diff options
Diffstat (limited to 'old/44391-8.txt')
| -rw-r--r-- | old/44391-8.txt | 6939 |
1 files changed, 6939 insertions, 0 deletions
diff --git a/old/44391-8.txt b/old/44391-8.txt new file mode 100644 index 0000000..063978b --- /dev/null +++ b/old/44391-8.txt @@ -0,0 +1,6939 @@ +The Project Gutenberg eBook, The Arts and Crafts of Older Spain, Volume I +(of 3), by Leonard Williams + + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + + + + + +Title: The Arts and Crafts of Older Spain, Volume I (of 3) + + +Author: Leonard Williams + + + +Release Date: December 10, 2013 [eBook #44391] + +Language: English + +Character set encoding: ISO-8859-1 + + +***START OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ARTS AND CRAFTS OF OLDER +SPAIN, VOLUME I (OF 3)*** + + +E-text prepared by Chris Curnow, Jens Nordmann, Joseph Cooper, and the +Online Distributed Proofreading Team (http://www.pgdp.net) + + + +Note: Project Gutenberg also has an HTML version of this + file which includes the original illustrations. + See 44391-h.htm or 44391-h.zip: + (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/44391/44391-h/44391-h.htm) + or + (http://www.gutenberg.org/files/44391/44391-h.zip) + + + Project Gutenberg has the other two volumes of this work. + Volume II: see http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/44392 + Volume III: see http://www.gutenberg.org/ebooks/44393 + + +Transcriber's note: + + Text enclosed by underscores is in italics (_italics_). + + The ligature oe is represented by [oe]. + + The signs cross and dagger have been marked as [cross] + and [dagger]. + + A carat character is used to denote superscription. A + single character following the carat is superscripted + (Comp^a). + + + + + +[Illustration: _Frontispiece_ +_REJA_ OF THE CHOIR +(_Seville Cathedral_)] + + +The World of Art Series + +THE ARTS AND CRAFTS OF OLDER SPAIN + +by + +LEONARD WILLIAMS + +Corresponding Member of the Royal Spanish Academy, +of the Royal Spanish Academy of History, and of the +Royal Spanish Academy of Fine Arts; +Author of "The Land of the Dons"; "Toledo and Madrid"; "Granada," etc. + +In Three Volumes, Illustrated + +VOLUME I + + + + + + + +Chicago +A. C. McClurg & Co. +Edinburgh: T. N. Foulis +1908 + +American Edition +Published October 10, 1908 + + + + Dedicated + + BY SPECIAL PERMISSION + TO + THEIR MAJESTIES + KING ALFONSO THE THIRTEENTH + AND + QUEEN VICTORIA OF SPAIN + + + + + PREFACE + + +In preparing these volumes, it has been my aim to give a clear and +fairly complete account of the arts and crafts of older Spain. It seems +to me that there is room for a work of this design and scope, and that +there is no reason why so attractive a subject--or rather, group of +subjects--should be perpetually ignored by persons who travel through, +or who profess to feel an interest in, the country of the Cid and of Don +Quixote. + +My account of Spanish pottery is guarded, and yet I trust acceptable. +The study of this craft in Spain is far from definite, and fresh +researches and discoveries may be hoped for at some future time. The +history of Spanish arms has also suffered from unjust neglect. Perhaps +my sketch of them may slightly compensate for this deficiency. For the +rest, my book, which represents the well-meant assiduity of several +years, shall speak for itself. Although I was embarrassed by too much +material, the illustrations have been chosen with great care, and not, I +think, inadequately. Some of the photographs were taken specially for +this work. For the loan of others, or for kind assistance generally, I +am indebted to Excmo. Señor Don Guillermo J. de Osma, Excmo. Señor Don +José Villegas, and Excmo. Señor Don José Moreno Carbonero; to Señores +Góngora and Valladar, of Granada; and to Messrs Hauser and Menet, and +Mons. Lacoste, of Madrid. + +_August_, 1907. + + + + + CONTENTS OF VOLUME ONE + + + PAGES + + GOLD, SILVER, AND JEWEL WORK 1-119 + + IRON-WORK 120-159 + + BRONZES 160-191 + + ARMS 192-289 + + + + + LIST OF ILLUSTRATIONS + + _VOLUME ONE_ + + + GOLD AND SILVER + + PLATE PAGE + + _Reja_ of the Choir; Seville Cathedral _Frontispiece_ + + I. Treasure of Guarrazar; Royal Armoury, Madrid 22 + + II. The Cross of Angels; Oviedo Cathedral 36 + + III. The Cross of Victory; Oviedo Cathedral 43 + + IV. Moorish Casket; Gerona Cathedral 46 + + V. Altar-Front in enamelled Bronze; Museum of Burgos 50 + + VI. "The Crucifix of the Cid"; Salamanca Cathedral 52 + + VII. The "Virgen de la Vega"; San Esteban, Salamanca 54 + + VIII. Saint James in Pilgrim's Dress; Santiago Cathedral 57 + + IX. Mudejar Triptych; Royal Academy of History, Madrid 60 + + X. The "Tablas Alfonsinas"; Seville Cathedral 62 + + XI. "The Cup of Saint Ferdinand"; Seville Cathedral 64 + + XII. Ship; Zaragoza Cathedral 65 + + XIII. Moorish Bracelets 77 + + XIV. Morisco Jewellery 83 + + XV. Silver-Gilt Processional Cross 85 + + XVI. Gothic _Custodia_ 95 + + XVII. The _Custodia_ of Seville Cathedral 100 + + XVIII. Early Chalice and Cross in Filigree Gold 114 + + + IRON-WORK + + XIX. Old Keys; Seville Cathedral 131 + + XIXA. Decorative Nail-Heads; Convent of San Antonio, Toledo 134 + + XX. Door-Knockers 136 + + XXI. Ceremonial Maces and Lantern 138 + + XXII. Iron Pulpit; Avila Cathedral 140 + + XXIII. _Reja_ of Chapel Royal; Granada Cathedral 148 + + XXIV. The same (View from Interior) 149 + + XXV. _Reja_; Casa de Pilatos, Seville 155 + + XXVI. _Reja_ of the "Casa de las Conchas," Salamanca 156 + + + BRONZES + + XXVII. "Meleager's Hunt" 164 + + XXVIII. A _Candil_ 166 + + XXIX. A _Velón_ 168 + + XXX. Bronze Lion 171 + + XXXI. Bronze Stag; Museum of Cordova 173 + + XXXII. Bronze Temple; Museum of Granada 174 + + XXXIII. Moorish Lamp and Mortar; Museum of Granada 176 + + XXXIV. Lamp of Mohammed the Third; Madrid Museum 178 + + XXXV. Abbot Samson's Bell; Museum of Cordova 180 + + XXXVI. Bronze Crucifix 182 + + XXXVII. The Puerta del Perdón; Seville Cathedral 184 + + XXXVIII. The Weathercock of the Giralda Tower 186 + + + ARMS + + XXXIX. Crest of Jousting Helmet; Royal Armoury, Madrid 198 + + XL. Spanish Crossbowman; Royal Armoury, Madrid 202 + + XLI. The Battle of La Higueruela; El Escorial 206 + + XLII. Parade Harness of Philip the Third; Royal Armoury, + Madrid 210 + + XLIII. Moorish Crossbow and Stirrup; Museum of Granada 214 + + XLIV. Moorish Sword; Casa de los Tiros, Granada 218 + + XLV. Sword of Boabdil el Chico; Museum of Artillery, Madrid 222 + + XLVI. Dagger of Boabdil el Chico; Museum of Artillery, Madrid 226 + + XLVII. Moorish Sword 230 + + XLVIII. War Harness of Charles the Fifth; Royal Armoury, Madrid 234 + + XLIX. Jousting Harness of Charles the Fifth; Royal Armoury, + Madrid 238 + + L. Jousting Harness of Philip the Handsome; Royal Armoury, + Madrid 242 + + LI. Moorish Buckler; Royal Armoury, Madrid 246 + + LII. Armour made at Pamplona; Royal Armoury, Madrid 250 + + LIII. _Adarga_; Royal Armoury, Madrid 254 + + LIV. Spanish Swords; Royal Armoury, Madrid 258 + + LV. Spanish Sword; Royal Armoury, Madrid 262 + + LVI. Spanish Sword 266 + + LVII. Spanish Swords; Royal Armoury, Madrid 270 + + LVIII. Sword Marks 272 + + LIX. _Bridona_ Saddle; Royal Armoury, Madrid 274 + + LX. Hanging _Jaeces_ for Horses 278 + + LXI. Travelling Litter attributed to Charles the Fifth; Royal + Armoury, Madrid 282 + + + + + GOLD, SILVER, AND JEWEL WORK + + +The hyperbolic language of the ancients spoke of Spain as filled +throughout, upon her surface and beneath her soil, with precious stones +and precious metals. Old writers--Strabo, Pliny, Aristoteles, Pomponius +Mela, and Diodorus Siculus--declare that once upon a time a mountain +fire, lighted by shepherds in the Pyrenees and fanned into a +conflagration by the wind, heated the earth until the ore within her +entrails came bubbling to the top and ran away in rivulets of molten +gold and silver, spreading all over Spain. The indigens of Lusitania as +they dug their fields were said to strike their implements on nuggets +half a pound in weight. The heart of the Peninsula, between the B[oe]tis +and the Annas rivers--that is, the country of the Oretani and the +Bastitani--was fabled to abound in mines of gold. The traders from +Ph[oe]nicia, we are told, discovered silver to be so abundant with the +Turdetani that "the vilest utensils of this people were composed +thereof, even to their barrels and their pots." Accordingly these shrewd +Ph[oe]nicians, offering worthless trinkets in exchange, loaded their +ships with silver to the water's edge, and even, when their cargo was +complete, fashioned their chains and anchors of the residue. + +In spite of their extravagance, upon the whole these legends are not +utterly devoid of truth. "Tradition," said so careful an authority as +Symonds, "when not positively disproved should be allowed to have its +full value; and a sounder historic sense is exercised in adopting its +testimony with due caution, than in recklessly rejecting it and +substituting guesses which the lack of knowledge renders insubstantial." +So with the legends of the gold and silver treasure of the old-time +Spaniards. Besides, it seems unquestionable that those fanciful +assertions had their origin in fact. Spain stood upon the western border +of the ancient world. Year in, year out, the sanguine sun went seething +down into the waters at her western marge. Mariners from distant +countries viewed those sunsets and associated them with Spain herself. +Thus, hereabouts in the unclouded south, would gold and silver be +suggested by the solar orb; or emerald and jacinth, pearl and amethyst +and ruby, by the matchless colours of the seldom-failing sunset. + +Then, too, though not of course in fabulous amount, the precious metals +actually existed in this land. Various of her rivers, such as the Calom +or Darro of Granada, the Tagus, the Agneda, and the Sil, rolled down, +together with their current, grains of gold. "Les Mores," wrote Bertaut +de Rouen of the first of these rivers, "en tiroient beaucoup autrefois; +mais cela a esté discontinué depuis à cause de la trop grande dépense +qu'il y faloit faire. Il est certain que souvent on prend dans le Darro +de petits morceaux d'or, et il y a des gens qui sont accoûtumez d'y en +chercher." + +Centuries before this abbot wrote his book, the Arab author of the +geographical dictionary known as the _Marasid Ithila_ had made a similar +remark upon this gold-producing stream; and in the sixteenth century I +find an Ordinance of Granada city prohibiting the townspeople from +digging up the river-bed unless it were to look for gold.[1] Probably, +however, and in spite of what some chroniclers suppose, the title Darro +is not in any way connected with the Latin words _dat aurum_. + + [1] _Ordenanza de la Limpieza_ (1537), Tit. 9: "We command that nobody + remove sand from the aforesaid river Darro unless to extract gold, + in which case he shall fill up the holes he made, or pay a fine of + fifty _maravedis_ for damaging the watercourses that enter this + city and the buildings of the Alhambra." + +"Two leagues from Guadarrama," wrote the mineralogist William Bowles, +about the middle of the eighteenth century, "opposite the town and in +the direction of San Ildefonso, is a deep valley where one notices a +vein of common quartz containing some iron. Here, without the use of +glasses, I perceived a good many grains of gold.... In Galicia grains of +gold are found on sandy hills, and one is astonished to observe the +wonderful works carried out by the Romans to bring the sands together, +wash them, and extract the precious metal. Local tradition affirms that +this precious sand was destined for the purses of three Roman +empresses--Livia, Agrippina, and Faustina.... I know a German minister +who employed his spare time in washing these sands and collecting the +gold." + +The Romans, it is true, profited very greatly by the native wealth of +the Peninsula. Helvius enriched the treasury with 14,732 pounds of +Spanish silver bars and 17,023 pounds of silver money; Cornelius +Lentulus, with 1515 pounds of gold, 20,000 pounds of bar-silver, and +34,550 pounds in coin. Cato came back from his pro-consulship with +five-and-twenty thousand pounds of silver bars, twelve thousand pounds +of silver money, and four hundred pounds of gold. Seventy thousand +pounds of coined silver fell to the share of Flaccus, while Minutius +exhibited at his triumph eight thousand pounds of silver bars, and three +hundred thousand pounds of silver coin. + +Mines of silver,[2] gold, and precious stones were also fairly numerous +in Spain. Moorish authors wrote enthusiastically of the mines of +precious metals in or close to the Sierra Nevada. "Even at this day," +said Bowles, "the Moorish mines may be distinguished from the Roman. The +Romans made the towers of their fortresses of a round shape, in order to +avoid as far as possible the blows of the battering-ram; and their +miners, whether from habit or intentionally, made the mouths of their +mines round also. The Moors, as strangers to this engine, built their +towers square and gave a square shape also to the mouths of their +mines. The round mouths of Roman mines are yet to be seen at Riotinto +and other places, and the square mouths of Moorish mines in the +neighbourhood of Linares." + + [2] "I am not aware of any Spanish mine containing silver in a state of + absolute purity; though some, I think, would be discovered if they + were searched for."--Bowles: _Historia Natural de España_. + +Emeralds were formerly extracted from a mine at Moron, in the Sierra de +Leyta; white sapphires and agates at Cape de Gata,[3] at the eastern +extremity of the Gulf of Almeria; amethysts at Monte de las Guardas, +near the port of Plata, "in a precipice (_sic_) about twenty feet in +depth." According to Laborde, garnets have been discovered down to +modern times "in a plain half-way on the road from Almeria to Motril. +They are very abundant there, particularly in the bed of a ravine, +formed by rain-torrents, at the foot of a little hill, upon which a +great number of them are likewise found. The emeralds are in the kingdom +of Seville, all the others in that of Granada. It has been said for some +time that a pit in the mountain of Bujo, at Cape de Gata, contains a +great many precious stones; but none could be found there, +notwithstanding the prolonged and careful searches that were lately +made." + + [3] Possibly, as Bowles suggests, for Cabo de Agata--"Agate Cape." "It + would not be strange," he adds, "if diamonds were found at this + cape, since there are signs of their presence. I found white + sapphires, slightly clouded, together with cornelians, jaspers, + agates, and garnets." + +Silver mines exist, or have existed, at Benasque, Calzena, and Bielza, +in Aragon; at Cuevas, near Almeria; at Almodovar del Campo; at Zalamea, +in Extremadura; at Puerto Blanco, in Seville province; in the Sierra de +Guadalupe; at Fuente de la Mina, near Constantina; and near Almazarron, +in the province of Carthagena. Not far from this latter city was another +mine, that sent to Rome a daily yield of five-and-twenty thousand +drachmas, and was worked by forty thousand men. Twenty thousand pounds +in weight of pure silver proceeded yearly from Asturias, Lusitania, and +Galicia. Hannibal extracted from a Pyrenean mine three hundred pounds a +day. The fair Himilca, wife of Hasdrubal, was owner of a silver mine at +two leagues' distance from Linares. Laborde wrote of this mine: "It was +reopened in the seventeenth century, when a vein five feet in breadth +was found, from which many pieces of silver were taken; the working of +it, however, has been neglected. It belongs to the town of Baeza." + +The same author, who wrote about one hundred years ago, gives curious +and instructive notices of several other Spanish silver mines. "The +mountains of the kingdom of Seville, on the confines of Extremadura, +towards Guadalcanal, Alanis, Puerto Blanco, and Cazalla, which form a +part of the extremity of the chain of Sierra Morena, contain several +silver mines, which have been worked. There is one of these in the +Sierra Morena, three miles from Guadalcanal, which to all appearance +must have been very rich: there were three shafts for descending, the +mouths of which are still to be seen: it was worked in the seventeenth +century, and given up in 1653. It is believed that it was inundated by +the workmen, in revenge for a new tax that was laid upon them. Another +silver mine was also worked formerly, a league and a half from the +other; it has a shaft, and a gallery of ancient construction; the vein +is six feet in circumference, and is composed of spar and quartz. There +is also a third mine, a league and a half from Guadalcanal, and half a +league south-east of the village of Alanis, in the middle of a field; it +is two feet wide; the Romans constructed a gallery in it, from south to +north; a branch of it running eastward has been worked since their time: +it originally contained pyrites and quartz, but it is by no means rich; +there is lead at the bottom." + +Gold mines, or traces of them, have been found in the neighbourhood of +Molina in Aragon, San Ildefonso in Old Castile, and Alocer in +Extremadura; in the Sierra de Leyta; in the valley of Hecho in Aragon; +and at Paradeseca and Ponferrada--this latter town the _Interamnium +Flavium_ of the Romans. + +It is said that the chieftains of the ancient Spaniards adorned their +robes with rude embroidery worked in gold, and that the men and women of +all ranks wore gold and silver bracelets. These statements cannot now be +either proved or controverted. Gold or silver objects older than the +Roman domination have not been found abundantly in Spain. Riaño +describes a silver bowl, conical in shape and evidently fashioned on the +wheel, engraved with Iberian characters on one of its sides. A similar +bowl was found in Andalusia in the seventeenth century, full of Iberian +coins and weighing ten ounces. Gold ornaments, such as earrings, and +_torques_ or collars for the neck, have been discovered in Galicia less +infrequently than in the other Spanish regions, and may be seen to-day +in private collections, in the Royal Academy of History at Madrid, and +in the National Museum of Archæology.[4] Villa-amil y Castro has written +fully of these _torques_ (Museo Español de Antigüedades, _Adornos de oro +encontrados en Galicia_). In nearly every case, he says, they consist of +a plain gold bar, C-shaped and therefore not completely closed into a +ring, and with a knob at each extremity, as though their pattern were +suggested by the yoke of cattle. One or two are decorated with a +somewhat rude design extending through a portion of their length. + + [4] A fresh find of _torques_ and _fibulæ_ has occurred in the spring + of this year at La Moureta, near Ferrol. + +On one of these occasions a pair of curious, kidney-shaped earrings was +found, together with a _torque_. These earrings, apparently of later +workmanship than the other ornament, are decorated over all their +surface, partly with a filigree design, and partly with a fine, beadlike +pattern executed with a small chisel or graving tool in the manner known +in French as _fusé_, _guilloché_, or _hachié_. Their material is hollow +gold, and when discovered they were filled with a substance resembling +powdered charcoal, mixed with a metallic clay. + +These ornaments are ascribed by most authorities to an undetermined +period somewhere previous to the Roman domination. I think, however, +that less improbably they were produced by Spanish craftsmen in +imitation of the Roman manner, and during the time of Roman rule in the +Peninsula. This would account for their deficiencies of execution, and +also for certain characteristics which they evidently share with Roman +work. + +We know that Rome imposed her usages on all the peoples whom she +subjugated. Consequently, following this universal law, the Spaniards +would adopt, together with the lavish luxury of Rome, the Roman +ornaments and articles of jewellery. Such were the _annulus_ or +finger-ring; the _fibula_, a brooch or clasp for securing the cloak; the +_torques_ or neck-ring, more or less resembling those in use among the +Persians; and the _phalera_, a round plate of gold, silver, or other +metal, engraved with any one of a variety of emblems, worn upon the +breast or stomach by the persons of either sex, and very commonly +bestowed upon the Roman soldiers in reward of military service. Then +there were several kinds of earrings--the variously-designed +_stalagmium_ or pendant, the _inaures_, or the _crotalium_, hung with +pearls that brushed together as their wearer walked, and gratified her +vanity by their rustling; and also several kinds of bracelets--the gold +or bronze _armilla_, principally worn by men; the _periscelis_, the +_spathalium_, and the _dextrale_, worn round the fleshy part of the +right arm.[5] + + [5] These ornaments were retained in use by the Visigoths, and find + their due description in the _Etymologies_ of Saint Isidore; + _e.g._:-- + + "_Inaures_ ab aurium foraminibus nuncupatae, quibus pretiosa genera + lapidum dependuntur." + + "_Tourques_ sunt circuli aurei a collo ad pectus usque dependentes. + Torques autem et bullae a viris geruntur; a foeminis vero monilia et + catellae." + + "_Fibulæ_ sunt quibus pectus foeminarum ornatur, vel pallium tenetur: + viris in humeris, seu cingulum in lumbris." + +Discoveries of Roman jewellery and gold and silver work have occurred +from time to time in the Peninsula; for example, at Espinosa de Henares +and (in 1840) near Atarfe, on the southern side of the volcanic-looking +Sierra Elvira, a few miles from Granada. Riaño describes a Roman silver +dish found in a stone quarry at Otañez, in the north of Spain. "It +weighs thirty-three ounces, and is covered with an ornamentation of +figures in relief, some of which are gilt, representing an allegorical +subject of the source of medicinal waters. In the upper part is a nymph +who pours water from an urn over rocks; a youth collects it in a +vessel; another gives a cup of it to a sick man; another fills with it a +barrel which is placed in a four-wheeled car to which are yoked two +mules. On each side of the fountain are altars on which sacrifices and +libations are offered. Round it is the inscription: SALVS VMERITANA, and +at the back are engraved, in confused characters, the words: L. P. +CORNELIANI. PIII...." + +The same author is of opinion that in the time of the Romans "objects of +all kinds in gold and silver were used in Spain to a very great extent, +for, notwithstanding the destruction of ages, we still possess +inscriptions which allude to silver statues, and a large number of +objects in the precious metals exist in museums and private +collections." Doubtless, in the case of articles and household utensils +of smaller size--bowls, dishes, and the like, or ornaments for the +person--the precious metals were made use of freely; but when we hear of +mighty objects as also made of silver, _e.g._ principal portions of a +building, we might do well to bear in mind a couple of old columns that +were standing once not far from Cadiz, on a spot where in the days +preceding history a temple sacred to the Spanish Hercules is rumoured +to have been. Philostratus affirmed these columns to be wrought of solid +gold and silver, mixed together yet in themselves without alloy. Strabo +reduced them modestly to brass; but it was reserved for a curious +Frenchman, the Père Labat, who travelled in Spain in 1705, to warn us +what they really were. "Elles sont sur cette langue de terre, qui joint +l'Isle de Léon à celle de Cadix; car il faut se souvenir que c'est ainsi +qu'on appelle la partie Orientale, et la partie Occidentale de la même +Isle. Il y a environ une lieue de la porte de Terre à ces vénérables +restes de l'antiquité. Nous nous en approchames, croyant justifier les +contes que les Espagnols en débitent. Mais nous fûmes étrangement +surpris de ne pas rencontrer la moindre chose qui pût nous faire +seulement soupçonner qu'elles fussent d'une antiquité un peu +considérable. Nous vimes que ces deux tours rondes, qui n'ont à présent +qu'environ vingt pieds de hauteur sur douze à quinze pieds de diamètre, +étoient d'une maçonnerie fort commune. Leurs portes étoient bouchées, et +nous convinmes tous qu'elles avoient été dans leur jeune tems des +moulins à vent qu'on avoit abandonnés; il n'y a ni inscriptions, ni +bas-reliefs, ni reste de figures quelconques. En un mot, rien qui +méritât notre attention, ni qui recompensât la moindre partie de la +peine que nous avions prise pour les aller voir de près. Car je les +avois vue plus d'une fois du grand chemin, où j'avois passé, et je +devois me contenter. Mais que ne fait-on pas quand on est curieux, et +aussi des[oe]uvré que je l'étois alors." + +Many of the usages of Roman Spain descended to the Visigoths. The jewels +of this people manifest the double influence of Rome and of Byzantium, +and the latter influenced in its turn from Eastern sources. We learn +from that extraordinary encyclopædia of early mediæval Spanish lore--the +_Etymologies_ of Isidore of Beja--that the Visigothic women decked +themselves with earrings, necklaces, and bracelets, set with precious +stones of fabulous price. Leovigild is stated by the same writer to have +been the first of the Visigothic princes to use the insignia of royalty. +One of his coins (engraved in Florez) represents him with an imperial +crown surmounted by a cross resembling that of the Byzantines. Coins of +a similar design, and also bearing the imperial crown, were minted at +Toledo, Cordova, or Merida, in the reigns of Chindaswint, Wamba, +Ervigius, and Egica. + +But the true fountain-head of all our modern knowledge respecting the +jewellery of Visigothic Spain is in the wonderful crosses, crowns, and +other ornaments discovered in 1858 upon the site of some old Christian +temple, two leagues distant from Toledo. These objects, known +collectively as "the treasure of Guarrazar," were stumbled on by certain +peasants after a heavy storm had washed away a quantity of earth. Some +were destroyed upon the spot; others were sold to the Toledo +silversmiths and melted down by these barbarians of our day; but +fortunately the greater part remained intact, or very nearly so. There +were in all, composed exclusively of gold and precious stones, eleven +crowns, two crosses containing legible inscriptions, fragments such as +the arms of a processional cross, and many single stones which time had +doubtless separated from the crosses or the crowns.[6] + + [6] There is also in the Archæological Museum at Madrid a small + collection of what has been described as Visigothic jewellery, + consisting of a handsome _phalera_, necklaces, finger-rings, and + earrings. Most of these objects were found at Elche in 1776. The + _Museo Español de Antigüedades_ published a full description by + Florencio Janer. Their interest is by no means as great as that of + the treasure of Guarrazar, nor is the date of their production + definitely ascertained. From various details I suspect that many + of them may be purely Roman. + +Part of this treasure passed in some mysterious way to France, and is +now in the Cluny Museum at Paris. The rest is in the Royal Armoury at +Madrid. Paris can boast possession of nine of the crowns; Madrid, of +two, together with a fragment of a third--this latter of a balustrade or +basket pattern. Five of the nine crowns preserved at Paris are fashioned +of simple hoops of gold. The most important of the five, the crown of +Recceswinth, who ruled in Spain from 650 to 672 A.D., consists of two +hinged semicircles of hollow gold, about a finger's-breadth across the +interspace. It measures just over eight inches in diameter and four +inches in depth. Both the upper and the lower rims are decorated to the +depth of nearly half an inch with a design of four-pointed floral or +semi-floral figures within minute circles. Amador de los Ríos has +recognized this same design in the frieze of certain buildings at +Toledo, and in the edges of mosaic discovered at Italica and Lugo, as +well as in the Balearic Islands. The interstices of this design upon the +crown are filled with a kind of red enamel or glaze, the true nature of +which has not been definitely ascertained. Riaño calls it "a delicate +ornamentation of _cloisonné_ work, which encloses a substance resembling +red glass." The centre of the crown is filled with three rows of large +stones, principally pearls and sapphires. There are also several onyxes, +a stone which in those days was held in great esteem. The spaces between +the rows of stones are ornamented with a somewhat rudimentary design of +palm branches, the leaves of which appear to have been filled or +outlined with the kind of red enamel I have spoken of. + +This crown is suspended by four gold chains containing each of them five +leaf-shaped links, _percées à jour_. The chains unite at a gold rosette +in the form of a double lily, terminated by a stoutish capital of +rock-crystal. This in its turn is capped by another piece of crystal +holding the final stem of gold which served as a hook for hanging up the +crown. Suspended from the gold rosette by a long chain is a handsome +cross, undoubtedly of more elaborate workmanship, studded with union +pearls and monster sapphires. Amador believed this ornament to be a +brooch. If this were so it is, of course, improperly appended here. +Twenty-four gold chains hang from the lower border of the crown, +concluding in pyriform sapphires of large size. Each sapphire is +surmounted by a small, square frame of gold containing coloured glass, +and above this, in each of three-and-twenty of the chains, is one of +the golden letters forming the inscription, [cross] RECCESVINTHVS REX +OFFERET. + +Besides this crown there are at Paris-- + +(1) A similar though slighter crown, the body of which is studded with +fifty-four magnificent stones. A cross, now kept apart in the same +collection, is thought by Spanish experts to have once been pendent from +the crown. If so, the latter was perhaps presented to the sanctuary by +one Sonnica, probably a Visigothic magnate, and not a woman, as the +termination of the name induced some foreign antiquaries to suppose. The +cross is thus inscribed:-- + _ + IN DI + NOM + INE + OFFERET ___ SONNICA + SCE + MA + RIE + INS + ORBA + CES[7] + + [7] The last word is commonly believed to be the name of a + place--_Sorbaces_. There has been much discussion as to its + meaning. + +(2) Three crowns of plain design consisting of hoops of gold with +primitive _repoussé_ decoration, and, in the case of one, with precious +stones. + +(3) Four crowns, each with a pendent cross. The pattern is a basket-work +or set of balustrades of thin gold hollow plates (not, as Riaño stated, +massive) with precious stones about the intersections of the bars or +meshes, and others hanging from the lower rim. Three of these crowns +have three rows or tiers of what I call the balustrade; the other crown +has four. + +The custom of offering votive crowns to Christian temples was taken by +the emperors of Constantinople from heathen peoples of the eastern +world. In Spain this custom, introduced by Recared, outlived by many +years the ruin of the Visigothic monarchy--survived, in fact, until the +twelfth and thirteenth centuries. Thus in 891 Alfonso the Third +presented to the monastery of San Adrian and Santa Natalia four crowns +of gold and three of silver, while just a hundred years afterwards +Ordoño the Second presented three silver crowns to the monastery of +Samos. Other crowns were offered by the prelates and the secular +nobility. + +Returning to the crowns of Guarrazar, there has been great controversy +as to whether these were worn upon the head. Some experts think they +must have been so worn; and in this case the rings upon the rim, through +which the chains are passed, would seem to have been added on the +presentation of these objects to the sanctuary. Lasteyrie, on the other +hand, considered that the crowns were merely votive and were never meant +for personal use, arguing that the rings were fixed about the border +from the very moment when the crowns were made;[8] but Amador +ingeniously replied to this by pointing out that in a few of the old +Castilian coins--for instance, one of Sancho the Third--the crown, with +rings about its rim, is actually upon the monarch's head. It is +possible, adds the same authority, that these were old votive crowns +proceeding from some church, although he thinks it still more likely +that they were fashioned with the rings attached to them. We should +remember, too, the hinge which serves to open and close the body of +these crowns. It is difficult to guess the purpose of this hinge, unless +it were to fit the crown more comfortably on the head. + + [8] _Description du trésor de Guarrazar_. + +Of that portion of the treasure of Guarrazar which has remained at +Madrid (Plate i.), the most important object is the votive crown of King +Swinthila, son of Recared, and described as "one of the most illustrious +and unlucky princes that ever occupied the throne of Atawulf." This +crown measures nine inches in diameter by two and a half in height. It +consists of thin gold plates united at the edge, leaving, between the +inner and the outer side, a hollow space about a quarter of an inch +across. The exterior is divided into a central horizontal hoop or band +between two others, somewhat narrower, at the top and bottom, these last +being slightly raised above the level of the third. A triple row of +precious stones, amounting to one hundred and twenty-five pearls and +sapphires in the entire crown, surrounds the outer surface of the same, +the central band or zone of which contains besides, wrought in +_repoussé_ on the hoop, a simple circular device wherein each centre is +a sapphire or a pearl, though many of these have fallen from their +setting. The spaces which describe these circles are superposed on what +looks like a red enamel retaining at this moment all or nearly all its +pristine brightness of twelve hundred years ago. This substance was +believed by French investigators to be a coloured glass or paste,[9] +but Amador, after protracted chemical experiments, declared it to be +layers of cornelian. Some of these layers have fallen from their grip, +and if the crown be stirred are heard to move within. It is worth +remarking, too, that the fillets which form the setting of the precious +stones were made apart and welded afterwards; nor are these settings +uniform in shape, but tally in each instance with the outline of the +gem. + + [9] "_Ce que je puis affirmer, après l'examen le plus minutieux, c'est + que la matière qui fait le fond de cette riche ornementation est + réellement du verre._"--Lasteyrie, supported by Sommerard. + + [Illustration: I + TREASURE OF GUARRAZAR + (_Royal Armoury, Madrid_)] + +The chains which served for hanging up the crown are four in number. As +in the crown of Recceswinth, each of them is composed of four _repoussé_ +cinquefoil links adorned along their edge with small gold beads minutely +threaded on a wire and fastened on by fusing. The chains converge into +an ornament shaped like two lilies pointing stem to stem, so that the +lower is inverted, although they are divided by a piece of faceted rock +crystal.[10] Four gems are hung from either lily, and issuing from the +uppermost of these a strong gold hook attaches to the final length of +chain. + + [10] "In Spain," said Bowles (_Hist. Nat. de Esp._, p. 498), "are found + two species of rock crystal. The one, occurring in clusters, are + transparent, six-sided, and always have their source in rocks. + There are great quantities all over the kingdom, and at Madrid + they are found near the hills of San Isidro. The other species are + found singly, and are rounded like a pebble. I have seen them from + the size of a filbert to that of my fist. Some were covered with a + thin, opaque integument.... The river Henares abounds with these + crystals, and as it passes San Fernando, at two leagues' distance + from Madrid, sweeps some of them along which are the size of the + largest ones at Strasburg, though very few are perfect." + +Possibly the chain and cross now hanging through the circuit of the +crown were not originally part of it. This cross is most remarkable. It +has four arms of equal length, gracefully curved, and is wrought of +plates of gold in duplicate, fastened back to back by straps of gold +along the edges. The centre holds a piece of crystal in the midst of +pearls and gold bead work threaded on a wire of the same metal and +attached by fusion. Several fairly large stones are hung from the +lateral and lower arms of the cross by small gold chains. + +The letters hanging from Swinthila's crown are cut and punched from thin +gold plates. Their decoration is a zigzag ornament backed by the same +mysterious crimson substance as the circular devices on the hoop. +Hanging from the letters are pearls, sapphires, and several imitation +stones--particularly imitation emeralds--in paste. + +The cross before the letters points to a custom of that period. We find +it also on Swinthila's coins, and those of other Visigothic kings. Of +the letters themselves twelve have been recovered, thus:-- + + [cross] SV TI NV REX OFF T + +The chains, however, or fragments of them, amount to +twenty-three--precisely (if we count the cross) the number needed to +complete the dedication.[11] + + [11] A veritable cryptogram awaited the decipherers of these legends. + When King Swinthila's crown was brought to light, four of the + letters only were in place, thus:-- + + [cross] ...... I ... V . R .... F .... + + Eight of the others were recovered shortly after; two more, an E + and L, appeared at a later date, and eight continued to be missing. + The inscription dangling from the crown of Recceswinth arrived at + Paris in this eloquent form:-- + + [cross] RRCCEEFEVINSTVSETORHFEX + +The Royal Armoury contains another crown, a great deal smaller and less +ornamented than Swinthila's. The body of this crown, which was presented +by the finder to the late Queen Isabella the Second, is just a hoop of +gold, two inches deep and five across, hinged like the more elaborate +and larger crowns, but merely decorated with a fine gold spiral at the +rims, a zigzag pattern in _repoussé_, and a rudely executed scale-work. +The dedication on this cross is in the centre of the hoop, and says-- + __ + [cross] OFFERET MVNVSCVLVM SCO STEFANO + _ + THEODOSIVS ABBA + +We do not know who Theodosius was, but Amador, judging from the simple +decoration of this crown, believes him to have been a priest of lower +rank, and by no means a dignitary of the Visigothic church. + +A votive cross also forms part of this collection, which has a simple +sunk device along the edges and seven pendent stones, two of these +hanging from each of the lateral arms, and three, a little larger, from +the lower arm. The inscription, which is rough in the extreme, appears +to be the work of some illiterate craftsman, and has been interpreted +with difficulty:-- + __ + IN NOMINE DEI: IN NOMINE SCI OFFERET + LUCETIUS E + +This reading gives an extra letter at the end, which may be construed as +_Episcopus_--or anything else, according to the student's fancy. + +I may close my notice of this collection in the Royal Armoury at Madrid +by drawing attention to a greenish, semi-opaque stone, three-quarters of +an inch in height. It is engraved _en creux_ upon two facets with the +scene of the Annunciation. The gem itself is commonly taken for an +emerald, of which, referring to the glyptic art among the Visigoths, the +learned Isidore remarked that "_Sculpentibus quoque gemmas nulla gratior +oculorum refectio est._" I shall insert a sketch of the cutting on this +stone as a tailpiece to the chapter, and here append a full description. +"The Virgin listens standing to the Archangel Gabriel, who communicates +to her the will of the Almighty. Before her is a jar, from which +projects the stem of a lily, emblematic of the chaste and pure, that +reaches to her breast. Her figure is completely out of measurement. Upon +her head appears to be a _nimbus_ or _amiculum_; her breast is covered +with a broad and folded _fascia_, enveloping her arms, while her tunic, +reaching to the ground, conceals one of her feet. The angel in the +cutting on the stone is at the Virgin's right. His attitude is that of +one who is conveying tidings. Large wings folded upon his shoulders and +extending nearly to the ground are fitted to his form, better drawn and +livelier than the Virgin's. He executes his holy mission with his right +hand lifted. His dress is a tunic in small folds, over which is a cloak +fastened by a brooch and fitting closely. Upon his head he wears a kind +of helmet."[12] + + [12] Amador de los Ríos, _El Arte latino-bizantino en España y las + Coronas Visigodas de Guarrazar_, p. 121. + +The drawing of this design upon the stone is most bizarre and barbarous; +for the Virgin's head is so completely disproportioned that it forms the +one-third part of her entire person. + +The merit of all this Visigothic gem or gold and silver work has been +extolled too highly by the French and Spanish archæologists.[13] It is, +however, greatly interesting. Rudely and ponderously magnificent, it +tells us of a people who as yet were almost wholly strangers to the true +artistic sense. Such were the Visigoths and the Spaniards of the +Visigothic era, of all of whom I have observed elsewhere that "serfdom +was the distinguishing mark of the commons; arrogance, of the nobility; +avarice, and ambition of temporal and political power, of the clergy; +regicide and tumult, of the crown."[14] These crowns of Guarrazar +proclaim to us in plainest language that the volume of the stones, and +showiness and glitter of the precious metal were accorded preference of +every other factor--the _pondus auri_ preference of the _manus +artificis_. We gather, too, from documents and chronicles and popular +tradition, that the Visigothic princes, as they set apart their stores +of treasure in secluded caves or in the strong rooms of their palaces, +were ever captivated and corrupted by the mere intrinsic worth in +opposition to the nobler and æsthetic value of the craftsmanship. + + [13] _E.g._ Sommerard: "_Une collection sans égale de joyaux les plus + précieux qui, par la splendeur de la matière, le mérite de + l'exécution, et plus encore, peut être, par leur origine + incontestable et par leur étonnante conservation, surpassent tout + ce qui possédent d'analogue les collections publiques de l'Europe + et les trésors les plus renommés de l'Italie_." + + [14] _Toledo and Madrid_; p. 16. + +Thus we are told that Sisenand owned a plate of gold (no word is said of +its design or style) five hundred pounds in weight, proceeding from the +royal treasure of his race, and which, long years before, had been +presented by the nobleman Accio to King Turismund. When Sisenand was +conspiring to dethrone Swinthila, he called on Dagobert the king of +France to come to his support, and promised him, as recompense, this +golden plate. The French king lent his help forthwith, and then, as +soon as Turismund was seated on the throne of Spain, despatched an +embassy to bring the coveted vessel to his court. Sisenand fulfilled his +word and placed the envoys in possession of the plate, but since his +subjects, rising in rebellion, wrenched it from their power and kept it +under custody, he compensated Dagobert by a money payment of two hundred +thousand _sueldos_.[15] + + [15] _Ajbar Machmua_. Lafuente y Alcántara's edition; p. 27, note. + +Innumerable narratives and legends dwell upon the treasure taken by the +Moors on entering Spain. Such as relate the battle of the Guadalete, or +the Lake of Janda (as it is also called by some authorities), agree that +when the fatal day was at an end the riderless steed of Roderick was +found imbedded in the mire, wearing a saddle of massive gold adorned +with emeralds and rubies. According to Al-Makkari, that luckless +monarch's boots were also made of gold studded with precious stones, +while the Muslim victors, stripping the Visigothic dead, identified the +nobles by the golden rings upon their fingers, those of a less exalted +rank by their silver rings, and the slaves by their rings of copper. The +widow of the fallen king was also famous for her stores of jewellery. +Her name was Eila or Egilona (Umm-Asim of the Moors), but she was known +besides as "the lady of the beautiful necklaces." After being made a +prisoner she was given in marriage to the young prince Abd-al-Azis, who +grew to love her very greatly, and received from her, "seeing that she +still retained sufficient of her royal wealth," the present of a crown. + +Muza, on returning to the East, is said to have drawn near to Damascus +with a train of thirty waggons full of Spanish silver, gold, and +precious stones. Tarik ben Ziyed, marching in triumph through the land, +secured at Cordova, Amaya, and other towns and capitals, enormous store +of "pearls, arms, dishes, silver, gold, and other jewels in +unprecedented number." One object, in particular, is mentioned with +insistency by nearly all the chronicles, both Mussulman and Christian. +Quoting from the _Pearl of Marvels_ of Ibn Alwardi, this was "the table +which had belonged to God's prophet, Solomon (health be to both of +them). It was of green emeralds, and nothing fairer had been ever seen +before. Its cups were golden and its plates of precious jewels, one of +them specked with black and white." All manner of strange things are +said about this table, though most accounts describe it as consisting of +a _single_ emerald. Perhaps it was of malachite, or of the bright green +serpentine stone extracted formerly as well as nowadays from the +Barranco de San Juan at Granada, and several other spots in Spain. Bayan +Almoghreb says it was of gold mixed with a little silver and surrounded +by three gold rings or collars; the first containing pearls, the second +rubies, and the third emeralds. Al-Makkari describes it as "green, with +its 365 feet and borders of a single emerald." Nor is it known for +certain where this "table" fell into the hands of Tarik. Probably he +found it in the principal Christian temple at Toledo--that is to say, +the Basilica of Santa María. Ibn Alwardi says that in the _aula regia_, +or palace of the Visigothic kings, the lancers of the Moorish general +broke down a certain door, discovering "a matchless quantity of gold and +silver plate," together with the "table." Doubtless this strong room was +the same referred to in the following lines. "It was for ever closed; +and each time that a Christian king began to reign he added to its door +a new and powerful fastening. In this way as many as four and twenty +padlocks were gathered on the door." + +However, the most explicit and informative of all these ancient authors +is Ibn Hayyan, who says; "The table had its origin in the days of +Christian rulers. It was the custom in those times that when a rich man +died he should bequeath a legacy to the churches. Proceeding from the +value of these gifts were fashioned tables, thrones, and other articles +of gold and silver, whereon the clergy bore the volumes of their gospel +when they showed them at their ceremonies. These objects they would also +set upon their altars to invest them with a further splendour by the +ornament thereof. For this cause was the table at Toledo, and the +[Visigothic] monarchs vied with one another in enriching it, each of +them adding somewhat to the offerings of his predecessor, till it +surpassed all other jewels of its kind and grew to be renowned +exceedingly. It was of fine gold studded with emeralds, pearls, and +rubies, in such wise that nothing similar had ever been beheld. So did +the kings endeavour to increase its richness, seeing that this city was +their capital, nor did they wish another to contain more splendid +ornaments or furniture. Thus was the table resting on an altar of the +church, and here the Muslims came upon it, and the fame of its +magnificence spread far abroad." + +Another chronicle affirms that Tarik found the "table" at a city called +Almeida, now perhaps Olmedo. "He reached Toledo, and leaving a +detachment there, advanced to Guadalajara and the [Guadarrama] +mountains. These he crossed by the pass which took his name, and +reached, upon the other side, a city called Almeida or _The Table_, for +there had been discovered the table of Solomon the son of David, and the +feet and borders of it, numbering three hundred and sixty-five, were of +green emerald." + +In any case this venerated jewel gave considerable trouble to its +captors. When envious Muza followed up the march of Tarik, his +lieutenant, he demanded from him all the spoil, and in particular the +ever-famous table. Tarik surrendered this forthwith, but after slyly +wrenching off a leg. Muza perceived the breakage, and inquired for the +missing piece. "I know not," said the other; "'twas thus that I +discovered it." Muza then ordered a new leg of gold to be made for the +table, as well as a box of palm leaves, in which it was deposited. +"This," says Ibn Hayyan, "is known to be one of the reasons why Tarik +worsted Muza in the dispute they had before the Caliph as to their +respective conquests." So it proved. Ibn Abdo-l-Haquem[16] relates that +Muza appeared before the Caliph Al-Walid and produced the table. Tarik +interposed and said that he himself had taken it, and not the other +leader. "Give it into my hands," the Caliph answered, "that I may see if +any piece of it be wanting," and found, indeed, that one of its feet was +different from the rest. "Ask Muza," interrupted Tarik, "for the missing +foot, and if he answer from his heart, then shall his words be truth." +Accordingly Al-Walid inquired for the foot, and Muza made reply that he +had found the table as it now appeared; but Tarik with an air of triumph +drew forth the missing piece which he himself had broken off, and said: +"By this shall the Emir of the Faithful recognize that I am speaking +truth; that I it was who found the table." And thereupon Al-Walid +credited his words and loaded him with gifts. + + [16] _Account of the Conquest of Spain_, published, with an English + translation and notes, by John Harris Jones. London, 1858. + +Comparing the statements of these writers, we may be certain that the +"table" was a kind of desk of Visigothic or, more probably, Byzantine +workmanship, for holding the gospels on the feast-days of the national +church. Probably, too, seeing that a palm-leaf box was strong enough to +keep it in, its size was inconsiderable. Its value, on the statement of +Ibn Abdo-l-Haquem, was two hundred thousand _dinares_. + +The sum of my remarks upon the Visigothic jewel-work is this. +Distinguished by a coarse though costly splendour, we find in it a +mingled Roman and Byzantine source, although it was upon the whole +inferior to these styles, being essentially, as Amador observes, "an +imitative and decadent art." Yet it did not succumb before the Moors, +but lurked for refuge in the small Asturian monarchy, and later, issuing +thence, extended through the kingdom of León into Castile. We find its +clearest characteristics in such objects as the Cross of Angels and the +Cross of Victory. Then, later still, it is affected and regenerated by +the purely oriental art of the invader; and lastly, till the wave of the +Renaissance floods the western world, by Gothic influences from across +the Pyrenees. + +A similar sketch may be applied to other arts and crafts of +Spain--particularly furniture and architecture. + + [Illustration: II + THE CROSS OF ANGELS + _(Oviedo Cathedral)_] + +The pious or superstitious kings and magnates of this land have always +taken pride in adding (at the instigation of the clergy) to the treasure +of her churches and cathedrals. Such gifts include all kinds of +sumptuous apparel for the priesthood; chasubles and dalmatics heavily +embroidered with the precious metals, gold or silver crowns and crosses, +paxes,[17] chalices and patines, paraments and baldaquinos, reliquaries +in every shape and style and size, and figures of the Virgin--such as +those of Lugo, Seville, Astorga, and Pamplona--consisting of elaborate +silver-work upon a wooden frame. Visitors to Spain, from leisurely +Rosmithal five hundred years ago to time-economizing tourists of our +century, have been continually astonished at the prodigal richness of +her sanctuaries. Upon this point I quote a typical extract from the +narrative of Bertaut de Rouen. "The treasure of this church," he said of +Montserrat, "is wonderfully precious, and particularly so by reason of +two objects that belong to it. The first is a crown of massive gold of +twenty pounds in weight, covered with pearls, with ten stars radiating +from it also loaded with large pearls and diamonds of extraordinary +value. This crown took forty years to make, and is valued at two +millions of gold money. The second object is a gold crown entirely +covered with emeralds, most of them of an amazing size. Many are worth +five thousand crowns apiece. The reliquary, too, is of extraordinary +richness, as also a service of gold plate studded with pearls, donated +by the late emperor for use in celebrating Mass." + + [17] The pax or osculatory used in celebrating High Mass is commonly, + says Rosell de Torres, "a plate of gold or ivory, or other metal + or material, according to the time and circumstances of its + manufacture. The priest who celebrates the Mass kisses it after + the _Agnus Dei_ and the prayer _ad petendam pacem_, and the + acolytes present it, as a sign of peace and brotherly union, to + all the other priests who may be present. This usage springs from + the kiss of peace which was exchanged, prior to receiving the + communion, between the early Christians in their churches. The pax + has commonly borne an image of the Virgin with the Holy Infant, + the face of Christ, or else the Agnus Dei." Its Latin name was the + _deosculatorium_. + +Similar accounts to the above exist in quantities, relating to every +part of Spain and every period of her history. + +Reverting to the earlier Middle Ages, a few conspicuous objects thus +presented to the Spanish Church require to be briefly noted here. Famous +chalices are those of Santo Domingo de Silos (eleventh century), made to +the order of Abbot Domingo in honour of San Sebastian, and showing the +characteristic Asturian filigree-work; and of San Isidoro of León, made +in 1101 by order of Urraca Fernandez, sister of the fourth Alfonso. The +latter vessel, inscribed with the dedication of _Urraca Fredinandi_, has +an agate cup and foot. A remarkably handsome silver-gilt chalice and +patine (thirteenth century) belong to Toledo cathedral. The height of +this chalice is thirteen inches, and the diameter of its bowl, which has +a conical shape, eight and a half inches. Inside and out the bowl is +smooth, but midway between the bowl and the foot is a massive knot or +swelling in the stem, and on the knot the emblematic lion, eagle, bull, +and angel are chiselled in high relief. Below the knot is a ring of +graceful rosettes. The patine which accompanies this chalice measures +twelve inches in diameter. It has upon it, thinly engraved within a +slightly sunk centre with a scalloped edge, the figure of Christ upon +the cross, between the Virgin and St John. This central group of figures +and the border of the plate are each surrounded with a narrow strip of +decoration. + +The cathedral of Valencia has a beautiful and early cup asserted to be +the veritable Holy Grail (_greal_, _garal_, or _gradal_, in the old +Castilian), "of which," wrote Ford with his accustomed irony, "so many +are shown in different orthodox _relicarios_." However this may be, the +chalice of Valencia is particularly handsome. According to Riaño it +consists of "a fine brown sardonyx which is tastefully moulded round the +lip. The base is formed of another inverted sardonyx. These are united +by straps of pure gold. The stem is flanked by handles, which are inlaid +with delicate arabesque in black enamel. Oriental pearls are set round +the base and stem, which alternate with rubies, sapphires, and emeralds. +This chalice is a work of the Roman imperial epoch, and the mounts are +of a later date." + +A series of Spanish chalices, beginning chronologically with specimens +which date from the early Middle Ages, and terminating with the chalice, +made in 1712, of Santa María la Blanca of Seville, was shown in 1892 at +the Exposición Histórico-Europea of Madrid. Among the finer or most +curious were chalices proceeding from the parish church of Játiva, Las +Huelgas, and Seville cathedral, and the Plateresque chalices of +Calatayud, Granada, and Alcalá de Henares. Another chalice which is +greatly interesting because of the date inscribed on it, is one which +was presented to Lugo cathedral by a bishop of that diocese, Don Garcia +Martinez de Bahamonde (1441-1470). The workmanship, though prior to the +sixteenth century, is partly Gothic. An article by José Villa-amil y +Castro, dealing with all these chalices, will be found in the _Boletín +de la Sociedad Española de Excursiones_ for April, 1893. + +A small exhibition was held at Lugo in August 1896. Here were shown +sixteen chalices, nearly all of them of merit from the point of view of +history or art. Such are the chalice of San Rosendo, proceeding from the +old monastery of Celanova; the Gothic chalices of Tuy cathedral, Lugo +cathedral, Santa María del Lucio, Santa Eulalia de Guilfrei, San Pedro +de Puertomarín, and the Franciscan friars of Santiago; and the chalice +and patine of Cebrero (twelfth century), in which it is said that on a +certain occasion in the fifteenth century the wine miraculously turned +to actual blood, and the Host to actual flesh, in order to convince a +doubting priest who celebrated service. + +The Cross of Angels and the Cross of Victory--presents, respectively, +from Alfonso the Chaste and Alfonso the Great--are now preserved at +Oviedo, in the Camara Santa of that stately temple. The former of these +crosses, fancied by credulous people to be the handiwork of +angels--whence its title[18]--was made in A.D. 808. It consists of four +arms of equal length, radiating from a central rosette (Pl. ii.). The +core or _alma_ is of wood covered with a double plate of richly +decorated gold, chased in the finest filigree (indicative already of the +influence of Cordova) and thickly strewn with sapphires, amethysts, +topazes, and cornelians. Other stones hung formerly from six small rings +upon the lower border of the arms. The cross is thus inscribed:-- + + _"Susceptum placide maneat hoc in honore Dei + Offeret Adefonsus humilis servus Xti + Hoc signo tuetur pius + Hoc signo vincitur inimicus._ + + _Quisquis auferre presumpserit mihi + Fulmine divino intereat ipse + Nisi libens ubi voluntas dederit mea + Hoc opus perfectum est in Era DCCXLVI."_ + + [18] This marvel is related by the Monk of Silos. A quotation from + another of my books is applicable here. "Last year," I wrote in + 1902--(pp. 64, 65 of _Toledo and Madrid: Their Records and + Romances_)--"the young King Alfonso the Thirteenth paid a visit to + Oviedo cathedral, and was duly shown the relics and the jewels. + Among these latter was the 'Cross of the Angels.' + + "'Why is it so called?' inquired the king. + + "'Because,' replied the bishop of the diocese, 'it is said that the + angels made it to reward King Alfonso the Chaste.' + + "'Well, but,' insisted the young monarch, 'what ground is there for + thinking so?' + + "'Señor,' replied the prelate, 'none whatever. _The time for + traditions is passing away._'" + + [Illustration: III + THE CROSS OF VICTORY + (_Oviedo Cathedral_)] + +The other cross (Pl. iii.) is more than twice as large, and measures +just one yard in height by two feet four and a half inches in width. +Tradition says that the primitive, undecorated wooden core of this cross +was carried against the Moors by King Pelayo. The ornate casing, similar +to that upon the Cross of Angels, was added later, and contains 152 gems +and imitation gems. The following inscription tells us that this casing +was made at the Castle of Gauzon in Asturias, in the year 828:-- + + _"Susceptum placide maneat hoc in honore Dei, quod offerent + Famuli Christi Adefonsus princeps et Scemaena Regina; + Quisquis auferre hoc donoria nostra presumpserit + Fulmine divino intereat ipse. + Hoc opus perfectum et concessum est + Santo Salvatori Oventense sedis. + Hoc signo tuetur pius, hoc vincitur inimicus + Et operatum est in castello Gauzon anno regni nostri._ + XLII. _discurrente Era_ DCCCLXVI." + +These crosses are processional. Others which were used for the same +purpose are those of San Sebastián de Serrano (Galicia), San Munio de +Veiga, Santa María de Guillar (Lugo), San Mamed de Fisteos, and Santa +María de Arcos. The five preceding crosses are of bronze; those of +Baamorto and San Adriano de Lorenzana are respectively of silver, and of +wood covered with silver plates, and all were shown at the Lugo +exhibition I have spoken of. + +Besides the Cross of Victory or Pelayo, and the Cross of Angels, +interesting objects preserved at Oviedo are a small diptych presented by +Bishop Don Gonzalo (A.D. 1162-1175), and the _Arca Santa_ used for +storing saintly relics. This beautiful chest, measuring three feet nine +inches and a half in length by twenty-eight inches and a half in height, +is considered by Riaño to be of Italian origin, and to date from between +the tenth and twelfth centuries. + +Another handsome box belonging to the cathedral of Astorga was once upon +a time the property of Alfonso the Third and his queen Jimena, whose +names it bears--ADEFONSVS REX: SCEMENA REGINA. The workmanship is +consequently of the close of the ninth or the beginning of the tenth +century. The material is wood covered with _repoussé_ silver plates on +which are figured angels and birds, together with the eagle and the ox +as emblems of the evangelists John and Luke, whose names are also to be +read upon the casket. + +Next to the sword, no object in the history of mediæval Spain was more +profoundly popular or venerated than the _relicario_. This in its +primitive form was just a small receptacle, such as a vase or urn of +gold or silver, ivory or crystal, used by the laity or clergy for +treasuring bones, or hairs, or other relics of the Virgin, or the +Saviour, or the saints. In private families a holy tooth, or toe, or +finger thus preserved would often, as though it were some Eastern +talisman, accompany its credulous possessor to the battlefield. + +As time went on, the urn or vase was commonly replaced by chests or +caskets made by Moorish captives, or by tranquil and respected Moorish +residents within the territory of the Christian,[19] or wrested from +the infidel in war and offered by the Spanish kings or nobles to their +churches. Here they were kept on brackets, or suspended near the altar +by a chain[20] of silver, gold, or iron. Among the Moors themselves such +chests and caskets served, according to their richness or capacity, for +storing perfumes, clothes, or jewels, or as a present from a bridegroom +to his bride; and since the sparsely-furnished Oriental room contains no +kind of wardrobe, cabinet, or chest of drawers, their use in Moorish +parts of Spain was universal. + + [19] In many towns a hearty friendship sprang up between the Spaniard + and the Moor. This was a natural consequence in places where the + vanquished had a better education than the victor. The warrior + population of both races might be struggling on the field at the + same moment that their craftsmen were fraternizing in the workshop. + Ferdinand the First and Alfonso the Sixth were particularly lenient + in their usage of the dominated Muslim. Thus, the former of these + princes recognised the Moorish townspeople of Sena as his vassals, + while those of Toledo were freely allowed by Alfonso to retain + their worship and their mosque. + + [20] "_Fallaron ay de marfil arquetas muy preçiadas + Con tantas de noblezas que non podrian ser contadas + Fueron para San Pedro las arquetas donadas; + Están en este dia en el su altar asentadas._" + Poem of FERRAN GONZALVEZ (13th century). + +A typical Moorish casket of this kind (Plate iv.) is now in the +cathedral of Gerona. It measures fifteen inches in length by nine +across, fastens with a finely ornamented band and clasp of bronze, and +is covered with thin silver-gilt plates profusely decorated with a bead +and floral pattern superposed upon a box of non-decaying +wood--possibly larch or cedar. A Cufic inscription along the lower +part of the lid was formerly interpreted as follows:-- + +"In the name of God. (May) the blessing of God, prosperity and fortune +and perpetual felicity be (destined) for the servant of God, Alhakem, +Emir of the Faithful, because he ordered (this casket) to be made for +Abdul Walid Hischem, heir to the throne of the Muslims. It was finished +by the hands of Hudzen, son of Bothla." + + [Illustration: IV + MOORISH CASKET + (_Gerona Cathedral_)] + +It is supposed, however, that the part of this inscription which +contains the maker's name was rendered incorrectly by Riaño, who +followed, on this point, Saavedra, Fita, and other archæologists; and +that the casket was made to the order of Djaudar, as a gift to the heir +to the throne, Abulwalid Hischem, the actual workmen being two slaves, +Bedr and Tarif. That is to say, the name Hudzen is now replaced by +Djaudar, whom Dozy mentions in his history of the Mussulman domination +in Spain, and who is known to have been a eunuch high in favour with +Alhakem, Hischem's father. These princes ruled at Cordova in the latter +half of the tenth century and the beginning of the eleventh. + +Spanish-Moorish caskets (_arquetas_) of ivory, silver, or inlaid work, +are also preserved in the South Kensington Museum, the Archæological +Museum at Madrid, and the cathedrals of Braga, Tortosa, and Oviedo. +There is no reason to doubt that all these boxes were made in Spain, +although an Eastern and particularly Persian influence is very +noticeable in their scheme of decoration. + +Two silver caskets which were once in the church of San Isidoro at León +are now in the Madrid Museum. The smaller and plainer of the two, +elliptical in shape and measuring five inches in length by two inches +and a half in depth, is covered with a leaf and stem device outlined in +black enamel. A Cufic inscription of a private and domestic import, also +picked out with black enamel, runs along the top. The lid is ornamented, +like the body of the box, with leaves and stems surrounded by a Grecian +border, and fastens with a heart-shaped clasp secured by a ring. + +The other, more elaborate, and larger box measures eight inches long by +five in height. In shape it is a parallelogram, with a deeply bevelled +rather than--as Amador describes it--a five-sided top. Bands of a simple +winding pattern outlined in black enamel on a ground of delicate +niello-work run round the top and body of the casket. The central band +upon the lower part contains a Cufic inscription of slight interest. +Some of the letters terminate in leaves. The bevelled lid is covered +with groups of peacocks--symbolic, among Mohammedans, of eternal +life--outlined in black enamel. These birds are eight in all, gathered +in two groups of four about the large and overlapping hinges. Four +leaves, trifoliate, in _repoussé_, one beneath the other, decorate the +clasp, which opens out into a heart containing, also in _repoussé_, two +inverted peacocks looking face to face. Between the birds this heart +extremity is pierced for the passage of a ring. + +Amador de los Ríos considers that both caskets were made between the +years 1048 and 1089. + +The use of coloured enamel in the manufacture of these boxes dates, or +generally so, from somewhat later. Although the history of enamelling in +Spain is nebulous and contradictory in the extreme, we know that caskets +in _champlevé_ enamel on a copper ground, with figures either flat or +hammered in a bold relief, became abundant here. Two, from the convent +of San Marcos at León, and dating from the thirteenth century, are now +in the Madrid Museum. Labarte says that the lids of these enamelled +reliquaries were flat until the twelfth century, and of a gable form +thenceforward. + + [Illustration: V + ALTAR-FRONT IN ENAMELLED BRONZE + (_11th Century. Museum of Burgos_)] + +Other old objects--boxes, triptyches, statuettes, incensories, +book-covers, crucifixes, and processional crosses--partly or wholly +covered with enamel, belong or recently belonged to the Marquises of +Castrillo and Casa-Torres, the Count of Valencia de Don Juan, and Señor +Escanciano. All, or nearly all, of these are thought to have proceeded +from Limoges (Pl. v.). _Champlevé_ enamel is also on the tiny "Crucifix +of the Cid" (Pl. vi.) at Salamanca, as well as on the Virgin's throne in +the gilt bronze statuette of the Virgin de la Vega at San Esteban in the +same city.[21] Of this image, although it properly belongs to another +heading of my book, I think it well to give a reproduction here (Plate +vii.). I will also mention, in spite of its presumably foreign origin, +the enamelled altar-front of San Miguel de Excelsis in Navarre--a small +sanctuary constructed by a mediæval cavalier who, by an accident +occasioned by the dark, murdered his father and mother in lieu of his +wife.[22] This altar-front, conspicuously Byzantine in its style, +measures four feet three inches high by seven feet five inches long, and +is now employed as the _retablo_ of the little church which stands in +solitary picturesqueness on the lofty mountain-top of Aralar. The +figures, coloured in relief upon a yellowish enamel ground, are those of +saints, and of a monarch and his queen--possibly King Sancho the Great, +who is believed to have been the donor of the ornament. If this surmise +be accurate, the front would date from the eleventh century. + + [21] Together with the statuette of Ujué in Navarre, the Virgen de la + Vega of Salamanca may be classed as one of the earliest "local + Virgins" of this country. Sometimes these images are of wood alone, + sometimes of wood beneath a silver covering, sometimes, as that of + the Claustro de León, of stone. But whatever may be the substance, + the characteristics are the same:--Byzantine rigidness and + disproportion, the crude and primitive anatomy of artists only just + emerging from the dark. The Virgin and Child of Santa María la Real + of Hirache in Navarra may be instanced as another of the series. + This image dates from late in the twelfth or early in the + thirteenth century, although a crown and nimbus have been added + subsequently. It measures rather more than a yard in height, and + consists of wood covered with silver plates, except the hands and + face, which are painted. The Virgin, seated, holds the Infant with + her left arm; in her right hand is an apple. A kind of stole + bearing the following inscription in Gothic letter falls upon the + Infant's breast; "_Puer natus est nobis, venite adoremus. Ego sum + alpha et omega, primus et novissimus Dominus._" Before this + statuette the King Don Sancho is stated to have offered his + devotion. + + [22] I quote this legend in Appendix A. + +I have said that the history of Spanish enamel-work is both confused and +scanty. The subject in its general aspects has been studied by M. +Roulin, whose judgments will be found in the _Revue de l'Art Ancien et +Moderne_, and in his article, "Mobilier liturgique d'Espagne," published +in the _Revue de l'Art Chrétien_ for 1903. M. Roulin believes the +altar-front of San Miguel in Excelsis to be a Limoges product, not +earlier than the first half of the thirteenth century. + +Ramírez de Arellano declares that no enamelling at all was done in Spain +before the invasion of the Almohades. López Ferreiro, who as a priest +had access to the jealously secreted archives of Santiago cathedral, +gives us the names of Arias Perez, Pedro Martinez, Fernan Perez, and +Pedro Pelaez, Galician enamellers who worked at Santiago in the twelfth +and thirteenth centuries. Martin Minguez says that enamelling was done +at Gerona in the fourteenth century, and Moorish enamels were certainly +produced at Cordova and Cuenca from comparatively early in the Middle +Ages. A few obscure workers in enamel are mentioned by Gestoso, in his +_Diccionario de Artistas Sevillanos_, as living at Seville in the +fifteenth century, though, in the entries which refer to them, little is +told us of their lives and nothing of their labours. In the sixteenth +century we obtain a glimpse of two enamellers of Toledo--Lorenzo Marqués +and Andrés Ordoñez, and dating from the same period the Chapter of the +Military Orders of Ciudad Real possesses a silver-gilt _porta-paz_ with +enamelling done at Cuenca. However, our notices of this branch of +Spanish art have yet to be completed. + + [Illustration: VI + "THE CRUCIFIX OF THE CID" + (_Salamanca Cathedral_)] + +A long array of royal gifts caused, in the olden time, the treasure of +Santiago cathedral to be the richest and most varied in the whole +Peninsula, although at first this see was merely suffragan to Merida. +But early in the twelfth century a scheming bishop, by name Diego +Gelmirez, intrigued at Rome to raise his diocese to the dignity of an +archbishopric. The means by which he proved successful in the end were +far from irreproachable. "Gelmirez," says Ford (vol. ii. p. 666) "was a +cunning prelate, and well knew how to carry his point; he put Santiago's +images and plate into the crucible, and sent the ingots to the Pope." + +The original altar-front or parament (_aurea tabula_) was made of solid +gold. This altar-front Gelmirez melted down to steal from it some +hundred ounces of the precious metal for the Pope, donating in its +stead another front of gold and silver mixed, wrought from the remaining +treasure of the sanctuary. Aymerich tells us that the primitive frontal +bore the figure of the Saviour seated on a throne supported by the four +evangelists, blessing with his right hand, and holding in his left the +Book of Life. The four-and-twenty elders (called by quaint Morales +"gentlemen") of the apocalypse were also gathered round the throne, with +musical instruments in their hands, and golden goblets filled with +fragrant essences. At either end of the frontal were six of the +apostles, three above and three beneath, separated by "beautiful +columns" and surrounded by floral decoration. The upper part was thus +inscribed:-- + + HANC TABULAM DIDACUS PRÆSUL JACOBITA + SECUNDUS + TEMPORE QUINQUENNI FECIT EPISCOPI + MARCAS ARGENTI DE THESAURO JACOBENSI + HIC OCTOGINTA QUINQUE MINUS NUMERA. + +And the lower part:-- + + REX ERAT ANFONSUS GENER EJUS DUX RAIMUNDUS + PRÆSUL PRÆFATUS QUANDO PEREGIT OPUS. + +This early altar-front has disappeared like its predecessor; it is +not known precisely at what time; but both Morales and Medina saw and +wrote about it in the sixteenth century. + + [Illustration: VII + THE "VIRGEN DE LA VEGA" + (_Salamanca_)] + +Another ornament which Aymerich describes, namely, the _baldaquino_ or +_cimborius_, has likewise faded from the eyes of the profane, together +with three bronze caskets covered with enamel, and stated by Morales to +have contained the bones of Saints Silvestre, Cucufate, and Fructuoso. +One of these caskets was existing in the seventeenth century. + +The silver lamps were greatly celebrated. Ambrosio de Morales counted +"twenty or more"; but Zepedano made their total mount to fifty-one. The +French invasion brought their number down to three. Three of the oldest +of these lamps had been of huge dimensions, particularly one, a present +from Alfonso of Aragon, which occupied the centre. The shape of it, says +Aymerich, was "like a mighty mortar." Seven was the number of its beaks, +symbolic of the seven gifts of the Holy Ghost; and each beak contained a +lamplet fed with oil of myrtles, acorns, or olives. + +All kinds of robberies and pilferings have thus been perpetrated with +the once abundant wealth of Santiago.[23] The jealous care which keeps +the copious archives inaccessible to all the outside world is in itself +of sinister significance. It has transpired, furthermore, that many of +the bishops have "exchanged," or simply stolen, portions of the holy +property. Besides these clerical dilapidations, a cartload, weighing +half a ton, was carried off by Marshal Ney, though some was subsequently +handed back, "because the spoilers feared the hostility of the +_Plateros_, the silversmiths who live close to the cathedral, and by +whom many workmen were employed in making little graven images, +teraphims and lares, as well as medallions of Santiago, which pilgrims +purchase."[24] + + [23] A recent instance, not devoid of humour, is as follows. About three + years ago, a silly rogue removed and carried off the crown from + Santiago's head; but since the actual jewel is only worn on solemn + festivals, his prize turned out to be a worthless piece of tin. An + odd removal of the treasure of another Spanish church was noted by + the traveller Bowles. "The curate of the place, a worthy fellow who + put me up in his house, assured me that a detachment of a legion of + locusts entered the church, ate up the silk clothes upon the + images, and gnawed the varnish on the altars." Perhaps these + adamantine-stomached insects have assailed, from time to time, the + gold and silver plate of Santiago. + + [24] Ford, _Handbook_, vol. ii. p. 671. I briefly notice, in Appendix B, + the Santiago jet-work, also practised by these craftsmen. + + [Illustration: VIII + SAINT JAMES IN PILGRIM'S DRESS + (_Silver-gilt statuette; 15th Century. Santiago Cathedral_)] + +Among the gifts of value which this temple yet preserves are the ancient +processional cross presented by the third Alfonso in the year of +grace 874,[25] and the hideous fourteenth-century reliquary shaped to +represent the head of James Alfeo, and containing (as it is believed) +this very relic (Pl. viii.). I make a reservation here, because the +Chapter have forbidden the reliquary to be opened. In either case, +whether the head be there or not, heads of the same apostle are affirmed +to be at Chartres, Toulouse, and other places. Similarly, discussing +these Hydra-headed beings of the Bible and the hagiology, Villa-amil y +Castro (_El Tesoro de la Catedral de Santiago_, published in the _Museo +Español de Antigüedades_) recalls to us the ten authenticated and +indubitable mazzards of Saint John the Baptist. + + [25] To lend my censures further cogency, I leave this statement as I + set it down some weeks ago; since when, on picking up a Spanish + newspaper, I read the following telegram:-- + + "THEFT IN SANTIAGO CATHEDRAL + + "SANTIAGO, _May 7th, 1906_ (9.15 _p.m._). + + "This morning, when the canon in charge of the Chapel of the Relics + unlocked the door, he was surprised to observe that some of these + were lying in confusion on the floor. Fearing that a theft had been + committed, he sent for the dean and others of the clergy, who had + examination made, and found the following objects to be missing:-- + + _"A gold cross, presented by King Alfonso the Great, when he + attended the consecration of this temple in the year 874._ + + "Another cross, of silver, dating from the fifteenth century--a + present from Archbishop Spinola. + + "An aureole of the fifteenth century, studded with precious stones + belonging to a statuette of the apostle Santiago. + + "The authorities were summoned and at once began their search. + + "They find that two of the thick iron bars of the skylight in the + ceiling of the cloister have been filed through. This cloister has + a skylight which opens upon the chapel. + + "They have also found, upon the roof, a knotted rope. This rope was + only long enough to reach a cornice in the chapel wall. _The wall + itself affords no sign that anybody has attempted to descend by + it._" + +The head-shaped reliquary is of beaten silver with enamelled visage, and +the hair and beard gilt.[26] The workmanship is French. The cross, which +hung till recently above the altar of the Relicario, but which now +requires to be placed upon the lengthy list of stolen wealth, was not +unlike the Cross of Angels in the Camara Santa at Oviedo, and had a +wooden body covered with gold plates in finely executed filigree, +studded with precious stones and cameos. Not many days ago, the wooden +core, divested of the precious metal and the precious stones, was found +abandoned in a field. + + [26] This form of reliquary was not uncommon. Morales, in his _Viaje + Sacro_, describes another one, also preserved at Santiago, saying + that it was a bust of silver, life-size and gilded to the breast, + "with a large diadem of rays and many stones, both small and great, + all or most of them of fine quality, though not of the most + precious." Other bust-reliquaries belong, or have belonged, to the + Cathedrals of Burgos and Toledo. + +Visitors to the shrine of Santiago seldom fail to have their curiosity +excited by the monster "smoke-thrower" (_bota-fumeiro_) or incensory, +lowered (much like the deadly sword in Poe's exciting tale) on each +_fiesta_ by a batch of vigorous Gallegos from an iron frame fixed into +the pendentives of the dome. "The calmest heart," says Villa-amil, +"grows agitated to behold this giant vessel descending from the apex of +the nave until it almost sweeps the ground, wreathed in dense smoke and +spewing flame." Ford seems to have been unaware that the real purpose of +this metal monster was not to simply scent the holy precincts, but to +cover up the pestilential atmosphere created by a horde of verminous, +diseased, and evil-smelling pilgrims, who, by a usage which is now +suppressed, were authorized to pass the night before the services within +the actual cathedral wall. + +The original _bota-fumeiro_, resembling, in Oxea's words, "a silver +boiler of gigantic bulk," was lost or stolen in the War of Spanish +Independence. It was replaced by another of iron, and this, in 1851, by +the present apparatus of white metal. + +Striking objects of ecclesiastical _orfebrería_ were produced in Spain +throughout the thirteenth and the fourteenth centuries. Among the finest +are the triptych-reliquary of Seville cathedral known as the _Alfonsine +Tables_; the _retablo_ and _baldaquino_ of the cathedral of Gerona; the +silver throne, preserved in Barcelona cathedral, of Don Martin of +Aragon; and the _guión_, at Toledo, of Cardinal Mendoza. + + [Illustration: IX + MUDEJAR TRIPTYCH + (_Interior of one leaf of the door. 14th Century. + Royal Academy of History, Madrid_)] + +Triptych-reliquaries, which had gradually expanded from the diptych +form--three leaves or panels thus replacing two,--were generally used in +Spain from the eleventh century, and varied in dimensions from a few +inches in height and width to several yards. We find them in the Gothic, +Mudejar,[27] Romanic, or Renaissance styles--wrought either in a single +style of these, or in effective combination of some two or more. The +Academy of History at Madrid possesses a richly ornamented Mudejar +triptych (Plate ix.) proceeding from the Monasterio de Piedra. It is +inferior, notwithstanding, to the _Tablas Alfonsinas_,[28] "a +specimen of Spanish silversmiths' work which illustrates the transition +to the new style, and the progress in the design of the figures owing to +the Italian Renaissance."[29] In or about the year 1274, this splendid +piece of sacred furniture was made by order of the learned king, to hold +the relics of certain saints and of the Virgin Mary. The maker is +thought by Amador to have been one "Master George," a craftsman held in +high esteem by the father of Alfonso and the conqueror of Seville, +Ferdinand the Third. Romanic influence is abundant in this triptych, +showing that, although exposed to constant changes from abroad, the +Spanish mediæval crafts adhered upon the whole with singular tenacity to +primitive tradition. + + [27] The Mudejares were the Mussulmans who submitted, in the conquered + cities, to the Spanish-Christian rule. The word _Mudejar_ is of + modern growth, nor can its derivation be resolved with certainty. + From the thirteenth century onwards, and formed by the fusion of + the Christian and the Saracenic elements, we find Mudejar influence + copiously distributed through every phase of Spanish life and art, + and even literature. + + [28] Amador prefers to call these Tables "the triptych of the learned + king," in order to distinguish them by this explicit title from the + _Astronomical Tables_ prepared by order of the same monarch. + + [29] Riaño, _Spanish Arts_, p. 16. + +The triptych is of larch, or some such undecaying wood, and measures, +when the leaves are opened wide, forty inches over its entire breadth, +by twenty-two in height. Linen is stretched upon the wood, and over that +the silver-gilt _repoussé_ plates which form the principal adornment of +the reliquary. "The outside is decorated with twelve medallions +containing the arms of Castile and Aragon, and forty-eight others in +which are repeated alternately the subjects of the Adoration of the Magi +and the Annunciation of the Virgin, also in _repoussé_. In the centres +are eagles, allusive, it is possible, to Don Alfonso's claim to be +crowned Emperor.... The ornamentation which surrounds the panels belongs +to the sixteenth century" (Riaño). The arms here spoken of contain the +crowned lion and the castle of three towers; and the interesting fact is +pointed out by Amador that the diminutive doors and windows of these +castles show a strongly pointed Gothic arch. The sixteenth-century +bordering to the panels is in the manner known as Plateresque.[30] The +clasps are also Plateresque, and prove, together with the border, +that the triptych was restored about this time. + + [30] So named because the silversmiths (_plateros_) of this country used + it in their monstrances (_custodias_) and in many other objects or + utensils of religious worship. The most refined and erudite of + Spanish silver-workers, Juan de Arfe, thus referred to it in + rhyme:-- + + _"Usaron desta obra los plateros + Guardando sus preceptos con zelo; + Pusiéronle en los puntos postrimeros + De perfección mi abuelo."_ + + [Illustration: X + THE "TABLAS ALFONSINAS" + (_View of Interior; 13th Century. Seville Cathedral_)] + +Inside (Plate x.), it consists of fifteen compartments, "full of minute +ornamentation, among which are set a large number of capsules covered +with rock crystal containing relics, each one with an inscription of +enamelled gold, _cloisonné_. Several good cameos with sacred subjects +appear near the edge of the side leaves" (Riaño). These cameos, +handsomely engraved with figures of the Virgin and other subjects of +religious character, are fairly well preserved; but the designs upon +enamel are almost obliterated. Eight precious stones, set in as rude a +style as those upon the ancient crowns and crosses of the Visigoths, +have also fallen out, or been removed, from the interior. + +The _retablo_ of Gerona cathedral and its baldachin date from the +fourteenth century. "The Retablo is of wood entirely covered with silver +plates, and divided vertically into three series of niches and canopies; +each division has a subject, and a good deal of enamelling is introduced +in various parts of the canopies and grounds of the panels. Each panel +has a cinq-foiled arch with a crocketed gablet and pinnacles on either +side. The straight line of the top is broken by three niches, which +rise in the centre and at either end. In the centre is the Blessed +Virgin with our Lord; on the right, San Narciso; and on the left, St +Filia. The three tiers of subjects contain figures of saints, subjects +from the life of the Blessed Virgin, and subjects from the life of our +Lord."[31] + + [31] Street, _Gothic Architecture in Spain_. + +San Narciso is patron of the city of Gerona; which explains the presence +of his image here. From the treasury of the same cathedral was stolen, +during the War of Spanish Independence, a magnificent altar-front of +wrought gold and mosaic, a gift of Countess Gisla, wife of Ramón +Berenguer, count-king of Barcelona. It had in the centre a bas-relief +medallion representing the Virgin, another medallion with a portrait of +the donor, and various saints in niches, interworked with precious +stones. + +The great armchair of Don Martin, called by Baron Davillier a "beau +faudesteuil gothique," which possibly served that monarch as a throne, +and was presented by him to the cathedral of Barcelona, dates from the +year 1410. The wooden frame is covered with elaborately chiselled plates +in silver-gilt. This most imposing object is carried in procession +through the streets upon the yearly festival of Corpus Christi. + + [Illustration: XI + "THE CUP OF SAN FERNANDO" + (_13th Century. Seville Cathedral_)] + + [Illustration: XII + SHIP + (_15th Century. Zaragoza Cathedral_)] + +The _guión de Mendoza_, now in Toledo cathedral, is a handsome +later-Gothic silver-gilt cross, and is the same which was raised upon +the Torre de la Vela at Granada on January 2nd, 1492, when the fairest +and most storied city in all Spain surrendered formally to Ferdinand and +Isabella. Many other interesting crosses, of the character known as +processional, are still preserved in various parts of the Peninsula, at +South Kensington, and elsewhere. The more remarkable are noticed under +various headings of this book. Their workmanship is generally of the +fifteenth or the sixteenth century. + +The Seo or cathedral of Zaragoza possesses a handsome ship (Plate xii.), +presented to this temple, towards the end of the fifteenth century, by +the Valencian corsair, Mosén Juan de Torrellas. The hull is a large +shell resting on a silver-gilt dragon of good design, with a large +emerald set in the middle of its forehead, and a ruby for each eye. +Ships of this kind were not uncommon on a Spanish dining table of the +time, or in the treasuries of churches and cathedrals. Toledo owns +another of these vessels (in both senses of the word), which once +belonged to Doña Juana, daughter of Ferdinand and Isabella. + +Hitherto I have confined my notice almost wholly to the treasure of the +Spanish temples. Turning from ecclesiastical to secular life, we find, +all through the Middle Ages, the humbler classes kept by constant penury +and war aloof from every form of luxury. Jewellery and gold and silver +work were thus essentially the perquisite or, so to speak, the privilege +of princes, nobles, and the Church. The mediæval kings and magnates of +this land were smitten inveterately with a passion for display, and +chronicles and inventories of the time contain instructive details of +the quantities of gems and precious metals employed by them to decorate +their persons and their palaces. The richness of their bedsteads will be +noticed under Furniture. Quantities of jewellery and plate belonged to +every noble household. For instance, the testament of the Countess of +Castañeda (A.D. 1443) includes the mention of "a gilded cup and cover to +the same; a silver vessel and its lid, the edges gilt, and in the centre +of both lid and vessel the arms of the said count, my lord; a silver +vessel with a foot to it; a diamond ring; a silver vessel with gilt +edges and the arms of the count, companion to the other vessels; a +jasper sweetmeat-tray with silver-gilt handles and feet; four coral +spoons; a gilt enamelled cup and lid; a small gilt cup and lid; two +large silver porringers; two French cups of white silver; two large +plates of eight marks apiece; two middling-sized silver vessels; two +silver-gilt barrels with silver-gilt chains."[32] + + [32] Count of Clonard. + +On each occasion of a court or national festivity, the apparel of the +great was ponderous with gold and silver fringe, or thickly strewn with +pearls--the characteristic _aljofar_ or _aljofar_-work (Arabic _chawar_, +small pearls), for which the Moors were widely famed. Towards the +thirteenth century unmarried Spanish women of high rank possessed +abundant stores of bracelets, earrings, necklaces, gold chains, rings, +and gem-embroidered pouches for their money. Their waist-belts, too, +were heavy with gold and silver, and _aljofar_.[33] The poem of the +Archpriest of Hita (1343) mentions two articles of jewellery for female +wear called the _broncha_ and the _pancha_. The former was an ornament +for the throat; the other, a plate or medal which hung to below the +waist. An Arabic document quoted by Casiri, and dating from the reign +of Henry the First of Castile, specifies as belonging to an aristocratic +lady of that time, "Egyptian shirts of silk and linen, embroidered +shirts, Persian shirts with silk embroidery, Murcian gold necklaces, +ear-pendants of the same metal, set with gems; finger-rings and +bracelets, waist-belts of skins, embroidered with silk and precious +stones; cloaks of cloth of gold, embroidered mantles of the same, +coverings for the head, and kerchiefs." + + [33] _Ibid_. + +For all the frequency with which they framed and iterated sterile and +exasperating sumptuary pragmatics for their people, the Spanish kings +themselves went even beyond the nobles in their craze for ostentatious +luxury. Upon the day when he was crowned at Burgos, Alfonso the Eleventh +"arrayed himself in gold and silver cloth bearing devices of the castle +and the lion, in which was much _aljofar_-work, as well as precious +stones innumerable; rubies, emeralds, and sapphires." Even the bit and +saddle of the monarch's charger were "exceeding precious on this day, +for gems and gold and silver covered all the saddle-bows, and the sides +of the saddle and its girths, together with the headstall, were +curiously wrought of gold and silver thread." + +Similar relations may be found at every moment of the history of +mediæval Spain. Another instance may be quoted from the reign of +Ferdinand and Isabella. When these sovereigns visited Barcelona in 1481, +the queen was dressed as follows:--"She advanced riding upon a fine +mule, and seated on cushions covered with brocade, rising high above the +saddle. Her robe was of gold thread and jewel-work, with a rich brocade +skirt. Upon her head she wore a crown of gold adorned with richest +diamonds, pearls, rubies, balas rubies, and other stones of passing +price." During the same visit, a royal tournament was given in the Plaza +del Born, in presence of the aristocracy and wealthy townspeople, "the +counts, viscounts, deputies, councillors, _caballeros_, _gentiles +hombres_, burgesses, and others without number." Ferdinand, who "with +virtue and benignity" had deigned to break a lance or two in tourneying +with the Duke of Alburquerque, the Count of Benavente, and several +gentlemen of Cataluña, was wearing "over his harness a jacket all of +gold brocade. His horse's coverings and poitral also were of thread of +gold, richly devised and wrought, and of exceeding majesty and beauty. +And on his helm he wore a crown of gold, embellished with many pearls +and other stones; and above the crown a figure of a large gold bat, +which is the emblem of the kings of Aragon and counts of Barcelona, with +white and sanguine bars upon the scutcheon.[34] The queen and the +cardinal of Spain were in a window of the house of Mossen Guillem +Pujades, conservator of the realm of Sicily. Her highness wore a robe of +rich gold thread with a collar of beautiful pearls; and the trappings of +her mule were of brocade."[35] + + [34] Four pallets gules, on a field or; which were the arms of Cataluña + and subsequently of Aragon. + + [35] _Archives of the Crown of Aragon._ + +Eleven years later the youthful prince, Don Juan, son of these rulers, +appeared before the citizens of Barcelona dressed in "a robe of +beautiful brocade that almost swept the ground, and a doublet of the +same material; the sleeves of the robe thickly adorned with fine pearls +of large size." He carried, too, "a gold collar of great size and beauty, +wrought of large diamonds, pearls, and other stones."[36] + + [36] _Ibid_. + +It was an ancient usage with the people of Barcelona to present a silver +service to any member of the royal family who paid a visit to their +capital. The service so presented to Ferdinand the Catholic cost the +corporation a sum of more than twelve hundred pounds of Catalan money, +and included "a saltcellar made upon a rock. Upon the rock is a castle, +the tower of which contains the salt.... Two silver ewers, gilt within +and containing on the outside various enamelled devices in the centre, +together with the city arms. Also a silver-gilt lion upon a rustic +palisade of tree-trunks, holding an inscription in his right paw, with +the arms of the city, a flag, and a crown upon his head. This object +weighs thirty-four marks."[37] The service offered on the same occasion +to Isabella, though less in weight, was more elaborately wrought, and +cost on this account considerably more. It included "two silver ewers, +gilt within and enamelled without, bearing the city arms, and chiselled +in the centre with various designs of foliage. Also a silver saltcellar, +with six small towers, containing at the foot three pieces of +enamel-work with the arms of the city in relief. This saltcellar has its +lid and case, with a pinnacle upon the lid, and is of silver-gilt inside +and out."[38] + + [37] Sanpere y Miquel, _Revista de Ciencias Históricas_, art. _La + Platería catalana en los siglos XIV. y XV._, vol. i. p. 441. + + [38] _Ibid_. + +From about the fifteenth century the goldsmiths and the silversmiths of +Barcelona enjoyed considerable fame. Among their names are those of +Lobarolla, Roig, Berni, Belloch, Planes, Mellar, Corda, Fábregues, +Farrán, Perot Ximenis, Rafel Ximenis, Balagué, and Antonio de Valdés. +Riaño quotes the names of many more from Cean's dictionary. The most +important facts relating to these artists were brought to light some +years ago by Baron Davillier, who based the greater part of his research +upon the _Libros de Pasantía_ or silversmiths' examination-books (filled +with excellent designs for jewel-work) of Barcelona. These volumes, +formerly kept in the college of San Eloy, are now the property of the +Provincial Deputation of this city. + +The goldsmiths' and the silversmiths' guild of Seville also possesses +four of its old examination-books, of which the earliest dates from +1600. Gestoso, in his _Dictionary of Sevillian Artificers_ describes the +actual ceremony of examination for a silversmith or goldsmith. Once in +every year the members of the guild assembled in their chapel of the +convent of San Francisco. Here and upon this day the candidate was +closely questioned, to begin with, as to his "purity of blood"--that is, +his freedom from contamination by relationship with any Moor or Hebrew. +When it was duly and precisely ascertained that he, his parents, and his +grandparents were uniformly "old Christians," untainted with the "wicked +race of Moors, Jews, heretics, mulattoes, and renegades," and that +neither he nor his ancestors had ever been put on trial by the +Inquisition or by any other tribunal, "whether publicly or secretly," he +was permitted to proceed to his examination proper.[39] The formula of +this was simple. The candidate was summoned before the board of +examiners, consisting of the Padre Mayor or patriarch of the guild, and +the two _veedores_ or inspectors, the one of gold-work, the other of +silver-work. The book of drawings was then placed upon the table, and a +ruler was thrust at haphazard among its leaves. Where the ruler chanced +to fall, the candidate was called upon to execute the corresponding +drawing to the satisfaction of his judges. + + [39] Gestoso mentions that Juan de Luna, a silversmith of Seville, was + turned into the gutter from the workshop where he was employed, + solely because his father had been punished as a Morisco by the + Inquisition (_Diccionario de Artífices Sevillanos_, vol. i. + p. lvi.). + +Riaño lays too slight a stress upon the Moorish and Morisco jewellery of +Spain. Although the use of gold and silver ornaments is forbidden by +the Koran, the Muslim, wherever his vanity or his bodily comfort is +involved, tramples his Bible underfoot almost as regularly, tranquilly, +and radically as the Christians do their own. The Moors of Spain were +not at all behind their oriental brethren in displaying precious stones +and metals on their persons or about their homes. Al-Jattib tells us +that the third Mohammed offered to the mosque of the Alhambra columns +with capitals and bases of pure silver. Or who does not recall the +Caliphate of Cordova; the silver lamp that measured fifty palms across, +fitted with a thousand and fifty-four glass lamplets, and swinging by a +golden chain from the cupola of the entrance to the _mirhab_ in the vast +_mezquita_; the silver candlesticks and perfume-burners in the same +extraordinary temple; the precious stones and metals employed in mighty +quantities to decorate the palaces of Az-zahyra and Az-zahra?-- + + "A wilderness of building, sinking far + And self-withdrawn into a wondrous depth, + Far sinking into splendour without end! + Fabric it seemed of diamond and of gold, + With alabaster domes and silver spires, + And blazing terrace upon terrace, high + Uplifted." + +In brief, just as the prelates of the Christian Church habitually +precede the Christian laity in trampling underfoot the elemental +doctrine of Our Lord, so were the most exalted and responsible of all +the Mussulmans--that is, their sultans--indefatigably foremost in +neglect of the Koranic law. + +The Spanish sultans wore a ring of gold containing one large stone (such +as an emerald, or ruby, or turquoise), on which was cut the royal seal +and signature. Such was the ring belonging to Boabdil el Chico, worn by +him on the very day of the surrender of his capital, and by his hand +presented to a Spanish nobleman, the Count of Tendilla, governor-elect +of the Alhambra. According to Rodriguez de Ardila, the following +inscription was upon the stone:--"_La Ala ile Ala, abahu Tabiu. Aben Abi +Abdalá_," meaning, "_There is no God but God; this is the seal of Aben +Abi Abdalá._" Ardila, who was the author of a history of the Counts of +Tendilla (which still remains in manuscript), adds that he saw the ring, +although, as Eguilaz observes, two words of the inscription are +inaccurately rendered. + +Among the Moors of Spain the use of signet rings was general. The stone +employed was commonly cornelian, richly mounted and inscribed in various +ways, as with the owner's name, his name together with a date, or the +name of the town of which he was a native. In other instances we meet +with pious phrases or quotations from the Koran; or perhaps a talismanic +figure, such as the open eye to guard the wearer from the dreaded _mal +de ojo_; or the open hand that still surmounts the gateway of the Tower +of Justice at Granada.[40] + + [40] An article by Señor Saavedra on these inscribed jewels and signets + of Mohammedan Spain will be found in the _Museo Español de + Antigüedades_. + +Undoubtedly, too, the Moorish sultans of this country owned enormous +hoards of silver, gold, and precious stones. Al-Makkari says that the +treasure of the Nasrite rulers of Granada included quantities of pearls, +turquoises, and rubies; pearl necklets; earrings "surpassing those of +Mary the Copt" (Mohammed's concubine); swords of the finest temper, +embellished with pure gold; helmets with gilded borders, studded with +emeralds, pearls, and rubies; and silvered and enamelled belts. + + [Illustration: XIII + MOORISH BRACELETS] + +The Moorish women of this country, and in particular the +Granadinas,[41] were passionately fond of jewellery. Ornaments which +once belonged to them are sometimes brought to light in Andalusia, +Murcia, or Valencia, including pendants, rings, necklaces, and _axorcas_ +or bangles for the ankle or the wrist, and bracelets for the upper +portion of the arm. The National Museum contains a small collection of +these objects, dating from the time of the Moriscos, and including a +handsome necklace terminating in a double chain, with ball and pyramid +shaped ornaments about the centre, a square-headed finger-ring with four +green stones and a garnet, and a hollow bracelet filled with a substance +that appears to be mastic, similar to those which are reproduced in +Plate xiii. + + [41] "As to the ornaments and jewels of the ladies of Granada, these + wear at present necklaces of rich design, bracelets, rings (upon + their ankles), and earrings of pure gold; together with quantities + of silver and of precious stones upon their shoes. I say this of + the middle class; for ladies of the aristocracy and of the older + noble families display a vast variety of gems, such as rubies, + chrysolites, emeralds, and pearls of great value. The ladies of + Granada are commonly fair to look upon, shapely, of good stature, + with long hair, teeth of a shining white, and perfumed breath, + gracefully alert in their movements, and witty and agreeable in + conversation. But unfortunately at this time their passion for + painting themselves and for arraying themselves in every kind of + jewellery and costly stuffs has reached a pitch that is no longer + tolerable."--Al-Jattib, in _The Splendour of the New Moon + concerning the Nasrite Sultans of Granada_. + +These jewels, I repeat, are of Morisco workmanship, and therefore date +from later than the independent empire of the Spanish Moors. +Nevertheless, the geometrical or filigree design was common both to +Moorish and Morisco art. As I observed in my description of the +casket-reliquaries, we note continually the influence of these motives +on the arts of Christian Spain. The Ordinances relative to the +goldsmiths and the silversmiths of Granada, cried at various times +between 1529 and 1538, whether "in the silversmiths' street of the +Alcaycería, that has its opening over against the scriveners'"; or in +"the street of the Puente del Carbon, before the goldsmiths' shops"; or +"in the street of the Zacatin, where dwell the silversmiths," prove also +that for many years after the Reconquest the character and nomenclature +of this kind of work continued to be principally and traditionally +Moorish. + +Firstly, the Ordinances complain that the goldsmiths of Granada now +employ a base and detrimental standard of the precious metals, +especially in the bracelets or _manillas_ of the women. The goldsmiths +answer in their vindication that equally as poor a standard is employed +at Seville, Cordova, and Toledo. These city laws herewith establish +twenty carats as a minimum fineness for the gold employed in making +ornaments. The makers, also, are ordered to impress their private stamp +or seal on every article, or in default to pay a fine of ten thousand +_maravedis_. A copy of each stamp or seal to be deposited in the city +chest. The _alamín_ or inspector of this trade to test and weigh all +gold and silver work before it is exposed for sale. + +We learn from the same source that the gold bracelets were sometimes +smooth, and sometimes "covered over with devices" (_cubiertos de +estampas por cima_). The technical name of these was _albordados_. The +silver bracelets were also either smooth, or stamped, or twisted in a +cord (_encordados_). Bangles for the ankle, upper arm, and wrist are +mentioned as continuing to be generally worn, while one of the +Ordinances complains that "Moorish _axorcas_ are often sold that are +hollow, and filled with chalk and mastic, so that before they can be +weighed it is necessary to rid them of such substances by submitting +them to fire, albeit the fire turns them black." + +The weapons and war-harness of the Spanish Moors were often exquisitely +decorated with the precious stones or metals. Splendid objects of this +kind have been preserved, and will be noticed in their proper chapter. + +The ruinous and reckless measure known to Spain's eternal shame as the +Expulsion of the Moriscos, deprived this country of a great--perhaps the +greatest--part of her resources. Fonseca estimates this loss, solely in +the quantity of coin conveyed away, at two million and eight hundred +thousand _escudos_, adding that a single Morisco, Alami Delascar de +Aberique, bore off with him one hundred thousand ducats.[42] To make +this matter worse, the Moriscos, just before they went on board their +ships, fashioned from scraps of tin, old nails, and other refuse, +enormous stores of counterfeit coin, and slyly sold this rubbish to the +simple Spaniards in return for lawful money of the land. In the course +of a few days, and in a single quarter of Valencia, more than three +hundred thousand ducats of false coin were thus passed off upon the +Christians. Besides this exportation of good Spanish money, the cunning +fugitives removed huge quantities of jewellery and plate. Chains, +_axorcas_, rings, _zarcillos_, and gold _escudos_ were taken from the +bodies of many of the Morisco women who were murdered by the Spanish +soldiery; but the greater part of all this treasure found its way to +Africa. In his work _Expulsión justificada de los Moriscos_ (1612), +Aznar de Cardona says that the Morisco women carried "divers plates upon +the breast, together with necklaces and collars, earrings and +bracelets." It is recorded, too, that the Moriscos, as they struggled in +the country regions to avenge themselves upon their persecutors, did +unlimited damage to the ornaments and fittings of the churches. "This +people," says Fonseca, "respected not our temples or the holy images +that in them were; nor yet the chalices and other objects they +encountered in our sacristies. Upon the contrary, they smashed the +crosses, burned the saints, profaned the sacred vestments, and committed +such acts of sacrilege as though they had been Algerian Moors, or Turks +of Constantinople." + + [42] There was, however, from long before this time a prohibition to + export from Spain the precious metals, in any form, whether as + objects of plate or as coined money. The penalty for a repetition + of this offence was death. Another law prohibited all foreigners + who were resident in Spain, not excluding the Moriscos, from buying + gold or silver in the bar (_Suma de Leyes_, p. 46). It was also + forbidden to sell the jewels or other objects of value belonging to + a place of worship (_ibid_. p. 87). + +Legends of hidden Moorish and Morisco wealth are still extant in many +parts of Spain. The Abbé Bertaut de Rouen[43] and Swinburne among +foreigners, or Spaniards such as the gossiping priest Echeverría, who +provided Washington Irving with the pick of his _Tales of the Alhambra_, +have treated copiously of this fascinating and mysterious theme. The +Siete Suelos Tower at Granada is particularly favoured with traditions +of this kind. Peasants of the Alpujarras still declare that piles of +Moorish money lie secreted in the lofty buttresses of Mulhacen and the +Veleta, while yet another summit of this snowy range bears the +suggestive title of the Cerro del Tesoro, where, almost within the +memory of living men, a numerous party, fitted and commissioned by the +State, explored with feverish though unlucky zeal the naked cliffs and +sterile crannies of the lonely mountain.[44] + + [43] This entertaining and inquisitive tourist describes, in 1659, a + wondrous cavern in the south of Spain, "ou l'on conte que les Mores + ont caché leurs trésors en s'en retournant en Afrique, et ou + personne n'ose aborder de peur des esprits que l'on dit que l'on y + voit souvent. Mais comme il commencait a se faire nuit, je n'eus + pas le loisir de m'y amuser beaucoup." With this our author shelved + his curiosity, and prudently retired. + + [44] Leonard Williams. _Granada: Memories, Adventures, Studies, and + Impressions_, p. 90. + +Reducing all these fables to the terms of truth, Moorish and Morisco +jewellery and coin are sometimes brought to light on Spanish soil. Such +finds occur, less seldom than elsewhere, within the provinces of +Seville, Cordova, Granada, and Almeria (Plate xiv.), but since they are +neither frequent nor considerable, although the likeliest ground for +them is being disturbed continually, we may conclude that nearly all the +Muslim wealth accumulated here slipped from the clumsy if ferocious +fingers of the mother-country, and found its way, concealed upon the +bodies of her persecuted offspring, to the shores of Africa.[45] + + [45] Ford was more hopeful as to the preservation of this wealth in + Spain. "No doubt much coin is buried in the Peninsula, since the + country has always been invaded and torn by civil wars, and there + never has been much confidence between Spaniard and Spaniard; + accordingly the only sure, although unproductive, investment for + those who had money, was gold or silver, and the only resource to + preserve that, was to hide it."--_Handbook_, vol. ii. p. 682. + + [Illustration: XIV + MORISCO JEWELLERY + (_Found in the Province of Granada_)] + +Sometimes, too, an early gold or silver object would be melted down and +modernized into another and a newer piece of plate. This was a fairly +common usage with the silversmiths themselves, or with an ignorant or +stingy brotherhood or chapter. Thus, the following entry occurs in the +_Libro de Visita de Fábrica_ belonging to the parish church of Santa +Ana, Triana, Seville. In the year 1599 "the large cross of silver-gilt, +together with its _mançana_ and all the silver attaching thereto, was +taken to the house of Zubieta the silversmith, and pulled to pieces. It +weighed 25 marks and 4 _ochavas_ of silver, besides 5 marks and 2 ounces +and 4 _ochavas_ of silver which was the weight of the three lamps +delivered to Zubieta in the time of Juan de Mirando, aforetime steward +of this church. It is now made into a silver-gilt cross."[46] + + [46] Gestoso, _Diccionario de Artífices Sevillanos_, vol. ii. p. 360. + +A similar instance may be quoted from a document of Cordova, published +by Ramírez de Arellano in his relation of a visit to the monastery of +San Jerónimo de Valparaiso. In the year 1607 Gerónimo de la Cruz, a +Cordovese silversmith, agreed with the prior of this monastery to make +for the community a silver-gilt _custodia_. For this purpose he received +from the prior, doubtless a man of parsimonious spirit and a boor in his +appreciativeness of art, eight pairs of vinegar cruets, four of whose +tops were missing; a silver-gilt chalice and its patine; a _viril_ with +two angels and four pieces on the crown of it; a small communion cup; +some silver candlesticks; four spoons and a fork, also of silver; and a +silver-gilt salt-cellar. The total value of these objects was 1826 +_reales_; and all of them were tossed, in Ford's indignant phrase, into +the "sacrilegious melting-pot," in order to provide material for the new +_custodia_. + + [Illustration: XV + SILVER-GILT PROCESSIONAL CROSS + (_Made by Juan de Arfe in_ 1592. _Burgos Cathedral_)] + +The gold and silver work of Christian Spain attained, throughout the +fifteenth and the sixteenth centuries, a high degree of excellence +(Plates xv., xvi., etc.). The best of it was made at Seville, Barcelona, +Toledo, and Valladolid. Objects of great artistic worth were also +produced at Burgos, Palencia, León, Cuenca, Cordova, and Salamanca. I +have already mentioned some of the principal _orfebreros_ of Barcelona. +Juan Ruiz of Cordova, whom Juan de Arfe applauds as "the first +silversmith who taught the way to do good work in Andalusia," was also, +in this region, the first to turn the precious metals on the lathe. A +famous silversmith of Seville was Diego de Vozmediano, whom we find +living there in 1525. Toledo, too, could boast, among an army of +distinguished gold and silver smiths (Riaño gives the names of no fewer +than seventy-seven), Cristóbal de Ordas, Juan Rodríguez de Babria, and +Pedro Hernandez, _plateros_, respectively, to Charles the Fifth, to +Philip the Second, and to the queen-dowager of Portugal; and also the +silversmith and engraver upon metals, Pedro Angel, whose praise is sung +by Lope de Vega in the prologue to his _auto_ called _The Voyage of the +Soul_:-- + + "_Y es hoy Pedro Angel un divino artífice + con el buril en oro, plata, ó cobre._" + +By far the greater part of all Toledo's gold and silver work was made +for service in her mighty temple. Such were the statue of Saint Helen, +presented by Philip the Second; the crown of the Virgen del Sagrario, +wrought by Hernando de Carrión and Alejo de Montoya; the bracelets or +_ajorcas_ made for the image of the same Madonna by Julián Honrado; and +the exquisite chests carved in 1569 and 1598 by Francisco Merino from +designs by the two Vergaras, father and son, as reliquaries for the +bones of San Eugenio and Santa Leocadia, patrons of this ancient +capital.[47] A magnificent silver lamp was also, in 1565, offered by the +chapter of the cathedral to the church of Saint Denis in France, in +gratitude for the surrender of the bones of San Eugenio to the city of +his birth. These and other objects of Toledan gold and silver work are +stated to be "worthy of comparison with the very best of what was then +produced in Germany, Italy, and France."[48] + + [47] A full description of these chests will be found in Cean Bermudez, + vol. iii. pp. 135-137. + + [48] Rada y Delgado, in his reply to the Count of Cedillo's address in + the Royal Academy of History. For particulars of the silver lamp, + which was made by Marcos and Gonzalo Hernandez, Toledanos, and by + Diego Dávila, see Zarco del Valle, _Documentos Inéditos para la + Historia de las Bellas Artes en España_, vol. lv. p. 580. + +Baron Davillier also held a high opinion of the Spanish _orfebreros_ of +this time. After remarking that the Italian influence was powerful among +the Spaniards in the sixteenth century, and more particularly for some +fifty years at Barcelona, he says: "A cette époque les _plateros_ +espagnols pouvaient rivaliser sans désavantage avec les Italiens, les +Français, les Flamands, et les Allemands." + +The same authority also says that the Spanish _plateros_ of this period +were skilled enamellers on gold and silver, and quotes some entries from +French inventories of the time in which we read of cups, salt-cellars, +washing-basins, and other objects executed or enamelled "à la mode +d'Espagne."[49] + + [49] _Recherches sur l'Orfévrerie en Espagne_, pp. 61 _et seq._ + +As we have seen, the exodus of the Moriscos lost to Spain a great +proportion of her total wealth, although, conjointly with this loss, new +wealth flowed into her in marvellous abundance from the New World.[50] +Thus, the silver-mines of Potosi, discovered in 1545, sent over to the +mother-country, between that year and 1633, no less than eight hundred +and forty-five millions of _pesos_. And yet this mighty influx of new +riches cannot be said, except in the artistic sense, to have enriched +the nation. She had renounced the service of the most industrious and, +in many instances, the most ingenious of her native craftsmen; while on +the other hand the Christians, with but limited exceptions, were far too +proud and far too indolent to set their hand to any form of manual +exercise; just as (I much regret to add) a great proportion of them are +this very day. Foreign artificers in consequence (particularly after the +royal pragmatic of 1623 encouraging their immigration), attracted by the +treasure fleets that anchored in the bay of Cadiz, came trooping into +Spain and filled their pockets from the national purse, fashioning, in +return for money which they husbanded and sent abroad, luxurious gold +and silver objects that were merely destined to stagnate within her +churches and cathedrals. + + [50] Ulloa, _Memorias Sevillanas_, vol. i. p. 199. + +Riaño and Baron de la Vega de Hoz extract from Cean Bermudez a copious +list of silversmiths who worked in Spain all through the Middle Ages. +This long array of isolated names and dates is neither interesting nor +informative. Newer and more attractive notices have been discovered +subsequently. Thus, in the National Library at Madrid, Don Manuel G. +Simancas has disinterred quite recently the copy made by a Jesuit of a +series of thirteenth-century accounts relating to various craftsmen of +the reign of Sancho the Fourth ("the Brave"). Two of them are concerning +early _orfebreros_:-- + +"Juan Yanez. By letters of the king and queen to Johan Yanez, goldsmith, +brother of Ferran García, scrivener to the king; for three chalices +received from him by the king, CCCCLXXVIII _maravedis_." + +The second entry says:-- + +"Bartolomé Rinalt. And he paid Bartolomé Rinalt for jewels which the +queen bought from him to present to Doña Marina Suarez, nurse of the +Infante Don Pedro, MCCCL _maravedis_."[51] + + [51] _Libro de diferentes Cuentas y gasto de la Casa Real en el Reynado + de Don Sancho IV. Sacado de un tomo original en folio que se guarda + en la Librería de la Santa Iglesia de Toledo._ Años de 1293-1294. + Por el P. Andres Marcos Burriel de la Comp^a de Jesus. + +Among Spain's gold and silver craftsmen of the fifteenth century we +find the names of Juan de Castelnou, together with his son Jaime, who +worked at Valencia; of Lope Rodríguez de Villareal, Ruby, and Juan +Gonzalez, all three of whom worked at Toledo; and of Juan de Segovia, a +friar of Guadalupe. Papers concerning Juan Gonzalez, and dated 1425, +1427, and 1431, are published among the _Documentos Inéditos_ of Zarco +del Valle. One of Segovia's masterpieces was a silver salt-cellar in the +form of a lion tearing open a pomegranate--clearly allusive to the +conquest of Granada from the Moors. Upon their visiting the monastery, +Ferdinand and Isabella saw and, as was natural, conceived a fancy for +this salt-cellar; and so, whether from inclination or necessity, the +brotherhood induced them to accept it. + +Sixteenth-century _plateros_ of renown were Juan Donante, Mateo and +Nicolás (whose surnames are unknown)--all three of whom worked at +Seville; and Duarte Rodríguez and Fernando Ballesteros, natives of that +city. In or about the year 1524 were working at Toledo the silversmiths +Pedro Herreros and Hernando de Valles, together with Diego Vazquez, +Andres Ordoñez, Hernando de Carrión, Diego de Valdivieso, Juan Domingo +de Villanueva, Diego Abedo de Villandrando, Juan Tello de Morata, +Francisco de Reinalte, Hans Belta, and Francisco Merino. Several of +these men were natives of Toledo. + +Among the silversmiths of sixteenth-century Cordova were Diego de Alfaro +and his son Francisco, Francisco de Baena, Alonso Casas, Alonso del +Castillo, Luis de Cordoba, Sebastián de Cordoba, Cristóbal de Escalante, +Juan Gonzalez, Diego Fernandez, Diego Hernandez Rubio (son of Sebastián +de Cordoba), Rodrigo de León, Gómez Luque, Ginés Martinez, Melchor de +los Reyes (silversmith and enameller), Andrés de Roa, Pedro de Roa, +Alonso Sanchez, Jerónimo Sanchez de la Cruz, Martin Sanchez de la Cruz +(Jerónimo's son), Pedro Sanchez de Luque, Alonso de Sevilla, Juan +Urbano, and Lucas de Valdés. + +Not much is told us of the lives and labours of these artists. The best +reputed of them as a craftsman was Rodrigo de León, who stood next after +Juan Ruiz, _el Sandolino_. Ramírez de Arellano, from whom I have +collected these data, publishes a number of León's agreements or +contracts, which from their length and dryness I do not here repeat. In +1603 we find him official silversmith to the cathedral, under the title +of "_platero de martillo_ ("silversmith of hammered work") _de la obra +de la catedral desta ciudad_." + +Francisco de Alfaro, although a Cordovese by birth, resided commonly at +Seville. In 1578 he received 446,163 _maravedis_ for making four silver +candlesticks for use in celebrating divine service. These candlesticks +are still in the cathedral. + +Sebastián de Cordoba was one of the foremost artists of his age. He died +in 1587, leaving, together with other children, a son, Diego, who also +won some reputation as a silversmith. Ramírez de Arellano publishes a +full relation of the property which Sebastián de Cordoba bequeathed at +his decease, as well as of the money which was owing to him. Among the +former, or the "movable effects," we read of "Isabel, a Morisco woman, +native of the kingdom of Granada; her age thirty-four years, a little +less or more." The same inventory includes a curious and complete +account of all the tools and apparatus in Sebastián's workshop. + +But the quaintest notice of them all, though it does not apprise us of +his merit as a silversmith, is that concerning Cristóbal de Escalante. +Cristóbal suffered, we are told, from "certain sores produced by humours +in his left leg; wherefore the said leg undergoes a change and swells." +He therefore makes a contract with one Juan Jiménez, "servant in the +Royal Stables of His Majesty the King," and duly examined as a herbalist +("licensed," in the actual phrase, "to remedy this kind of ailments"), +who is to heal his leg "by means of the divine will of the cure." As +soon as Cristóbal shall be thoroughly well, "in so much that his ailing +leg shall be the other's equal in the fatness and the form thereof," he +is to pay Jiménez five-and-fifty _reales_, "having already given him ten +_reales_ on account." + +Probably, as Señor Ramírez de Arellano facetiously supposes, Cristóbal, +after such a course of treatment, would be lame for all his life. At any +rate, he died in 1605, though whether from the gentle handling of the +stableman and herbalist is not recorded in these entries. + +Still keeping to the sixteenth century, in other parts of Spain we find +the silversmiths Baltasar Alvarez and Juan de Benavente, working at +Palencia; Alonso de Dueñas at Salamanca; and Juan de Orna at Burgos, +about the same time that the foreigners Jacomi de Trezzo and Leo Leoni +were engaged at the Escorial. Cuenca, too, boasted three excellent +silver-workers in the family of Becerril, mentioned by Juan de Arfe in +company with other craftsmen of the time of the Renaissance.[52] +Stirling says of Cuenca and the Becerriles: "They made for the cathedral +its great _custodia_, which was one of the most costly and celebrated +pieces of church plate in Spain. They began it in 1528, and, though +ready for use in 1546, it was not finished till 1573. It was a +three-storied edifice, of a florid classical design, crowned with a +dome, and enriched with numberless groups and statues, and an inner +shrine of jewelled gold; it contained 616 marks of silver, and cost +17,725-1/2 ducats, a sum which can barely have paid the ingenious +artists for the labour of forty-five years. In the War of Independence, +this splendid prize fell into the hands of the French General +Caulaincourt, by whom it was forthwith turned into five-franc pieces, +bearing the image and superscription of Napoleon."[53] + + [52] "_Con estos fué mi padre en seguimiento + Joan Alvarez tambien el Salmantino, + Becerril, que tambien fué deste cuento, + Juan de Orna, y Juan Ruiz el Vandolino._" + + [53] _Annals of the Artists of Spain_, vol. i. pp. 161, 162. + +A more reliable notice says that this _custodia_ was begun by Alonso +Becerril and finished by his brother Francisco. The third member of +this family of artists, Cristóbal, who flourished towards the end of the +sixteenth century, was Francisco's son. + + [Illustration: XVI + GOTHIC _CUSTODIA_ + (_15th Century_)] + +Towards the close of the Gothic and during the earlier phases of the +Renaissance movement in this country, enormous quantities of gold and +silver began to be employed in making these _custodias_ or monstrances +of her temples; so that the fifteenth century may well be called, in +Spanish craftsmanship, the "age of the _custodia_." A century ago the +reverend Townsend, loyal to the Low Church prejudices of his day, spoke +of this object with something of a sneer as "the depository of the Host, +or, according to the ideas of a Catholic, the throne of the Most High, +when, upon solemn festivals, He appears to command the adoration of +mankind." Riaño's description is more technical. "The name of +_custodia_," he says, "is given in Spain, not only to the monstrance or +ostensoir where the Blessed Sacrament is exposed, but also to a sort of +temple or tabernacle, of large size, made also of silver, inside which +is placed the monstrance, which is carried in procession on Corpus +Christi day (Plate xvi.). In order to distinguish these objects one from +another, the name of _viril_ is given to the object which holds the +consecrated Host; it is generally made of rock crystal, with a gold stem +and mount ornamented with precious stones. The small tabernacles are +generally objects of the greatest importance, both from their artistic +and intrinsic value." A third description of the monstrance, written in +quaint and antiquated Spanish verse by Juan de Arfe, is truthfully if +not melodiously translated into English rhyme by Stirling:-- + + "Custodia is a temple of rich plate, + Wrought for the glory of our Saviour true, + Where, into wafer transubstantiate, + He shows his Godhead and his Manhood too, + That holiest ark of old to imitate, + Fashioned by Bezaleel, the cunning Jew, + Chosen of God to work His sov'ran will, + And greatly gifted with celestial skill."[54] + + [54] _Op. cit._, p. 159, note. + +Notwithstanding that the monstrance of Toledo, surmounted by a cross of +solid gold, turns the scale at ten thousand nine hundred ounces, and +that of Avila at one hundred and forty pounds, the weight of nearly all +of these _custodias_ is far exceeded by the value of their workmanship. +The style employed in their construction is the Gothic, the Renaissance, +or the two combined. _Custodias_ of the eastern parts of Spain are more +affected than the others by Italian influence, noticeable both in +decorative motives which recall the Florentine, and in the use, together +with the silver-work, of painting and enamels. In other parts of Spain +the dominating influence is the later Gothic. Among the former or +Levantine class of monstrances, the most important are those of +Barcelona, Vich, Gerona, and Palma de Mallorca; and of the others, those +of Cordova, Cadiz, Sahagún, Zamora, Salamanca, and Toledo--this last, +according to Bertaut de Rouen, "à la manière d'un clocher percé à jour, +d'ouvrage de filigrane, et plein de figures." _Custodias_ in the purest +classic or Renaissance style are those of Seville, Valladolid, Palencia, +Avila, Jaen, Madrid, Segovia, Zaragoza, Santiago, and Orense. + +Juan de Arfe y Villafañe, who may be called the Cellini of Spain's +_custodia_-makers, was born at León in 1535. He was the son of Antonio +de Arfe, and grandson of Enrique de Arfe, a German who had married a +Spanish wife and made his home in Spain. The family of Juan, including +his brother Antonio, were all distinguished craftsmen, and he himself +informs us that his grandfather excelled in Gothic _platería_, as may +be judged from the _custodias_, by Enrique's hand, of Cordova, León, +Toledo, and Sahagún, and many smaller objects, such as incensories, +crosiers, and paxes. + +The father of Juan, Antonio de Arfe, worked in silver in the Renaissance +or Plateresque styles, and executed in the florid manner the _custodias_ +of Santiago de Galicia and Medina de Rioseco; but the training and +tastes of Juan himself were sternly classical. His work in consequence +has a certain coldness, largely atoned for by its exquisite correctness +of design and unimpeachable proportions. Arfe's ideal in these matters +may readily be judged of from his written verdict on the Greco-Roman +architecture. "The Escorial," he says, in the preface to his description +of the _custodia_ of Seville cathedral, "_because it follows the rules +of ancient art_, competes in general perfection, size, or splendour with +the most distinguished buildings of the Asiatics, Greeks, and Romans, +and displays magnificence and truth in all its detail." + +In point of versatility Juan de Arfe was a kind of Spanish Leonardo. His +book, _De Varia Conmensuración_, etc., published in 1585, is divided +into four parts, and deals, the first part with the practice of +geometry, the second with human anatomy, the third with animals, and +the fourth with architecture and silver-work for use in churches. + +[Illustration: IOAN DE ARFE] + +This book is prefaced by the portrait of the author, given above. It +shows us--what he really was--a quiet, cultured, gentle-hearted man. +Indeed, while Arfe was studying anatomy at Salamanca, it gave him pain +to lacerate the bodies even of the dead. "I was witness," he records, +"to the flaying of several pauper men and women whom the law had +executed; but these experiments, besides being horrible and cruel, I saw +to be of little service to my studies in anatomy." + +Arfe's workmanship of the _custodia_ of Avila cathedral, which he began +in 1564 and terminated in 1571, won for him an early and extended fame. +He also made the _custodia_ of Burgos (brutally melted during the +Spanish War of Independence), and those of Valladolid (finished in +1590), Lugo, Osma, and the Hermandad del Santísimo at Madrid. The +_custodia_ of Palencia is also thought by some to be his handiwork. + +But Arfe's crowning labour was the Greco-Roman _custodia_ of Seville +cathedral (Plate xvii.). The chapter of this temple selected his design +in 1580, and nominated the licentiate Pacheco to assist him with the +statuettes. Pacheco also carried out his portion of the task with skill +and judgment. A rare pamphlet, written by Arfe and published at Seville +in 1587, gives a minute description of the whole _custodia_. In Appendix +C, I render this description into English, together with a similarly +detailed notice of the _custodia_ (1513 A.D.) of Cordova. This last, +which we have seen to be the work of Juan de Arfe's grandfather, +Enrique, is not to be surpassed for fairy grace and lightness, seeming, +in the eloquent metaphor of a modern writer, "to have been conceived in +a dream, and executed with the breath." + + [Illustration: XVII + _CUSTODIA_ OF SEVILLE CATHEDRAL + (_By Juan de Arfe. Late 16th Century_)] + +Spain in the seventeenth century had reached the lowest depth of her +decadence and impoverishment; and yet we find that century an age--to +quote a Spanish term--of "gallantries and pearls," in which a craze for +reckless luxury continued to prevail in every quarter. Narratives +innumerable inform us of the life and doings of that prodigal court and +prodigal aristocracy; their ruinous and incessant festivals; the +fortunes that were thrown away on furniture, and jewels, and costume. +True, we are told by Bertaut de Rouen that, except upon their numerous +holidays, the costume of the Spanish men was plain enough. This author, +who calls them otherwise "debauched and ignorant," says that their +clothes were all of "méchante frise," and adds that they continually +took snuff, "dont ils ont toujours les narines pleines, ce qui fait +qu'ils n'ont que des mouchoirs de laine, de toile grise, et peinte comme +de la toile de la Chine." The same traveller, attending an ordinary +reception in the royal palace at Madrid, was unable to distinguish the +nobles from the lower orders, except that, by the privilege peculiar to +this country, the former kept their hats on in the presence of the +sovereign. Even of Philip himself he says: "Le Roy d'Espagne estoit +debout avec un habit fort simple et fort ressemblant à tous ses +portraits"; alluding, probably, to those of Philip the Fourth by +Velazquez, in which the monarch wears a plain cloth doublet. + +But when the Spaniard dressed himself for any scene of gala show, his +spendthrift inclinations swelled into a positive disease. The women, +too, squandered enormous sums on finery. The Marchioness of Liche, said +to have been the loveliest Española of that day, is spoken of by Bertaut +as wearing "un corps de brocard d'argent avec de grandes basques à leur +mode, la jupe d'une autre étoffe avec grand nombre de pierreries, et +cela luy fetoit fort bien." An anonymous manuscript of the period, +published by Gayangos in the _Revista de España_ for 1884, describes the +_fiestas_ celebrated at Valladolid in 1605, in honour of the English +ambassador and his retinue. In this relation the Duke of Lerma is quoted +as possessing a yearly income of three hundred thousand _cruzados_, +besides "as much again in jewellery and furniture, and gold and silver +services." At the state banquets which were given at that wasteful +court, even the pies and tarts were washed with gold or silver; and at a +single feast the dishes of various kinds of fare amounted to two +thousand and two hundred. At the banquet given by the Duke of Lerma, +three special sideboards were constructed to sustain the weight of four +hundred pieces of silver, "all of them of delicate design and +exquisitely wrought of silver, gold, and enamel, together with +innumerable objects of glass and crystal of capricious form, with +handles, lids, and feet of finest gold." + +The whole of Spain's nobility was congregated at these festivals, +"richly attired with quantities of pearls and oriental gems," while +everybody, young and old alike, wore "diamond buttons and brooches on +cloaks and doublets," feather plumes with costly medals, gold chains +with emeralds, and other ornaments. The ladies of the aristocracy were +also "clothed in costliest style, as well as loaded with diamonds and +pearls and hair-ornaments of pearls and gold, such as the women of +Castile lay by for these solemnities." + +The Spanish churches, too, continued to be veritable storehouses of +treasure. The manuscript published by Gayangos says that in 1605 the +church of La Merced at Valladolid had its altars "covered with beautiful +gold and silver vessels, of which there are a great many in the whole of +Castilla la Vieja, and particularly here at Valladolid." Bertaut de +Rouen's notice of the shrine of Montserrat in Cataluña has been inserted +previously. In 1775 Swinburne wrote of the same temple:--"In the +sacristy and passages leading to it are presses and cupboards full of +relics and ornaments of gold, silver, and precious stones; they pointed +out to us, as the most remarkable, two crowns for the Virgin and her +Son, of inestimable value, some large diamond rings, an excellent cameo +of Medusa's head, the Roman emperors in alabaster, the sword of Saint +Ignatius, and the chest that contains the ashes of a famous brother, +John Guarin, of whom they relate the same story as that given in the +_Spectator_ of a Turkish santon and the Sultan's daughter.... Immense is +the quantity of votive offerings to this miraculous statue; and as +nothing can be rejected or otherwise disposed of, the shelves are +crowded with the most whimsical _ex votos_, viz., silver legs, fingers, +breasts, earrings, watches, two-wheeled chaises, boats, carts, and +such-like trumpery." + +Many pragmatics from the Crown vainly endeavoured to suppress or +mitigate the popular extravagance. Such was the royal letter of 1611, +which forbade, among the laity, the wearing of "gold jewels with +decoration or enamel in relief, or points with pearls or other stones." +Smaller jewels, of the kind known as _joyeles_ and _brincos_,[55] were +limited to a single stone, together with its pearl pendant. The +jewellery of the women was exempted from these laws, though even here +were certain limitations. Rings for the finger might, however, bear +enamel-work, or any kind of stone. Enamel was also allowed in gold +buttons and chains for the men's caps, as well as in the badges worn by +the knights of the military orders. + + [55] _Brinco_ (_brincar_, to jump or spring). These jewels were so + called from their vibrating as the wearer walked. The Balearic + Islands were famous for their manufacture; and the late Marquis of + Arcicollar possessed a case of valuable examples, most of which + proceeded from this locality. + +"It is forbidden," continues this pragmatic, "to make any object of +gold, silver, or other metal with work in relief, or the likeness of a +person; nor shall any object be gilt, excepting drinking vessels, and +the weight of these shall not exceed three marks. All other silver +shall be flat and plain, without gilding; but this does not apply to +objects intended for religious worship." + +"All niello-work is prohibited, as are silver brasiers and buffets."[56] + + [56] _Suma de Leyes_, 1628, p. 116 (2). + +What I may call the private jewel-work of Spain, largely retains +throughout its history the characteristic lack of finish of all the +Visigothic treasure found at Guarrazar. From first to last, until +extinguished or absorbed by foreign influences two centuries ago, it +strives to compensate in ponderous and bulky splendour for what it lacks +in delicacy, elegance, and taste. It is just the jewellery we should +expect to find among a military people who once upon a time possessed +great riches simultaneously with little education, and who, from this +and other causes, such as the strenuous opposition of the national +church to pagan sentiments expressed in fleshly form, were never +genuinely or profoundly art-loving. Long residence and observation in +their midst induce me to affirm that as a race the Spaniards are and +always have been hostile, or at least indifferent, to the arts; and that +their most illustrious artists have made their power manifest and raised +themselves to eminence despite the people--not, as in Italy, on the +supporting shoulders of the people. + +Dazzle and show monopolized, and to a great extent monopolize still, the +preference of this race. The Spanish breast-ornaments of the seventeenth +century, preserved at South Kensington and reproduced by Riaño on pages +37 and 39 of his handbook, are strongly reminiscent of the Visigothic +ornaments. Who would imagine that a thousand years had come and gone +between the execution of the new and of the old? As late as the reign of +Charles the Second the culture of a Spanish lady of high birth was +little, if at all, superior to a savage's. "False stones enchant them," +wrote Countess d'Aulnoy. "Although they possess many jewels of +considerable value and the finest quality, it is their whim to carry on +their person wretched bits of glass cut in the coarsest fashion, just +like those which pedlars in my country sell to country girls who have +seen nobody but the village curate, and nothing but their flocks of +sheep. Dames of the aristocracy adorn themselves with these pieces of +glass, that are worth nothing at all; yet they purchase them at high +prices. When I asked them why they like false diamonds, they told me +they prefer them to the genuine as being larger. Indeed, they sometimes +wear them of the bigness of an egg." Even where the stones were real, +the Spanish taste in setting and in wearing them was no less execrable. +The Countess says: "the ladies here possess great stores of beautiful +precious stones, and do not wear, like Frenchwomen, a single article of +jewellery, but nine or ten together, some of diamonds, others of rubies, +pearls, emeralds, and turquoises, wretchedly mounted, since they are +almost wholly covered with the gold. When I inquired the cause of this, +they told me the jewels were so made because the gold was as beautiful +as the gems. I suppose, however, the real reason is the backwardness of +the craftsmen, who can do no better work than this, excepting Verbec, +who has no lack of skill, and would turn out excellent jewels if he took +the trouble to finish them." + +"In the neck of their bodices the ladies fasten pins profusely set with +precious stones. Hanging from the pin, and fastened at the lower end to +the side of their dress, is a string of pearls or diamonds. They wear no +necklace, but bracelets on their wrists and rings on their fingers, as +well as long earrings of so great a weight that I know not how they can +support them. Hanging from these earrings they display whatever finery +they may fancy. I have seen some ladies who wore good-sized watches +hanging from their ears, strings of precious stones, English keys of +dainty make, and little bells. They also wear the _agnus_, together with +little images about their neck and arms, or in their hair. They dress +their hair in various ways, and always go with it uncovered, using many +hairpins in the form of coloured flies or butterflies of diamonds, +emeralds, and rubies." + +Book-worm authorities, addicted to "dry bones" of letters, are prone +just now to doubt this visit of Countess d'Aulnoy to the capital of +Spain. But if such patient doubters will compare her narrative with +those of other foreigners, _e.g._ Bertaut de Rouen, or the manuscript +description of Valladolid, written by a Portuguese, and now in the +British Museum library, their scepticism will--or should--be done away +with on the moment. The letters of the countess make it plain by copious +inner testimony that she actually performed her Spanish visit; and +though from time to time she over-colours or misreads the truth, it was +the very usages of Spain that were absurd and out of joint, and not, +except in isolated instances, the sprightly and observant Frenchwoman's +account of them.[57] + + [57] But on the other hand I much suspect that the following passage in + Alvarez de Colmenar's _Annales d'Espagne et de Portugal_ + (vol. iii. p. 326) is stolen from Countess d'Aulnoy. "Elles ne + portent point de colier, mais en échange elles ont des bracelets, + des bagues, et des pendans d'oreille, plus gros que tous ceux qu'on + voit en Hollande. Telle est la diversité des gouts des nations + différentes, en matière de beauté. Il y en a même quelques-unes, + qui attachent quelque beau joli bijou à leurs pendans d'oreilles, + quelque ornement de pierreries, par exemple, ou d'autres choses + semblables, selon leur quantité ou leur pouvoir." + +Elsewhere the Countess says: "Utensils of common metal are not employed +here, but only those of silver or of ware. I hear that a little while +ago, upon the death of the Duke of Alburquerque, six weeks were needed +to make out an inventory of his gold and silver services. His house +contained fourteen hundred dozen plates, five hundred large dishes, and +seven hundred of a smaller size, with all the other pieces in +proportion, and forty silver ladders for climbing his sideboard, made in +grades like an altar in a spacious hall." + +These statements have been proved in later years. Dating from 1560, an +inventory of the ducal house of Alburquerque was found not many years +ago. In it we find the detailed list of gold and silver; cups and +dishes, bowls and basins, plates and salt-cellars, trenchers, wine and +water flagons, sauce-spoons, salad-spoons, conserve-spoons, and +innumerable other articles. Here, too, we find, upon the mighty +sideboard mounted by its forty silver stairs, such objects as the +following:-- + +"A gold cup with festoon-work above and beneath, wrought with leaves in +relief. At the top of the foot there issue some leaves that fall down +over a small gold staple, and below this, about the narrowest part of +the foot, are leaves in relief and several dolphins. The broad part of +the foot is decorated with festoons. The lid of this cup is wrought with +leaves in relief, and on the crest thereof is a lion, crowned. The cup +weighs three hundred and fifty-one _castellanos_ and a half." + +"A Castilian jar from which my lord the duke was wont to drink, weighing +two marks and five ounces."[58] + + [58] The mark was a standard of eight ounces, and was divided into fifty + _castellanos_. + +"A cup with a high foot, gilt all over, with the figure of a woman in +its midst, and decorated in four places in the Roman manner." + +"A flagon of white silver, flat beneath the stem, with a screw-top +surmounted by a small lion; for cooling water." + +"A small silver dish, of the kind they call meat-warmers." + +"A large silver seal for sealing provisions, with the arms of my lord +the duke, Don Francisco." + +"A large silver vessel, embossed, with a savage on top." + +"A gold horse, enamelled in white upon a gold plate enamelled in green +and open at the top; also a wolf, upon another gold plate enamelled in +green, with lettering round about it; also a green enamelled lizard upon +blue enamel; and a gold toothpick with four pieces enamelled in green, +white, and rose; also a small gold column enamelled in black and rose." + +"A silver lemon-squeezer, gilt and chiselled, with white scroll-work +about the mesh thereof, through which the lemon-juice is strained." + +"A large round silver salt-cellar, in two halves, gilt all over, with +scales about the body, and two thick twisted threads about the flat +part. One side of it is perforated." + +Among the property of the duchess, Doña Mencía Enriquez, we find "a +small gold padlock, which opens and closes by means of letters"; two +gold bangles; a gold necklace consisting of forty-two pieces "enamelled +with some B's";[59] a gold signet ring with the duchess's arms; and "a +gold and niello box with relics, for wearing round the neck." Also, +resting on a table covered with silver plates, "a box of combs; the said +box wrought in gold upon blue leather, containing five combs, a +looking-glass, a little brush, and other fittings; girt with a cord in +gold and blue silk." + + [59] For Beltran de la Cueva, ancestor of this family. + +The seventeenth century and a race of native Spanish kings declined and +passed away together. A dynasty of France succeeded to the throne of +Spain, and with the foreigner came a fresh reactionary movement towards +the neo-classic art, coupled with the canons of French taste. Henceforth +a century of slow political reform goes hand in hand with slow +suppression of the salient parts of Spanish character. Madrid transforms +or travesties herself into a miniature Versailles, and national arts and +crafts belong henceforward to a Frenchified society which found its +painter in Goya, just as the preceding and eminently Spanish society had +found its painter in Velazquez. + +Another of the causes of the falling-off in Spanish _orfebrería_ at this +time, is stated to have been the craftsmen's overwhelming tendency to +substitute the slighter though venerable and beautiful gold or silver +filigree (Plate xviii.), for more artistic and ambitious, if less showy +work in massive metal. Thus, in 1699, a supplementary chapter of the +Ordinances of Seville complained in bitter phrases of this tendency, +denouncing it as "a source of fraud and detriment to the republic," and +deploring that "of the last few years we have forsaken our goodly usages +of older times, in the matter of the drawings entrusted to the +candidates who come before us for examination." + +In the same year the goldsmiths' and the silversmiths' guild of Seville +enacted that none of its members were to work in filigree, unless they +were qualified to execute the other work as well. Such efforts to +suppress this evil were not new. More than a century before, on April +15th, 1567, the inspectors of the guild had entered the shop of Luis de +Alvarado, silversmith, and seized some filigree earrings "of the work +that is forbidden," breaking these objects on the spot, and imposing a +fine of half-a-dozen ducats on the peccant or oblivious Alvarado.[60] + + [60] Gestoso, _Diccionario de Artífices Sevillanos_, vol. ii. p. 134. + +The modern gold and silver work of Spain is thus exempted from a lengthy +notice, seeing that its typical and national characteristics have +succumbed, or very nearly so. I may, however, mention the giant silver +candelabra in the cathedral of Palma de Mallorca, which were made at +Barcelona, between 1704 and 1718, by Juan Matons and three of his +assistants. They measure eight feet high by four feet and a quarter +across, weigh more than eight thousand ounces, and cost 21,942 pounds, +15 _sueldos_, and 11 _dineros_ of Majorcan money. The State seized them +during the Napoleonic wars, in order to melt them down for money; but +the chapter of the cathedral bought them back for eleven thousand +dollars. + + [Illustration: XVIII + EARLY CHALICE AND CROSS IN FILIGREE GOLD-WORK + (_Church of Saint Isidore, León_)] + +During this century Riaño mentions several factories of silver articles +established at Madrid, including that of Isaac and Michael Naudin (1772) +and the Escuela de Platería (1778), protected by Charles the Third; but +since the work of these was purely in the French or English manner, they +call for no particular notice. The principal objects they produced were +"inkstands, dishes, dinner-services, chocolate-stands, cruets, knives +and forks, together with buckles, needle-cases, brooches, snuff-boxes, +frames for miniatures, and similar trinkets." + +Early in the nineteenth century Laborde wrote that "the fabrication of +articles of gold and silver might become an important object in a +country where these metals abound; but it is neglected, and the demand +is almost entirely supplied from foreign markets. What little they do in +this branch at home is usually very ill executed, and exorbitantly dear. +Madrid, however, begins to possess some good workmen; encouragement +would increase their number and facilitate the means of improvement; but +manual labour is there excessively dear. Hence the Spaniards prefer +foreign articles of this kind, which, notwithstanding the expense of +carriage, the enormous duties that they pay, and the profits of the +merchants, are still cheaper than those made at home." + +Several of the inherent characteristics of the national _orfebrería_ may +yet be noticed somewhat faintly in the ornaments and jewels of the +Spanish peasants, though even these are being discarded. A century ago +Laborde described the dress of the Mauregata women, near Astorga, in the +kingdom of León. "They wear large earrings, a kind of white turban, flat +and widened like a hat, and their hair parted on the forehead. They have +a chemise closed over the chest, and a brown corset buttoned, with +large sleeves opening behind. Their petticoats and veils are also brown. +Over all they wear immense coral necklaces, which descend from the neck +to the knee; they twist them several times round the neck, pass them +over the shoulders, where a row is fastened, forming a kind of bandage +over the bosom. Then another row lower than this; in short, a third and +fourth row at some distance from each other. The last falls over the +knee, with a large cross on the right side. These necklaces or chaplets +are ornamented with a great many silver medals, stamped with the figure +of saints. They only wear these decorations when not working, or on +festivals." + +I have a manuscript account in French of Spanish regional costumes at +the same period. The dress of the peasant women of Valencia is thus +described: "Elle se coiffe toujours en cheveux, de la manière appelée +_castaña_, et elle y passe une aiguille en argent que l'on nomme +_rascamoño_; quelque fois elle se pare d'un grand peigne (_peineta_) en +argent doré. Son cou este orné d'une chaine d'or ou d'argent (_cadena +del cuello_) à laquelle est suspendue une croix ou un reliquaire." This +was the Valencian peasant's dress for every day. On festivals the same +woman would adorn her ears with "pendants (_arracadas_) de pierres +fausses; mais lorsque la jardinière est riche, elles sont fines. Une +relique (_relicario_) dans un petit médaillon en argent, est suspendue à +son cou; ainsi qu'un chapelet très mince (_rosario_) en argent doré." + +The peasant women of Iviza, in the Balearics, are described in the same +manuscript as wearing "un collier en verre, quelque fois en argent, et +rarement en or"; while Laborde wrote of Minorca, another of these +islands, that "the ladies are always elegantly adorned; their ornaments +consist of necklaces, earrings, bracelets, rings, and chaplets. _The +peasants wear these also._" Of the women of Barcelona he said: "Silk +stockings are very common in every class; and their shoes are +embroidered with silk, gold, silver, pearls, and spangles." + +But Spain, like Italy or Switzerland, or many another country, is +throwing off her regional costumes, of which these various jewels form a +prominent and even an essential feature. More rarely now we come across +the gold and seed-pearl necklaces of Salamanca, the Moorish filigree +silver-work of Cordova, the silver-gilt necklaces of Santiago, and the +heavy _arracadas_, hung with emeralds and sapphires, of Cataluña. +Murcia, nevertheless, retains her Platería, a street of venerable aspect +and associations, where to this hour the oriental-looking silver +pendants of the neighbourhood are made and trafficked in. + +[Illustration] + + + + + IRON-WORK + + +The ancient iron mines of Spain were no less celebrated than her mines +of silver and of gold. Nevertheless, the history of Spanish iron-work +begins comparatively late. Excepting certain swords and other weapons +which require to be noticed under _Arms_, and owing to the commonness +and cheapness of this metal, as well as to the ease with which it +decomposes under damp, few of the earliest Spanish objects made of iron +have descended to our time.[61] Even Riaño pays but little notice to +this craft in the Peninsula before the second half of the fifteenth +century. Henceforth, he says, "it continued to progress in the +sixteenth, and produced, undoubtedly, at that period works which were +unrivalled in Europe." + + [61] A small collection, formed by Don Emilio Rotondo, of primitive iron + rings, bracelets, brooches, and other ornaments, is preserved in + the Schools of Aguirre at Madrid. Villa-amil y Castro + (_Antigüedades prehistóricas y célticas_, and _Castros y Mamoas de + Galicia_, published in the _Museo Español de Antigüedades_), + describes some iron objects of uncertain use discovered in Galicia, + together with spear-heads and other weapons or pieces of weapons + which will be noticed under _Arms_, and also an object which he + says may once have been a candlestick, or else a kind of flute. All + these are probably pre-Roman. Dating from the Roman period are an + iron ploughshare and some sickles, discovered at Ronda in + Andalusia, and now in the Madrid Museum. Góngora, however + (_Antigüedades prehistóricas de Andalucía_), inclines to think that + previous to the Roman conquest the occupants of Betica were + ignorant of this metal, though not of gold, from which they + fashioned diadems and other articles of wear. See also Caballero + Infante, _Aureos y barras de oro y plata encontrados en el pueblo + de Santiponce_, Seville, 1898. + +The decorative iron-work of Spain may suitably be dealt with in three +classes: railings, screens, or pulpits of churches, chapels, and +cathedrals; balconies and other parts or fittings applied to public or +private buildings of a non-ecclesiastical character; and smaller, though +not necessarily less attractive or important objects, such as knockers, +locks and keys, and nail-heads. + +The last of these divisions, as embracing Spanish-Moorish craftsmanship, +shall have, as far as order is concerned, our preferential notice. + +Surely, in the whole domain of history, no object has a grander +symbolism than the key. In mediæval times the keys of cities, castles, +towns, and fortresses were held to be significant of ownership, or +vigilance, or conquest. Especially was this the case in Spain--a nation +incessantly engaged in war. Probably in no country in the world has the +ceremony of delivering up this mark of tenure of a guarded and defended +place occurred so often as here. Do we not read of it in stirring +stanzas of her literature? Do we not find it in her paintings, on her +stone and metal _rilievi_, or carved in wood upon the stalls of her +cathedrals? Therefore the key, just like the sword, seemed, in the warm +imagination of the Spaniards, to be something almost sacred. The +legislative codes of Old Castile are most minute in their relation of +its venerated attributes. Nor were the Spanish Muslims less alive to its +importance than their foe, taking it also for an emblem of their own, +and planting it in lordly eminence upon their gates and towers of +Cordova, and Seville, and Granada. For what was Tarik's Mountain but the +key of the narrow gate that led to their enchanted land, as sunny as, +and yet less sultry than, their sandy home; truly a land of promise to +the fiery children of the desert, panting for the paradise that smiled +at them across the storied strip of emerald and sapphire water? + +So was it that both Moors and Spaniards made their keys of fortresses +and citadels almost into an object of their worship. In hearing or in +reading of such keys, the mind at once recurs to those of Seville (Plate +xix.), two in number, famed throughout the world of mediæval art, and +stored among the holiest relics in the sacristy of her cathedral. The +larger is of silver, in the style now known as Mudejar, and dates from +the second half of the thirteenth century. The length is rather more +than eight inches, and the whole key is divided into five compartments, +ornamented in enamels and in gold. Castles, ships, and lions adorn the +thicker portion of the stem between the barrel proper and the handle; +and on the rim of the latter is this inscription, in Hebrew +characters:-- + +"_The King of Kings will open; the king of all the land shall +enter._"[62] + + [62] Riaño's reading was, "_the King of the whole Earth will enter_." + But is not this contradicted by the other inscription on the same + key? + +The wards are also beautifully carved into the following legend, +distributed in two rows, one superposed upon the other, of two words +and of ten letters apiece:-- + + "_Dios abrirá; Rey entrará._" + "_God will open; the king shall enter._" + +The iron key is purely Moorish, smaller than its fellow, and measures +just over six inches. Like the other, it consists of five divisions, and +the wards are in the form of an inscription in African Cufic characters, +which Gayangos and other Arabists have variously interpreted. Five of +the commonest readings are as follows:-- + +(1) "_May Allah permit that the rule (of Islam) last for ever in this +city._" + +(2) "_By the grace of God may (this key) last for ever._" + +(3) "_May peace be in the King's mansion._" + +(4) "_May God grant us the boon of the preservation of the city._" + +(5) "_To God (belongs) all the empire and the power._" + +Our earliest tidings of this iron key are from the Jesuit Bernal, who +wrote in the seventeenth century. It was not then the property of the +cathedral chapter, for Ortiz de Zúñiga says that it belonged, in the +same century, to a gentleman of Seville named Don Antonio Lopez de Mesa, +who had inherited it from his father. Tradition declares that both this +key and its companion were laid at the feet of Ferdinand the Third by +Axataf, governor of Seville, when the city capitulated to the Christian +prince on November 23rd, 1248. But Ortiz is careful to inform us that he +neither countenances nor rejects the popular notion that the iron key +was thus delivered as the token of surrender, "although," he says, "the +owners of it are strongly of this judgment." What we do know is that on +June 16th, 1698, the iron key was presented to the cathedral by Doña +Catalina Basilia Domonte y Pinto, niece of the Señor Lopez de Mesa +aforesaid; and that the chapter forthwith accepted it with solemn +gratitude as "one of the keys delivered by the Moors to the Rey Santo on +the conquest of the city," ordering it to be guarded in a special box. + +Such is the popular fancy still accepted by the Sevillanos. However, +Amador de los Ríos has sifted out a good deal of the truth, showing that +the iron and the silver key are wrought in different styles, and were +intended for a different purpose. He places the iron instrument among +the "keys of conquered cities," and its silver neighbour among the "keys +of honour, or of dedication"; and he declares as certain (although the +reasons he adduces do not quite convince me) that this iron key is +actually the one which figured in the ceremony of surrender. The other +he considers to have been a gift from the Sevillians to the tenth +Alfonso, son of Ferdinand the saint and conqueror, as a loyal and a +grateful offering in return for his protection of their industries and +commerce. However this may be, the decorative aspect of the larger key, +together with the choice material of which it is made, appears to prove +that it was not associated with the rigours of a siege, but served in +some way as a symbol of prosperity and peace. It was a common custom at +a later age for Spanish cities to present their sovereign, when he came +among them, with a richly ornamented key. Such keys were offered to +Charles the Fifth and Philip the Second when, in 1526 and 1570, +respectively, they visited Seville; while Riaño reminds us that "even in +the present day the ceremony is still kept up of offering a key to the +foreign princes who stay at the royal palace of Madrid." Similarly, as +an ordinary form of salutation, does the well-bred Spaniard place his +house at your disposal. + +Five Moorish keys--one of bronze and four of iron--are in the Museum of +Segovia, and bear, as Amador observes, a general resemblance to the iron +key of Seville. The wards of four of them are shaped into the following +inscriptions: the first key, "_In Secovia_ (Segovia)"; the second, +"(_This_) _key was curiously wrought at Medina Huelma, God protect +her_"; the third, "_Open_"; and the fourth, "_This work is by +Abdallah._" + +The first and smallest of these keys informs us, therefore, that it was +manufactured at Segovia. The third key is that which is of bronze, and +bears the word "_Open_," probably addressed to Allah. The second, which +is also the largest and the most artistic and ornate, belonged, we read +upon its wards, to Huelma, a fortress-town upon the frontiers of the +kingdom of Granada. This town was wrested from the Moors on April 20th, +1438, by Iñigo Lopez de Mendoza, first Marquis of Santillana, who +possibly sent this key to Castile as a present to his sovereign, Juan +the Second, in company with the usual papers of capitulation. + +Other Moorish keys are scattered over Spain in various of her public and +private collections, though none are so remarkable as those of Seville +and Segovia. The town of Sepúlveda possesses seven early iron keys, +several of which are Moorish. Others are at Burgos, Valencia, Palma, +Jaen, and Granada. At the last-named city the following key, dating +undoubtedly from the period of the Muslim domination, was discovered, in +1901, among the débris of the Palace of Seti Meriem.[63] + + [63] _La Alhambra_ (from which this sketch is taken) for September 30th, + 1901; article on the Palace of Seti Meriem, by F. de Paula + Valladar. + +[Illustration] + +Keys of awe-inspiring magnitude are still preferred among the Spaniards +to a handier and slighter instrument, this people seeming to believe +that the bigger the key the more inviolable is the custody which it +affords--a theory not at all upheld by modern experts in this venerable +craft. Perhaps this singular and local preference is derived from +Barbary. At any rate it still obtains across the Strait. "Our host," +wrote Mr Cunninghame Graham in _Mogreb-El-Acksa_, "knocks off great +pieces from a loaf of cheap French sugar with the key of the house, +drawing it from his belt and hammering lustily, as the key weighs about +four ounces, and is eight or nine inches long." Of such a length are +nearly all the house-keys of contemporary Spain; and with this apparatus +bulging in his belt the somnolent _sereno_ or night-watchman of this +sleepy, unprogressive, Latino-Mussulmanic land prowls to this hour along +the starlit streets of Barcelona, Seville, or Madrid. + +The city Ordinances of Granada form a valuable and interesting link +between the Spanish-Moorish craftsmanship and that of Spaniards +Christian-born. The _Ordenanzas de Cerrageros_, or Locksmiths' +Ordinances, though not voluminous, are curious and informative beyond +the rest, and show us that a general rascality was prevalent in Granada +after her reconquest from the Moor. Locksmiths were forbidden now to +make a lock the impression of which was put into their hands in wax, +even if the order should be sweetened by "a quantity of maravedis," +since the effect of such commissions, whose very secrecy betrayed +illicit and improper ends in view, was stated to be "very greatly +perilous and mischief-making." + +Another Ordinance reveals the Christian locksmiths of Granada as arrant +scoundrels, almost as troublesome to deal with as the pestering little +shoeblacks of to-day. "Word is brought us," groaned the aldermen, "how +many locksmiths, foreigners that dwell within this city as well as +naturals that go up and down our thoroughfares, in taking locks and +padlocks to repair, do, at the same time that they set the keys in +order, contrive to fit them with new wards inferior to the older ones, +so as to be able to open and close them with the keys they have +themselves in store, wherein is grave deceitfulness, seeing that the +aforesaid locks and padlocks may be opened in such wise without a key at +all."[64] + + [64] _Ordenanzas de Granada_, p. 191. + +If we except the vast dimensions of the common keys of houses, this +branch of Spanish craftsmanship has now no quality to point it from the +rest of Europe, having become, in Riaño's words, "simply practical and +useful." Laborde observed in 1809 that "locks and various iron utensils +are made in divers places. Locksmiths are numerous at Vega de Ribadeo in +Galicia, at Helgoivar in Biscay, at Vergara in Guipuscoa, at Solsona and +Cardona in Catalonia. Different kinds of iron goods are manufactured at +Vergara, Solsona, and Cardona. The articles made of iron and steel at +Solsona are in high estimation, notwithstanding they are destitute of +taste and elegance, badly finished, and worse polished; and can by no +means be put in competition with similar articles introduced from other +countries."[65] + + [65] Those of my readers who have visited Spain will probably have seen + the inlaid iron-work of Eibar and Toledo. The objects chiefly + manufactured in this style are brooches, bracelets, scarf and hat + pins, photograph frames, jewel and trinket boxes, watches, and + cigarette cases. The workmanship is often elaborate and costly, nor + can it be denied that the red or greenish gold has an effective + look against the jet-black surface of the polished or unpolished + iron. Upon the other hand, the taste displayed in the design is + seldom good; while in a climate with the slightest tendency to + damp, the iron is apt to rust and tarnish, and the fine inlay to + loosen. + +Iron nails with ornamented heads and decorative door-knockers are other +objects which reveal the influence of Mohammedan Spain. A number of +artistic Spanish nails are in the South Kensington Museum. "Some doors," +says Riaño, "still exist at the Alhambra, Granada, covered with enormous +heads of nails of a half-spherical form with embossed pattern. These +same nails are constantly to be found on old Spanish houses, to which +are added in the angles pieces of iron of a most artistic order" (Pl. +xix.A). In the same city, though not precisely in the Alhambra, I +have seen upon the doors of private houses nails of a decorative kind +which appear to consist of a single piece, but which are really formed +of two--an ornamental boss perforated through its centre, and the nail +proper, which fastens through it to the woodwork of the door behind. +Thus, when the nail is hammered tight upon the boss, the effect is +naturally that of a single piece of metal. Similar nails are on the door +of Tavera's hospital at Toledo. + + [Illustration: XIX_a_ + DECORATIVE NAIL-HEADS + (_Convent of San Antonio, Toledo_)] + +The _Ordenanzas_ of Granada tell us minutely of the nails which were +produced there in the sixteenth century. They were denominated +_cabriales_, _costaneros_, _palmares_, _bolayques_, _vizcainos_, +sabetinos, and _moriscos_; of all of which I can only find that the +_cabriales_ and _costaneros_ were used for beams and rafters, and the +_moriscos_ for fixing horse-shoes. In Spain the custom of fastening down +the decorative coverings of chairs or benches dates from comparatively +late; and it was probably with this innovation that iron-workers began +to exercise their ingenuity upon the heads of nails. + +Towards the close of the Middle Ages the city of Segovia was celebrated +for her locks and keys, her knockers, and her _rejas_. In 1892, +collections of iron objects, chiefly manufactured in this town, were +shown by the duke of Segovia, Don Nicolás Duque, and Don Adolfo Herrera +at the Exposición Histórico-Europea of Madrid. Segovia still preserves +an old door covered with extraordinary iron spikes, that once belonged +to the castle of Pedraza; many curious balconies, such as that in a +first floor of the Calle del Carmen; and the grilles--proceeding from +the old cathedral--of the chapel of the Cristo del Consuelo and the +chapel of the Piedad. + +Another interesting collection of early decorative Spanish iron, +belonging to the well-known painter, Señor Rusiñol, is kept at the town +of Sitjes, in Cataluña. The late Marquis of Arcicollar possessed a +number of specimens of Spanish manufactured iron of the later Middle +Ages, such as boxes, candelabra, locks, nails, door-knockers, +_braseros_, and a rare and curious iron desk (fourteenth century), with +leather fittings. + +The collection of the late Count of Valencia de Don Juan included four +door-knockers of Spanish iron, dating from late in the fifteenth century +or early in the sixteenth. I give a reproduction of these knockers (Pl. +xx.). The two which occupy the centre are evidently from a sacred +building; while the other pair are just as evidently _señoriales_, and +belonged to a noble house. In the former pair, the clumsy carving of the +saints, Peter and James, is attributed by Serrano Fatigati to the native +coarseness of the iron. + + [Illustration: XX + DOOR-KNOCKERS + (_15th Century_)] + +Proceeding from the same collection are a pair of ceremonial maces and a +ceremonial lantern, which I also reproduce (Pl. xxi.), since the Spanish +writer from whom I have just quoted pronounces them to be "excellent +specimens of the iron-work of our country at the close of the Middle +Ages." He says that, as we notice in the pinnacles, they show a tendency +to copy architectural detail, and are otherwise characteristic of the +period. Towards the fourteenth century the file replaced the hammer, and +the sheet of iron was substituted for the bar. These objects, dating +from the fifteenth century, duly reveal this change. Also, as was usual +at the time, they are composed of separate pieces stoutly riveted. In +the knockers with the figures of the saints "we notice the partial use +of the chisel, which became general in the sixteenth century, at the +same time that iron objects were loaded with images, forms of animals, +and other capricious figures. These may be said to belong to a period +of transition, culminating in the _rejas_."[66] + + [66] Serrano Fatigati, in the _Boletín de la Sociedad Española de + Excursiones_. + +The Madrid Museum contains a sixteenth-century cross of _repoussé_ iron, +in the Greek form, and which is certainly of Spanish make. According to +Villa-amil, it formerly had a gilded border and was painted black, which +leads this writer to suppose that it was used at funerals. Iron crosses +may be seen occasionally on churches and on other public buildings, and +Stirling has inserted cuts of several in his _Annals of the Artists of +Spain_. Crosses of large size were sometimes planted on the highway. +Such was the elaborate but ugly iron cross, measuring three yards in +height, made by Sebastian Conde in 1692 for the Plazuela de la +Cerrajeriá in Seville, and now preserved in her Museum. + +The iron balustrade or _verja_ of the marble tomb of Cardinal Cisneros +is finely wrought in Plateresque-Renaissance, with elaborate designs of +gryphons, foliage, urns, birds, masks, sheep's heads, swans, coats of +arms, dolphins, and other ornament in great profusion. The craftsman was +Nicolás de Vergara the elder. Lesser in size, though not less +striking in its execution, is the railing, by Francisco de Villalpando, +which surrounds the _Altar de Prima_ in the choir of Toledo Cathedral. + + [Illustration: XXI + CEREMONIAL MACES AND LANTERN + (_15th Century_)] + +"Iron pulpits," says Riaño, "have been made in Spain with great +success." He mentions five: two in Avila Cathedral (Plate xxii.); two at +Seville; and one at the church of San Gil at Burgos. The latter is +described by Street, who says: "It is of very late date, end of the +fifteenth century, but I think it quite worthy of illustration. The +support is of iron, resting on stone, and the staircase modern. The +framework at the angles, top and bottom, is of wood, upon which the +iron-work is laid. The traceries are cut out of two plates of iron, laid +one over the other, and the iron-work is in part gilded, but I do not +think that this is original. The canopy is of the same age and +character, and the whole effect is very rich at the same time that it is +very novel. I saw other pulpits, but none so old as this." + +The iron pulpits of Salamanca, "covered with bas-reliefs representing +the Evangelists and subjects taken from the Acts of the Apostles and the +apocalypse," were made at the same time as the _reja_ by Fray Francisco +de Zalamea or Salamanca, Fray Juan, and other artists. The two at Avila +are stationed one on either side of the Capilla Mayor, and are of gilded +iron, hexagonal in form, and measuring about ten feet in height. +Gryphons or other beasts support the pulpit on its stem or column. The +body of each pulpit bears the arms of the cathedral, namely, the _Agnus +Dei_, a lion, and a castle--the whole surmounted by a crown--and is +divided lengthways by a central band into a double tier, closed by a +richly decorated cornice at the upper and the lower border. Otherwise +the pulpits are quite dissimilar. In one the decorative scheme is almost +purely geometrical, while in the other it consists of foliage, birds and +beasts, and niches containing statuettes of saints. The stair-railings +are modern; but the primitive carving still adorns the end of every +step.[67] + + [67] For a detailed account of these pulpits see Villa-amil y Castro's + article in the _Museo Español de Antigüedadess_. + + [Illustration: XXII + IRON PULPIT + (_Avila Cathedral_)] + +We do not know who was the maker of these pulpits. Some believe him to +have been a certain Juan Francés, to whom our notice will again be +called as figuring among the earliest masters of this eminently Spanish +craft, and who, on strongish evidence, is thought to be the author of +the _rejas_ in the same cathedral which enclose the choir, and the +front and sides of the Capilla Mayor. This is the only reason for +supposing him to have made the pulpits also. One of these, however, is +in the Flamboyant, and the other in the Renaissance style; so it may +well be doubted whether both were produced by the same hand, or even at +exactly the same period.[68] + + [68] Payments made to "Master Juan Francés" are recorded by Zarco del + Valle, _Documentos Inéditos para la Historia de las Bellas Artes + en España_, pp. 320, 321. + +It is, however, in the _rejas_ that the craftsmanship of older Spain +attains its loftiest pinnacle. They consist, says Banister Fletcher, of +"rich and lofty grilles in hammered and chiselled iron ... strongly +characteristic of the national art. The formality of the long and +vertical bars is relieved by figures beaten in _repoussé_, in +duplicates, attached back to back, and by crestings and traceries +adapted to the material, and freely employed. Few things in Spain are +more original and artistic."[69] + + [69] _History of Architecture_, p. 303. They possess, too, the + advantage, from their ponderous solidity and fixedness, that most + of them are still extant and in the best of preservation, although + Napoleon's Vandals rooted up the chapel _rejas_ of the Church of + Santo Domingo at Granada, and turned them into bullets; just as + their general, Sebastiani, threw down the tower of San Jerónimo to + make a trumpery bridge across the trickling stream of the Genil. + Scores of thousands of such crimes, not to forget the blowing up + of the gate and tower of the Siete Suelos, were perpetrated by the + French all over Spain; yet Washington Irving, in a strangely + infelicitous passage of his _Tales of the Alhambra_, congratulates + the invaders for their reverential treatment of the noblest + monuments of Spanish art! + +The _reja_ generally was not, as many have supposed, of late invention. +It existed from the earliest days of Christianity; but it was only in +the Gothic and Renaissance ages that Spain converted it into a vehicle +for decorative art. The growth of these ornamental _rejas_ may be traced +in cities of Old Castile, together with Seville, Salamanca, Cuenca, and +Toledo. Spain, it is idle to observe, was at no moment so appreciative +of her craftsmen as was Italy, so that our information as to mediæval +Spanish craftsmen and the process of their lives and labours is, upon +the whole, deplorably deficient. Nevertheless, among the oldest of her +artists known in Spanish as _rejeros_, or (a finer and more venerable +term) _"reja_-masters"--_maestros de rexas_--appears Juan Francés, +working in 1494 in Toledo Cathedral and, in the same capacity (for he +seems to have been an armourer besides, and to have held the title of +"master-maker of iron arms in Spain")[70] at Alcalá de Henares, as well +as, in 1505, at Osma, in whose cathedral he made the _rejas_ of the +choir and high chapel.[71] + + [70] So, in Spain, does war appear to have been connected even with the + peaceful _reja_. Similarly, in 1518, the contractors for the grille + of the Chapel Royal of Granada were Juan Zagala and Juan de + Cubillana, "master-artillerymen to their highnesses." Valladar, + _Guía de Granada_, 1st ed., p. 302, note. + + [71] A quaint but somewhat tautological and prosy letter + concerning matters of his craft, addressed by Francés to the + cardinal-archbishop of Toledo, is published in the _Museo Español + de Antigüedades_, article _Los Púlpitos de la Catedral de Avila_, + by Villa-amil y Castro. The _reja_ of the presbytery at Burgo de + Osma is thus inscribed: "_Izo esta obra maestre Joan Francés + maestre mayor._" The top consists of repetitions of a shield + containing five stars and supported by angels, lions, and gryphons. + Two iron pulpits project from the lower part of the grille, and a + swan of the same metal, with extended wings, rests upon either + pulpit. + +Although the craftsman's name has rarely been recorded, we know that +excellent _rejería_ was made at Barcelona in the fifteenth century. Also +dating from the fifteenth century, and therefore prior to the +Plateresque, is the _reja_, ornamented with leaves and figures of +centaurs and other creatures, mythical and real, enclosing the sepulchre +of the Anayas in the old cathedral of Salamanca. During the first +quarter of the sixteenth century much work in decorative _rejería_ was +completed in Seville Cathedral by Fernando Prieto, Fray Francisco de +Salamanca,[72] Sancho Muñoz, Diego de Adrobo, and others (_vide_ +Frontispiece). Taught by these, while yet belonging to a slightly later +time, and linking in this way the riper and decadent Gothic with the new +Renaissance and the Plateresque, were Pedro de Andino, Antonio de +Palencia, and Juan Delgado. Rosell observes that without doubt these +artists, excepting only Juan Francés--the pioneer of them all--were +Spanish-born; and they in their turn were succeeded by other Spaniards +who worked most regularly at Toledo; such as Bartolomé Rodriguez, Luis +de Peñafiel, and Francisco de Silva. + + [72] A Dominican friar, summoned to Seville in 1518, to make her + cathedral _rejas_. He also made the pulpits of the high altar in + 1531, and was working in this city as late as 1547. Account-sheets + penned by his hand were still extant a century ago, and Cean + conveys to us some knowledge of Fray Francisco, receiving as the + wages of his labour, now a score or so of ducats, now a bushel or + two of corn. The friar, whom the canons spoke of with affection for + his many virtues, seems to have been a handy man, seeing that + between his spells of _reja_-making he put the clock of the Giralda + into trim, and built an alarum apparatus to rouse the cathedral + bell-ringer at early morning. + + For the sums paid to Fray Francisco and to Sancho Muñoz for their + work, see Gestoso, _Diccionario de Artífices Sevillanos_, vol. ii. + pp. 365 _et seq._ + +An excellent _rejero_ named Hernando de Arenas completed the grille of +Cuenca Cathedral in 1557. Three years before, a Cordovese, Fernando de +Valencia, had made the intricate Renaissance _reja_ of the Chapel of the +Asunción in the mosque of that most ancient capital--a noble piece of +work, which still exists. Other _rejeros_ who were either natives of, or +who resided in, this city were Pedro Sanchez, Alonso Perez, Pedro +Sanchez Cardenosa, Francisco Lopez, Juan Martinez Cano, and Diego de +Valencia. + +One of these men, Alonso Perez, a native of Jaen, contracted, on April +13th, 1576, to make the _rejas_ of the Capilla Mayor in the church of +the convent of the Trinity at Cordova. He was to finish them within one +year, at a cost of fifty-one _maravedis_ for every pound of iron, of +sixteen ounces to the pound. Ramírez de Arellano, who has extracted +these notices of Cordovese artists from the city archives[73], says that +the _reja_ in question is no longer standing; but a document of the time +informs us that it was of an elaborate character, and carried +architraves, cornices, and the usual decorative detail of the Spanish +Renaissance. + + [73] Consult his valuable studies, _Artistas exhumados_, published in + various numbers of the _Boletín de la Sociedad Española de + Excursionistas_. + +In 1593 Pedro Sanchez agreed to make, within four years, a grille for +the old chapel of the Concepción, also in Cordova, at a cost of +forty-nine maravedis for every pound of iron that the finished _reja_ +should contain; and a year later the same artist signed a contract for +what is thought to be his masterpiece--the _reja_ of the chapel of the +Holy Cross, in the nave of the _sagrario_ of the same temple. The +stipulated time was two years only; but the cost amounted in this +instance to one hundred maravedis for every pound of the completed +_reja_. + +Marvels of power and of patience are among the _rejas_ of this land. In +them, obedient to the genius of the craftsman, the ponderous metal +assumes the gossamer lightness of the finest gauze, now seeming to be +breathed rather than built across the entrance to some side-chapel, now +tapering skyward till we fancy it to melt away, like vapour, on the +surface of the lofty roof. Such are the screens--which here demand a +brief description--of Toledo and Palencia and Granada; that of Cuenca, +where Arenas plied his master-hand; and, first in merit of them all, +the peerless _reja_, royal in magnificence and faultless taste, that +closes in at Burgos the no less royal-looking chapel of a Count of Haro, +sometime Constable of all Castile. + +The _reja_ of the Capilla Mayor of Toledo Cathedral is twenty-one feet +high by forty-six in breadth. "Armies of workmen," wrote Méndez Silva, +referring to this screen and to its neighbour, that of the _coro_, "were +toiling at them for ten years, nor would their cost have been greater +had they been of founded silver." The cost of which he speaks was more +than a quarter of a million _reales_, although the workmen's daily wage +was only two _reales_ and a half, or, in the case of the particularly +skilled, four _reales_. + +The author of this admirable screen was Francisco de Villalpando, whose +plans and estimate were approved by Cardinal Tavera in 1540. "The _reja_ +consists of two tiers resting on different kinds of marble. Attic +columns ornamented with handsome _rilievi_ and terminated by bronze +caryatides, divide these tiers into several spaces. The upper tier is +formed by seven columns of ornate pattern, containing, on a frieze of +complicated tracery, figures of animals and angels, and other +delicately drawn and executed objects in relief. Upon the cornice are +coats of arms, angels, and other decoration; and in the centre, the +imperial arms of Charles the Fifth, together with a large crucifix +pendent from a massive gilded chain. On the frieze of the second tier +are the words, ADORATE DOMINUM IN ATRIO SANCTO EJUS KALENDAS APRILIS +1548, and on the inner side, PLUS ULTRA." [74] + + [74] Rosell y Torres; _La Reja de la Capilla del Condestable en la + Catedral de Burgos_, published in the _Museo Español de + Antigüedades_. + + [Illustration: XXIII + _REJA_ OF CHAPEL ROYAL + (_Granada Cathedral_)] + +The other of the larger _rejas_ in this temple--that of the choir--is +not inferior in a great degree to Villalpando's masterpiece. It was made +by "Maestre" Domingo (de Céspedes),[75] who, in his estimate of June +18th, 1540, engaged to finish it at a total cost of 5000 ducats, "he to +be given the necessary gold and silver for the plating" (_Archives of +Toledo Cathedral_, quoted by Rosell). This Maestre Domingo was +aided by his son-in-law, Fernando Bravo, and both of them, says de la +Rada y Delgado, were probably natives of Toledo.[76] In the same city +they also made the _rejas_ for the Baptismal Chapel, and for the chapels +of the Reyes Viejos and Reyes Nuevos. + + [75] He is called Domingo de Céspedes by Cean Bermudez, although, as + Zarco del Valle remarks, the surname does not appear in any of the + documents relating to this craftsman which are yet preserved in the + archives of Toledo cathedral. These documents merely tell us that + Domingo was his Christian name, that his own signature was _Maestre + Domingo_, and that he and Fernando Bravo were required to find + surety to the value of 375,000 _maravedis_ for the faithful and + expert performance of their work, which they were to complete + within two years, receiving for it the sum of six thousand ducats. + + [76] Conde de Cedillo, _Toledo en el Siglo XVI_. Reply to the Count's + address, by J. de Dios de la Rada y Delgado. + + [Illustration: XXIV + _REJA_ OF CHAPEL ROYAL + (_View from interior. Granada Cathedral_)] + +Excellent Plateresque _rejas_ are those of the Capilla Mayor and Coro of +Palencia Cathedral--the latter from the hand of Gaspar Rodriguez of +Segovia, who finished it in 1571 at a cost of 3400 ducats. In the same +city is the _reja_ of the chapel of Nuestra Señora la Blanca, finished +in 1512 by Juan Relojero, a Palencian, who received for his labour +25,000 _maravedis_ and a load and a half of wheat. + +The noble and colossal gilt and painted[77] _reja_ of the Chapel Royal +of Granada Cathedral was wrought between the years 1518 and 1523 by one +Master Bartholomew, whose name is near the keyhole. This was a person of +obscure life though mighty powers as a craftsman. We know that he +resided at Jaen, and, from a document which still remains,[78] that he +petitioned Charles the Fifth for payment (sixteen hundred ducats) of +this grille, because the clergy had continually refused to liquidate it. +He made, besides the work I herewith describe, the _reja_ of the +presbytery for Seville cathedral,[79] and possibly, as Sentenach +suggests, the iron tenebrarium, ten feet high by five across, for the +cathedral of Jaen. + + [77] The painting of a _reja_ was commonly executed by the + "image-painter" (_pintor de imaginería_). As the term implies, it + was this artist's business to gild or colour sacred furniture, + such as altars, panels, images, and decorative doors and ceilings. + + [78] Archives of Simancas. _Descargos de las R.C._; _Legajo 23 prov._ + Valladar, _Guía de Granada_ (1st ed.), p. 302, note. + + [79] "To Master Bartholomew, _rexero_, twenty gold ducats for the days + he took in travelling from Jaen, and for those on which he was at + work upon the _reja_ of the high altar here in Seville." On + March 18th, 1524, the same craftsman was paid 13,125 _maravedis_ + for making the "samples and other things belonging to the _reja_ + of the high altar."--_Libro de Fábrica_ of Seville Cathedral. + Gestoso, _Sevilla Monumental y Artística_, and _Diccionario de + Artífices Sevillanos_, vol. xi. p. 362. + +The _reja_ of the Chapel Royal of Granada, "of two faces, the finest +that was ever made of this material," [80] has three tiers. "The first +tier contains six Corinthian pilasters and a broad frieze covered with +Plateresque ornamentation, as are the pedestals on which the pilasters +rest. In the second tier are the arms of Ferdinand and Isabella within +a garland supported by two lions, and other crowns together with the +yoke and arrows;[81] all intertwined with stems, leaves, and little +angels of an exquisite effect. Before the pilasters of this tier and of +the one immediately above it are figures of the apostles on Gothic +brackets--a style we also notice on the fastening of the gate and on the +twisted railing; but every other detail of the grille is Plateresque. +Upon the top are scenes of martyrdoms and of the life of Christ, the +whole surmounted by a decorative scheme of leaves and candelabra, and, +over this, a crucifix together with the figures of the Virgin and Saint +John. The designing of the figures is only moderately good, but all +remaining detail and the craftsmanship are admirable" [82] (Plates +xxiii. and xxiv.). + + [80] Pedraza, _Historia de Granada_ (1636), p. 40. + + [81] The yoke and sheaf of arrows were the emblems of these princes--the + yoke, of Ferdinand; the arrows, of his queen. Shields of their + reign, whether employed in architecture or on title-pages, almost + invariably include these emblems and the well-known motto, + _Tanto Monta_. + + [82] Gómez Moreno, _Guía de Granada_, p. 291. + +Last on my list of Spanish _reja_-makers I place the greatest and most +honoured of them all--Cristóbal de Andino, who, as a modern writer has +expressed it, "uttered the last word in the matter of giving shape to +iron." Cristóbal, son of Pedro de Andino--himself an artist of no mean +capacity--excelled in architecture, sculpture, _rejería_, and probably +in silver-work as well. "Good craftsmen," wrote his contemporary, Diego +de Sagredo, "and those who wish their work to breathe the spirit of +authority and pass without rebuke, should follow--like your +fellow-townsman, Cristóbal de Andino--ancient precepts, in that his +works have greater elegance and beauty than any others that I witnessed +heretofore. If this (you think) be not the case, look at that _reja_ he +is making for my lord the Constable, which _reja_ is well known to be +superior to all others of this kingdom." + +Such is the _reja_ thought, both then and now, to be the finest ever +made. The style is pure Renaissance. Two tiers of equal height consist +of four-and-twenty ornamented rails or balusters disposed, above, +between four columns; below, between four pilasters. An attic is upon +the cornice, and contains two central, semi-naked, kneeling figures +which support a large, crowned shield. This is surmounted by a bust of +God the Father, enclosed in a triangular frame, and raising the hand to +bless. On either side of the attic are S-shaped crests sustaining +circular medallions with the likenesses, in bold relief, of Christ and +Mary. Along the friezes are the legends; EGO SUM ALPHA ET [Greek: +omega]; EGO SUM LUX VERA; and ECCE ANCILLA DOMINI, together with the +words, referring to the artist, AB ANDINO, and the date A.D. MDXXIII. +The decorative scheme is spirited and delicate at once, whether we +observe it on the railing, pilasters, and columns, or on the horizontal +parts and members of the _reja_. The attic which surmounts the double +tier and cornice is finally surmounted by a gilt Saint Andrew's cross; +and the entire screen is lavishly painted and gilded throughout. + +Here is a thing--almost a being--created out of iron, so intensely +lovely that the eye would wish to contemplate it to the end of time; +and, as we linger in its presence, if perchance the dead are privileged +to hear their earthly praises echoed in the silence of the tomb, surely +from his marble sepulchre Cristóbal de Andino listens to such praises at +this hour. For yonder, in the neighbouring parish church of San Cosmé, +beside a wife devoted and well-loved the great artificer is laid to +rest, where Latin words (although of idle purport while the _reja_ of +the Constable remains) are deep engraved to thus remind us of his +worth:-- + + CHRISTOPHORUS ANDINO EGREGIUS + ARTIFEX ET IN ARCHITECTURA OMNIUM + SUI SECULI FACILE PRINCEPS + MONUMENTUM SIBI PONENDUM LE + GAVIT ET CATERINA FRIAS EJUS + UXOR HONESTISSIMA STATIM MARITI + VOTIS ET SUIS SATISFACIENDUM B + ENIGNE CHRISTIANEQUE CURAVIT URNAM CU + JUS LAPIDES SOLUM AMBORUM OSSA TEGUNT + SED ADMONET ETIAM CERTIS ANNUI HE + BDOMADE CUJUSQUE DIEBUS SACRIFICIA + PRO EIS ESSE PERPETUO FACIENDA + +But if these splendid _rejas_ of her temples constitute to-day a special +glory of this nation, her private balconies and window-gratings were in +former times, though from profaner motives, almost or quite as notable. +Between the sixteenth and the eighteenth centuries, few of the +foreigners who visited Spain omitted to record their admiration of these +balconies, crowded upon a holiday with pretty women. "Il y avoit," wrote +Bertaut de Rouen in 1659, "autant de foule à proportion qu'à Paris; et +mesme ce qu'il y avoit de plus beau, c'estoit que comme il y avoit des +balcons à toutes les fenestres et qu'elles estoient occupées par +toutes les dames de la ville, cela faisoit un plus bel effet que les +échaffauts que l'on fait dans les rues de Paris en semblables +rencontres." + + [Illustration: XXV + _REJA_ + (_Casa de Pilatos, Seville_)] + +Pinheiro da Veiga, in his queer _Pincigraphia_, or "Description and +Natural and Moral History of Valladolid," written earlier in the same +century, and published twenty years ago by Gayangos from a manuscript in +the British Museum, is more plain-spoken than the Frenchman on the +various merits and peculiarities of the Spanish balconies and _rejas_. +"All of these churches have the most beautiful iron balustrades and iron +open-work doors (_cancelas_) that can be found in Europe, for nowhere is +iron worked so skilfully as here in Valladolid. These objects are made +by the Moriscos with turned balusters, foliage, boughs, fruits, +war-material, trophies, and other contrivances, which afterwards they +gild and silver into the very likeness of these metals. I say the same +of window-balconies; for nearly every window has its balcony. There are +in Valladolid houses up which one might clamber to the very roof from +balcony to balcony, as though these were a hand-ladder. So too from +balcony to balcony (for the distance from one to other is never greater +than a palm's breadth) one might climb round the whole Plaza. By reason +of this, we Portuguese were wont to say that if there were as many +thieves or lovers in Valladolid as in Portugal, verily both one and +other of this kind of folks would have but little need of hand-ladders. +Yet here the thieves content themselves with stealing by the light of +day, while as for the women (crafty creatures that they are!), they +perpetrate their thefts away from home; and, having all the day at their +disposal, prefer to thieve while daylight lasts, rather than pass the +night uncomfortably. To this I heard a lady of Castile declare, when one +of my friends, a Portuguese, petitioned her for leave to speak with her +at night across her _reja_: 'That would be tantamount to passing from +one _hierro_ to another _yerro_;[83] and in my house (which is also your +worship's) it would not look well for you to seem a window-climbing +thief.'" + + [83] _Hierro_ means _iron_; _yerro_, a _fault, faux pas_. Thus glossed, + the somewhat feeble pleasantry or pun is able to explain itself. + + [Illustration: XXVI + _REJA_ OF THE _CASA DE LAS CONCHAS_ + (_Salamanca_)] + +It is curious, in the foregoing narrative, to read of Morisco craftsmen +working as late as 1600, and as far north as Castile. Perhaps the notice +of Moriscos doing Spanish iron-work may be traced to certain +Ordinances of Granada, published about three-quarters of a century +before. On October 14th, 1522, the councillors of that town confabulated +very lengthily and seriously as to the damage caused by "balconies and +_rejas_ in the streets, fixed in the basements and the lower rooms of +houses, or projecting portals which extend beyond the level of the wall. +For we have witnessed, and do witness daily, numerous mishaps to +wayfarers, alike on horseback and on foot, whether by day or night, +because the highways, narrow in themselves, are rendered yet more narrow +by such balconies and _rejas_. Whereas in winter persons seeking to +escape the filth by keeping to the wall are thwarted, or at night-time +injured, by these _rejas_. Or yet in summer, when the waters swell, and +conduits burst and overflow the middle of the street, then neither can +they keep the middle of the way, nor pass aside (by reason of the +balconies aforesaid) to its edges." + +Having regard to all these grievances, the councillors decreed that +"none of whatsoever order or condition shall dare henceforth to place, +or cause to be placed, about the lower floors or entrance of their +dwelling, _rejas_ or iron balconies, or anything projecting much or +little from the level of the wall. But all projections shall be set +three yards, not any less, above the street. If not so much, they shall +be set within the wall, on pain of a fine of ten thousand _maravedis_, +and five thousand _maravedis_ to the mason and the carpenter that shall +repair their fixing. Further, we order that all balconies and _rejas_ +now at a height of less than the aforesaid three yards be taken away +within three days from the crying in public of these Ordinances."[84] + + [84] These laws affecting balconies were not, or not as time went on, + restricted to Granada. "Nobody," prescribes the general Spanish + code in force in 1628, "shall make a balcony or oversailing part + to fall upon the street, nor yet rebuild or repair any that shall + fall."--Pradilla, _Suma de Todas las Leyes Penales, Canonicas, + Civiles, y destos Reynos_. + +For this deplorable state of things a double influence was to blame; +namely, the oriental narrowness of the street, and also the elaborate +ornamentation, proceeding very largely from a northern Gothic and +non-Spanish source, of these annoying yet impressive gratings. Some of +them, sweeping the very soil, and boldly and fantastically curved, may +yet be seen at Toro. Those of Granada are no more. Indeed, not only have +the _rejas_ of the Spanish private house long ceased to show the +decorative cunning of the craftsman, but even in their present +unartistic form are largely limited to Andalusia. Yet even thus, they +seem to guard a typical and national air, mixed with a subtle, +semi-Mussulmanic poetry. Across them, while the term of courtship lasts, +the lover whispers with his mistress, oblivious of the outer world, +fixing his gaze within, until his sultaness emerges from the gloom, and +holds his hand, and looks into his eyes, and listens to his vow. +Therefore, in "April's ivory moonlight," beneath the velvet skies of +Andalusia, one always is well pleased to pass beside these children of +romantic Spain, warming the frigid iron with the breath of youth, and +hope, and happiness, and telling to each other a secret that is known +unto us all--at once the sweetest and the saddest, the newest and the +oldest story of all stories. + + + + + BRONZES + + +The earliest objects of bronze discovered in this country are +comparatively few. As in other parts of Europe, they consist mostly of +weapons, such as spear-heads and hatchets (which will be noticed under +_Arms_), or bracelets, necklaces, and clasps or brooches. Earrings +(_inaures_), brooches (_fibulæ_), and other objects of a similar purpose +dating from the Roman period have been discovered in Galicia, while +plates of the same alloy[85] which imitate a shell were used as personal +ornaments by the men and women of the ancient Spanish tribes. + + [85] Le Hon reminds us, in _L'homme fossile_, that before the Iron Age + all bronzes of our western world contained one part of tin to nine + of copper. + +The province of Palencia is a fertile field for archæological discovery. +Here have been found some curious clasps, intended, it would seem, to +represent the old Iberian mounted warrior, sometimes brandishing the +typical Iberian lance. The following is a sketch in outline of an +object of this kind, fashioned as clumsily and crudely as the cheapest +wooden plaything of our time:-- + +[Illustration] + +Two parts--the figure of the horseman, and a four-wheeled stand on which +the warrior's steed is resolutely set--compose this comical antiquity. +The rider's only article of clothing is a helmet; while the horse, +without a saddle or a bridle, is completely nude. This toy, or table +ornament, or whatever it may be, was found not far from Badajoz, where +other prehistoric bronzes are preserved in the museum of the +province;[86] and Mr E. S. Dodgson says that in possession of an +Englishman at Comillas he has seen another bronze rider of primitive +workmanship, with the head of a wild boar under his left arm. Those who +are interested in the meaning of these early bronzes should consult +an article, _El jinete ibérico_, by Señor Mélida, published in Nos. +90-92 of the _Boletín de la Sociedad Española de Excursiones_. + + [86] See Romero de Castilla, _Inventarios de los objetos recogidos en + el Museo Arqueológico de la Comisión de Monumentos de Badajoz_. + Badajoz, 1896. Plate xxvii. represents another of these objects. + + [Illustration: XXVII + "MELEAGER'S HUNT" + (_Primitive Spanish Bronze_)] + +We know that the use of Roman lamps grew to be general in this land--a +fact which justifies my noticing the specimens preserved in the museum +of Madrid; and more particularly so because their shape and general +character have been perpetuated through the Spanish Moors and Christians +of the Middle Ages till this very moment. + +The Roman lamp, shaped somewhat like a boat by reason of the _rostrum_ +or beakish receptacle for the wick, consisted of an earthenware or metal +vessel with a circular or oblong body and a handle, together with at +least one hole for pouring in the oil. The commonest material was +earthenware, and next to this, bronze. The lamp was either suspended by +a chain or chains, or else was rested on a stand. Plato and Petronius +tell us that the stand was borrowed from the rustic makeshift of a +stick, or the stout stem of a plant, thrust into the ground. As time +went on, the stem or stick in imitative metal-work was rendered more or +less artistic and ornate. But there was more than a single kind of +lampstand. The _lychnuchus_ ([Greek: lychnouchos]), invented by the +Greeks, held various lamps suspended from its branches, while, on the +other hand, the Roman _candelabrum_ supported but a solitary lamp upon +the disc or platform at its top extremity.[87] The island of Egina was +famed for the production of these discs, and Pliny tells us that the +decorated stem or _scapus_ was chiefly manufactured at Tarentum. + + [87] Undoubtedly the use of the Roman _candelabrum_ was continued by the + Spanish Visigoths. "_Candelabrum_," says Saint Isidore, "_a + candelis dictum, quasi candela feram, quod candelam ferat_" + (_Originum_, book xx., chap. x.). The Spanish word _candela_ is + loosely used to-day for almost any kind of light or fire, or even + for a match; but an ordinary candle is generally called a _vela_ or + _bugía_ (_bougie_). + +The Roman lampstands also varied in their height. When the stem was long +they stood upon the ground--a fashion we have seen revived in recent +years, and even where electricity replaces oil. When, on the contrary, +the stem was short, the stand was known as a _candelabrum humile_, and +rested on a table or a stool. + +The Madrid Museum contains a remarkable bronze lamp in the form of an +ass's head adorned with flowers and with ivy. The ass is holding in its +mouth the _rostrum_ for the wick. The hole for the oil is shaped like a +flower with eleven petals, under one of which is the monogram M[dagger]R. +The back of this lamp consists of an uncouth human male figure, in a +reclining posture, wearing a Phrygian cap and holding the ass's head +between his legs. + + [Illustration: XXVIII + A _CANDIL_ + (_Modern_)] + +Other lamps of bronze, including several of an interesting character, +are in the same collection. One of these represents a sea-deity; another +has its handle shaped like a horse's head and neck; and in a third the +orifice for the oil is heart-shaped, while the handle terminates in the +head of a swan. + +There is also a series of three pensile lamps--two in the likeness of +the head and neck of a griffin, and the third in that of a theatrical +mask; as well as a candelabrum fourteen inches high, terminating beneath +in three legs with lions' claws (foreshadowing or repeating oriental +motives), and above in a two-handled vessel on which to place the lamp. +This vessel supports at present a fine _lucerna_ in the form of a +peacock. + +Probably no people in the world have kept extant, or rather, kept alive, +their oldest forms of pottery or instruments for giving light more +steadfastly or more solicitously than the Spaniards. Their iron +_candil_[88] and brass _velón_ of nowadays (Pls. xxviii. and +xxix.)--the one of these the primitive lamp that hangs; the other, the +primitive lamp that rests upon a table or the ground--are borrowed with +but a minimum of alteration from the lighting apparatus of the ancient +Greeks and Romans, and possess, for all their coarse and cheap and +unpretentious workmanship, a subtle interest and elegance attributable +only to the inspiration of antiquity. + + [88] "A small open lamp with a beak, and a hook to hang it, within which + is another of the same make that contains oil and a wick to give + light, commonly used in kitchens, stables, and inns."--Fathers + Connelly and Higgins, _Spanish-English and English-Spanish + Dictionary_. Swinburne wrote of these _candiles_:--"The Spaniards + delight in wine that tastes strong of the pitched skin, and of oil + that has a rank smell and taste; indeed, the same oil feeds their + lamp, swims in their pottage, and dresses their salad; in inns the + lighted lamp is frequently handed down to the table, that each man + may take the quantity he chooses." + + [Illustration: XXIX + A _VELÓN_ + (_Modern_)] + +More than the shape of these old objects seems to have passed to modern +Spain--if any phase at all of Spanish life can ever justly be accounted +modern. The ancients had an almost superstitious reverence for a lighted +lamp, and were accustomed to declare that "_lucerna, cum extinguitur, +vocem emittit, quasi necata_"; "a lamp, on being put out, utters +a sound as though it were being murdered." Now, it may be a +coincidence--although I cannot but regard it as distinctly more than a +coincidence--that even at this day a large proportion of the +Andalusian people are markedly averse to blowing out a kindled match; +nor do they think it of good augury to be in a room where three +lights--candles, matches, or whatever they may be--are simultaneously +aflame. I have noticed, too, that, whether from utter carelessness or +whether from ancestral superstition handed down from Rome, one rarely +sees upon the staircase or the doorstep of a Spanish public building a +vesta that has been (if I may be allowed the term) extinguished +_artificially_.[89] + + [89] Perhaps it is not foreign to my theme to add that the current name + in Spanish for an oil lamp is _quinqué_, from Quinquet, the + Parisian chemist who invented the _tuyau-cheminée_ a hundred and + odd years ago. The same word passes also into Spanish slang, + "_tener quinqué_"--_i.e._ to be quick-witted and perceptive. + +In the Madrid Museum are several military bronze _signa_ which were +found in Spain and date from the Roman era, as well as a _vexillum_, or +one of the T-shaped frames on which the warriors of that people used to +hang their standards. One of these _signa_ is in the form of a wild +boar; another in that of a saddled and bridled horse. Beneath this +latter is the word VIVA and a cross, which shows that the object dates +from a period not earlier than the reign of Constantine. + +It is strange--or rather, would be strange in any country that had been +less constantly afflicted both with civil and external warfare--that +hardly anything remains of all the bronze artistic objects manufactured +by the Spanish Moors. Poets of this race have sung of gold and silver +fountains, door-knockers, and statues that adorned the buildings of +Cordova. In many of these instances the hyperbolic gold and silver of +the writers would undoubtedly be bronze. Al-Makkari quotes an Arab poet +who extols in passionate terms Almanzor's dazzling mansion of Az-zahyra. +"Lions of metal," sang this poet, "bite the knockers of thy doors, and +as those doors resound appear to be exclaiming _Allahu akbar_" ("God is +great"). Another bard describes the fountains of the same enchanted +palace. "The lions who repose majestically in this home of princes, +instead of roaring, allow the waters to fall in murmuring music from +their mouths. _Their bodies seem to be covered with gold_, and in their +mouths crystal is made liquid. + +"Though in reality these lions are at rest, they seem to move and, when +provoked, to grow enraged. One would imagine that they remembered their +carnage of past days, and bellowing turned once more to the attack. + +"When the sun is reflected from their _bronze_ surface, they seem to be +of fire, with tongues of flame that issue from their mouths. + +"Nevertheless, when we observe them to be vomiting water, one would +think this water to be swords which melt without the help of fire, and +are confounded with the crystal of the fountain." + + [Illustration: XXX + BRONZE LION + (_Found in the Province of Palencia_)] + +Figures in bronze, of eagles, peacocks, swans, stags, dragons, lions, +and many other creatures were set about in garden and in hall, to +decorate these splendid palaces of ancient Cordova. + +A specimen of this class of objects is a bronze lion of small dimensions +(Plate xxx.) found not many years ago in the province of Palencia, and +believed to date from the reign of Al-Hakem the Second of Cordova. It +belonged for some time to the painter Fortuny--a diligent and lucky +hunter of antiquities,--and was subsequently purchased in 1875 by M. +Piot. The modelling and decoration of this beast, especially the +mannered and symmetrical curls which are supposed to form its mane, are +quite conventional and strongly reminiscent of Assyrian art, such as +pervades the various lions rudely wrought in stone and still existing at +Granada; whether the celebrated dozen that support and guard the +fountain in the courtyard of the Moorish palace,[90] or else the +greater pair of grinning brutes proceeding from the ruins of the palace +of Azaque (miscalled the Moorish Mint), which may be noticed squatting +with their rumps towards the road, beside the garden entrance to the +Carmen de la Mezquita. + + [90] Swinburne fell into a comical error concerning these. "In the + centre of the court are twelve ill-made lions _muzzled_, their + fore-parts smooth, their hind-parts rough, which bear upon their + backs an enormous bason, out of which a lesser rises."--_Travels + through Spain_, p. 180. + +This little bronze lion measures about twelve inches high by fourteen +inches long. The legs and part of the body are covered with a pattern +representing flowers. The mane is described by comma-shaped marks. The +tail, bent not ungracefully along the animal's back, is decorated with a +kind of plait through nearly all its length. The eyes are now two +cavities, but seem in other days to have contained two coloured stones +or gems. Upon the back and flanks is a Cufic inscription which says, +"_Perfect blessing. Complete happiness._" + + [Illustration: XXXI + BRONZE STAG + (_Moorish. Museum of Cordova._)] + +Mussulman historians have described, in terms of cloying praise, the +"red gold animals contrived with subtle skill and spread with precious +stones" which Abderrahman placed at Cordova upon the fountains of his +palaces. "Rivers of water issued from the mouth of every animal, and +fell into a jasper basin." The words "red gold" are patently an oriental +term for bronze. In view of this, and of the fact that the lion of +Palencia is hollow-bellied, with his mouth wide open for ejecting water, +and with a tail of cunning craftsmanship, which would avail, on being +rotated, to produce or check the current of the "liquid crystal," we may +conclude that it was intended both to form a part of, and to decorate a +Moorish fountain of old days, and is the kind of beast "with precious +stones for eyes" so often and so ecstatically lauded by the Muslim +writers. + +Similar to the foregoing object, and dating from about the same period, +is a small bronze stag (Pl. xxxi.) in the provincial museum of Cordova. +It is believed to proceed originally from the famous palace (tenth +century) of Az-zahra, and used to be kept, some centuries ago, in the +convent of San Jerónimo de Valparaiso. + +The museum of Granada contains some interesting Moorish bronzes, found +on the site of the ancient city of Illiberis, abandoned by its occupants +on their removal to Granada at the beginning of the eleventh century. +The most remarkable of these discoveries are pieces of a fountain, a +small temple (Plate xxxii.), an _almirez_ or mortar (Plate xxxiii.), +similar to one (not mentioned by Riaño) which was discovered at Monzón, +and a few lamps. The fragments of a fountain end in the characteristic +Assyrian-looking lions' heads, with lines in regular zones to represent +the eyes and other features. One of the lamps (Pl. xxxiii.) is far +superior to the rest. Notwithstanding Riaño's assertion that all of +these antiquities are "incomplete and mutilated," this lamp is well +preserved, and still retains, secured by a chain, the little metal +trimming-piece or _emunctorium_ of the Romans. The small bronze temple +is sometimes thought (but this hypothesis seems rather fanciful) to be a +case, or part of a case, designed for keeping jewellery. The height of +it is two-and-twenty inches, and the form hexagonal, "with twelve small +columns supporting bands of open work, frescoes, cupola, and turrets; in +the angles are birds" (Riaño). + + [Illustration: XXXII + BRONZE TEMPLE + (_Moorish. Museum of Granada_)] + +The most important object in this substance now extant in any part of +Spain is probably the huge and finely decorated lamp of Mohammed the +Third of Granada (Pl. xxxiv.), called sometimes "the lamp of Oran," +from a mistaken belief that it had formed part of the booty yielded by +this city after her capture in 1509 by Cardinal Jimenez de Cisneros. + +The material of this lamp is bronze, possibly provided by the bells of +Christian churches taken and pillaged by the Moors. It has four parts or +tiers of varying shape, delicately wrought in open-work, and reaching a +height of nearly seven feet in all. The third and largest tier, +corresponding to the shade, is in the form of a truncated pyramid, and +shows a different design on each of its four sides. The lamp bears +several inscriptions, interrupted here and there through breakage of the +metal. The longest of these legends is interpreted as follows:-- + +"In the name of God the Merciful. (May) the blessing of God be on our +lord Mohammed and his kin; health and peace. (This lamp) was ordered (to +be made) by our Lord the egregious sultan, the favoured, the victorious, +the just, the happy, the conqueror of cities, and the extreme boundary +of just conduct among the servants (of God); the emir of the Mussulmans +Abu-Abdillah, son of our lord the emir of the Mussulmans Abu-Abdillah, +son of our lord Al-Galib-Billah, the conqueror through God's +protection, the emir of the Mussulmans Abu-Abdillah; (may) God aid him +(praised be God)." Here is a breakage and a corresponding gap in the +inscription, which continues, "beneath it, lighted by my light for its +magnificence and the care of its _xeque_, with righteous purpose and +unerring certainty. And this was in the month of Rabié the first +blessed, in the year 705.[91] May (God) be praised." + + [91] September 20th to October 19th, A.D. 1305. + +The history of this lamp has been explored with scholarly care by +Rodrigo Amador de los Ríos, whose monograph will be found in the _Museo +Español de Antigüedades_. He says that the lamp was formerly suspended +from the ceiling of the chapel of San Ildefonso in the university of +Alcalá de Henares. Here, too, he has discovered entries which relate to +it in two separate inventories, dated 1526 and 1531, from which we +gather that the lamp, excepting the lowest part or tier, which probably +proceeded from Oran, was brought to Alcalá by Cardinal Cisneros from the +mosque of the Alhambra of Granada. + + [Illustration: XXXIII + MOORISH LAMP AND MORTAR + (_Museum of Granada_)] + +All of the lamp (continues Amador) that properly belongs to it, is the +open-work shade, together with the graduated set of spheres which we +now observe on top.[92] The lowest part is clearly an inverted bell, +from which project four decorative pieces. This is believed by Amador to +be a Spanish bell, dating from the fifteenth century, designed for +striking with a hammer, and proceeding from some monastery or convent +plundered by the Moors. Indeed, one of the two inventories discovered at +Alcalá mentions "a bell with a hole in it, _which used to belong to a +Moorish lamp_," thus countenancing the widespread supposition that the +lamps of the mosque of Cordova were made of the Christian bells of +Compostela, which the fierce Almanzor caused to be conveyed upon the +aching backs of Christian captives to the Moorish court and capital of +Andalusia. + + [92] These spheres recall the four great gilded globes of bronze, + tapering from the bottom to the top, that crowned in olden days the + Giralda tower of Seville. According to the _Crónica General_ the + glitter of these globes "de tan grande obra, é tan grandes, que no + se podríen hacer otras tales," could be distinguished at a distance + of eight leagues. On August 24th, 1395, when Seville was assailed + by a frightful tempest accompanied by an earthquake, the metal rod + which pierced and held the globes was snapped, and the globes + themselves were dashed into a myriad pieces on the _azotea_, scores + of yards below. + +It is probable, therefore, that the lamp of the third Mohammed of +Granada is now composed of two lamps, and that the primitive +arrangement of its parts was altered by the ignorant. Eight chains +would formerly suspend it, in the following order of its tiers or +stages, from the dome of the _mezquita_. First and uppermost would come +the shade; then, next to this, the set of tapering spheres; and, last +and lowest, the saucer or _platillo_, which has disappeared. Further, +and as Koranic law prescribed, the lamp would hold two lights--one to be +kindled on the saucer, and the other underneath the shade. + +[Illustration] + +Other articles of Spanish-Moorish ornamented bronze are thimbles, +buckets, and the spherical perfume-burners which were used to roll upon +the stone or marble pavement of a dwelling. Moorish thimbles, conical +and uncouthly large, are not uncommonly met with at Granada. I have one, +of which the above is an outline sketched to size. + + [Illustration: XXXIV + LAMP OF MOHAMMED THE THIRD + (_Madrid Museum_)] + +Sometimes these Moorish thimbles are inscribed in Cufic lettering +with phrases such as--"(May) the blessing of God and every kind of +happiness (be destined for the owner of this thimble)"; or else the +maker's name--"The work of Saif"; or a single word--"Blessing." + +The thimbles from which I quote these legends are in the National +Museum. The same collection includes a very finely wrought bronze bucket +or _acetre_ (Latin _situlus_; Arabic _as-setl_, the utensil for drawing +water for a bath). The outside is covered with delicate ornamentation, +varied with inscriptions of no great interest, invoking Allah's blessing +on the owner or employer of the bucket, which is thought by Amador to be +of Granadino workmanship, and to date from about the middle of the +fourteenth century. + +Not many specimens remain of early mediæval Spanish bronzes wrought by +Christian hands. Riaño, who admits that "we can hardly trace any bronze +of this period other than cathedral bells," mentions as probably +proceeding from abroad the altar-fronts and statuettes, in gilt +enamelled bronze, of Salamanca and elsewhere,[93] and gives a short +description of the bell, about six inches high (Pl. xxxv.), known as the +Abbot Samson's, now in Cordova Museum. This object bears an early date +(875 A.D.), and is inscribed, "_Offert hoc munus Samson abbatis in domum +Sancti Sebastiani martyris Christi, Era_ D.C.C.C.C.XIII." + + [93] See p. 50. + +It is curious that Riaño should make no mention of Spanish bronze +processional crosses. In my chapter on gold, silver, and jewel work I +mentioned those belonging to churches in the north of Spain. A bronze +crucifix (Plate xxxvi.), believed to date from the beginning of the +twelfth century, and proceeding from the monastery of Arbós, in the +province of León, is now in the possession of Don Felix Granda Builla. +It is undoubtedly of Spanish make, and probably was carried in +processions. The style is pure Romanic, and the drawing of the ribs, +extremities, and limbs is typically primitive. The _sudarium_ is secured +by the belt or _parazonium_. The feet, unpierced, rest on a +_supedaneum_. + +A bronze Renaissance parish cross of the sixteenth century, once hidden +in a village of Asturias, was bought some thirty years ago by the museum +of Madrid. The body of the cross is wood, covered on both sides with +bronze plates wrought with figures of the Saviour as the holy infant and +as full-grown man, and also with a figure of the Virgin. These +figures were formerly painted, and traces of the colour yet remain. The +cross was also silvered. The rest of the ornamentation consists of +vases, flowers, and other subjects proper to Renaissance art. + + [Illustration: XXXV + ABBOT SAMSON'S BELL + (_9th Century. Museum of Cordova_)] + +A similar cross belongs to the parish church of San Julian de Recaré, in +the province of Lugo, while San Pedro de Donas, near Santiago in +Galicia, possesses a processional cross of bronze, pierced along the +edges in a pattern of trefoils and _fleurs-de-lis_, but otherwise +undecorated. + +Sometimes in Spanish bronze we find the handiwork of Moors and +Christians picturesquely intermingled, as in the gates of Toledo +cathedral (1337), and the Puertas del Perdón--forming the principal +entrance to the Court of Orange Trees--of the mosque of Cordova, made of +wood and covered with bronze plating decorated with irregular hexagons +and Gothic and Arabic inscriptions. The knockers contain a scroll and +flowers, and on the scroll the words, _Benedictus Dominus Deus Israel_. +The gate of the same name of Seville cathedral (Pl. xxxvii.) is similar +in workmanship, and is considered by Riaño to be a good example of +Moresque bronze-work. + +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] + + [94] _Libro de las Tablas_, pp. 17, 18. See Madrazo, _Cordova_, pp. 273 + _et seq._ + + [Illustration: XXXVI + 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. + + [95] In documents which relate to him (see Gestoso's _Dictionary of + Sevillian Artificers_) Morel is often called an _artillero_. His + father, Juan Morel, was also a founder of cannon, and signed a + contract in 1564 to cast two bronze pieces or _tiros_, with the + royal arms on them. + +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." + + [96] The efficacy of light in illuminating, or may be in dazzling and + confounding, Christian worshippers is too self-evident to call for + illustration. The symbolic meaning of church candles is, however, + neatly indicated by the wise Alfonso in his compilation of the + seven _Partidas_. "Because three virtues dwell in candles, namely, + wick, wax, and flame, so do we understand that persons three dwell + in the Trinity--Father, Son, and Holy Spirit; and we may understand + three other things that dwell in Jesus Christ; to wit, body, soul, + and godhead. Hence the twelve lighted candles manifested to each + quarter of the church exhibit unto us the twelve apostles who + preached the faith of our Lord Jesus Christ through all the earth, + and manifesting truest wisdom illumined all the world." + +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. + + [97] The English rendering of Cean's description inserted by Riaño is + inaccurate throughout. + + [Illustration: XXXVII + THE _PUERTA DEL PERDÓN_ + (_Seville Cathedral_)] + +Morel, like Brunelleschi, was an architect as well as a craftsman in +bronze.[98] He completed this tenebrarium in 1562, and the chapter of +the cathedral were so contented with it that instead of paying him the +stipulated price, namely, eight hundred ducats, they added of their own +accord a further two hundred and fifty. They also commissioned him to +make a handsome case to keep it in; but the case has disappeared, and +the naked tenebrarium now stands in the Sacristy of Chalices of the +cathedral.[99] It is still used at the Matin service during the last +three days of Holy Week, and still, in the _Oficio de Tinieblas_, the +custom is observed of extinguishing the fifteen tapers, one by one, at +the conclusion of each psalm. + + [98] As architect, he made a monument (which exists no longer) for the + festivals of Holy Week at Seville. + + [99] In 1565 Juan del Pozo, an ironsmith, received one hundred _reales_ + "on account of an engine which he made of iron for moving the + tenebrarium of the cathedral, and other heavy things."--Gestoso, + _Diccionario de Artífices Sevillanos_, vol. i. p. 313. + +The title of the object which surmounts the famed Giralda tower of +Seville is properly "the Statue of Faith, the triumph of the Church" +(Pl. xxxviii.); but it is known in common language as the Giraldillo +(weathercock), which name has passed into the word Giralda, now applied +to all the tower. The populace of Seville also call it, in the _argot_ +of their cheerful town, the _muñeco_ or "doll," the "Victory," and the +"Santa Juana." + + [Illustration: XXXVIII + THE WEATHERCOCK OF THE GIRALDA TOWER + (_16th Century. Seville Cathedral_)] + +This statue, made of hollow bronze, rotates upon an iron rod piercing +the great bronze globe which lies immediately beneath the figure's feet. +The globe is nearly six feet in diameter. The figure itself represents a +Roman matron wearing a flowing tunic partly covering her legs and arms. +Sandals are secured to her feet by straps. Upon her head she wears a +Roman helmet crested by a triple plume. In her right hand she holds the +semicircular Roman standard of the time of Constantine, which points the +direction of the wind and causes the figure to revolve, excepting when +the air is very faint, in which case it is caught by two diminutive +banners springing from the large one.[100] So huge are the proportions +of this metal lady that the medal on her breast contains a life-size +head which represents an angel. + + [100] The statue, which looks so tiny from the street, measures nearly + fourteen feet in height, and weighs more than two thousand two + hundred pounds. The banner alone weighs close upon four hundred + pounds. The figure was raised into its place in 1568, in which + year I find that eighteen Moriscos were paid seventy-eight + _reales_ between them all for doing the work of carriage (Gestoso, + _Diccionario_). Gestoso also mentions a large bronze plate made + by Morel for the pavement of the cathedral, and which has + disappeared. It weighed 2269 pounds, or about the same as the + weathercock of the Giralda, and Morel was paid for it the sum of + 289,361 _maravedis_. + +The Spanish Moors were also well acquainted with the use of +weathercocks. During the reign, in the eleventh century, of the Zirite +kingling of Granada, Badis ben Habbus, a weathercock of strange design +surmounted his _alcázar_. The historian Marmol wrote in the sixteenth +century that it was still existing on a little tower, and consisted of a +horseman in Moorish dress, with a long lance and his shield upon his +arm, the whole of bronze, with an inscription on the shield which says: +"Badis ben Habbus declares that in this attitude should the Andalusian +be discovered (at his post)." + +Not many other objects in this substance can be instanced as the work of +Spanish craftsmen of the sixteenth and succeeding centuries, or of the +later-Gothic age immediately preceding. Among them are the pulpits of +Santiago cathedral, made by Celma, an Aragonese, in 1563; the +choir-screen (1574-1579) in the cathedral of Zaragoza, made by Juan +Tomás Cela, also a native of Aragon; the gilt lecterns of Toledo +cathedral, which are the work of Nicolás Vergara and his son; the Gothic +lectern of the mosque of Cordova; the choir-lectern (1557) of Cuenca, +made by Hernando de Arenas, who will also be remembered as having made +the _reja_ of the same cathedral; and the octagonal gilt-bronze pulpits +of Toledo, wrought by Francisco de Villalpando, as are the bas-reliefs +(1564) upon the door of Lions, executed by the same craftsman from +designs by Berruguete. + +These last-named pulpits are associated with a legend. Within this +temple, once upon a time, rested the metal sepulchre of the great Don +Alvaro de Luna, so constructed by his orders that upon the touching of a +secret spring the statue of the Constable himself would rise into a +kneeling posture throughout the celebration of the mass. His lifelong +and relentless foe, the Infante Enrique of Aragon, tore up the tomb in +1449; and from its fragments, superstition says, were made these +pulpits. + +Spanish Renaissance door-knockers in bronze are often curious. Fifteen +large bronze rings adorned with garlands, heads of lions and of eagles, +or with the pair of columns and the motto PLUS OULTRE of Charles the +Fifth, were formerly upon the pilasters of the roofless, semi-ruined +palace of that emperor at Granada. Removed elsewhere for greater +safety,[101] they will now be found among the couple of dozen +curiosities preserved in a chamber of the Moorish royal residence of the +Alhambra. + + [101] Spaniards have a very scanty confidence in one another's honesty, + as well as in the competence of their police. Often, at Madrid, + and at this day, the porter of a house, as soon as it is dark, + unscrews the knockers from the downstairs door, and guards them + in his _conciergerie_ until the morning. + +Herewith I end my sketch of Spanish bronzes, without delaying to +describe the tasteless _transparente_ behind the altar of Toledo +cathedral, or the neo-classic, Frenchified productions of the reign of +Charles the Third, such as the table-mountings of the Buen Retiro, or +trifles from the silver factory of Antonio Martinez. At the Escorial, +the shrine of the Sagrario de la Santa Forma and the altar-front of the +pantheon of the kings of Spain, wrought by Fray Eugenio de la Cruz, Fray +Juan de la Concepción, and Fray Marcos de Perpignan, are meritorious +objects of their time. But the history of Spanish bronzes properly ends +with the Renaissance. This material, possibly from its cost, has not at +any time been greatly popular in Spain. Wood, plain or painted, was +preferred to bronze in nearly all her statuary. Her mediæval and +Renaissance _reja_ and _custodia_ makers can challenge all the world. So +can her potters, armourers, leather-workers, and wood-carvers. But if +we look for masterpieces in the art of shaping bronze, our eyes must +turn to Italy, where, to astonish modern men, the powers of a Donatello +or Ghiberti vibrate across all ages in the bas-reliefs of Saint Anthony +at Padua, or in the gates of the Baptistery of Florence. + + + + + ARMS + + +Lovers of the old-time crafts approach a fertile field in Spanish arms; +for truly with this warworn land the sword and spear, obstinately +substituted for the plough, seem to have grown well-nigh into her +regular implements of daily bread-winning; and from long before the age +of written chronicle her soil was planted with innumerable weapons of +her wrangling tribesmen. + +The history of these ancient Spanish tribes is both obscure and +complicated. If Pliny, Strabo, Ptolemy, and other authors may be +credited, the Celtic race invaded the Peninsula some seven centuries +before the Christian era, crossing the river Ebro, founding settlements, +and fusing with the natives into the composite people known henceforward +as the Celtiberians. Thus strengthened, they extended over nearly all +the land, and occupied, by a dominative or assimilative policy, the +regions corresponding to the modern Andalusia, Portugal, Galicia, and +the flat and central elevations of Castile. + +These Spanish tribes were ever quarrelling, and knew, in Strabo's words, +"no entertainment save in horsemanship and in the exercise of arms." +Quantities of their weapons have been found all over Spain, such as the +heads of spears and arrows, or the blades of daggers, hatchets, knives, +and swords. With these Iberian tribesmen, as with other peoples of the +ancient world, the truly prehistoric age is that of stone; hence they +advanced to bronze, and finally to iron. Beuter, the historian of +Valencia, wrote in 1534 that near to the town of Cariñena, in Aragon, on +digging out some earthen mounds the excavators came upon enormous bones, +flint lance and arrow heads, and knives the size of half an ordinary +sword; all these in company with "many skulls transfixed by the said +stones." In the collection at Madrid, formed by Don Emilio Rotondo y +Nicolau, these primitive Spanish weapons number several thousands; and +many more are in the National Museum.[102] + + [102] According to Tubino, the existence of a prehistoric age of stone + was not suspected in Spain until the year 1755, when Mann y + Mendoza affirmed that a state of society had existed in the + Peninsula before the age of metals. Since then the Celtic remains + of Spain and Portugal have been investigated by many scientists, + including Assas, Mitjana, Murguía, and Casiano de Prado, who + discovered numbers of these weapons. Towards the middle of last + century Casiano de Prado, aided by the Frenchmen Verneuil and + Lartet, explored the neighbourhood of San Isidro on the + Manzanares, and found large quantities of arms and implements of + stone. Valuable service in the cause of prehistoric Spanish + archæology has also been performed by Vilanova, Torrubia, and + Machado. + +Discoveries of ancient Spanish arms of bronze occur less often and in +smaller quantities than those of stone or iron. Bronze hatchets, +principally of the straight-edged class (_à bords droites_) have been +found in Galicia and certain other provinces. Villa-amil y Castro +describes a bronze dagger of curious workmanship, which was found in +Galicia in 1869. The point of the blade is missing. If this were +included, the length of the weapon would be about six inches. + +Other examples, now in the Madrid Museum, include two swords, two +daggers, and two arrowheads. The swords, sharp-pointed, narrow in the +blade, and used by preference for thrusting, were found not far from +Calatayud--the ancient town renowned, as Roman Bilbilis, for weapons of +incomparable temper. The daggers were probably used for fighting hand to +hand. + +At the time of the Roman invasion we find, of course, the Spaniards +using iron weapons. I shall not tax the patience of my readers by +enumerating all these weapons. Their names are many, and the comments +and descriptions of old authors which refer to them are constantly at +variance. Nevertheless, the sword most popular with the Celtiberians at +the period of the Roman conquest seems to have been a broad, two-handed +weapon with a point and double edge, and therefore serviceable both for +cutting and for thrusting. Another of the Celtiberian swords, called the +_falcata_, was of a sickle shape. It terminated in the kind of point we +commonly associate with a scimitar, and which is found to-day in Spanish +knives produced at Albacete. One of these swords, in good condition, is +in the National Museum. It has a single edge, upon the concave side of +the blade, and measures rather less than two feet. Other weapons in +common use among the Celtiberians were an iron dart--the _sannion_ or +_soliferrea_; the javelin; the lance--a weapon so immemorially old in +Spain that patriotic writers trace its origin to the prehistoric town of +Lancia in Asturias; and the _trudes_ or _bidente_, a crescent blade +mounted upon a pole, mentioned by Strabo and Saint Isidore, and +identical with the cruel weapon used until about a quarter of a +century ago for houghing coward cattle in the bull-ring. + + [Illustration: XXXIX + CREST OF JOUSTING HELMET + (_Royal Armoury, Madrid_)] + +Thus, when the Romans entered Spain the natives of this country were +experienced in the use of arms, and made their own from such materials +as their own soil yielded. Their tempering was excellent, for Diodorus +Siculus tells us that they had already discovered the secret of burying +the metal in order that the moisture of the earth might eat away its +baser portions. Besides the ancient Bilbilis in Aragon, a Spanish city +famous for her faultless tempering of implements and weapons was Toledo. +Martial,[103] the most illustrious son of Bilbilis, has sung the praises +of the one; less celebrated poets, such as Gracio Falisco, of the +other.[104] Even the armourers of Rome were found to be less skilful and +successful swordsmiths than the Spaniards;[105] and so, before the +second Punic War, the model or the models of the Spanish sword had been +adopted by the Roman army. + + [103] "_Gerone qui ferrum gelat._" This river, the purity and coldness + of whose waters lent, or so it is supposed, its virtues to the + steel, rolls past the walls of Calatayud, and is called in later + ages the Jalon. + + [104] "_Imo Toletano præcingant ilia cultro._" + + [105] "_Romani patriis gladiis depositis Hannibalico bello Hispaniensium + assumpserunt ... sed ferri bonitatem et fabrica solertiam imitari + non potuerunt._"--Suidas. + +Various of the native peoples of Iberia were distinguished by a special +instrument or mode of fighting. Strabo says that the Iberians as a +general rule employed two lances and a sword. Those of Lusitania were +especially adroit in hurling darts. Each of their warriors kept a number +of these darts contained within his shield. Upon the head they wore a +helmet of a primitive pattern strapped beneath the chin. This helmet, +called the _bacula_, protected all the wearer's face, and had a mitred +shape, with three red feathers on the crest. Together with these arms, +the Lusitanians used a copper-headed lance and the typical form of +Celtiberian sword. More singular and celebrated in their mode of +fighting were the Balearic islanders, who carried, through persistent +exercise, the art of slinging stones and leaden plummets to the utmost +limit of perfection. The beaches of these islands, we are told, +abounded, then as now, in small, smooth pebbles, "weapons of Nature's +own contrivance," rarely suited to the sling.[106] These slings were of +three patterns, severally designed for near, far, and middling +distances. The lead or stone projectile sometimes weighed a pound. +Accordingly--so strenuous was their zeal to be unrivalled in the +practice of this arm--even as little children the Baleares went without +their dinner, till, with the formidable _funda_ in their hand, they +struck the stick their parents planted for them in the soil. Pliny and +Polybius, notwithstanding, state that the sling itself was not +indigenous in this region, but imported from Ph[oe]nicia. However this +may be, the islanders within a little time contributed to swell the +power of the Roman legions. + + [106] _Descripciones de las Islas Pithiusas y Baleares._ Madrid, 1787. + +The Visigoths continued using many of the Roman or Ibero-Roman arms. +Nevertheless, the solid armour of the Romans, such as their greaves and +thigh-pieces and breastplates, was now replaced by primitive chain-mail +resembling scales of fishes. According to Saint Isidore, Procopius, and +other writers, the favourite weapons of the Spanish Visigoths were the +sword or _spatha_, long, broad-bladed, with a double edge; the hatchet, +the bow, the sling, the lance, the scythe, the mace, the _pilum_ or +javelin (used extensively in Spain throughout the Middle Ages),[107] the +_dolon_, a dagger which concealed itself within a wooden staff, and +took the name of "treacherous" or "wily" from this circumstance; and the +_conto_, a keenly pointed pike. We also find among the military engines +of the Visigoths the _balista_, for hurling stones and darts of large +size, and the _ariete_ or battering-ram, constructed from a gnarled and +powerful tree-trunk braced with iron and suspended by a cable. Their +defensive body-armour consisted of a coat of mail composed of bronze or +iron scales, and called the _lóriga_ or _perpunte_. This was worn above +the _thorachomachus_, a kind of tunic made of felt, in order to shield +the body from the roughness of the mail. Upon their heads they wore an +ample helmet. + + [107] A javelin made throughout of iron was found in Spain some years + ago, completely doubled up, so as to admit of its being thrust + into a burial urn. The javelin in question is now in the Madrid + museum, and a similar weapon may be seen in the provincial museum + of Granada. + +A fragment of stone carving preserved in Seville museum shows us two +Visigothic Spanish warriors who wear a tunic and helmet of a simple +pattern, and carry a two-edged sword and a large shield. García Llansó +says, however, that the nobles of this people wore close-fitting mail +tunics covered with steel scales, a kind of bronze bassinet, tight +breeches, and high boots, and carried, besides the sword which was slung +from their belts, a large, oval shield.[108] + + [108] _Historia General del Arte_: García Llansó; _Armas_, pp. 439, 440. + + [Illustration: XL + SPANISH CROSSBOWMAN + (_Late 15th Century. Royal Armoury, Madrid_)] + +From about the time of the Moorish invasion, the changes in the arms and +armour of the Spaniards coincided in the main with those in other parts +of western Europe. Nevertheless, as late as the eleventh century the +Spanish sword retained the characteristic which had endeared it to the +Roman legionaries--namely, a hilt of small dimensions and a broad and +shortish blade. In course of time the blade grows narrower and begins to +taper towards the point. The _quillons_ or crossbars (Spanish +_arriaces_, from the Arabic _arrias_, a sword-hilt) were originally +straight or semicircular, and ended in a knob (_manzana_, literally +"apple"; Latin _pomum_, English _pommel_). Thus, in the _Poem of the +Cid_ we find the verse:-- + + "_Las manzanas é los arriaces todos de oro son._" + +Throughout these early times the scabbard was of wood lined with leather +or with velvet, and strengthened and adorned with leather bands; but +when the owner was of high estate, it often bore enamels in the +_cloisonné_ style; that is, with patches of the coloured, vitreous +substance bordered and fastened in by metal wire. In Spain this style, +undoubtedly of foreign origin, was superseded in the thirteenth century +by _champlevé_ enamelling, in which the enamel lies within a hollowed +ground. + +Spanish mediæval weapons down to the fourteenth century are specified in +the _fuero_ of Cáceres and other documents contemporary with their use. +Next always in importance to the sword we find the hatchet, lance, +crossbow, and mace. Montaner's _Chronicle of the Kings of Aragon_ tells +us that the sovereign, mace in hand, dealt one of his enemies "such a +blow upon his iron hat that his brains came oozing out at his ears." +Covarrubias mentions a dart-shaped missile called the _azcona_--a word +which some authorities derive from the Arabic, and others from the +Basque _gascona_, an arm employed by the natives of Gascony. The former +derivation seems the likelier. The _fuero_ of Cáceres mentions the +_tarágulo_, described by the Count of Clonard as a kind of dagger; and +at the close of the thirteenth century appears in Spain the poniard, +which was called among the Germans _Panzerbrecher_, or "breaker of +cuirasses," and among the French the _misericorde_. + +The _fuero_ of Cáceres tells us, furthermore, what was the regular +equipment of the Spanish foot and mounted soldier of that period. "Each +horseman shall go forth to battle with a shield, a lance, a sword, and +spurs; and he that carries not all these shall pay each time five sheep +wherewith to feed the soldiers.... Each mounted man or pawn that +trotteth not or runneth not to quit his town or village as he hears the +call,--the first shall have his horse's tail cut off; the other shall +have his beard clipped." + +Defensive arms included various kinds of coverings for the head; the +_lóriga_ or covering for the body, the _cálcias_ or covering for the +legs, and the shield. + +The _lóriga_ (Latin _lorica_) was the ordinary hauberk or shirt of mail, +such as was worn all over military Europe, made of rings or scales sewed +strongly on a linen or leather under-tunic consisting of a single piece, +and reaching to the knee. The _Gran Conquista de Ultramar_ of Alfonso el +Sabio also informs us that it was tied at certain openings known as +_ventanas_ ("windows"), and that the collar of the tunic was called the +_gorguera_. The resistance of the Spanish _lóriga_ to a pointed weapon +does not seem to have been great, for the Chronicle of the Monk of Silos +says that at the siege of Viseo the arrows of the Moorish bowmen went +through the triple _lórigas_ of their foe. + +Towards the twelfth century the custom arose of wearing over the coat of +mail a loose, sleeveless frock (the _Waffenrock_ of Germany), woven of +linen or some other light material, painted or embroidered with the +owner's arms. As the Count of Clonard observes, it is clearly this kind +of frock that is referred to in the following passage of the _Leyes de +Partida_: "For some (of the knights) placed upon the armour carried by +themselves and by their horses,[109] signs that were different one from +another, in order to be known thereby; while others placed them on their +heads, or on their helmets." + + [109] The horse was also covered with a _lóriga_, on which, from about + the twelfth century, were thrown the decorative trappings of + _cendal_ or thin silk, painted or embroidered with the warrior's + arms. + + [Illustration: XLI + THE BATTLE OF LA HIGUERUELA + (_Wall painting. Hall of Battles, El Escorial_)] + +The Normans used a form of hauberk with attached mail-stockings. In +Spain we find in lieu of this leg-covering, the Roman _cálcia_ (Latin +_caliga_), extending from the foot to just below the thigh, and +subsequently called the _brafonera_.[110] This was, in fact, a separate +mail-stocking, made of closely interlacing steel rings, and worn above +the leather boots or _trebuqueras_. + + [110] "_Calzó las brafoneras que eran bien obradas + Con sortijas de acero, sabet bien enlazadas; + Asi eran presas é bien trabadas, + Que semejaban calzas de las tiendas taiadas._" + _Poem of the Cid._ + +The Spanish _escudo_ or shield was usually made of wood covered with +leather, and painted with the arms or the distinguishing emblem of its +lord. Sometimes it was made of parchment. Thus the Chronicle of the Cid +informs us that this hero after death was equipped with "a painted +parchment helm and with a shield in the same wise." Another form of +Spanish shield, the _adarga_ (_atareca_, _atarca_; Arabic _ad-darka_, to +hold upon the arm), of which I shall subsequently notice specimens in +the Royal Armoury, was commonly in the shape of a rough oval or of a +heart, and made of various folds of leather sewn and glued together. The +Chronicle of Alfonso the Eleventh speaks of a certain famine which broke +out among the Spanish troops, and caused them such privation that "they +chewed the leather of their shields."[111] + + [111] Count of Clonard, _op. cit._ + +The battle headgear of this people passed through many changes. "The +helmet of the eighth century," says the Count of Clonard, "was the same +which had been used by the Cantabrians and Vascones before the general +peace proclaimed by Augustus Cæsar. Helmets of this design are engraved +upon the medals (reproduced by Florez) of the imperial legate Publius +Carisius. They covered the entire head and face, leaving only two holes +for the eyes, as we see upon the carved stone fragments in relief at the +door of the church of San Pedro de Villanueva, representing the struggle +of King Froila with a bear." + +Another form of helmet which the Spaniards began to use about this time +was the _almofar_ (Arabic _al-mejfar_), made of iron scales. It covered +all the head, with the exception of the eyes, nose, and mouth, and +corresponds to the _camail_ of the Normans. Beneath it was worn the +linen _cofia_, a kind of bag or cap in which the warrior gathered up his +hair. After about another century a round or conical iron helmet +(_capacete_), fitted with cheek-pieces, was superposed on the _almofar_ +and fastened round the chin with straps. The _capacete_ of a noble was +often adorned with precious stones and coronets of pure gold, while a +spike projecting from the top was tipped with a large carbuncle, in +order to catch and to reflect the flashing sunbeams. + +The substitution for this spike of multiform and multicolor figures or +devices dates from a later age. The Chronicle of Alfonso the Eleventh +describes as something altogether novel and surprising, the crests upon +the helmets of the foreign knights who flocked, in 1343, to Algeciras to +aid the cause of Christianity against the Moor. "All of them," says this +narrative, "placed their helmets at the door of their dwellings, +supporting them on stout and lofty staves; and the figures on the +helmets were of many kinds. On some was the figure of a lion; on others +that of a wolf, or ass's head, or ox, or dog, or divers other beasts; +while others bore the likeness of the heads of men; faces, beards, and +all. Others, too, had wings as those of eagles or of crows; and so, +between these various kinds there were in all as many as six hundred +helmets." + +This brings us to the celebrated helmet or _cimera_ (Plate xxxix.), now +in the Royal Armoury of Madrid, believed till recently to have belonged +to Jayme the First, conqueror of Palma and Valencia, and the greatest, +both in spirit and in stature, of the old-time kings of Aragon. + +Such part of this interesting helmet as is left consists of two pieces, +one of them resting loosely on the other. Baron de las Cuatro Torres +infers, from a detail which will presently be noted, that the lower of +these two pieces is not original; and his opinion was shared by the +Count of Valencia de Don Juan, who, notwithstanding, thought the +spurious part to be coeval with the actual crest. The upper part +consists of a fragment of a helm, made, like some flimsy theatre +property, of linen, card, and parchment, and surmounted with the figure +of the mythical monster known in the Lemosin language as the +_drac-pennat_, or winged dragon, which formed, conjointly with the royal +crown, the emblem or device of all the Aragonese sovereigns from Pedro +the Fourth to Ferdinand the Second. + + [Illustration: XLII + PARADE HARNESS OF PHILIP THE THIRD + (_Royal Armoury, Madrid_)] + +There is, however, no reason to doubt the helmet's authenticity. It is +known to have remained for centuries at Palma, in the Balearics, where +it was worn upon the day of Saint Sylvester in each year, by a person +who walked in the procession of the _Standart_ to celebrate the capture +of the city by Don Jayme. This would explain the lower piece contrived +and added to the crest itself, in order to adjust the incomplete and +upper portion to the subsequent wearer's head. The helmet as originally +made was meant for tourneying only, and is therefore fashioned, not of +metal, but of the frail theatrical materials I have stated. Copper and +wood, says Viollet-le-Duc, were also used in making these objects. The +earliest wearer of the helm cannot have been Don Jayme. Baron de las +Cuatro Torres remarks that on an Aragonese coin of the reign of Pedro +the Fourth, the monarch is wearing on his head something which looks +identical with this _cimera_.[112] Demay has further told us that the +vogue of such _cimeras_, whose principal purpose was to distinguish +seigniories, lasted from 1289 till the introduction of movable visors at +the end of the fourteenth or the beginning of the fifteenth century. The +present helmet, therefore, probably belonged to Don Pedro the Fourth of +Aragon ("the Ceremonious"), and was made at some time in his +reign--that is, between 1335 and 1387. A document has been discovered in +which this monarch's son, Don Martin of Aragon, commands that year by +year his own helmet, "_nostram emprissiam sive cimbram_," together with +the banner of Jayme the Conqueror, is to be publicly exhibited in +commemoration of the capture of Majorca. Therefore we may conclude from +these important facts that here is the crest of a tourneying helmet +which belonged either to Don Pedro the Fourth of Aragon, or else to +either of, or possibly both, his sons, Don Juan and Don Martin. + + [112] _Boletín de la Sociedad Española de Excursiones_; Nos. 16 and 17. + +The changes which occur in Spanish arms and armour between the +fourteenth and the sixteenth centuries keep pace, upon the whole, with +those in other parts of Europe. It is, however, opportune to notice how +the Spanish armies of this time were organized. Their regular cavalry +consisted of: (1) the force directly mustered by the king and under his +immediate leadership; (2) the mounted burghers who defrayed the whole or +part of their expenses, being in certain instances assisted by a stipend +which had been created by municipal and local _fueros_; (3) the knights +belonging to the military orders; and (4) the barons, together with the +men these last were called upon, obedient to the summons of the royal +_mandadero_ (messenger), to mount, equip, provision, and bring to war +with them. Such was the heavy cavalry of later mediæval Spain. A lighter +class, said by the Count of Clonard to have been recruited from the +southern regions of the land, was known as _alfaraces_, _almogávares_, +or _omes de la gineta_. + +These latter lived in frugal fashion. Water was their only drink; bread +and the roots of plants their only food. Their clothing, too, was of the +slightest, consisting merely of a shirt, high boots, and a kind of net +upon the head. They wore no armour, and carried as their only weapons an +_azagaya_ and a lance. Their principal value was in skirmishing. + +The infantry were also of two kinds. The first, collective or +stipendiary, was levied by the towns and cities, and from them received +its maintenance. The second was the _almogávares_, who served for +scouting, like their mounted comrades of the same denomination. The +stipendiary or regular troops proceeded chiefly from the northern +provinces--Alava, Guipúzcoa, the Asturias, and the mountains of León, +and carried commonly the lance, sword, sling, crossbow, and the +_azagaya_--this last a dart-shaped missile borrowed from the Berber +tribesmen,--the ancient Moorish _azgaya_, the modern _assagai_ or +_assegai_ of Zululand.[113] + + [113] One of these weapons may be seen in the Royal Armoury (No. I. 95). + It is made of iron covered with leather, and has a laurel-shaped + blade with sharpened edges. The other end consists of two + projecting pieces of the metal, shaped to resemble the plumes of + an arrow. The length of this arm is 5 feet 8 inches. + +In a country which was plunged in ruinous and almost unremitting +internecine strife; which was (and is) inherently averse to commerce or +to agriculture; and where the bulk of all the national wealth was either +locked away in churches and in convents, or in the coffers of great +nobles who were frequently as wealthy as, or even wealthier than, the +Crown, the armour of the common mediæval Spanish soldier consisted of +the plain and necessary parts and nothing more. The aristocracy, upon +the other hand, often adorned their battle-harness with the finest gold +and silver work, and studded it with precious stones. Even the esquires +would sometimes imitate their masters in this costly mode. "We command," +said Juan the First in one of his pragmatics dating from the end of the +fourteenth century, "that no shield-bearer shall carry cloth of gold or +any manner of gold ornament upon his trappings, scarf, or saddle; or +on his badge or arms, excepting only on the edges of his bassinet and +his cuisses, together with the bit and poitral of his horse, which may +be gilded." + + [Illustration: XLIII + MOORISH CROSSBOW AND STIRRUP + (_Museum of Granada_)] + +It is also evident from Royal Letters of this time, that the kings of +Spain depended very largely for the flower of their forces on the +private fortune or resources of the Spanish noblemen or even commoners; +nor did they ever hesitate to turn these means of other people to their +own particular good. The Ordinance of Juan the First, dated Segovia, +1390, commands that, "Every man who possesses 20,000 _maravedis_ and +upward shall have his proper set of harness, habergeons and +scale-pieces, and lappet-piece, cuisses and vantbrasses, bassinet, +camail, and war-cap[114] with its gorget; or else a helmet, together +with sword and dagger, glaive and battle-axe. And whoso possesses 3000 +_maravedis_ and upward shall have his lance and javelin and shield, his +lappet-piece and coat of mail, and iron bassinet without a camail, and a +_capellina_, together with his sword, _estoque_, and knife. And whoso +has between 2000 and 3000 _maravedis_ shall have his lance and sword or +_estoque_ and knife, or a bassinet or _capellina_, together with a +shield. And whoso has from 600 to 2000 _maravedis_ shall have a crossbow +with its nut and cord and stirrup, quiver and strap, and three dozen +shafts. And whoso has from 400 to 600 _maravedis_ shall have a lance, a +javelin, and a shield. And whoso has 400 _maravedis_ shall have a +javelin and a lance." + + [114] _Capellina_. The Count of Clonard says that this was in the shape + of half a lemon, and fitted with a visor with a cutting edge. + +The wealthier classes responded lavishly to this command. Describing the +battle of Olmedo and the forces of Don Alvaro de Luna sent against the +Navarrese, the chronicle of the Constable declares that among his entire +host could hardly have been found a single cavalier whose horse was not +covered with trappings, and its neck with mail. "For some there were +that carried divers figures painted on the aforesaid trappings, and +others that bore upon their helmets jewels that were a token from their +mistresses. And others carried gold or silver bells suspended from their +horses' necks by thick chains; or plates upon their helmets studded with +precious stones, or small targes richly garnished with strange figures +and devices. Nor was there less variety in the crests upon their +helmets; for some bore likenesses of savage beasts, and others plumes of +various colours; while others carried but a plume or two upon their +helmet crest, like unto those upon the forehead of their horses." + +The fifteenth century is often called in Spain her golden age of +arms--not in the sense that she invented anything new relating to this +craft, but that her warriors were more fully and more frequently +equipped with what had been imported from elsewhere. As in the case of +crested helmets, foreign initiative brought about the substitution of +plate or German armour--developed from the chain armour and the coat of +mail--for the earlier sets of disconnected pieces. Possibly, as a +chronicle which describes the Englishmen and Gascons who were present at +the siege of Lerma in 1334 would seem to indicate, it was in consequence +of this direct association with the foreigner that the older form of +Spanish harness yielded to the new. However this may be, plate armour +certainly appeared in Spain at some time in the fourteenth century, and +grew in vogue throughout the fifteenth and the sixteenth centuries. +Suits of armour worn by Spanish pikemen and crossbowmen of this period +may be profitably studied in the Royal Armoury (Plate xl.); and the same +harness is reproduced in the choir-stalls of Toledo cathedral, carved by +Maestre Rodrigo in 1495. It is also useful to consult the prolix +description of the _Passo Honroso_ (1433) of Suero de Quiñones, held at +the bridge of Orbigo, as well as the painting of the battle of La +Higueruela (Plate xli.) in the Sala de las Batallas of the Escorial. We +find from these authoritative sources that Spanish harness then +consisted of the war-hat or _capacete_, with its _barbote_ or piece to +cover the mouth and cheeks, and fringe of mail (_mantillos_) to protect +the neck: the _coracina_ or korazin of tinned steel plates;[115] the +coat of mail; armlets and gauntlets; leg-pieces with closed greaves; and +steel-pointed mail shoes. + + [115] The following armourers' marks are stamped on various korazins in + the Royal Armoury, made in Aragon and dating from the fifteenth + century:-- + +[Illustration] + +The Spanish man-at-arms of the sixteenth century is well described by +Martin de Eguiluz, in his book, _Milicia, Discursos, y Regla Militar_. +"The man is mounted and bears a lance. His head is covered with a +visored helmet. He wears a double breastplate, of which the outer piece +is called _volante_. His thighs are guarded by cuisses, his legs by +greaves, and his feet by shoes of mail or iron. His horse's face, neck, +breast, and haunches are covered with iron or with doubled leather. +These coverings are called _bardas_, and the horses protected by them +_bardados_, of which each man-at-arms is called upon to possess two." + + [Illustration: XLIV + MOORISH SWORD + (_Casa de los Tiros, Granada_)] + +These plainer sets of war-harness for horses were made in Spain. The +costlier bards, whether for war or tournament, were made in Italy and +Germany, and often match the outfit of the rider in the splendour and +luxuriance of their decoration. Striking examples of these bards are in +the Royal Armoury, including one (Plate xlii.) which formerly belonged +to Philip the Third. Probably it is the same referred to in the +manuscript account of Valladolid from which I have already quoted +curious notices of other crafts. Speaking of the Duke of Lerma in 1605, +this narrative says; "He rode a beautiful horse with richly decorated +arms and gold-embroidered bard, fringed, and with medallions in relief. +The trappings, reaching to the ground, were of black velvet covered with +silver plates as large as dinner-plates, and others of a smaller size +that represented arms and war-trophies, all of them gilt, and studded +with precious stones. I heard say that this armour which the Duke now +wore, had once belonged to the Emperor, and is now the King's."[116] + + [116] My theory that this harness and the one in the Royal Armoury are + the same is strengthened by the official inventory, which + specifies "a band of gold and silver, striped, and with devices + in relief, studded with lapis lazuli, and yellow gems and luminous + crystals." The Count of Valencia de Don Juan says that this fine + outfit, except the portions which are represented in the plate, + was mutilated and dispersed in later years, and that he has + discovered fragments in the museums of Paris and Vienna, and in + the collection of Baron Nathaniel de Rothschild. + +The crossbow was an arm of great importance from about the eleventh +century until the seventeenth, and Spain, throughout the latter of these +centuries, was celebrated for their manufacture. Roquetas, a Catalan, +"master-maker of crossbows," constructed them of steel, so skilfully and +finely that they could be carried concealed inside the sleeve of a coat, +and discharged without awaking the suspicion of the victim. A letter of +René of Anjou, quoted by the Count of Valencia de Don Juan, also refers +to the skill of the Catalans in making crossbows, and mentions one of +these weapons constructed by "Saracen," of Barcelona, "who refuses to +teach his craft to Christians." The letter further states that this arm +was of a curious shape, and that, "despite its small dimensions, it +carries to a greater distance than any other I have yet possessed." + +A handsome Moorish crossbow, inlaid with bronze (Plate xliii.), exists +in the provincial museum of Granada. The Royal Armoury has no example of +the rare form of crossbow fitted with wheeled gear, but all the commoner +kinds employed for hunting or for war are represented here, including +those with the _armatoste_ or goat's-foot lever, stirruped crossbows, +and those which have the _torno_ or windlass (French _cranequin_). +Demmin appends the following note to an illustration in his handbook of +a crossbow with a goat's-foot lever fixed to the stock:--"A similar +weapon in ironwood, sixteenth century, belonged to Ferdinand the First, +proved by the inscription on the bow: DOM FERNANDO REI DE ROMANO, +followed by four Golden Fleeces. It bears the name of the Spanish +armourer Juan Deneinas. This valuable crossbow once belonged to M. +Spengel, at Munich, but it is at present in the collection of the Count +of Nieuwerkerke." + +There is also in the Royal Armoury a crossbow of the scarcer kind known +in Spanish as _ballestas de palo_, in which the gaffle is not of steel, +but put together from slips of springy woods, including yew. The wings +are tipped with horn, and traces of heraldic and Renaissance decoration, +painted on parchment, yet remain upon the weapon. Other portions are +inlaid. Except for the erasure of the painting, this arm is splendidly +preserved, and still retains its double cord, nut, and pins, together +with the separate lever. + +Another interesting crossbow in this armoury belonged to Charles the +Fifth, who used it for the chase. It has a _verja_ or yard of steel +engraved with the letter C four times repeated and surmounted by a +crown, and bears the inscription, PRO · IMPERATORE · SEMPER · AVGVSTO · +PLVS · VLTRA ·, together with · IV DE LA FVETE ·, for Juan de la +Fuente, the name of a celebrated maker of these parts of a crossbow. The +shaft (_tablero_), ornamented in bone and iron, is from the hand of +another master, Juan Hernandez, whose signature is IO: HRZ. The Count of +Valencia de Don Juan supposed that this was the one crossbow which +Charles took with him to the rustic solitude of Yuste, and which is +mentioned in a document at Simancas as "a crossbow with its gear and +gaffles (it is in His Majesty's possession, but he has not paid for +it)." + + [Illustration: XLV + SWORD OF BOABDIL EL CHICO + (_Museum of Artillery, Madrid_)] + +Hitherto I have traced the war-equipment of the Spanish Christians only. +In the early period of Mohammedan rule, the conquerors used a simple +dress for war, consisting of the _capacete_ or _almofar_ for the head, +secured by a chain beneath the chin and covered by a piece of cloth +called _schasch_, hanging to just below the shoulders; a wide sleeveless +tunic; a shirt of mail; tight breeches, and leather shoes. Their weapons +were the lance and sword. The foot-soldiery wore the _djobba_, a +tight-sleeved tunic of white wool, bound to the body by a scarf, and +leather shoes, and carried as their arms a _capacete_ of beaten iron, +without a crest or cheek-pieces; a large round shield with its +projecting umbo; and either a lance, or a double-edged and double-handed +sword. Such are the details represented in the _Codex of the +Apocalypse_, preserved in the cathedral of Gerona. As time progressed, +the weapons and defensive armour of these Spanish Moors grew more +luxurious and ornate, being often decorated with enamels, precious +stones, or inlaid metals such as silver, gold, and bronze. Prominent +centres of this industry were Murcia, Zaragoza, and Toledo, which are +even said to have surpassed Damascus. Andalusia, too, was celebrated for +her gold-inlaid cuirasses and coats of mail; while, according to El +Idrisi, the town of Jativa enjoyed a widespread fame for every kind of +decorative armour.[117] + + [117] _Historia General del Arte_: García Llansó; _Armas_; pp. 440, 441. + +The military outfit of the Spanish Moors was, therefore, much the same +as that of Christian Spain. Toledo under Muslim rule continued to be +famous for her swords. Moorish Seville, Ronda, and Valencia were also +favourably known for weapons, household knives, and scissors. Cutlery in +the Moorish style is still produced in certain parts of eastern Spain, +and in his _History of the Mohammedan Dynasties_ of this country, +Gayangos tells us of a knife which bore upon one side of the blade the +inscription in Arabic characters, "_With the help of God I will inflict +death upon thy adversary_," and upon the other side, in Castilian, the +words, "_Knife-factory of Antonio Gonzalez. Albacete, 1705._" + +The primitive Spanish-Moorish sword was an arm of moderate breadth used +both for cutting and for thrusting. As time went on, this people +gradually adopted swords of Spanish make or pattern, such as the +ponderous _brandimartes_ and _montantes_ made for wielding with both +hands. The Granadino writer Aben Said complains that the adoption of the +arms, and even of the costume of the Spanish Christians, was prevalent +at Granada in the thirteenth century. "Sultans and soldiers alike," he +said, "dress in the manner of the Christians, even to their arms and +armour, crimson cloaks, standards, and saddlery. They wield in battle a +shield and a long lance,[118] which serves them to attack with; nor do +they seem to care for Arab bows or maces, but prefer to use the Frankish +ones." + + [118] This weapon can have been no other than the typical Iberian lance. + +Nevertheless, the warriors of Granada carried several weapons which were +not of Christian origin. The tribe of the Beni-Merines brought across +from Africa a kind of sword called often in the Christian chronicles the +_espada gineta_, used principally, as we gather from its name, by those +addicted to the Moorish mode of horsemanship, or riding with short +stirrups. The use of it extended later to the Christian Spaniards, and +it is said to have contributed in later times to the victory of the +Spanish army at Pavia. Other swords in use among the Granadinos were the +_alfange_, the _chifarra_, the _chifarote_, and the _nammexi_. The last +of these is described in an old dictionary of the Valencian and +Castilian languages as a kind of scimitar, although Quatremère and +Fleischer believe it to have been a dagger. + + [Illustration: XLVI + DAGGER OF BOABDIL EL CHICO + (_Museum of Artillery, Madrid_)] + +Another author who describes the arms and armour of the Granadinos is +Al-Jattib, who says in his _Splendour of the New Moon_; "There are in +Granada two kinds of soldiery--those of Al-Andalus and those of Africa. +Their leader is a prince of royal blood, or some exalted personage at +court. Formerly they used the Christian arms; that is, ample coats of +mail, heavy shields, thick iron helmets, lances with broad points, and +insecure saddles.... Now they have discarded that equipment, and are +beginning to use short cuirasses, light helmets, Arab saddles, leather +shields, and thin lances." Of the African troops the same historian +adds; "Their weapons for attacking are spears, either short or long, +which they propel by pressing with the finger. These arms they call +_marasas_; but for daily exercise they use the European bow." + +Descriptions of the Spanish-Moorish swords inserted in the chronicles +and poems of the Middle Ages, together with the few examples that have +been preserved until our time, enable us to form an accurate idea of the +shape and decoration of these weapons generally. Those of the sultans +and the Muslim aristocracy were, as a rule, profusely ornamented, either +with precious stones or with enamels, or else with delicate and lavish +damascening, or with the characteristic Oriental _ataujía_-work of gold +and silver inlay. Inscriptions, too, were freely used upon the hilt or +scabbard. Thus we are told that the great Almanzor kept for daily use a +sword which bore the legend; "_Strive in warfare till ye win great +victories. Battle with the infidels till ye win them over to Islam_"; +and similar inscriptions may be quoted in great number. But four or five +of these magnificent arms have proved superior to the ravages of time, +and naturally tell us more than any weapons whose renown survives in +written records merely. Among such extant Spanish-Moorish swords are two +attributed respectively to Aliatar and Abindarraez; two others which are +known to have belonged to the last ill-fated monarch of the Moors of +Spain, Boabdil el Chico; and another, considered to have also been +Boabdil's property, now in possession of the Marquises of Campotejar, +owners of the Generalife and of the Casa de los Tiros at Granada. + +The "sword of Aliatar," preserved in the Museum of Artillery at Madrid, +is said to have been wrested from the clenched hand of that warrior, +father-in-law of Boabdil and governor of Loja, as his corpse was swept +away down stream after the rout of the Moorish expedition at Lucena. +This arm is richly damascened as well as decorated with the +characteristic _ataujía_. The centre of the hilt is made of ivory, and +the pommel and crossbars--which latter terminate in elephants' heads +with slightly upturned trunks--of damascened and inlaid iron, ornamented +here and there with _ataujía_. Part of the blade--probably about an +eighth--is broken off. The sheath has disappeared. + +An idle superstition has attributed the so-called "sword of Abindarraez" +to the hero of the well-known sixteenth-century romance entitled _The +Abencerraje and the Beautiful Jarifa._ This weapon, which for many years +was in possession of the Narvaez family, belongs at present to the +Marquis of La Vega de Armijo. The decoration is not particularly rich, +and part of it is worn away; but the narrow blade is still engraved +with figures or portraits from the story which has given the sword its +name. + +The sword (Pl. xliv.) belonging to the Marquises of Campotejar, and +which is preserved in the Casa de los Tiros at Granada, bears some +resemblance to the "sword of Aliatar," and has about the same +dimensions. Although it is commonly believed that Boabdil was the +original owner of this sword, Gómez Moreno considers that more probably +it belonged to one of the Moorish princes of Almería. The handle and +crossbars, as well as the shape of the sheath, are silver-gilt, covered +with minute arabesque ornamentation forming leaves and stems, and +further decorated with enamel. The sheath is of Morocco leather worked +with silver thread. The crossbars, curving abruptly down,[119] terminate +in elephants' trunks boldly upturned towards the pommel. The blade is +stamped with a Toledo mark consisting of Castilian letters and a +pomegranate. + + [119] In the reign of Ferdinand and Isabella, this characteristically + eastern downward curve of the crossbars grew to be popular even + with the Christian Spaniards, as we observe from the swords of + Ferdinand himself, preserved in the Royal Armoury at Madrid, and + the Chapel Royal of the cathedral of Granada. + +But the most important, interesting, and beautiful specimens of +Spanish-Moorish arms preserved to-day are those which were captured from +Boabdil at the battle of Lucena (1482), when the monarch was made +prisoner by the young Alcaide de los Donceles, Don Diego Fernandez de +Cordova. A manuscript _History of the House of Cordova_, quoted by +Eguilaz Yanguas,[120] says that upon the day in question, irretrievably +disastrous to the Moorish cause in Spain, Boabdil carried "a short, +silver-handled sword, a damascened dagger, and a lance and buckler of +great strength" (Plates xlv. and xlvi.). These arms, together with +another and a larger sword (_montante_ or _estoque real_) for wielding +with both hands, and certain articles of Boabdil's clothing, continued +in the captor's family for centuries, and were, some years ago, +presented by the Marquises of Villaseca, his direct descendants, to the +National Museum of Artillery. + + [120] _Las Pinturas de la Alhambra_, p. 15. + + [Illustration: XLVII + MOORISH SWORD + (_Hilt and upper part of sheath_)] + +The smaller or _gineta_ sword[121] is handsomer and more important +than the large _estoque_. The crossbars, as we find so often in weapons +of this character and date, are bent abruptly down, and then curve up in +a design of dragons' heads--the well-known emblem of the Nasrite sultans +of Granada. Part of the handle is of solid gold adorned with crimson, +white, and blue enamel distributed about the top and bottom of the hilt, +the pommel, and the _arriaces_ or crossbars. The centre of the hilt +consists of ivory, richly carved. On either side of it are two octagonal +intersecting figures, bearing upon one side, in semi-Cufic characters, +the words, "_Achieve thy aim_," and on the other, "_in preserving his_ +(_i.e._ the owner's) _life_." Round the upper border of the ivory is +carved the sentence; "_In the name of God; the power belongs to Him, and +there is no Divinity but He. Happiness proceeds from God alone_"; and +round the lower border, "_The marvellous belongs to God. Assuredly at +the outset the ignorant do not know their God; seeing that error is +their custom._" + + [121] The Count of Valencia de Don Juan states that seven + Hispano-Moresque _gineta_ swords are known to exist to-day: the + one vwhich is here described, and those belonging to the Marquises + of Viana and Pallavicino, Baron de Sangarrén, the Duke of Dino, + Señor Sánchez Toscano, the archæological museum at Madrid, the + museum of Cassel in Germany, and the national library at Paris, A + _gineta_ sword in the Madrid Armoury popularly attributed to + Boabdil can never have belonged to him. The hilt is modern, and + the blade proceeds from Barbary. + +Other inscriptions of a sacred character, combined with delicate +_ataujía_-work, are on the pommel and the upper portion of the hilt; but +it has been remarked that, although the entire decoration is amazingly +elaborate and rich, these inscriptions nowhere indicate that the weapon +belonged to a personage of royal blood. + +The sheath of this most sumptuous arm is also lavishly adorned with +silver and enamel on a purple leather ground. The blade is of a later +date than either sheath or hilt, and bears the letter S, believed to be +the mark of Alonso Sahagun the elder, of Toledo. The total length of +this weapon is thirty-nine inches; and Gayangos declares that it was +worn suspended by a belt between the shoulders.[122] + + [122] A number of Moorish swords are mentioned in the inventory, + compiled in 1560, of the Dukes of Alburquerque. One is + particularly interesting. It is described as "a Moorish _gineta_ + sword which belongs to the Count of Monteagudo, and is pawned for + six thousand _maravedis_. The sheath is of bay leather, worked in + gold thread. The chape and fittings are of silver, decorated with + green, blue, purple, and white enamel. There are two serpents' + heads upon the fitting, together with the figure of a monster + worked in gold thread on a little plate, and two large scarlet + tassels: the little plate has three ends of the same enamel and a + silver-gilt buckle." A note at the margin adds; "The chape is + wanting, and is owed us by the Marquis of Comares, who lost it at + the cane-play at Madrid." + + The two serpents' heads formed part of the arms of the Alahmar + sultans of Granada; so that from this and from the richness of + this weapon we may infer that it had once belonged to Mussulman + royalty. The same inventory describes "a Moorish scimitar with + gilded hilt; the cross and pommel, and a great part of the + scimitar itself, being of gilded _ataujía_ work. The sheath is + green inside, and black and gilt upon the face; and hanging from + the hilt is a gold and purple cord with a button and a black + tassel." + +The large _montante_ which belonged to the same ill-fated monarch has a +cylindrical hilt, narrower in the centre of the handle than at either +end. This hilt is made of steel inlaid with _lacería_ or network +ornament in ivory. In a small shield within the decoration of the +pommel, appear the words "_To God_"; and in the centre of the handle, +the familiar motto of the Nasrite sultans of Granada; "_The only +Conqueror is God._" + +Part of the blade is broken off. That which is left is broad and +straight, with two grooves (one of which extends about three inches +only) on each side, and bears an oriental mark consisting of five +half-moons. The sheath is of brown Morocco decorated with a small gilt +pattern forming shells and flowers. The mouth and chape are silver-gilt. + +In beautiful and skilful craftsmanship Boabdil's dagger or _gumía_ +matches with his swords. The handle is of steel inlaid in ivory with +floral patterns, and terminates in a large sphere, similarly decorated. +The blade has a single edge, and is exquisitely damascened in gold +designs which cover more than half of all its surface. Along one side we +read the inscription; "_Health, permanent glory, lasting felicity, +permanent glory, lasting felicity, and lasting and permanent glory +belong to God_"; and on the other side, "_It was made by Reduan._" + +The sheath of this little arm is made of crimson velvet richly +embroidered with gold thread, and hanging from it is a large tassel of +gold cord and crimson silk. The chape and mouth are silver-gilt, +profusely decorated, and the latter of these pieces is embellished with +circular devices of a lightish green enamel, in addition to the chasing. + +The small, plain knife, also preserved among the spoil, was carried in +this sheath, together with the dagger.[123] + + [123] To-day the craft of finely decorating arms is not forgotten in + Morocco. "A silversmith advanced to show a half-completed + silver-sheathed and hafted dagger, engraved with pious sentences, + as, "God is our sufficiency and our best bulwark here on earth," + and running in and out between the texts a pattern of a rope with + one of the strands left out, which pattern also ran round the + cornice of the room we sat in, and round the door, as it runs + round the doors in the Alhambra and the Alcazar, and in thousands + of houses built by the Moors, and standing still, in Spain. The + dagger and the sheath were handed to me for my inspection, and on + my saying that they were beautifully worked, the Caid said keep + them, but I declined, not having anything of equal value to give + in return."--Cunninghame Graham; _Mogreb-El-Acksa_, p. 234. + + [Illustration: XLVIII + WAR HARNESS OF CHARLES THE FIFTH + (_Royal Armoury, Madrid_)] + +The Royal Armoury at Madrid is often thought by foreigners[124] to +contain a representative collection of the arms, offensive and +defensive, used by the Spanish people through all their mediæval and +post-mediæval history. This is not so. Although it is the choicest and +the richest gallery in Europe, the Armería Real was formed almost +entirely from the _cámaras de armas_ or private armouries of Charles the +Fifth and of his son, and is, as Mélida describes it, "a splendid +gallery of royal arms," dating, with very few exceptions, from the +sixteenth century. + + [124] _E.g._, by Townsend, who wrote of it, with ill-informed + enthusiasm, as "an epitome of Spanish history." Swinburne's notice + of the same armoury is also curious: "At the bottom of the + palace-yard is an old building, called the Armeria, containing a + curious assortment of antique arms and weapons, kept in a manner + that would have made poor Cornelius Scriblerus swoon at every + step; no notable housemaid in England has her fire-grates half so + bright as these coats of mail; they show those of all the heroes + that dignify the annals of Spain; those of Saint Ferdinand, + Ferdinand the Catholic, his wife Isabella, Charles the Fifth, the + great Captain Gonsalo, the king of Granada, and many others. Some + suits are embossed with great nicety. The temper of the sword + blades is quite wonderful, for you may lap them round your waist + like a girdle. The art of tempering steel in Toledo was lost about + seventy years ago, and the project of reviving and encouraging it + is one of the favourite schemes of Charles the Third, who has + erected proper works for it on the banks of the Tagus." + +The greater part of its contents were made within a limited interval, as +well as not produced in Spain. Such are the glittering and gorgeous +harnesses constructed for the actual use of Charles the Fifth by +celebrated German and Italian armourers, ponderous suits for jousting or +parade, or lighter suits for combat in the field, whether on foot or +horseback (Plate xlviii.), fashioned, chiselled, and inlaid by craftsmen +such as the Negroli and Piccini of Milan, Bartolommeo Campi of Pesaro, +or Kollman of Augsburg, bombastically called, by a Spanish poet in the +mode of Gongora, "the direct descendant of Vulcanus." + +This German and Italian armour, with its multitude of accessorial +pieces,[125] falls outside the province of a book on Spanish arts and +crafts. Nevertheless, I reproduce, as being too little known outside +Madrid, the sumptuous jousting harness (Plate xlix.), of Charles the +Fifth, made for the emperor when he was a lad of only eighteen years by +Kollman Helmschmied of Augsburg.[126] Laurent Vital, describing the +royal jousts at Valladolid in 1518, relates that "après marchait le Roy +bien gorgiasement monté et armé d'un fin harnais d'Alemaigne, plus +reluisant que d'argent brunti." This is the very harness told of by the +chronicler. The helmet turns the scale at forty pounds; the entire suit +at two hundred and fifty-three pounds; and the length of the lance +exceeds eleven feet. + + [125] Throughout this time, the full equipment of the knight consisted + of no less than four complete suits, for tournament or battle, or + for foot or mounted fighting, together with their lances, swords, + and targes. The Alburquerque inventory describes in detail a + complete set ("all of it kept in a box") of war and tourneying + harness belonging to the duke. Although the warriors of that day + were short of stature, their muscular strength is undeniable, for + one of their lances has to be lifted nowadays by several men. When + the author of _Mogreb-El-Acksa_ wrote contemptuously of the + "scrofulous champions tapping on each other's shields," he was + perhaps, forgetful for a moment of this fact. + + [126] The Count of Valencia de Don Juan has found, from documents at + Simancas, that in the year 1525 Kollman visited Toledo to measure + Charles for armour. It is also certain, adds the Count, that, in + order to produce this armour of a perfect fit, Kollman first + moulded Charles' limbs in wax, and then transferred the moulds to + lead. In a budget of accounts which coincides with Kollman's visit + to Toledo appears the following item: "Pour trois livres de cire + et de plomb pour faire les patrons que maître Colman, armoyeur, + a fait"--followed by details of the cost. + +There is, however, also in this armoury a jousting harness (Plate l.) +formerly the property of Philip the First of Spain, a part of which, +including the cuirass, is known to be of Spanish make. The cuirass in +question bears the mark of a Valencia armourer, and the harness +generally dates from about the year 1500, at which time Gachard tells us +in his _Chroniques Belges_ that Philip was learning to joust "à la mode +d'Espaigne." Besides the enormous helmet and the Spanish-made cuirass, +covered with gold brocade, this ornament includes a tourneying lance +with a blunt three-pointed head,[127] and a curious form of rest, said +by the Count of Valencia de Don Juan to be peculiar to the Spaniards and +Italians. This rest is stuffed with cork, on which, just as the fray +began, the iron extremity of the lance was firmly driven. Another +interesting detail is the _cuja_, fastened to the right side of the +cuirass, and also stuffed with cork, made use of to support the lance +upon its passage over to the rest. Nor in this instance was the _cuja_ a +superfluous device, seeing that the lance is over fifteen feet in +length. + + [127] This, in the later Middle Ages, was a favourite form of tourneying + lance. + +These are the principal portions of the harness. The seemingly +insufficient protection for the arms is explained by the fact that the +solid wooden shield completely covered the fighter's left arm, while +the right would be defended by the shield-like disc or _arandela_ of the +lance. + + [Illustration: XLIX + JOUSTING HARNESS OF CHARLES THE FIFTH + (_Royal Armoury, Madrid_)] + +Spanish shields and swords of great antiquity and interest are also in +this armoury. The oldest of the shields dates from the twelfth century, +and proceeds from the monastery of San Salvador de Oña, Burgos. The +material is a wood resembling cedar, although much eaten by moth, and is +covered on both sides with parchment bearing traces of primitive +painting of a non-heraldic character. Inside the shield, this decoration +consisted of a black ground crossed diagonally by a broad red band, and +outside, of a red ground covered with rhomboid figures, some in gilt and +some in colour. Such figures were a popular pattern at this time and on +this class of objects. The general stoutness of this shield shows that +it was meant for war. It still retains the strap which slung it from the +warrior's neck, as well as fragments of the braces--made of buffalo +leather covered with crimson velvet--for the hand. + +Another shield, proceeding from the same monastery, dates from the +thirteenth century. The material, here again, is wood and parchment; but +in this hundred years formal heraldic ornament had superseded fancy or +conventional devices. Accordingly, this shield is painted with a +blazon, now much worn, of which, however, enough remains to show that it +consisted once upon a time of four black chaperons crowned with gold +_fleurs-de-lis_ upon a gold ground--said to have been the arms of Don +Rodrigo Gomez, Count of Bureba. + +The _scut_, or polished metal shield, with painted blazonry or other +decoration, was limited to Aragon and Cataluña.[128] + + [128] _Historia General del Arte; Armas_, by García Llansó; p. 445. + +Among the smaller and more modern shields preserved in this collection +are two wooden bucklers dating from the sixteenth century. One is in the +Spanish-Moorish style and of a convex shape, with iron bordering and +umbo, and a lining of yellow brocade. The other, of the Christian +Spaniards, is small and lined with painted parchment, and was intended, +so the inventory says, "for going about at night."[129] + + [129] "Dès que le soir arrive, on ne va point n'y à Madrid ny ailleurs, + sans cotte de maille et sans _broquet_ qui est une + rondache."--Bertaut de Rouen, _Voyage d'Espagne_ (1659 A.D.), + p. 294. + + The arms of Spaniards promenading after dark were even fixed by + law. The _Suma de Leyes_ of 1628 ordains that after ten o'clock + nobody is to carry arms at all unless he also bears a lighted + torch or lantern. No arquebus, on pain of a fine of ten thousand + _maravedis_, may have a barrel less than a yard long. Nobody may + carry a sword or rapier the length of whose blade exceeds a yard + and a quarter, or wear a dagger unless a sword accompanies it. + Sometimes these prohibitions extended even to seasons of the year. + In 1530 an Ordinance of Granada proclaims that from the first of + March until the last day of November nobody may carry a hatchet, + sickle, or dagger, "except the dagger which is called a + _barazano_, of a palm in length, even if the wearer be a + shepherd." The penalty for infringement of this law was a fine of + ten thousand _maravedis_; but labourers who worked upon a farm + were exempted from the prohibition. + + Swinburne wrote from Cataluña, in 1775, that "amongst other + restrictions, the use of slouched hats, white shoes, and large + brown cloaks is forbidden. Until of late they durst not carry any + kind of knife; but in each public house there was one chained to + the table, for the use of all comers." + +There is also a richly gilt and silvered buckler of the seventeenth +century, made at Eugui in Navarre, and covered with a scene--decadent +in design and workmanship--which represents the judgment of Paris. +Defensive armour, chiefly of a highly decorative kind, was made all +through this century at the capital of Navarre, Pamplona. The Royal +Armoury contains a Pamplonese parade harness (Plate lii.), offered as a +gift to Philip the Third, as well as six diminutive sets of armour made +to his order for the youthful princes Don Felipe, Don Fernando, and Don +Carlos. + +The _adarga_ was a kind of targe used by the light cavalry, and had its +origin in Africa. Those which were stored in the palace of the Nasrite +sultans of Granada are described by Al-Makkari as "solid, without pores, +soft to the touch, and famed for their imperviousness." The material was +strong leather, such as cowhide, often embroidered with a scutcheon or +with arabesques. Two Spanish-made _adargas_ in this armoury are +particularly handsome. One is of Moorish craftsmanship, and dates from +the end of the fifteenth century. The other (Plate liii.), apparently +the work of a Spanish Christian and dating from a century later, is +embroidered in silver thread and coloured silk with arabesque devices +and also with four coats of arms, one of which belongs to the noble +family of Fernández de Cordova. The dimensions of this shield are a yard +in height by thirty inches in breadth. + + [Illustration: L + JOUSTING HARNESS OF PHILIP THE HANDSOME + (_Royal Armoury, Madrid_)] + +There also are preserved in this collection a shield (late sixteenth +century) adorned by Mexican Indians with a most elaborate "mosaic of +feather-work," and a number of Spanish _adargas_ of the same period, for +playing the _juego de cañas_ or "game of canes." The armoury contained +in former days as many as forty-two _adargas_; but the fire of 1884 +completely destroyed sixteen and badly damaged twenty-three, +obliterating their heraldic and other decoration. A yet more sinister +event befell on December 1st, 1808, when the Spanish mob, exasperated by +the French, broke in and seized three hundred swords, not one of which +was afterwards recovered. Mention of these disasters leads me to recall +the quantity of beautiful or historic military gear that Spain has lost +through many tribulations and vicissitudes. Formerly her noble families +had excellent collections in their palaces or castles. Such were the +private armouries of the Dukes of Pastrana at Guadalajara, and of the +Dukes of Alburquerque at Cuéllar Castle, near Segovia. Bertaut de Rouen +describes the first as "une des plus belles qui se voyent pour un +seigneur particulier. Il y a quantité d'armes anciennes, et l'on y void +une épée qui s'allonge et s'accourcit quand on veut, de deux pieds et +demy."[130] The Cuéllar armoury was pulled to pieces by Philip the +Fourth to arm his troops against the French. "Send me," he wrote to the +Duke from Madrid, in a letter dated April 16th, 1637, "all your pistols, +carbines, harness for horses, breastplates and other arms for mounted +fighting"; and the loyal nobleman complied upon the spot, despatching +more than five hundred pieces, many of which were doubtless of the +greatest interest.[131] + + [130] _Voyage d'Espagne_, p. 199. + + [131] Gonzalo de la Torre de Trassierra; Articles on Cuéllar published + in the _Boletín de la Sociedad Española de Excursiones_. + +Had I the erudition and the time, I would attempt to write, as it +deserves to be written, an introduction to the history of Spanish +swords. Of all the objects mentioned in these volumes, here is the most +inherently symbolic of the Spanish character and history. The Spanish +Moors and Spanish Christians spoke of it as something superhuman. "Once +the sword is in the hand of man," observed, in solemn tones, the Wise +Alfonso, "he hath it in his power to raise or lower it, to strike with +it, or to abandon it." The Spanish Mussulmans talked of putting "clothes +and breeches" on a sword that had a sheath, as though it were a +breathing person; while a Spaniard of the time of Gongora would often +use such language as the following: "Truly in point of look there is as +great a difference between a costly sword and a _Toledan Loyalty_ or +_Soldier's Dream_, as between a marquis and a muleteer, or a washerwoman +and the Infanta. Yet every sword is virtually an hidalgo. Does not the +basest of our Toledanas, even to the _perrillos_ and _morillos_, which +have no core, and cost a dozen _reales_ merely, afford a chivalrous +lesson to its wearer, as it bids him _no me saques sin razon, ni me +envaines sin honor_?[132] The horse and the sword," he continued, taking +a magnificently damascened rapier, and stroking it caressingly, "are the +noblest friends of man, albeit the nobler is the sword; for the horse at +times is obstinate or faint-hearted, but the sword is ready continually. +The sword, moreover, possesses the chiefest of all virtues--justice, or +the power of dividing right and wrong; a soul of iron, which is +strength; and, last and greatest, the Cross, which is the symbol of the +blessed Catholic Faith."[133] + + [132] "Draw me not without a cause, nor sheathe me without honour." A + sword with this inscription is in the Royal Armoury--(G. 71 of + the official catalogue). + + [133] Leonard Williams; _Toledo and Madrid: their Records and Romances_; + p. 102. + +Notices of early Spanish sword-makers are far from common. Don Manuel G. +Simancas quotes the following, dated in the thirteenth century:-- + +"_Master Almerique._ By letters of the King and Queen, to Master +Almerique, for making the (sword) blades for the King; out of the MCC +_maravedis_ of his salary he received CCCC _maravedis_." + +"_Master Enrique._ By letters of the King and Queen, to Master Enrique, +for making the swords, MCCCC, (of which) he received CCCCXII +_maravedis_." + +Other entries of the same period relate to Juan Ferrández, armourer, who +received a sum for making coverings for arms and saddles; and to Master +Jacomin, who was paid three gold _doblas_, or sixty-three _maravedis_, +for making a breastplate. + +In the inventory (1560) of the Dukes of Alburquerque occurs a very +curious notice which seems to show that mediæval Spanish swords were +manufactured even in the rural districts. The entry runs; "an old +grooved sword of a broad shape, bearing the words _Juanes me fezió_ +("John made me"). In the middle of the same a P within a parted wave, +with Portuguese fittings, varnished, black silk hilt and fringes, and +double straps of black leather, with varnished ends and buckles and +black leather sheath. _Juan de Lobinguez made this sword at Cuéllar._" + + [Illustration: LI + MOORISH BUCKLER + (_Osier and metal. Royal Armoury, Madrid_)] + +The Spanish guilds of armourers enjoyed high favour,[134] since the +examination for admission to this craft was very strict, as well as +fenced about with curious prohibitions. Thus at Seville, "no Moor, Jew, +black man, or other person such as the law debars, shall set up a shop +for making and selling defensive arms, or undergo examination in this +craft."[135] The penalty for infringement of this law was confiscation +of the arms, together with a fine of twenty thousand _maravedis_. + + [134] In the Corpus Christi festival at Granada the banner which + preceded all the rest was that of the armourers and knife-makers, + followed by that of the silk-mercers. _Ordenanzas de Granada_; + tit. 126. + + [135] _Armourers' Ordinances of Seville_, extant in ms. (quoted by + Gestoso; _Diccionario de Artífices Sevillanos_; vol. I., + p. xxxvi). + +Throughout these times the armourer's and the gilder's crafts are found +in closest union; just as the armourer's craft would often alternate +with that of the goldsmith or the silversmith. At Seville, the Ordinance +of 1512 prescribed that every candidate who came to be examined must +make "a set of horse harness, complete with stirrups, headstalls, spurs, +poitral, and the fittings of a sword; and he must silver several of +these pieces and blue them with fine blue; and make of iron, and gild +the spurs and fittings of the sword. Thus shall he make, and gild, and +silver the aforesaid pieces." + +Equally severe and comprehensive are the swordsmiths' Ordinances (1527 +to 1531) of Granada. The aspirant to the title of _oficial_ "shall mount +a sword for wear with ordinary clothes, fitted in black, together with +its straps, and fringed and corded hilt; besides a sword gilded a low +gold, together with its straps and other parts, all of a single colour. +Also he shall fit a velvet-scabbarded, silver-hilted sword, and a +two-handed sword, fully decorated, with the knife attaching to the same, +one-edged and with a smooth hilt; also a sword whose scabbard shall be +fitted with knives numbering not less than three; and a hilt of +_lacería_ (network ornament); and another sword in a white sheath, with +woven hilt; and another of a hand and a half."[136] + + [136] "_De mano y media_"; _i.e._ for wielding either with one hand or + both. Specimens of this kind of sword existing at Madrid will be + described immediately. + +The Royal Armoury at Madrid contains an excellent collection of these +weapons. Among the earliest known to be of Spanish make are two which +date from the thirteenth century. One of them (Plate liv., No. 1), with +fittings of a later time, is frequently miscalled the "Cid's Colada," +and seems to have been confounded with the genuine weapon of that hero +which was acquired in the thirteenth century by one of the sovereigns of +Castile, and which has probably disappeared. + +The blade of this remarkable sword has two edges and tapers gradually to +the point. Part of the blade is slightly hollowed, and bears, extending +through about a quarter of the hollow or _canal_, the following +inscription or device:-- + +[Illustration] + +This is believed by some authorities to represent the words SI, SI, NO, +NON ("Yes, yes, no, no"); and by others to be a purely meaningless and +decorative pattern. The weapon, in any case, is in the best of +preservation, and is especially interesting from the fact that engraved +blades dating from this early period are very seldom met with. The Count +of Valencia de Don Juan believes this weapon to be the same _Lobera_ +which belonged to Ferdinand the Third, and aptly quotes the following +passage from the chronicle. When Ferdinand, conqueror of Seville, was +lying on his death-bed in that capital, surrounded by his children, he +gave his blessing to his younger son, the Infante Don Manuel, and +addressed him in these words. "I can bequeath no heritage to you; but I +bestow upon you my sword Lobera, that is of passing worth, and wherewith +God has wrought much good to me." If the Count's surmise be accurate, +another passage which he quotes from the work _Nobleza y Lealtad_, +written by the twelve councillors of Ferdinand, fully explains the +legend on the blade. "_Sennor, el tu si sea asi, e el tu non, sea non; +que muy gran virtud es al Príncipe, ó á otro qualquier ome ser +verdadero, e grand seguranza de sus vasallos, e de sus cosas._"[137] + + [137] "Señor, let thy yea be yea, and thy nay be nay; for of great + virtue is it in the prince, or any man, to be a speaker of the + truth, and of great security to his vassals and to his property." + +I said that the chiselled and gilded iron fittings to the blade are of a +later period. They date from the earlier part of the sixteenth century, +and are the work of Salvador de Avila, of Toledo. + + [Illustration: LII + ARMOUR MADE AT PAMPLONA + (_17th Century. Royal Armoury, Madrid_)] + +The other sword in this collection, and which also belongs to the +thirteenth century, has a long, broad blade with two edges and a central +groove, thinly engraved with circles (Pl. liv., No. 3, and Pl. lv.). The +crossbars are of silver-gilt, engraved with _ataurique_, curving towards +the blade and terminating in trefoils. A shield midway between them +bears the arms of Castile upon one side, and those of León upon the +other. The grip is of wood, covered with silver plates with decorated +borders, and the pommel is of iron, also covered with ornamental plates +of silver-gilt. Formerly this arm was studded with precious stones, but +all of these excepting one have disappeared. + +The scabbard is of wood lined with sheepskin, and is covered with a +series of five silver-gilt plates, profusely decorated with +Hispano-Moresque _lacería_, studded with various kinds of gems. These +gems upon the scabbard amounted once upon a time to seventy-six, which +sum, through pilfering or accident (probably the former, since the +finest stones are gone), has been diminished by one-half. An inventory, +made in the reign of Philip the Second, states that the inner side of +the sheath, now wholly worn away, was covered with lions and castles, +and that the belt was of broad orange-coloured cloth, with silver +fittings. + +This sword has been absurdly attributed to the nephew of Charlemagne, +who lived not less than half a thousand years before its date of +manufacture. The Count of Valencia de Don Juan thought that it may have +been the property of a Spanish monarch of the thirteenth +century,--perhaps Alfonso the Learned, or Ferdinand the Third, Alfonso's +father. Ferdinand, we know, possessed a sword which he delivered with +due ceremony to his elder son, the Infante Don Fernando, upon his +leading out a force against the town of Antequera. This sword the +chronicler Alvar García de Santa María described as having "a sheath in +pieces, with many precious stones." + +Of even greater interest than the foregoing weapon is the great +two-handed and two-edged _estoque_ or ceremonial sword of Ferdinand and +Isabella, which measures forty-two inches in length. The fittings are of +iron, gilded and engraved. The crossbars, terminating in small +half-moons, with the concave side directed outward, are inscribed with +the well-known motto of the Catholic sovereigns, TANTO MONTA, and with +a supplication to the Virgin, MEMENTO MEI O MATER DEI MEI. The pommel is +a flat disc, suggestive in its outline of a Gothic cross, and bears upon +one side the figure of Saint John together with the yoke, emblem of +Ferdinand the Catholic, and upon the other the sheaf of arrows, emblem +of his consort Isabella. The hilt is covered with red velvet bound with +wire. + +The sheath of this most interesting sword--affirmed by the Count of +Valencia de Don Juan to have been used by Ferdinand and Isabella, and +subsequently by Charles the Fifth, in the ceremony of conferring +knighthood, and also, during the Hapsburg monarchy, to have been carried +by the master of the horse before the king upon his formal visit to a +city of his realm--is made of wood covered with crimson silk, bearing in +"superposed" embroidery the arms of Spain posterior to the conquest of +Granada, together with a repetition of the emblems of the Catholic +sovereigns (Plate liv., No. 2). + +In the same collection are two other swords which probably belonged to +Ferdinand the Catholic. One of them (Pl. lvii., No. 1), has a discoid +pommel and a gilded iron handle. The flat crossbars grow wider and bend +down towards the blade, and on the hilt we read the words PAZ COMIGO +NVNCA VEO, Y SIEMPRE GVERA DESEO ("Never does peace attend me, and +always do I yearn for war"). + +This sword has been attributed to Isabella. The evidence for this belief +is slight, although the Count of Valencia de Don Juan discovered that in +the year 1500 Isabella was undoubtedly the possessor of certain weapons +and armour which she sometimes actually wore. Among these objects were +several Milanese breastplates, a small dagger with a gold enamelled hilt +in the shape of her emblem of the sheaf of arrows, and two swords, one +fitted with silver and enamel, and the other with iron. + +The other sword, which probably belonged to Ferdinand the Catholic, is +of the kind known as "of a hand and a half" (_de mano y media_; see p. +248, _note_), and also of the class denominated _estoques de arzón_, or +"saddle-bow swords," being commonly slung from the forepart of the +saddle upon the left side of the rider. Ferdinand, however, had reason +to be chary of this usage, for Lucio Marineo Sículo affirms that at the +siege of Velez-Málaga the sword which he was wearing thus suspended, +jammed at a critical moment of the fray, and very nearly caused his +death. Sículo adds that after this experience Ferdinand invariably wore +his sword girt round his person, just as he wears it in the carving on +the choir-stalls of Toledo. + + [Illustration: LIII + _ADARGA_ + (_Royal Armoury, Madrid_)] + +The Royal Armoury contains another sword improperly attributed both to +Ferdinand the Third and Ferdinand the Catholic. It dates from the +fifteenth century, and has a blade of unusual strength intended to +resist plate armour. This blade, which has a central ridge continued to +the very point, is very broad towards the handle, tapers rapidly, and +measures thirty-two inches. At the broader end, and on a gilded ground +embellished with concentric circles, are graven such legends as:-- + +"The Lord is my aid. I will not fear what man may do to me, and will +despise my enemies. Superior to them, I will destroy them utterly." + +"Make me worthy to praise thee, O sweet and blessed Virgin Mary." + +The handle is of iron, with traces of gilded decoration, and corded with +black silk. The Count of Valencia de Don Juan says that no reliable +information can be found concerning this fine arm. Its length and +general design would allow of its being used with one hand or with +both, and either slung from the saddle-bow or round the middle of a +warrior on foot. + +Another handsome sword, wrongly attributed by the ignorant to Alfonso +the Sixth, is kept at Toledo, in the sacristy of the cathedral. The +scabbard is adorned with fourteenth-century enamel in the _champlevé_ +style. Baron de las Cuatro Torres considers that this sword belonged to +the archbishop Don Pedro Tenorio (see p. 269), and adduces his proofs in +the _Boletín de la Sociedad Española de Excursiones_ for March 1897. The +prelate in question, appointed to command an army sent against Granada, +was, like so many of the Spanish mediæval clerics, of a warlike temper, +and "exchanged with great alacrity his rochet for his harness, and his +mitre for his helm." + +One of the most ridiculous and barefaced forgeries in the Royal Armoury +is a sixteenth-century sword which has inscribed upon its blade the name +of the redoubtable Bernardo del Carpio. The Count of Valencia de Don +Juan says he remembers to have met with other blades of later mediæval +make, engraved with such legends as "belonging to Count +Fernán-Gonzalez," or even "Recaredus Rex Gothorum," while others in +this armoury are ascribed, without the least authority of fact or common +sense, to García de Paredes, Alvaro de Sande, and Hernando de Alarcón. +Others, again, with less extravagance, though not on solid proof, are +said to have belonged to Hernán Cortés, the Count of Lemos, and Diego +Hurtado de Mendoza. + +Some, upon the other hand, belonged undoubtedly to celebrated Spanish +warriors of the olden time. Such are the swords of the Count of Coruña, +of Gonzalo de Córdova, and of the conqueror of Peru, Francisco Pizarro. +The first of these weapons (Pl. lvii., No. 4) has a superb hilt carved +in the style of the Spanish Renaissance, with crossbars curving down, a +_pas d'âne_, and a Toledo blade of six _mesas_ ("tables") or surfaces, +grooved on both sides, and ending in a blunt point. The armourer's mark, +which seems to represent a _fleur-de-lis_ four times repeated, is that +of the swordsmith Juan Martinez, whose name we read upon the blade, +together with the words IN TE DOMINE SPERAVI, and on the other side, in +Spanish, PARA DON BERNARDINO XVAREZ DE MENDOZA, CONDE DE CORVÑA. + +The sword of "the great captain," Gonzalo de Córdova (1453-1515), is +not of Spanish make (Plate lvii., No. 3). It has a straight blade with +bevelled edges. The pommel and _quillons_ are decorated with Renaissance +carving, and the bars, which are of gilded iron, grow wider at their end +and curve towards the blade. The pommel, of gilded copper, is spherical, +and bears, upon one side, a scene which represents a battle, together +with the words GONSALVI AGIDARI VICTORIA DE GALLIS AD CANNAS. Upon the +other side are carved his arms. Other inscriptions in Latin are also on +the pommel and the blade. + +The Count of Valencia de Don Juan believed that this sword was a present +to Gonzalo from the corporation of some Italian town, and that it +replaced, as an _estoque real_, or sword of ceremony, the state sword +(see p. 252) of Ferdinand and Isabella. + + [Illustration: LIV + SPANISH SWORDS + (_Royal Armoury, Madrid_)] + +Pizarro's sword remained in possession of his descendants, the Marquises +of La Conquista, until as recently as 1809, in which year this family +presented it to a Scotch officer named John Downie, who had fought in +the Peninsular War against the French. Downie, in turn, bequeathed it to +his brother Charles, lieutenant-colonel in the Spanish army, from +whom it passed into the hands of Ferdinand the Seventh. The appearance +of this sword is not remarkable. It has a stout, four-surfaced blade, +with a powerful _recazo_ or central ridge, engraved with the Christian +name of Mateo Duarte, a swordsmith who was living at Valencia in the +middle of the sixteenth century. The hilt is of blued (_pavonado_) +steel, inlaid with leaves and other ornament in gold. The pommel is a +disc; the _quillons_ are straight, or very nearly so, and there is a +_pas d'âne_ (Plate lvii., No. 2). + +The sixteenth and the seventeenth centuries are famous as the epoch of +the Spanish rapier. Toledo, as the world is well aware, enjoyed an +undisputed name for the production of these weapons. Within this ancient +and historic capital generations of artists bequeathed, from father to +son, and son to grandson, the secret (if there were a secret) of the +tempering of these matchless arms; nor have Toledo blades deteriorated +to this day. Many an idle superstition seeks to justify the talent and +dexterity of these swordsmiths; though probably the key to all their +skill was merely in the manual cunning, based on constant practice, of +the craftsman, as well as in the native virtues of the water of the +Tagus. + +In one of my books I have described the workshop of an armourer of +Toledo in the sixteenth century. "After a few moments we entered the +Calle de las Armas, which struck me as having grown a good deal +narrower; and my companion, pausing beside an open doorway topped with a +sign depicting a halberd and a sword, invited me to enter. Two or three +steps led downwards to a dark, damp passage, and at the end of this was +a low but very large room, blackened by the smoke from half a dozen +forges. The walls were hung with a bewildering variety of arms and parts +of armour--gauntlets and cuirasses; morions, palettes, and +lobster-tails; partisans and ranseurs; halberds, bayonets, and +spontoons; as well as swords and daggers without number. Several anvils, +with tall, narrow buckets filled with water standing beside them, were +arranged about the stone-paved floor; and beside each forge was a large +heap of fine, white sand. + +"The showers of sparks, together with a couple of ancient-looking lamps +whose flames shook fitfully to and fro in the vibration, showed thirty +or forty workmen busily engaged; and what with the clanging of the +hammers, the roaring of the bellows, and the strident hissing of the hot +metal as it plunged into the cold water, the racket was incessant. + +"My cicerone surveyed the discordant scene with all the nonchalance of +lifelong custom, daintily eluding the columns of scalding steam, or +screening his _chambergo_ from the sparks. Finding, however, that I was +powerless to understand the remarks he kept addressing to me, he finally +held up his finger and gave the signal to cease work; upon which the +_oficial_ handed him a bundle of papers which I took to be accounts, and +the men, doffing their leathern aprons, and hanging them in a corner, +filed eagerly away. + +"'It is quite simple,' said my companion, as though divining the query I +was about to put to him; 'and indeed, I often wonder why we are so +famous. They say it is the water; but any water will do. Or else they +say it is the sand; and yet this sand, though clean and pure, is just +the same as any other. Look! The blade of nearly all our swords is +composed of three pieces--two strips of steel, from Mondragón in +Guipúzcoa, and an iron core. This latter is the _alma_, or soul. The +three pieces are heated and beaten together; and when they grow red-hot +and begin to throw out sparks, they are withdrawn from the fire, and a +few handfuls of sand are thrown over them. The welding of the pieces is +then continued on the anvil; and, finally, the file is brought to bear +on all unevennesses, and the weapon passes on to the temperer, the +grinder, and the burnisher.' + +"'It is in the tempering that we have earned our principal renown, +although this process is quite as simple as the rest. Upon the +forge--see, here is one still burning--a fire is made in the form of a +narrow trench, long enough to receive four-fifths of the length of the +weapon. As soon as the metal reaches a certain colour' (I thought I +noted a mischievous twinkle in the armourer's eyes, as though this +_certain colour_ were the key to all our conversation), 'I take these +pincers, and, grasping the portion which had remained outside the fire, +drop the weapon so, point downwards, into the bucket of water. Any curve +is then made straight by beating upon the concave side, and the part +which had been previously kept outside the trench of fire returns to the +forge and is duly heated. The entire blade is next smeared with mutton +fat, and rested against the wall to cool, point upwards. There is +nothing more except the finishing. Your sword is made.'"[138] + + [138] _Toledo and Madrid: their Records and Romances_; pp. 99-101. + + [Illustration: LV + SWORD + (_13th Century. Royal Armoury, Madrid_)] + +The following passage from Bowles' _Natural History of Spain_, written +in 1752, is also of especial interest here:--"At a league's distance +from Mondragón is a mine of varnished, or, as miners term it, frozen +iron. It lies in the midst of soft red earth, and produces natural +steel--a very curious circumstance, seeing that, as I am assured, there +is no other mine of this description in the kingdom. A tradition exists +that the iron from this mine was used for making the swords, so +celebrated for their tempering, presented by Doña Catalina, daughter of +the Catholic Sovereigns, to her husband, Henry the Eighth of England. A +few of these swords are yet extant in Scotland, where the natives call +them _André Ferrara_,[139] and esteem them greatly. The famous +sword-blades of Toledo, and the Perrillo blades of Zaragoza, which are +still so highly valued, as well as others made elsewhere, are said to +have been forged from the iron of this mine, which yields forty per +cent. of metal. It is, however, somewhat hard to melt. With a little +trouble it is possible to secure excellent steel, because this mine, +like many another, possesses in itself the quality of readily taking +from the coal of the forge the spirit which is indispensable for making +first-rate swords; but without cementation I do not think it would serve +for making good files or razors." + + [139] Andrés Ferrara was a well-known armourer of Zaragoza. + +"The swords of which I spoke as being so famed were generally either of +a long shape, for wearing with a ruff; or broad, and known as the +_arzón_, for use on horseback. It is probable that when the ruff was +suddenly abandoned at the beginning of this century, large quantities of +ready-fitted swords began to be imported from abroad, of such a kind as +was demanded by the novel clothing. This would account for the decline +and the eventual collapse of our factories, and the loss of our art of +tempering swords. Concerning the mode of executing this, opinions +differ. It is said by some that the blades were tempered in winter only, +and that when they were withdrawn for the last time from the furnace, +the smiths would shake them in the air at great speed three times on a +very cold day. Others say that the blades were heated to a +cherry-colour, then plunged for a couple of seconds into a deep jar +filled with oil or grease, and changed forthwith to another vessel of +lukewarm water, after which they were set to cool in cold water; all +these operations being performed at midwinter. Others, again, declare +that the blades were forged from the natural iron of Mondragón by +placing a strip of ordinary iron along their core so as to give them +greater elasticity; and that they were then tempered in the ordinary +manner, though always in the winter. Such are the prevailing theories +about the iron swords of Mondragón, which are, in truth, of admirable +quality." + +Magnificent examples of Toledo sword-blades, produced while her craft +was at the zenith of its fame--that is, throughout the sixteenth and the +seventeenth centuries--are in the Royal Armoury (Pl. lvii., Nos. 5, 6, +7). Among them are a series of _montantes_ made for tournament or war, +and a superb blade, dated 1564, forged for Philip the Second by Miguel +Cantero. The Count of Valencia de Don Juan considered this to be one of +the finest weapons ever tempered; adding that the sword-blades of the +city of the Tagus were held in such esteem all over Europe that he had +seen, in numerous museums of the Continent, weapons professing to be +Toledo-made, in which the blade and mark are evidently forged; bearing, +for instance, _Ernantz_ for Hernandez, _Johanos_ for Juanes, and _Tomas +Dailae_ for Tomás de Ayala. + +It is generally agreed that the changes in the national costume, +together with the importation of a lighter make of sword from France, +were directly responsible for the decline of the Toledo sword-blades +early in the eighteenth century. However, this decline was only +temporary. Townsend wrote in 1786: "From the Alcazar we went to visit +the royal manufactory of arms, with which I was much pleased. The steel +is excellent, and so perfectly tempered, that in thrusting at a target, +the swords will bend like whalebone, and yet cut through a helmet +without turning their edge. This once famous manufacture had been +neglected, and in a manner lost, but it is now reviving." + +Laborde endorsed these praises subsequently: "Within a few years the +fabrication of swords has been resumed at Toledo; the place allotted to +this object is a handsome edifice, a quarter of a league distant from +the city, which commands the banks of the Tagus. This undertaking has +hitherto been prosperous; the swords are celebrated for the excellence +of their blades, which are of finely tempered steel." + + [Illustration: LVI + OLD SWORD + (_Erroneously attributed to the Cid. Collection + of the Marquis of Falces_)] + +The modern small-arms factory of Toledo, situated on the right bank of +the Tagus, a mile from the city walls, had, in fact, been opened in +1783, when the same industry was also reviving at Vitoria, Barcelona, +and elsewhere. Toledo worthily maintains to-day her ancient and +illustrious reputation for this craft. The Tagus still supplies its +magic water for the tempering, while part of the prime material of the +steel itself proceeds from Solingen and Styria, and the rest from Trubia +and Malaga. + +Cutlery continued to be made in Spain all through the eighteenth +century. Colmenar says that the knives of Barcelona were considered +excellent. According to Laborde, cutlery was made at Solsona and Cardona +in Cataluña, at Mora in New Castile, and at Albacete in Murcia. "The +cutlery of Solsona is in great repute; but the largest quantity is made +at Albacete. In the latter place are about twenty-eight working cutlers, +each of whom employs five or six journeymen, who respectively +manufacture annually six or seven thousand pieces, amounting in the +whole to about one hundred and eighty thousand pieces."[140] + + [140] Vol. iv. p. 358. + + + FIREARMS + +Cannon of a primitive kind were used in Spain comparatively early. A +large variety of names was given to these pieces, such as _cerbatanas_, +_ribadoquines_, _culebrinas_, _falconetes_, _pasavolantes_, _lombardas_ +or _bombardas_, and many more; but the oldest, commonest, and most +comprehensive name of all was _trueno_, "thunder," from the terrifying +noise of the discharge. This word was used for both the piece and the +projectile. The Count of Clonard quotes Pedro Megía's _Silva de Varias +Lecciones_ to show that gunpowder was known in Spain as early as the +eleventh century. "Thunders" of some description seem to have been used +at the siege of Zaragoza in 1118; and a Moorish author, writing in 1249, +describes in fearsome terms "the horrid noise like thunder, vomiting +fire in all directions, destroying everything, reducing everything to +ashes." Al-Jattib, the historian of Granada, wrote at the beginning of +the fourteenth century that the sultan of that kingdom used at the siege +of Baza "a mighty engine, applying fire thereto, prepared with naphtha +and with balls." The Chronicle of Alfonso the Eleventh describes in a +quaint and graphic passage the crude artillery of that period, and the +panic it occasioned. At the siege of Algeciras in 1342, "the Moors that +were within the city threw many 'thunders' at the (Christian) host, +together with mighty balls of iron, to such a distance that several +overpassed the army, and some did damage to our host. Also, by means of +'thunders' they threw arrows exceeding great and thick, so that it was +as much as a man could do to lift them from the ground. And as for the +iron balls these 'thunders' hurled, men were exceedingly afraid thereof; +for if they chanced to strike a limb they cut it off as clean as with a +knife, and though the wound were but a slight one, yet was the man as +good as dead; nor was any chirurgery that might avail him, both because +the balls came burning hot, like flame, and because the powder which +discharged them was of such a kind that any wound it made was surely +mortal; and such was the violence of these balls, that they went through +a man, together with all his armour." + +Towards the close of the same century the testament of Don Pedro Tenorio +(see p. 256), the bellicose archbishop of Alcalá de Henares, who +ruled that diocese from 1376 to 1399, contains the following +passage:--"_Item_. We bought crossbows and bassinets both for foot and +horse, together with shields, pikes, javelins, darts, lombards, hemp, +powder, and other munitions for the castles of our Church; of which +munitions we stored the greater quantity at Talavera and at Alcalá de +Henares, purposing to deposit them at Cazorla and in the castles of +Canales and of Alhamin, which we are now repairing after they were +thrown down by the King Don Pedro, and for the tower of Cazorla, which +we are now erecting. And it is our will that all of these munitions be +for the said castles and tower; and that no one lay his hand on them, on +pain of excommunication, excepting only the bishop elected and confirmed +who shall succeed us; and he shall distribute them as he holds best +among the aforesaid castles. And all the best of these munitions shall +be for the governorship of Cazorla, as being most needed there to +overthrow the enemies of our faith; and we have duly lodged the shields +and crossbows, parted from the rest, upon the champaign of Toledo; +whither should arrive more shields from Valladolid, that all together +may be carried to Cazorla." + + [Illustration: LVII + SPANISH SWORDS + (_Royal Armoury, Madrid_)] + +The article from which I quote this passage adds that the palace of the +archbishop at Alcalá de Henares was fortified with cannon until the +beginning of the nineteenth century.[141] + + [141] Escudero de la Peña; _Claustros, Escalera, y Artesonados del + Palacio Arzobispal de Alcalá de Henares_; published in the _Museo + Español de Antigüedades_. + +Cannon are mentioned with increasing frequency throughout the fifteenth +century; and in the reign of Ferdinand and Isabella we read of lombards +of enormous size, which had to be dragged across the Andalusian hills +and plains by many scores of men and beasts; which frequently stuck fast +and had to be abandoned on the march; and which, even in the best of +circumstances, could only be discharged some twice or thrice a day. + +In reading documents and chronicles of older Spain, it is easy to +confound the early forms of cannon with the engines similar to those +employed by the Crusaders in the Holy Land, and built for hurling stones +or arrows of large size. Such engines were the _trabuco_, the +_almajanech_ or _almojaneque_, the _algarrada_, and the _fundíbalo_ or +Catalan _fonevol_. Beuter, in his _Chronicle of Spain and of Valencia_, +describes the latter as "a certain instrument which has a sling made +fast to an extremity of wood ... made to revolve so rapidly that the +arm, on being released, projects the stone with such a force as to +inflict much harm, even in distant places, whither could reach no +missile slung by the hand of man." + +Turning to portable Spanish firearms, we find that the precursor of the +arquebus, musket, and rifle seems to have been a weapon which was +introduced about the middle of the fifteenth century, and called the +_espingarda_. Alfonso de Palencia says it was employed against the +rebels of Toledo in 1467; and the Chronicle of Don Alvaro de Luna +relates that when this nobleman was standing beside Don Iñigo +d'Estúñiga, upon a certain occasion in 1453, "a man came out in his +shirt and set fire to an _espingarda_, discharging the shot thereof +above the heads of Don Alvaro and of Iñigo d'Estúñiga, but wounding an +esquire." + + [Illustration: LVIII + MARKS OF TOLEDAN ARMOURERS (15TH-17TH CENTURIES), FROM + SWORDS IN THE ROYAL ARMOURY AT MADRID] + +As time advanced, portable firearms of first-rate quality were made +throughout the northern Spanish provinces, and also in Navarra, +Cataluña, Aragon, and Andalusia. The inventory of the Dukes of +Alburquerque mentions, in 1560, "four flint arquebuses of Zaragoza +make ... another arquebus of Zaragoza, together with its fuse," and +"arquebuses of those that are made within this province" (_i.e._ of +Segovia). Cristóbal Frisleva, of Ricla in Aragon, and Micerguillo of +Seville were celebrated makers of this arm; but probably these and all +the other Spanish masters of this craft derived their skill from foreign +teaching, such as that of the brothers Simon and Peter Marckwart (in +Spanish the name is spelt _Marcuarte_,) who were brought to Spain by +Charles the Fifth.[142] + + [142] The brothers Marckwart, or possibly one or other of them, are + believed to have stamped their arquebuses with a series of small + sickles, thus: + + [Illustration] + +The Royal Armoury contains some finely decorated guns, made for the +kings of Spain at the close of the seventeenth century and early in the +eighteenth, by Juan Belen, Juan Fernandez, Francisco Baeza y Bis, and +Nicolás Bis. The last-named, pupil of Juan Belen, was a German; but all +these gunsmiths lived and worked at Madrid. Nicolás was arquebus-maker +to Charles the Second from 1691, and afterwards held the same post from +Philip the Fifth. He died in 1726, and the Count of Valencia de Don Juan +says that in 1808--that is, before it was plundered by the mob--the +Royal Armoury contained no fewer than fifty-three weapons of his +manufacture. One of the guns which bear his mark, and still exist, is +inscribed with the words, "I belong to the Queen our lady" (Isabel +Farnese, first wife of Philip the Fifth), combined with the arms of León +and Castile, and of the Bourbon family. This weapon was used, or +intended to be used, for hunting. + +Diego Esquivel, another gunsmith of Madrid, was also famous early in the +eighteenth century, as, later on, were Manuel Sutil, José Cano, +Francisco Lopez, Salvador Cenarro, Isidro Soler (author of a +_Compendious History of the Arquebus-makers of Madrid_), Juan de Soto, +and Sebastián Santos. + +Swinburne wrote from Cataluña in 1775; "the gun-barrels of Barcelona are +much esteemed, and cost from four to twenty guineas, but about five is +the real value; all above is paid for fancy and ornament; they are made +out of the old shoes of mules." + + [Illustration: LIX + _BRIDONA_ SADDLE + (_15th Century. Royal Armoury, Madrid_)] + +Until 1793, the smaller firearms of the Spanish army were made at +Plasencia in Guipúzcoa. In that year the government factory, where +hand-labour alone continued to be used till 1855, was removed to Oviedo. +To-day this factory employs about five hundred workmen. In 1809 Laborde +wrote that "firearms, such as fusees, musquets, carbines, and pistols +are manufactured at Helgoivar, Eybor, and Plasencia; at Oviedo, +Barcelona, Igualada, and at Ripoll; the arms made at the latter city +have long had a distinguished reputation. Seven hundred and sixty-five +gunsmiths, it is estimated, find employment in the factories of +Guipúzcoa." + +Both Townsend and the foregoing writer give a good account of Spanish +cannon at this time. According to Laborde, "two excellent founderies for +brass cannon are royal establishments at Barcelona and Seville; in the +latter city copper cannon are cast, following the method recommended by +M. Maritz. Iron ordnance are made at Lierganez and Cavada." Townsend +wrote of Barcelona, in 1786; "The foundery for brass cannon is +magnificent, and worthy of inspection. It is impossible anywhere to see +either finer metal, or work executed in a neater and more perfect +manner. Their method of boring was, in the present reign, introduced by +Maritz, a Swiss. Near two hundred twenty-four pounders are finished +every year, besides mortars and field-pieces." + + + SADDLERY AND COACHES + +Probably no relic of the former of these crafts in Spain is older or +more curious than the iron bit (Plate lvii., No. 8), inlaid with silver +dragons' heads and crosses, and attributed, from cruciform monograms +which also decorate it, to the Visigothic King Witiza (who died in 711), +or sometimes to the conqueror of Toledo, Alfonso the Sixth (eleventh +century). The spurs or _acicates_ (Plate lvii., No. 9) of Ferdinand the +Third of Castile, who conquered Seville from the Moors, are also +treasured in the Royal Armoury, and bear upon an iron ground remains of +gold and silver decoration representing castles. The Count of Valencia +de Don Juan believed these spurs to be authentic, because they are +identical with the ones which Ferdinand wears in his equestrian seal, +preserved among the National Archives of France, and dating from the +year 1237. + +Saddles of various kinds were used in Spain throughout the Middle Ages. +Among them were the ordinary travelling-saddle or _silla de barda_ +(Arabic _al-bardá_); saddles _de palafrén_,[143] the _silla de la +guisa_, or _de la brida_ or _bridona_, for riding with long stirrups, +and consequently the antithesis of the _gineta_ saddle;[144] or saddles +made for use exclusively in war, on which the rider was accustomed to +make the sign of the cross before or after mounting, such as the +_lidona_, _gallega_ ("_siellas gallegas_" are mentioned in the _Poem of +the Cid_), and _corsera_ or _cocera_ (Arabic _al-corsi_), or else the +_silla de conteras_, "whose hindmost bow," according to the Count of +Valencia de Don Juan, "terminated in converging pieces to protect the +wearer's thighs." + + [143] An old account copied into a book (see p. 89, _note_) in the + National Library at Madrid, and dating from the reign of Sancho + the Fourth, states that Pedro Ferrández, saddler, received a + certain sum for making various saddles, including two "_de + palafrés_, wrought in silk with the devices of the king." + + [144] "In mediæval Spain, good riders were often designated as 'Ginete + en ambas sillas,' that is, accustomed to either saddle, _i.e._ + the Moorish and the Christian, and I now understand why + chroniclers have taken the trouble to record the fact. Strangely + enough, the high-peaked and short-stirruped saddle does not cross + the Nile, the Arabs of Arabia riding rather flat saddles with an + ordinary length of leg. The Arab saddle of Morocco, in itself, is + perhaps the worst that man has yet designed; but, curiously + enough, from it was made the Mexican saddle, perhaps the most + useful for all kinds of horses and of countries that the world has + seen." Cunninghame Graham: _Mogreb-El-Acksa_, p. 66. The same + writer naïvely adds the following footnote to the words _Ginete en + ambas sillas_. "This phrase often occurs in Spanish chronicles, + after along description of a man's virtues, his charity, love of + the church, and kindness to the poor, and it is apparently + inserted as at least as important a statement as any of the + others. In point of fact, chronicles being written for posterity, + it is the most important." + +A saddle known as the _silla de rua_, or "street saddle," was generally +used in Spain throughout the sixteenth and the seventeenth centuries. It +was intended, not for war, but promenade and show, and therefore richly +decorated. The Royal Armoury has nineteen of these saddles, all of which +are Spanish-made. In the same collection is a plain _bridona_ saddle +(Plate lix.), with iron stirrups and two gilt-metal bells, such as were +commonly used in tournaments or other festivals. This saddle has been +erroneously ascribed to the thirteenth century. It dates from the +beginning of the fifteenth century, and proceeds from Majorca. + + [Illustration: LX + HANGING _JAECES_ FOR HORSES] + +The old belief that one of the saddles in this armoury, whose bows are +chased with a design in black and gilt of leaves and pilgrim's shells, +was once upon a time the Cid Campeador's, has been exploded recently. +The saddle in question is known to be Italian, dates from the sixteenth +century, and bears the arms of a town in the duchy of Montferrato. + +The inventory (1560) of the dukes of Alburquerque mentions some curious +saddles, including one "_de la brida_, of blue velvet, with the bows +painted gold, and on the front bow a cannon with its carriage, and on +the hind bow another cannon with flames of fire." Among the rest were "a +_gineta_ saddle of red leather, used by my lord the duke," together with +saddles of bay leather, of dark brown leather, of "smooth leather with +trappings of blue cloth," of Cordova leather, and "a date-coloured +_gineta_-saddle, complete." + +The same inventory specifies innumerable smaller articles of harness, +such as stirrups, spurs, reins, headstalls, and poitrals or +breast-leathers. Many of these pieces were richly ornamented; _e.g._, +"some silver headstalls of small size, enamelled in blue, with gilt +supports of iron,"[145] as well as "some silver headstalls, gilded and +enamelled green and rose, with shields upon the temples." Others of +these headstalls were made of copper, and nearly all were +colour-enamelled. + + [145] As I have stated in another chapter, the precious stones and + metals were continually employed in arms and harness, both of + Spanish Moors and Spanish Christians. In 1062 Pedro Ruderiz + bequeathed to the Monastery of Arlanza all his battle harness, + together with his silver bit (_frenum argenteum_). Thousands of + such bequests have been recorded. The Chronicle of Alfonso the + Eleventh says that after the victory of the Rio Salado, this + monarch found among his spoil "many swords with gold and silver + fittings, and many spurs, all of enamelled gold and silver.... + And all this spoil was gathered by the king into his palaces + of Seville (_i.e._ the Alcázar), the doubloons in one part, and + the swords in another part." The testament (sometimes considered + to be a forgery) of Pedro the Cruel mentions "my sword in the + Castilian manner, that I caused to be made here in Seville with + gems and with _aljofar_." In 1409 Yusuf, King of Granada, + presented Juan the Second and the Infante Don Enrique with + silver-fitted swords. Referring to a later age, Davillier + discovered at Simancas a detailed list of weapons sumptuously + decorated with gold and coloured enamels, made for Philip the + Second by Juan de Soto, "_orfebrero de su Alteza_." _Recherches_, + pp. 149-151. + +The stirrups included "two Moorish stirrups of gilded tin, for a woman's +use";[146] "some large Moorish stirrups, gilt, with two silver plates +upon their faces, enamelled gold, green, and blue, and eight nails on +either face"; "some other Moorish stirrups, wrought inside with +_ataujía_-work in gold, and outside with plates of copper enamelled in +green, blue, and white; the handles gilt, with coverings of red +leather"; and "some silver stirrups with three bars upon the floor +thereof, round-shaped in the manner of an urinal, with open sides +consisting of two bars, a flower within a small shield on top, and, over +this, the small face of a man." + + [146] The women of mediæval Spain had few amusements besides riding. + Another--though owing to the temperate climate it must have been + on few occasions--was skating, since this inventory mentions + "two pairs of skates, for a man, for travelling over ice. Two + pairs of skates, for the same purpose, for a woman." This entry + almost matches in its quaintness with the "irons for mustaches," + or the "triggers for extracting teeth," set forth in Spanish + documents such as the _Tassa General_ of 1627. + +The many sets of reins included several of Granada make, coloured in +white, red, and bay; while one of the most elaborate of the poitrals was +of "red leather, embroidered with gold thread, with fringes of +rose-coloured silk, buckles, ends, and rounded knobs; the whole of +copper enamelled green, and blue, and white." + +Small but attractive accessories to these handsome sets of mediæval +Spanish harness were the decorative medals (Plate lx.) hung from the +horse's breast in tourneying or in war. In France these medals were +known as _annelets volants_, _branlants_, or _pendants_; although in +Spain, where it is probable that they were used more widely than in +other countries, they have no definite name. The term _jaeces_ is +sometimes applied to them; but _jaez_ properly means the entire harness +for a horse, and the word is thus employed by classic Spanish authors, +such as Tirso de Molina. A recent term, invented by a living writer, is +_jaeces colgantes_, or "hanging _jaeces_." + +These ornaments, which had their origin among the Romans and Byzantines, +are figured in certain of the older Spanish codices such as the +_Cántigas de Santa Maria_. In Christian Spain, however, their vogue was +greatest in the thirteenth and the fourteenth centuries. They +disappeared altogether in the sixteenth century; and among the Spanish +Moors their use, though not unknown, was always quite exceptional. + +The mottoes and devices on these little plates are very varied. +Sometimes the motto has an amorous, sometimes a religious import. +Sometimes the vehicle of the motto is Latin, sometimes Spanish, +sometimes French. Sometimes the device contains, or is composed of, a +blazon, and commonly there is floral or other ornament. A collection of +nearly three hundred of these medals belonged to the late Count of +Valencia de Don Juan, all of which were probably made in Spain. The +material as a rule is copper, adorned with _champlevé_ enamelling, and +the colours often used to decorate and relieve the interspaces of the +gilded metal are red, blue, black, white, and green. + + [Illustration: LXI + TRAVELLING LITTER + (_Attributed to Charles the Fifth. Royal Armoury, Madrid_)] + +According to Florencio Janer, coaches were not known in Spain until the +middle of the sixteenth century. Before that time the usual conveyance +was the litter. The Madrid Armoury contains an object which is thought +to have been the campaigning-litter of Charles the Fifth (Plate lxi.). +The Count of Valencia de Don Juan also inclined to this belief from the +circumstance that an engraving exists in the British Museum which +represents a German litter of the sixteenth century, identical in all +respects with this one. Probably, however, these litters were the same +all over Europe. The inventory of the Dukes of Alburquerque includes, in +1560, a "cowhide litter, black, lined with black serge; also poles +stained black, and harness for mules." This, together with other +travelling gear, belonged to "my lady the duchess"; and it is worth +noting that the litter attributed to Charles, though cased with a +protective covering of whitish canvas, is also of black leather and +lined with black serge, besides being evidently built for carriage by +two mules. The interior contains a small armchair rising some inches +only from the floor, and which, requiring him to keep his legs +continually outstretched, could hardly fail to prove excruciatingly +uncomfortable to the traveller. + +Mendez Silva says that the precise date of the introduction of coaches +into Spain was 1546, and other writers do not greatly differ from him. +The Alburquerque inventory includes "two four-wheeled coaches," as well +as "a triumphal car with four wheels, its body painted with red and gold +stripes." Vanderhamen, who says that the first coach ever seen in Spain +was brought here by a servant of Charles the Fifth in 1554, adds that +within a little time their use became "a hellish vice that wrought +incalculable havoc to Castile." Certainly this vehicle for many years +was far from popular among the Spaniards, and was assailed with special +vehemence by all who lacked the income to support one. The Duke of +Berganza is said to have remarked that "God had fashioned horses for the +use of men, and men had fashioned coaches for the use of women"; while a +priest, Tomás Ramón, declared that it was "a vast disgrace to see +bearded men, with rapiers at their side, promenading in a coach." Even +the governing powers thought fit to interfere. In 1550, 1563, and 1573 +the Cortes demanded the total prohibition of these modish yet detested +vehicles, while the Cortes of 1578 decreed four horses as the statutory +and invariable number for a private carriage. A further law enacted in +1611 that coaches must be strictly private property, and not, on pain of +rigorous chastisement, be lent or hired by their owner;[147] while the +owner, to own or use a coach at all, required a special licence from the +Crown. + + [147] This prohibition was not inopportune. Swinburne wrote towards the + end of the eighteenth century; "Having occasion one day for a + coach to carry us about, the stable-boy of our inn offered his + services, and in a quarter of an hour brought to the door a coach + and four fine mules, with two postillions and a lacquey, all in + flaming liveries; we found they belonged to a countess, who, like + the rest of the nobility, allows her coachman to let out her + equipage when she has no occasion for it; it cost us about nine + shillings, which no doubt was the perquisite of the servants." + +Some curious facts relating to these vehicles in older Spain are +instanced by Janer. In the seventeenth century a Spanish provincial town +would normally contain a couple of hundred coaches. Among such boroughs +was Granada. Here, in 1615, the authorities, backed by nearly all the +citizens, protested that the coaches ploughed the highway into muddy +pits and channels, and gave occasion, after nightfall, to disgraceful +and immoral scenes.[148] After a while the protest grew so loud that the +use of coaches in this capital was totally suppressed. One of the first +persons to employ a coach in Granada had been the Marquis of Mondejar; +and yet, in spite of his extensive influence, this nobleman, each time +he wished to drive abroad, required to sue for licence from the town +authorities, and these, in making out the written permit, took care to +specify the streets through which he was allowed to pass. + + [148] Towns still exist in Spain where vehicles are not allowed to + proceed at more than a walking-pace through any of the streets. + One of such towns is Argamasilla de Alba (of _Don Quixote_ fame), + where I remember to have read a notice to this effect, painted, + by order of the mayor, on a house-wall of the principal + thoroughfare. + +Assailed by numerous pragmatics,[149] chiefly of a sumptuary tenor and +repeated at spasmodic intervals until as late as 1785, the private coach +became at last an undisputed adjunct to the national life of Spain. +Doubtless the use by royalty of gala-coaches or _carrozas_ went far to +sanction and extend their vogue. However, I will not describe these +lumbering, uncouth, and over-ornamented gala-carriages (some of which +were made in Spain) belonging to the Spanish Crown, but quote the +following pragmatic, dated 1723, as aptly illustrative of the progress +of this industry, and other industries akin to it, in the Peninsula:-- + +"In order to restrain the immoderate use of coaches, state-coaches, +_estufas_, litters, _furlones_,[150] and calashes, we order that from +this time forth no one of these be decorated with gold embroidery or any +kind of silk containing gold, nor yet with bands or fringes that have +gold or silver points; but only with velvets, damasks, and other simple +silken fabrics made within this realm and its dependencies, or else in +foreign countries that have friendly commerce with us. Also, the fringes +and galloons shall be of silk alone; and none, of whatsoever dignity and +degree, shall cause his coach, state-coach, etc., to be decorated with +the fringes that are known as net-work, tassel-pointed, or bell-pointed; +but only with undecorated, simple fringes, or with those of Santa +Isabel; nor shall the breadth of either kind of these exceed four +fingers. Also, he shall not cause his coach, state-coach, etc., to be +overlaid with any gilt or silvered work, or painted with any manner of +design--meaning by such, historic scenes, marines, landscapes, flowers, +masks, knots of the pattern known as coulicoles, coats of arms, war +devices, perspectives, or any other painting, except it imitate marble, +or be marbled over of one single colour chosen at the owner's fancy; and +further, we allow in every coach, state-coach, etc., only a certain +moderate quantity of carving. And this our order and pragmatic shall +begin to rule upon the day it is made public; from which day forth no +person shall construct, or buy, or bring from other countries, coaches +or _estufas_ that infringe our law herein expressed; wherefore we order +the _alcaldes_ of this town, our court and capital, to make a register +of all such vehicles that each house contains, without excepting any. +Nevertheless, considering that if we should prohibit very shortly those +conveyances that now be lawful, the owners would be put to great +expense, we grant a period of two years wherein they may consume or rid +themselves thereof; upon the expiration of which term our law shall be +again made public, and thenceforward all, regardless of their quality +and rank, shall be compelled to pay obedience to the same. Also we +order that no person make or go abroad in hand-chairs fitted with +brocade, or cloth of gold or silver, or yet with any silk containing +gold and silver; nor shall the lining be embroidered or adorned with any +of the stuffs aforesaid; but the covering of the chair, inside and out, +shall only be of velvet, damask, or other unmixed silk, with a plain +fringe of four fingers' breadth and button-holes of the same silk, and +not of silver, gold, or thread, or any covering other than those +aforesaid; but the columns of such chairs may be adorned with silken +trimmings nailed thereto. And we allow, as in the case of coaches, a +period of two years for wearing out the hand-chairs now in use.... Also, +we order that the coverings of coaches, _estufas_, litters, calashes, +and _furlones_ shall not be made of any kind of silk, or yet the harness +of horses or mules for coaches and travelling litters; and that the said +coaches, gala-coaches, _estufas_, litters, calashes, and _furlones_ +shall not be back-stitched (_pespuntados_), even if they should be of +cowhide or of cordwain (goatskin); nor shall they contain any fitting of +embroidered leather." + + [149] A royal degree of 1619 disposed that "every one who sows and tills + twenty-five _fanegas_ of land each year, may use a coach." + + [150] The _estufa_ (literally _stove_) was a form of family-coach. The + _furlon_ is described in an old dictionary as "a coach with four + seats and hung with leather curtains." + + + + + PRINTED BY + + NEILL AND COMPANY, LIMITED, + + EDINBURGH. + + + + + * * * * * * + + + + +Transcriber's note: + +The original spelling and minor inconsistencies in the spelling and +formatting have been maintained. + +Inconsistent hyphenation and accents are as in the original if not marked +as an misprint. + +The text decoration above IV DE LA FVETE has been omitted on page 222. + +The table below lists all corrections applied to the original text. + + p. xii: Old Keys; Seville Cathedral 126 -> 131 + p. 11: for securing the cloak; the _torquis_ -> _torques_ + p. 12: _Fibulae_ -> _Fibulæ_ + p. 17: Amador de los Rios -> Ríos + p. 28: Amador de los Rios -> Ríos + p. 28: de joyaux les plus precieux -> précieux + p. 65: is generally of the fifteeenth -> fifteenth + p. 70: He carried, too, a -> "a + p. 72: The goldsmiths' and the silversmiths -> silversmiths' + p. 82: Mores ont caché leurs tresors -> trésors + p. 90: a friar of Guadelupe -> Guadalupe + p. 91: Juan González -> Gonzalez + p. 93: As soon as Cristobal -> Cristóbal + p. 94: fué deste cuento, Jan -> Juan + p. 102: et cela luy feioit -> fetoit + p. 105: pearls or other stones. -> stones." + p. 123: in the _Museo Español de Antigüedades_ -> Antigüedades_) + p. 140: Museo Español de Antiguedades -> Antigüedades + p. 143: Museo Español de Antiguedades -> Antigüedades + p. 176: the emir of the Mussulmans Abi-Abdillah -> Abu-Abdillah + p. 180: D.C.C.C.C.XIII. -> D.C.C.C.C.XIII." + p. 181: and the Puertas del Perdon -> Perdón + p. 188: consisted of "a -> a !!! + p. 205: among the Germans _panzerbrecher_ -> _Panzerbrecher_ + p. 206: frock (the _waffenrock_ -> _Waffenrock_ + p. 220: which specifies "a bard -> band + p. 222: It has a _verga_ -> _verja_ + p. 229: as well as the chape -> shape + p. 232: button and a black tassel. -> tassel." + p. 244: published in the _Boletin -> _Boletín + p. 262: and the burnisher. -> burnisher. + p. 264: making good files or razors. -> making good files or razors." + p. 273: of Segovia). Cristobal -> Cristóbal + + + +***END OF THE PROJECT GUTENBERG EBOOK THE ARTS AND CRAFTS OF OLDER SPAIN, +VOLUME I (OF 3)*** + + +******* This file should be named 44391-8.txt or 44391-8.zip ******* + + +This and all associated files of various formats will be found in: +http://www.gutenberg.org/dirs/4/4/3/9/44391 + + + +Updated editions will replace the previous one--the old editions +will be renamed. + +Creating the works from public domain print editions means that no +one owns a United States copyright in these works, so the Foundation +(and you!) can copy and distribute it in the United States without +permission and without paying copyright royalties. Special rules, +set forth in the General Terms of Use part of this license, apply to +copying and distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works to +protect the PROJECT GUTENBERG-tm concept and trademark. Project +Gutenberg is a registered trademark, and may not be used if you +charge for the eBooks, unless you receive specific permission. If you +do not charge anything for copies of this eBook, complying with the +rules is very easy. You may use this eBook for nearly any purpose +such as creation of derivative works, reports, performances and +research. They may be modified and printed and given away--you may do +practically ANYTHING with public domain eBooks. Redistribution is +subject to the trademark license, especially commercial +redistribution. + + + +*** START: FULL LICENSE *** + +THE FULL PROJECT GUTENBERG LICENSE +PLEASE READ THIS BEFORE YOU DISTRIBUTE OR USE THIS WORK + +To protect the Project Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting the free +distribution of electronic works, by using or distributing this work +(or any other work associated in any way with the phrase "Project +Gutenberg"), you agree to comply with all the terms of the Full Project +Gutenberg-tm License available with this file or online at + www.gutenberg.org/license. + + +Section 1. General Terms of Use and Redistributing Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic works + +1.A. By reading or using any part of this Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work, you indicate that you have read, understand, agree to +and accept all the terms of this license and intellectual property +(trademark/copyright) agreement. If you do not agree to abide by all +the terms of this agreement, you must cease using and return or destroy +all copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in your possession. +If you paid a fee for obtaining a copy of or access to a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work and you do not agree to be bound by the +terms of this agreement, you may obtain a refund from the person or +entity to whom you paid the fee as set forth in paragraph 1.E.8. + +1.B. "Project Gutenberg" is a registered trademark. It may only be +used on or associated in any way with an electronic work by people who +agree to be bound by the terms of this agreement. There are a few +things that you can do with most Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works +even without complying with the full terms of this agreement. See +paragraph 1.C below. There are a lot of things you can do with Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works if you follow the terms of this agreement +and help preserve free future access to Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. See paragraph 1.E below. + +1.C. The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation ("the Foundation" +or PGLAF), owns a compilation copyright in the collection of Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic works. Nearly all the individual works in the +collection are in the public domain in the United States. If an +individual work is in the public domain in the United States and you are +located in the United States, we do not claim a right to prevent you from +copying, distributing, performing, displaying or creating derivative +works based on the work as long as all references to Project Gutenberg +are removed. Of course, we hope that you will support the Project +Gutenberg-tm mission of promoting free access to electronic works by +freely sharing Project Gutenberg-tm works in compliance with the terms of +this agreement for keeping the Project Gutenberg-tm name associated with +the work. You can easily comply with the terms of this agreement by +keeping this work in the same format with its attached full Project +Gutenberg-tm License when you share it without charge with others. + +1.D. The copyright laws of the place where you are located also govern +what you can do with this work. Copyright laws in most countries are in +a constant state of change. If you are outside the United States, check +the laws of your country in addition to the terms of this agreement +before downloading, copying, displaying, performing, distributing or +creating derivative works based on this work or any other Project +Gutenberg-tm work. The Foundation makes no representations concerning +the copyright status of any work in any country outside the United +States. + +1.E. Unless you have removed all references to Project Gutenberg: + +1.E.1. The following sentence, with active links to, or other immediate +access to, the full Project Gutenberg-tm License must appear prominently +whenever any copy of a Project Gutenberg-tm work (any work on which the +phrase "Project Gutenberg" appears, or with which the phrase "Project +Gutenberg" is associated) is accessed, displayed, performed, viewed, +copied or distributed: + +This eBook is for the use of anyone anywhere at no cost and with +almost no restrictions whatsoever. You may copy it, give it away or +re-use it under the terms of the Project Gutenberg License included +with this eBook or online at www.gutenberg.org + +1.E.2. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is derived +from the public domain (does not contain a notice indicating that it is +posted with permission of the copyright holder), the work can be copied +and distributed to anyone in the United States without paying any fees +or charges. If you are redistributing or providing access to a work +with the phrase "Project Gutenberg" associated with or appearing on the +work, you must comply either with the requirements of paragraphs 1.E.1 +through 1.E.7 or obtain permission for the use of the work and the +Project Gutenberg-tm trademark as set forth in paragraphs 1.E.8 or +1.E.9. + +1.E.3. If an individual Project Gutenberg-tm electronic work is posted +with the permission of the copyright holder, your use and distribution +must comply with both paragraphs 1.E.1 through 1.E.7 and any additional +terms imposed by the copyright holder. Additional terms will be linked +to the Project Gutenberg-tm License for all works posted with the +permission of the copyright holder found at the beginning of this work. + +1.E.4. Do not unlink or detach or remove the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License terms from this work, or any files containing a part of this +work or any other work associated with Project Gutenberg-tm. + +1.E.5. Do not copy, display, perform, distribute or redistribute this +electronic work, or any part of this electronic work, without +prominently displaying the sentence set forth in paragraph 1.E.1 with +active links or immediate access to the full terms of the Project +Gutenberg-tm License. + +1.E.6. You may convert to and distribute this work in any binary, +compressed, marked up, nonproprietary or proprietary form, including any +word processing or hypertext form. However, if you provide access to or +distribute copies of a Project Gutenberg-tm work in a format other than +"Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other format used in the official version +posted on the official Project Gutenberg-tm web site (www.gutenberg.org), +you must, at no additional cost, fee or expense to the user, provide a +copy, a means of exporting a copy, or a means of obtaining a copy upon +request, of the work in its original "Plain Vanilla ASCII" or other +form. Any alternate format must include the full Project Gutenberg-tm +License as specified in paragraph 1.E.1. + +1.E.7. Do not charge a fee for access to, viewing, displaying, +performing, copying or distributing any Project Gutenberg-tm works +unless you comply with paragraph 1.E.8 or 1.E.9. + +1.E.8. You may charge a reasonable fee for copies of or providing +access to or distributing Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works provided +that + +- You pay a royalty fee of 20% of the gross profits you derive from + the use of Project Gutenberg-tm works calculated using the method + you already use to calculate your applicable taxes. The fee is + owed to the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark, but he + has agreed to donate royalties under this paragraph to the + Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation. Royalty payments + must be paid within 60 days following each date on which you + prepare (or are legally required to prepare) your periodic tax + returns. Royalty payments should be clearly marked as such and + sent to the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation at the + address specified in Section 4, "Information about donations to + the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation." + +- You provide a full refund of any money paid by a user who notifies + you in writing (or by e-mail) within 30 days of receipt that s/he + does not agree to the terms of the full Project Gutenberg-tm + License. You must require such a user to return or + destroy all copies of the works possessed in a physical medium + and discontinue all use of and all access to other copies of + Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +- You provide, in accordance with paragraph 1.F.3, a full refund of any + money paid for a work or a replacement copy, if a defect in the + electronic work is discovered and reported to you within 90 days + of receipt of the work. + +- You comply with all other terms of this agreement for free + distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm works. + +1.E.9. If you wish to charge a fee or distribute a Project Gutenberg-tm +electronic work or group of works on different terms than are set +forth in this agreement, you must obtain permission in writing from +both the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation and Michael +Hart, the owner of the Project Gutenberg-tm trademark. Contact the +Foundation as set forth in Section 3 below. + +1.F. + +1.F.1. Project Gutenberg volunteers and employees expend considerable +effort to identify, do copyright research on, transcribe and proofread +public domain works in creating the Project Gutenberg-tm +collection. Despite these efforts, Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works, and the medium on which they may be stored, may contain +"Defects," such as, but not limited to, incomplete, inaccurate or +corrupt data, transcription errors, a copyright or other intellectual +property infringement, a defective or damaged disk or other medium, a +computer virus, or computer codes that damage or cannot be read by +your equipment. + +1.F.2. LIMITED WARRANTY, DISCLAIMER OF DAMAGES - Except for the "Right +of Replacement or Refund" described in paragraph 1.F.3, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation, the owner of the Project +Gutenberg-tm trademark, and any other party distributing a Project +Gutenberg-tm electronic work under this agreement, disclaim all +liability to you for damages, costs and expenses, including legal +fees. YOU AGREE THAT YOU HAVE NO REMEDIES FOR NEGLIGENCE, STRICT +LIABILITY, BREACH OF WARRANTY OR BREACH OF CONTRACT EXCEPT THOSE +PROVIDED IN PARAGRAPH 1.F.3. YOU AGREE THAT THE FOUNDATION, THE +TRADEMARK OWNER, AND ANY DISTRIBUTOR UNDER THIS AGREEMENT WILL NOT BE +LIABLE TO YOU FOR ACTUAL, DIRECT, INDIRECT, CONSEQUENTIAL, PUNITIVE OR +INCIDENTAL DAMAGES EVEN IF YOU GIVE NOTICE OF THE POSSIBILITY OF SUCH +DAMAGE. + +1.F.3. LIMITED RIGHT OF REPLACEMENT OR REFUND - If you discover a +defect in this electronic work within 90 days of receiving it, you can +receive a refund of the money (if any) you paid for it by sending a +written explanation to the person you received the work from. If you +received the work on a physical medium, you must return the medium with +your written explanation. The person or entity that provided you with +the defective work may elect to provide a replacement copy in lieu of a +refund. If you received the work electronically, the person or entity +providing it to you may choose to give you a second opportunity to +receive the work electronically in lieu of a refund. If the second copy +is also defective, you may demand a refund in writing without further +opportunities to fix the problem. + +1.F.4. Except for the limited right of replacement or refund set forth +in paragraph 1.F.3, this work is provided to you 'AS-IS', WITH NO OTHER +WARRANTIES OF ANY KIND, EXPRESS OR IMPLIED, INCLUDING BUT NOT LIMITED TO +WARRANTIES OF MERCHANTABILITY OR FITNESS FOR ANY PURPOSE. + +1.F.5. Some states do not allow disclaimers of certain implied +warranties or the exclusion or limitation of certain types of damages. +If any disclaimer or limitation set forth in this agreement violates the +law of the state applicable to this agreement, the agreement shall be +interpreted to make the maximum disclaimer or limitation permitted by +the applicable state law. The invalidity or unenforceability of any +provision of this agreement shall not void the remaining provisions. + +1.F.6. INDEMNITY - You agree to indemnify and hold the Foundation, the +trademark owner, any agent or employee of the Foundation, anyone +providing copies of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works in accordance +with this agreement, and any volunteers associated with the production, +promotion and distribution of Project Gutenberg-tm electronic works, +harmless from all liability, costs and expenses, including legal fees, +that arise directly or indirectly from any of the following which you do +or cause to occur: (a) distribution of this or any Project Gutenberg-tm +work, (b) alteration, modification, or additions or deletions to any +Project Gutenberg-tm work, and (c) any Defect you cause. + + +Section 2. Information about the Mission of Project Gutenberg-tm + +Project Gutenberg-tm is synonymous with the free distribution of +electronic works in formats readable by the widest variety of computers +including obsolete, old, middle-aged and new computers. It exists +because of the efforts of hundreds of volunteers and donations from +people in all walks of life. + +Volunteers and financial support to provide volunteers with the +assistance they need are critical to reaching Project Gutenberg-tm's +goals and ensuring that the Project Gutenberg-tm collection will +remain freely available for generations to come. In 2001, the Project +Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation was created to provide a secure +and permanent future for Project Gutenberg-tm and future generations. +To learn more about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation +and how your efforts and donations can help, see Sections 3 and 4 +and the Foundation information page at www.gutenberg.org + + +Section 3. Information about the Project Gutenberg Literary Archive +Foundation + +The Project Gutenberg Literary Archive Foundation is a non profit +501(c)(3) educational corporation organized under the laws of the +state of Mississippi and granted tax exempt status by the Internal +Revenue Service. The Foundation's EIN or federal tax identification +number is 64-6221541. Contributions to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation are tax deductible to the full extent +permitted by U.S. federal laws and your state's laws. + +The Foundation's principal office is located at 4557 Melan Dr. S. +Fairbanks, AK, 99712., but its volunteers and employees are scattered +throughout numerous locations. Its business office is located at 809 +North 1500 West, Salt Lake City, UT 84116, (801) 596-1887. Email +contact links and up to date contact information can be found at the +Foundation's web site and official page at www.gutenberg.org/contact + +For additional contact information: + Dr. Gregory B. Newby + Chief Executive and Director + gbnewby@pglaf.org + +Section 4. Information about Donations to the Project Gutenberg +Literary Archive Foundation + +Project Gutenberg-tm depends upon and cannot survive without wide +spread public support and donations to carry out its mission of +increasing the number of public domain and licensed works that can be +freely distributed in machine readable form accessible by the widest +array of equipment including outdated equipment. Many small donations +($1 to $5,000) are particularly important to maintaining tax exempt +status with the IRS. + +The Foundation is committed to complying with the laws regulating +charities and charitable donations in all 50 states of the United +States. Compliance requirements are not uniform and it takes a +considerable effort, much paperwork and many fees to meet and keep up +with these requirements. We do not solicit donations in locations +where we have not received written confirmation of compliance. To +SEND DONATIONS or determine the status of compliance for any +particular state visit www.gutenberg.org/donate + +While we cannot and do not solicit contributions from states where we +have not met the solicitation requirements, we know of no prohibition +against accepting unsolicited donations from donors in such states who +approach us with offers to donate. + +International donations are gratefully accepted, but we cannot make +any statements concerning tax treatment of donations received from +outside the United States. U.S. laws alone swamp our small staff. + +Please check the Project Gutenberg Web pages for current donation +methods and addresses. Donations are accepted in a number of other +ways including checks, online payments and credit card donations. +To donate, please visit: www.gutenberg.org/donate + + +Section 5. General Information About Project Gutenberg-tm electronic +works. + +Professor Michael S. Hart was the originator of the Project Gutenberg-tm +concept of a library of electronic works that could be freely shared +with anyone. For forty years, he produced and distributed Project +Gutenberg-tm eBooks with only a loose network of volunteer support. + +Project Gutenberg-tm eBooks are often created from several printed +editions, all of which are confirmed as Public Domain in the U.S. +unless a copyright notice is included. Thus, we do not necessarily +keep eBooks in compliance with any particular paper edition. + +Most people start at our Web site which has the main PG search facility: + + www.gutenberg.org + +This Web site includes information about Project Gutenberg-tm, +including how to make donations to the Project Gutenberg Literary +Archive Foundation, how to help produce our new eBooks, and how to +subscribe to our email newsletter to hear about new eBooks. |