The "Lonjas," or Exchanges, of Spain, constitute an important and interesting class of buildings, dating, from mediæval times in the most commercial of the towns on the seaboard, and from the Renaissance period in those of the interior. The term Lonja, originally only implied a "long place" or platform, the sort of spot in a town on which merchants would meet, as on "the flags" at Liverpool. In process of time the Lonjas came to be covered in, and converted into handsome "Exchanges." The earliest structure of this class is, or rather was, at Barcelona. All the fine old building of 1383, Mr. Street tells us, has "been completely destroyed, with the one exception of its grand Hall, which still does service as of old. This consists of three naves, divided by lofty and slender columns, which carry stilted semi-circular arches. The ceiling is flat ... and the dimensions about one hundred feet by seventy-five." The "Casa Lonja" of Valencia, which Mr. Street has also fully illustrated[53] is one of the prettiest of the late Gothic buildings in Spain. It was erected between 1482 and the close of the fifteenth century. The next important Lonja in point of date was the Saragossan of 1551. The last was that of Seville built by Herrera between 1585 and 1598, and certainly one of his best works. It was avowedly built in rivalry with Gresham's Royal Exchange—completed in 1571.
To the interior of the fine building under notice I could not obtain access, and have therefore to trust to Ponz's description of it. "It forms," he says, "a splendid saloon with an internal double gallery of Doric columns and arches, to the number of fifty." Within it are erected an altar to, and statue of, the guardian angel, in fact the building had its Lararium. Ponz mentions, further, many paintings. These appear no longer to exist, since all I could learn by personal inquiry on the spot was that the place, having long been used as a carpenter's shop and warehouse was now absolutely empty and unused. I fear therefore that the "Angelo Custode" has had too much to do, and has broken down under his task.
PLATE LXXXV.
SARAGOSSA.
PATIO OF THE CASA DE COMERCIO.
THIS house, originally a Gothic one, in some of its earliest details, still acknowledges its allegiance to the noble family of the Torrellas, its founders. Their arms, with a lion, and the three little towers which pun heraldically upon their name, as charges, still exist upon a Gothic escutcheon over one of the doorways. The house is locally stated, I know not on what authority, to have been occupied, and altered by a company of Genoese merchants, whence, no doubt, its popular name "de Comercio." It is situated in the Calle de Sant' Jago, and is now the property of the Marquis de Ayerve.
Although retaining the usual Saragossan bracket-capitals and "Anillos," in the shape of quasi bases and dies or pedestals united, the symmetry of the plan and the regularity of the cinque-cento ornament and Arabesque of the panels and pilasters certainly bear out the tradition of the Genoese occupation and alteration of an original mediæval structure early in the sixteenth century.
At that time, and for nearly a couple of centuries afterwards, the bulk of the commercial transactions of Spain were administered by foreigners, principally at first Italians, and subsequently Flemings and Frenchmen. The expulsion of the Moors, the persecutions of the Jews, and the pouring in of American silver opened up a splendid field in Spain, during this period, for the trafficking talents of people endowed with greater activity and commercial genius than the Spaniards themselves possessed. Their function was to despise trade, and use, but detest, the foreigners, whose aptitude for work supplied the wants engendered by one of their besetting sins—laziness. "Ociedad, raiz de los vicios, y sepulchro de las virtudes," as Marcos Obregon exclaims. "En quatro cosas," he continues, "gasta la vida el ocioso, en dormir sin tiempo, en comer sin sagon, en solicitar quietas, en murmurar de todos."[54]