The word _plateresco_, or plateresque (from plata silver), is derived from the idea of silver filigree. The stone lacework of the Burgos cathedral, to take a well-known example, is _plateresque_. The word _churrigueresque_ is derived from the name of José Churriguera, though Churriguera was not the first to introduce it, Pedro Ribera and Narciso Tomé having been before him. Between the middle of the seventeenth century and the middle of the eighteenth, the Churrigueresque style of decoration was looked upon as the most perfect in creation. “Along with all the contradiction, all the praise and the censure with which this style of architectural decoration has been heaped,” says Lamperez, “we must consider what are the eternal and unchanging laws of architecture; we must remember that this art is not one of initiation, but of interpretation. Its form must be judged in relation to the end it has in view; it has both active and passive elements. It may seem hard, but we are compelled to pronounce the verdict that the so-called _churrigueresco_ style does not meet these requirements of true architecture. It may do honour to the man who executed it, but it does not bring honour to the architect who designed it.” The period during which the Churrigueresque style predominated was that which began with the year 1669 and closed about the middle of the eighteenth century. José Churriguera was born and educated at Salamanca. He made his name by work on the tomb of Queen Maria of Savoy, who died in 1489. Pedro Ribera exaggerated the defects of his master in the fountain of Anton Martin; so also did Narciso Tomé, who let the light through the roof of Toledo Cathedral by inserting an architectural filigree of Churrigueresque work. “The idea,” remarks Lamperez, “was bold in the extreme, and the conception grandiose; but--it produces optical illusions, a panoramic, not an architectural effect.” No art should ever be permitted to overstep its limits, and the architecture of Spain commits this crime in its most excellent examples of the Churrigueresque style. The examples of this style in Spain are very numerous, but of them all the most beautiful and sumptuous, the most truly magnificent and monumental, example in the whole of the Peninsula may be seen in the façade of the Cathedral of Santiago in Galicia, which was the work of Casas y Novea in 1737. CHAPTER VIII THE CATHEDRAL OF SANTIAGO