An Architect's Note-Book in Spain Part 8

PLATE x.x.xV.

_TOLEDO_.

VIEW OF THE REMAINS OF A MOORISH FORTRESS ON THE RIVER.

THE situation of Toledo is most romantic, and presents as many charms from its beauty to the architect, as the site for a commanding city, as no doubt it offered from, its great natural strength, to the "man of war" who must needs have regarded it as an almost heaven-born fortress.

It owes much, both of its beauty and its strength, to the clear and abundant current of the Tagus, which more than half surrounds it. This river has, as we shall have occasion to observe, been n.o.bly spanned by Roman, Moor, and Christian; and on its banks are yet traceable, in architectural fragments, the handiwork of each of those races.

Our sketch represents a pa.s.sage of this river which has once been commanded by the Moorish fortress, above the "tapia" or concrete remains of which, some shade-loving Spaniard of to-day has planted his vines and gourds, and reared his modest, but neither unpicturesque nor altogether uncomfortable, tenement. A fortification of this kind was much affected by the Moors for salient points, on account of the command it gave them of the various directions from which attack might be apprehended, and was called by them "Almodovar."

Charles Didier has admirably described the charms of such a position, as that occupied by the world-renowned capital of New Castille, in the following pa.s.sage of his "Annee en Espagne," "Tolede doit a sa situation," says he,[21] "une inepuisable richesse de sites et de vues.

La montagne escarpee dont elle couvre les flancs est separee par le Tage d'une autre montagne non moins escarpee, mais nue, deserte, abandonnee a la sterilite et tombant a pic dans le fleuve. A micote est le chateau ruine de Saint Cervantes. Un pet.i.t ermitage, _la Virgen del Valle_, est egare au sommet; mais, bati au milieu des rochers, il s'en detache a peine et se confond avec eux: des troupeaux de chevres sauvages errent a l'entour, et, presque aussi sauvage qu'elles, le patre, vetu de peaux, apporte au seuil de la ville les moeurs de la sierra. Ces contrastes sont frappants, mais ce sont les vues surtout qui captivent; quoique borne, le spectacle est varie; les ma.s.ses granitiques dont la montagne est formee s'adoucissent au-dessus du pont Saint Martin, et des villas, appelees dans le pays _cigarrales_, etendent sur la pierre nue et grisatre de frais tapis de verdure; c'est le seul point champetre du paysage, tout le reste est sec et depouille. La montagne n'a pas un arbre. La variete nait des mouvements du sol et des anfractuosites du rocher; les perspectives sont courtes, mais frappantes; tantot l'oeil plonge sur le Tage, qui serpente en meandres verdatres entre les deux collines; tantot la ville apparait herissee de ses innombrables clochers, puis le rideau retombe, et enferronne dans une gorge deserte et muette, on pourrait se croire tout d'un coup transporte dans quelque solitude primitive. Ces brusques alternatives ont un grand charme; elles impriment a ce paysage austere et melancolique un profond cachet d'originalite."

[Ill.u.s.tration: PLATE 36

TOLEDO

BRIDGE OF ALCANTARA

MDW 1869]

PLATE x.x.xVI.

_TOLEDO_.

BRIDGE OF ALCANTARA.

The brief words in which Ford gives the chronology of this "Bridge of Bridges," carries one to the long series of Lords and Masters who have made of Toledo a perfect mine of Archaeological interest. "The Roman one," he says, "was repaired in 687 by the Goth Sala; destroyed by an inundation, it was rebuilt in 871, by the Alcaide Halaf, repaired in 1258 by Alonzo el Sabio,[22] restored by Archbishop Tenorio about 1380, and fortified in 1484 by Andres Manrique." To crown the whole and make it safe for ever, Philip II. placed it, by solemn dedication, under the especial protection of San Ildefonso, who certainly appears to have done his duty hitherto, as I saw few signs of repair or want of it from the middle of the sixteenth century till now. I need scarcely say, that it crosses the River Tagus in one n.o.ble and most lofty span, and connects the walled city with its dependencies "across the water." Nothing can be more picturesque than this bridge, or indeed than the whole aspect of the position of the city placed upon seven hills, forming one lofty and rocky eminence, around which, on more than two sides, tears the Tagus.

Conspicuous in my sketch is the lofty Tower controlling access from the Bridge to the City on the side of the commanding "Alcazar," as literally the "royal residence," as Alcantara is in Arabic "the Bridge." Cean Bermudez[23] tells us, that one Mateo Paradiso was the architect, who in 1217 constructed a tower (probably, in at least the greatest part, the same which now remains) upon this famous bridge. In support of his opinion, he cites Estevan de Garibay, who in the ninth volume of his "unedited Works" fol. 512 t.i.t. 6, speaking of the Memorabilia of Toledo, says with reference to this Bridge, "that the river suddenly rising destroyed one of its pillars in the month of February, 1211, placing the bridge in peril of falling. As soon as it had been repaired, Henrique I. caused a tower to be built upon it for the greater security of it and of the city, as appears by an original inscription which once existed upon the tower in these words.

"Henry, son of the King Alfonso, caused this tower to be built in honour of G.o.d, by the hand of Matheo Paradiso in the year 1255."

Another tower of the time of Charles V. guards the access to the Bridge from the side farthest from the city, that from which my sketch has been taken.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PLATE 37

TOLEDO

PUENTE DE SAN MARTIN

MDW 1869]

PLATE x.x.xVII.

_TOLEDO_.

BRIDGE OF SAN MARTIN.

AMIROLA[24] has given us an excellent account of the origin of this n.o.ble mediaeval bridge, upon which the following short statement is mainly based. Near to the site on which the bridge of St. Martin now stands at Toledo, there was formerly a fine Roman bridge. This having been entirely destroyed for useful purposes, by a tremendous flood which rose, according to the most ancient annals of Toledo, in the year 1212, the city determined upon building another bridge upon a better site.

Having erected abutments of vast strength, which were ultimately crowned and weighted with two towers for defence, and having bedded two solid piers in the line of the stream, their master of the works, Rodrigo Alfonso, proceeded to span it with one of three lofty arches, two of which are shown in my sketch. This magnificent arch of one hundred and forty Spanish feet in width, and ninety-five in height was destroyed in the terrible struggle between the King Don Pedro, and his brother Don Henrique, in the year 1368. It was shortly after rebuilt, and the bridge generally repaired by the great Don Tenorio, Archbishop of Toledo. Villa Franca, Alcala de Henares, and the neighbourhood of Alamin, all boasted of bridges put up by the same Rodrigo Alfonso, who designed the bridge of San Martin at Toledo.

Beyond the bridge, in my sketch, appears on the crest of the hill the ma.s.s of the beautiful, though somewhat over florid church, San Juan de los Reyes. Having been erected by Ferdinand and Isabella, in a period as late as 1476, it fails to enlist the sympathies and approbation of some; others have praised it enthusiastically, and certain it is, that if it may have possessed faults when complete, scarcely anything can be more picturesque as a ruin.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PLATE 38

TOLEDO

MOORISH GATEWAY BY THE BRIDGE OF ALCANTARA.

MDW 1869]

PLATE x.x.xVIII.

_TOLEDO_.

MOORISH GATEWAY BY THE BRIDGE OF ALCANTARA.

Near to the bridge of Alcantara (sketch No. 36) on the road leading up from it to the city, stands the celebrated Moorish gateway of the "Puerta del Sol." This strong, large, and well fortified approach to the city, I found to labour under two marked disadvantages for my sketch-book, viz., it had been too often ill.u.s.trated, and its curious details had been so vigorously "restored" (when Spaniards do "restore"

there is no mistake about it), as to have lost in a great degree its original and authentic characteristics. I looked about, therefore, in the immediate vicinity of the bridge, for other vestiges of the antiquity of the city. These I soon came upon in the old gateway of which I give a sketch, and to the construction of which, both Roman and Moor have contributed. As the poor heavily laden mules laboured up the dusty stony road, with the patience of, in Spain, a much-abused race, it was impossible not to speculate upon the generations upon generations which had followed in the same track up the same road, on the same duty, through every vicissitude of occupation of the Gateway, through which they swayed monotonously from side to side.

[Ill.u.s.tration: PLATE 39

TOLEDO

ARCO DEL ZOCODOVER

MDW 1869]

PLATE x.x.xIX.