SEVILLE
SEVILLE, the "Sephela" of the Phœnicians, "Hispalis" of the Romans, and "Ishbilyah" of the Moors, is by far the largest and most interesting city of Southern Spain. In Visigothic times Seville was the capital of the Silingi until Leovigild moved his court to Toledo. It was captured by Julius Cæsar in 45 B.C., but during the Roman occupation was overshadowed by Italica, the birthplace of the Emperors Trajan, Adrian, and Theodosius, and the greatest of Rome's cities in Hispania. This once magnificent place is now a desolate ruin, plundered of its glories and the haunt of gipsies.
Under the Moors, who ruled it for five hundred and thirty-six years, Seville was second only to Cordova, to which city it became subject when Abdurrhaman established the Western Kalifate there in the year 756.
San Ferdinand, King of Leon and Castile, pushed his conquests far south and Seville succumbed to the force of his arms in 1248.
Seville is the most fascinating city in Spain. It is still Moorish in a way. Its houses are built on the Eastern plan with patios, their roofs are flat and many have that charming accessory, the miradore. Its streets are narrow and winding, pushed out from a common centre with no particular plan. It is Andalusian and behind the times. Triana, the gipsy suburb, is full of interest. The Cathedral, though of late and therefore not particularly good Gothic, is, on account of its great size, the most impressive in the whole country. The Alcázar, once more a royal residence, vies with Granada's Alhambra in beauty; and as a mercantile port, sixty miles from the estuary, Seville ranks second to none in Southern Spain.
The Cathedral stands third in point of size if the ground space is alone considered, after St. Peter's at Rome and the Mesquita at Cordova. The proportions of the lofty nave, one hundred feet in height, are so good that it appears really much higher. The columns of the double aisles break up the two hundred and sixty feet of its width and add much to the solemn dignity of the vast interior, enhanced greatly by the height of the vaulting above the spectator. Standing anywhere in the Cathedral I felt that there was a roof above my head, but it seemed lost in space. And this is the great characteristic of Seville's Cathedral, i.e., space.
The coro is railed off from the crossing by a simple iron-gilt reja. The silleria, by Sanchez, Dancart, and Guillier are very fine and took seventy years to execute. Between the coro and Capilla Mayor, in Holy Week the great bronze candlestick, twenty-five feet high, a fine specimen of sixteenth-century work, is placed alight. When the Misere is chanted during service, twelve of its thirteen candles are put out, one by one, indicating the desertion of Christ by his apostles. The thirteenth left burning symbolises the Virgin, faithful to the end. From this single light all the other candles in the Cathedral are lit.