one,” is merely wood bronzed over. Amador adds that the foot and stem are intended to represent “the people of Israel in their perfidy and ingratitude.” He also says that the statue in the centre of the triangle is that of Faith, and that which crowns the entire tenebrarium, of the Virgin Mary.