Some Account of Gothic Architecture in SpainStreet, George Edmund
History
Some Account of Gothic Architecture in Spain
Street, George Edmund
Architecture, Gothic -- Spain; Church architecture -- Spain
Of the other churches in the city Sta. Isabel has a polygonal apse, with
each side arcaded with a Moorish trefoil arch. San Eugenio has a similar
apse, with a second stage, with multifoil arcading all along it; and San
Bartolomé has three of these cusped and arcaded stages in its apse. Sta.
Ursula has a stone apse, circular in plan, coursed with brick, and
pierced with three Moorish windows. La Concepcion has a polygonal apse
of rude stonework below, and is coursed with bricks from mid-height
upwards, with three Moresque windows set within square recessed panels;
whilst Sta. Fé presents the unusual feature of buttresses to the apse,
and has an interlacing arcade below the eaves, and long lancet windows
set within Moresque cusped panels. Sta. Leocadia (commonly called Cristo
de la Vega), just outside the city, and in the valley below its walls,
also retains the apse of its church, erected on a site which is said to
have been first built upon as early as the fourth century. This is
entirely covered with arcading from the ground to the eaves, arranged in
three equal orders, the lower cusped, the next having the common Moorish
trefoil, and the upper being round-arched. Some of the panels of these
arcades are pierced for light. The existing building is probably in no
part earlier than the twelfth century; it consists of a small modern
nave, a sanctuary of two bays with round transverse arches, and cusped
Moresque arches in the side walls. The apse at the east end is roofed
with a semi-dome. At the west end is a small modern cemetery, full of
gravestones, inscribed at least as fully, fondly, and foolishly, as
those we indulge in in our own cemeteries.
In addition to these more important works there are, in the cathedral, a
door leading into the chapter-room, and a recessed arch in one of the
chapels on the south side of the nave, executed by Moorish artists
probably in the fifteenth or sixteenth century. It has been absurdly
enough suggested that these are parts of the ancient mosque which stood
on the same site; but there is no ground whatever for the idea, the work
being evidently of much later date, and it being at the time a common
fashion to introduce some work of this kind into buildings which
otherwise are purely Gothic.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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