Portuguese Architecture Part 25

The first part to be begun was the Claustro da Micha, or loaf, so called from the bread distributed there to the poor. Outside it was begun in 1528, but inside an inscription over the door says it was begun in 1534 and finished in 1546. Being the kitchen cloister it is very plain, with simple round-headed arches. Only the entrance door is adorned with a Corinthian column on either side; its straight head rests on well-carved corbels, and above it is a large inscribed tablet upheld by small boys.

Under the pavement of the cloister as well as under the Claustro dos Corvos is a great cistern. On the south was the kitchen and the oil cellar, on the east the dispensary, and on the west a great oven and wood-store with three large halls above, which seem to have been used by the Inquisition.[151] The lodgings of the Dom Prior were above the cloister to the north.

Like the Claustro da Micha, the Claustro dos Corvos has plain round arches resting on round columns and set usually in pairs with a b.u.t.tress between each pair. On the south side, below, were the cellars, finished in 1539, and above the library, on the west, various vaulted stores with a pa.s.sage above leading to the library from the dormitory.

The whole of the east side is occupied by the refectory, about 100 feet long by 30 wide. On each of the long sides there is a pulpit, one bearing the date 1536, enriched with arabesques, angels, and small columns. At the south end are two windows, and at the north a hatch communicating with the kitchen.

The Claustro da Hospedaria, as its name denotes, was where strangers were lodged; like the Claustro dos Corvos each pair of arches is divided by a b.u.t.tress, and the round columns have simple but effective capitals, in which nothing of the regular Corinthian is left but the abacus, and a large plain leaf at each corner. Still, though plain, this cloister is very picturesque. Its floor, like those of all the cloisters, lies deep below the level of the church, and looking eastward from one of the cell windows the Coro and the round church are seen towering high above the brown tile roofs of the rooms beyond the cloister and of the simple upper cloister, which runs across the eastern walk. (Fig. 85.)

This part of the building, begun about 1539, must have been carried on during Joo de Castilho's absence, as in 1541 he was sent to Mazago on the Moroccan coast to build fortifications; there he made a bastion 'so strong as to be able not only to resist the Shariff, but also the Turk, so strong was it.'[152]

The small cloister of Santa Barbara is the most pleasing of all those which Joo de Castilho was able to finish. In order not to hide the west front of the church its arches had to be kept very low. They are three-centred and almost flat, while the vault is even flatter, the bays being divided by a stone beam resting on beautifully carved brackets.

The upper cloister is not carried across the east side next the church; but in its south-west corner an opening with a good entablature, resting on two columns with fine Corinthian capitals, leads to one of those twisting stairs without a newel of which builders of this time were so fond. Going up this stair one reaches the cloister of the Filippes which Joo did not live to carry out.

More interesting than any of these cloisters are the long dormitory pa.s.sages. The walls for about one-third of the height are lined with tiles, which with the red paving tiles were bought for about 33 from one Aleixo Antunes. The roofs are throughout of dark panelled wood and semicircular in shape. The only windows--except at the crossing--are at the ends of the three long arms. There is a small round-headed window above, and below one, flat-headed, with a column in the centre and one at each side, the window on the north end having on it the date 1541, eight years after the chapel in the centre had been built.

On this chapel at the crossing has been expended far more ornament than on any other part of the pa.s.sages. Leading to each arm of the pa.s.sage an arch, curiously enriched with narrow bands which twice cross each other leaving diamond-shaped hollows, rests on Corinthian pilasters, which have only four flutes, but are adorned with niches, whose elegant canopies mark the level of the springing of the chapel vault. This vault, considerably lower than the pa.s.sage arches, is semicircular and coffered. Between it and the cornice which runs all round the square above the pa.s.sage arches is a large oblong panel, in the middle of which is a small round window. Beautifully carved figures which, instead of having legs, end in great acanthus-leaf volutes with dragons in the centre, hold a beautifully carved wreath round this window. In the middle of the architrave below, a tablet, held by exquisite little winged boys, gives the date, 'Era de 1533.' Above the cornice there rises a simple vault with a narrow round-headed window on each side.

This carving over the chapel is one of the finest examples of renaissance work left in the country. It is much bolder than any of the French work left at Coimbra, being in much higher relief than was usual in the early French renaissance, and yet the figures and leaves are carved with the utmost delicacy and refinement. (Fig. 86.)

The same delicacy characterises such small parts of the cloister dos Filippes as were built by Joo de Castilho before he retired in 1551.

These are now confined to two stairs leading from the upper to the lower cloister. These stairs

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 85.

THOMAR.

CONVENT OF CHRIST.

CLAUSTRO DA HOSPEDARIA.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 86.

THOMAR.

CHAPEL IN DORMITORY Pa.s.sAGE.]

are adorned with pilasters or thin columns against the walls, delicate cornices, medallions, figures, and foliage; in one are square-headed built-up doors or doorlike s.p.a.ces, with well-moulded architraves, and always in the centre above the opening small figures are carved, in one an exquisite little Cupid holding a torch. At the bottom of the eastern stair, which is decorated with scenes from the life of St. Jerome and with the head of Frei Antonio of Lisbon, first prior of the reformed order, a door led into the lower floor of the unfinished chapter-house.

On this same stair there is a date 1545, so the work was probably going on till the very end of Joo's tenure of office, and fine as the present cloister is, it is a pity that he was not able himself to finish it, for it is the chief cloister in the whole building, and on it he would no doubt have employed all the resources of his art. (Fig. 87.)

It is not without interest to learn that, like architects of the present day, Joo de Castilho often found very great difficulties in carrying out his work. Till well within the last hundred years Portugal was an almost roadless country, and four centuries ago, as now, most of the heavy carting was done by oxen, which are able to drag clumsy carts heavily laden up and down the most impa.s.sable lanes. Several times does he write to the king of the difficulty of getting oxen. On 4th March 1548 he says:

'I have written some days ago to Pero Carvalho to tell him of the want of carts, since those which we had were away carrying stone for the works at Cardiga and at Almeirim'--a palace now destroyed opposite Santarem--'the works of Thomar remaining without stone these three months. And for want of a hundred cart-loads of stone which I had worked at the quarry--doors and windows--I have not finished the students'

studies'--probably in the noviciate near the Claustro da Micha. 'The studies are raised to more than half their height and in eight days'

work I shall finish them if only I had oxen, for those I had have died.

'I would ask 20$000 [about 4, 10s.] to buy five oxen, and with three which I have I could manage the carriage of a thousand cart-loads of worked stone, besides that of which I speak of to your Highness, and since there are no carts the men can bring nothing, even were they given 60 reis [about 3d.] a cartload there is no one to do carting....

' ... And if your Highness will give me these oxen I shall finish the work very quickly, that when your Highness comes here you may find something to see and have contentment of it.'

Later he again complains of transport difficulties, for the few carts there were in the town were all being used by the Dom Prior; and in the year when he retired, 1551, he writes in despair asking the king for 'a very strong edict [Alvara] that no one of any condition whatever might be excused, because in this place those who have something of their own are excused by favour, and the poor men do service, which to them seems a great aggravation and oppression. May your Highness believe that I write this as a desperate man, since I cannot serve as I desire, and may this provision be sent to the magistrate and judge that they may have it executed by their officer, since the mayor [Alcaide] here is always away and never in his place.'[153]

These letters make it possible to understand how buildings in those days took such a long time to finish, and how Joo de Castilho--though it was at least begun in 1545--was able to do so little to the Claustro dos Filippes in the following six years.

The last letter also seems to show that some at least of the labour was forced.

Leaving the Claustro dos Filippes for the present, we must return to Batalha for a little, and then mention some buildings in which the early renaissance details recall some of the work at Thomar.

[Sidenote: Batalha.]

The younger Fernandes had died in 1528, leaving the Capellas Imperfeitas very much in the state in which they still remain. Though so much more interested in his monastery at Thomar, Dom Joo ordered Joo de Castilho to go on with the chapels, and in 1533 the loggia over the great entrance door had been finished. Beautiful though it is it did not please the king, and is not in harmony with the older work, and so nothing more was done.

In place of the large Manoelino window, which was begun on all the other seven sides, Joo de Castilho here built two renaissance arches, each of two orders, of which the broader springs from the square pilasters and the narrower from candelabrum shafts. In front there run up to the cornice three beautiful shafts standing on high pedestals which rest

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 87.

THOMAR.

CONVENTO DE CHRISTO.

STAIR IN CLAUSTRO DOS FILIPPES.]

[Ill.u.s.tration: FIG. 88.

THOMAR.

CHAPEL OF THE CONCEIcO.]

on corbels; the frieze of the cornice is carved much after the manner of the window panel in the dormitory corridor at Thomar, and with long masks where it projects over the shafts.

Below, the carved cornice and architrave are carried across the opening as they are round the whole octagon, but the frieze is open and filled with bal.u.s.ters. Behind, the whole s.p.a.ce is spanned by a three-centred arch, panelled like the pa.s.sage arches at Thomar.

All the work is most exquisite, but it is not easy to see how the horizontal cornice was to be brought into harmony with the higher windows intended on the other seven sides, nor does the renaissance detail, beautiful though it is, agree very well with the exuberant Manoelino of the rest.

With the beginning of the Claustro dos Filippes the work of Joo de Castilho comes to an end. He had been actively employed for about forty years, beginning and ending at Thomar, finis.h.i.+ng Belem, and adding to Alcobaca, besides improving the now vanished royal palace and even fortifying Mazago on the Moroccan coast, where perhaps his work may still survive. In these forty years his style went through more than one complete change. Beginning with late Gothic he was soon influenced by the surrounding Manoelino; at Belem he first met renaissance artists, at Alcobaca he either used Manoelino and renaissance side by side or else treated renaissance in a way of his own, though shortly after, at Belem again, he came to use renaissance details more and more fully. A little later at Thomar, having a free hand--for at Belem he had had to follow out the lines laid down by Boutaca--he discarded Manoelino and Gothic alike in favour of renaissance.

In this final adoption of the renaissance he was soon followed by many others, even before he laid down his charge at Thomar in 1551.

In most of these buildings, however, it is not so much his work at Thomar which is followed--except in the case of cloisters--but rather the chapel of the Conceico, also at Thomar. Like it they are free from the more exuberant details so common in France and in Spain, and yet they cannot be called Italian.

[Sidenote: Thomar, Conceico.]

There is unfortunately no proof that the Conceico chapel is Joo's work; indeed the date inscribed inside is 1572, twenty-one years after his retirement, and nineteen after his death. Still this date is probably a mistake, and some of the detail is so like what is found in the great convent on the hill above that probably it was really designed by him.

This small chapel stands on a projecting spur of the hill half-way down between the convent and the town.

Inside the whole building is about sixty feet long by thirty wide, and consists of a nave with aisles about thirty feet long, a transept the width of the central aisle but barely projecting beyond the walls, a square choir with a chapel on each side, followed by an apse; east of the north choir chapel is a small sacristy, and east of the south a newel-less stair--like that in the Claustro de Sta. Barbara--leading up to the roof and down to some vestries under the choir. Owing to the sacristy and stair the eastern part of the chancel, which is rather narrower than the nave, is square, showing outside no signs of the apse.