Spanish Arms and Armour: Being a Historical and Descriptive Account of the Royal Armoury of MadridCalvert, Albert Frederick
History
Spanish Arms and Armour: Being a Historical and Descriptive Account of the Royal Armoury of Madrid
Calvert, Albert Frederick
Arms and armor -- Spain; Real Armería de Madrid
“But the treasure, taken in 1858 from Guarrazar to Guadamar was not
exhausted. About May, 1861, a villager of Guadamar, Domingo de la Cruz,
who had found in the same Guarrazar cemetery, but in a different hole to
the one already explored, other crowns and objects used for worship,
presented himself at Aranjuez, where Queen Isabel was at the time. This
man, after many ambiguous and roundabout proposals, having ascertained
that no harm would come to him from the revelation he was about to make,
and, above all, stimulated by the promises which, relying on the
generosity of the Queen, the Intendant Don Antonio Flores cleverly let
fall in the conversation, said he was the possessor of these treasures.
The crafty rustic had them with him, but at the moment he did not say
so, and only showed them when Flores, having obtained the consent of her
Majesty, formally offered him, in the Queen’s name, a life-pension
[4,000 reals a year], which from that day was religiously paid to him.”
The Armoury and the Cluny Museum probably contain only a half of the
treasure of Guarrazar. As we have seen, much of it was broken up and
melted down by the goldsmiths of Toledo. It is said that it comprised a
beautiful golden dove, which came into the possession of a jeweller, who
had so many qualms of conscience concerning it, that he at last took the
drastic course of throwing it into the Tagus. That rapid stream must
have received a good deal of Visigothic treasure since it first flowed
under the arches of Toledo.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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