XXVII
CHOIR-STALLS
(San Márcos, León)

Other fittings for a building, wrought in wood by Moorish artists and by these communicated to the Christian-Spaniards, were balustrades and cornices, aleros (decorative bands beneath the eaves of a roof, Plate [xvii].) and zapatas (gargoyle-looking figures, often in human form, used to support a roof or gallery). In the so-called “Patio de las Asas” of the convent of Santa Catalina de Zafra, at Granada, exists an interesting Moorish balustrade[47] that seems almost untouched by time. I reproduce an outline of it as the tailpiece to the present chapter, and am glad to append the little sketch in question, copied from a photograph I took upon the spot three years ago, because it is almost impossible to obtain admission to this convent. Beautiful or uncouth and quaint zapatas may be seen in the Casa de los Tiros at Granada, and in many other places (Plates [xviii]. and [xix].). Much of the Moorish woodwork of the palace of the Alhambra was destroyed by the fire of 1590, but there yet remain the ample cornice and carved alero of the façade of the Cuarto de Comares (Plate [xx].), which is often called in error the Court of the Mezquita. This alero bears the following inscription, allusive to the Sultan Mohammed the Fifth:—“I am the place where the crown is guarded, and on my doors being opened the regions of the west believe the east to be contained within me. Algami Billah charged me to keep guard upon the doorway.”

XXVIII
DETAIL OF CHOIR-STALLS
(León Cathedral)

Other remarkable aleros are in the Generalife and in the Court of Lions of the Alhambra, while, also in this last-named mansion, genuine Moorish woodwork of elaborately inlaid ebony and larch is in two niches near the entrance to the Sala de Embajadores.

SACRED STATUARY, SILLERÍAS OR CHOIR-STALLS, AND RETABLOS

The genius of the wood-carvers of older Spain is manifested chiefly in three groups of objects—sacred statuary, choir-stalls, and retablos. Among this people, and probably by reason of its cheapness, plain, or gilt, or polychrome painted wood has always been a favourite material for the statues of their temples, whether such statues were employed alone, or as an accessory to a larger article of sacred furniture, such as a pulpit, or a sillería, or an altar-screen. So powerful, in fact, has been the vogue of this material here,[48] that even to-day the Spanish people, making, in Symonds' happy phrase, “representation an object in itself, independently of its spiritual significance,” attempt to elevate the most remarkable of their wooden, and by preference their coloured wooden, statuary (typically defended by Pacheco's indigested tome), to rank beside the noblest and the purest monuments of bronze and marble; denoting, by this reckless and uneducated partiality, a positively national misconception of the true domain of art.