Iberia (73 page)

In other words, a hundred and fifty-five people to look after one
addle-brained old woman.
montero
[huntsman]
guards, and five bodyguards. To serve in the royal chapel, there
were fourteen chaplains, two altar boys and three sacristans. Aside
from these, there were the wives and the children of a large
proportion of the servants of the household.

Juana la Loca constitutes one of the mysteries of Spanish
history. I find it difficult to believe that she was sane, but on the
other hand I find in European history several monarchs who ruled
more or less successfully while no more sane than she. I suppose
that with a council to guide her she could have governed
moderately well; however, her son Carlos V was doubtless far
more capable, though I am far from satisfied that he was as good
for Spain as she would have been. Juana, completely Spanish,
would at least have focused on Spanish problems rather than
dissipate her kingdom in an attempt to dominate Europe, and it
is tantalizing to reflect that a sane son destroyed Spain whereas
an insane mother might have saved it.

There is one spot in Spain that everyone should see, for it
pertains to the character of the country yet is so inconvenient to
visit that there is no rational point from which one can say, ‘Let’s
visit the Shrine of Guadalupe now. We may never have a better
opportunity.’

It hides in a remote corner of Extremadura and could be visited
from Badajoz, but the road is poor. It stands not too far from
Trujillo, but when I was in that city I was told the route was so
inconvenient that I ought to by-pass the shrine. Religiously it is
governed from Toledo, and once years ago I intended to set out
from Toledo to see it, but friends refused to let me risk the
miserable road. At the monastery of Yuste, I was almost due north
of Guadalupe, but there was no direct communication. Now,
from a totally ridiculous point of departure, I was determined to
see the shrine, so one morning I set out from Salamanca, kept
Yuste to the east and dropped down through Trujillo to try the
ferocious road that appeared on the map with the proud title
Route C-401. The scenery was exciting, with low mountains, long
vistas and here and there small villages where life progressed much
as it had four hundred years ago, but the road was so twisting,
with eight or ten right-angle turns to the half-mile, that the couple
riding in the back seat of our car got seasick and the driver
complained that his arms were wearing out.

But even if one had no concern with religion, the drive to
Guadalupe would be worth the effort, for just as it seemed that
all of us had had enough, the road climbed a sharp hill and below
us we saw one of the choice sights in Spain: a compact monastery,
so beautiful in all aspects that it is an architectural treasure, set
down in a rustic small village surrounded by handsome olive
groves that fill the valley. The road stops. There is no economic
life, no transportation, no rich farming. In fact, if it were not for
what happened here around 1325 there would be no reason for
the village to exist.

One day a cowherd whose name is remembered, Gil Cordero
(Giles of the Lamb), was looking for a strayed cow that had been
grazing along the banks of a turbulent river which came out of
these unpopulated mountains, and as he did so he saw projecting
from the soil the brown and weathered statue of a Virgin, later
to be known as the Virgin of Guadalupe (River of the Wolf,
according to some; Hidden River to others). As her history was
uncovered, it was seen that she was no ordinary Virgin.

The last work of art done by St. Luke, the
painter-physician-evangelist, was this carving of the Virgin, for
which she posed on the Greek island of Patmos just prior to her
death in Turkey. The statue was buried at the city that later
became Constantinople, whence it passed to Rome. Around

A.D
.
600 Pope Gregory the Great ordered that St. Luke’s Virgin be
paraded through Rome in an effort to end the plague, which she
did. The statue was then sent to Spain, but when the Muslims
overran the country devout followers carried the Virgin to the
banks of this remote hidden river and buried her, where she slept
undisturbed for more than six hundred years, until Gil Cordero
found her.

Her fame spread over Spain and was responsible for several
victories over Muslim armies. As the Virgin of Extremadura she
sponsored the settlement of the New World, where, after
appearing personally to the Mexican peasant Juan Diego in 1531,
she became even more popular than she was in Spain. From all
parts of the world riches flowed into this remote shrine, until it
became the wealthiest religious foundation in Christendom. The
official historian of that period affirms that more than one
hundred and twenty lamps of pure gold or silver burned at her
shrine, that she had countless vestments heavy with jewels, and
that the Hieronymite friars who tended the shrine had so much
money that they ordered from Toledo cleaning buckets and broom
handles of solid silver.

It became traditional for rulers of Spain to come to Guadalupe
to pay homage to the Virgin, and large buildings had to be erected
to lodge the royal visitors whose names form an index to Spanish
history; therefore, it was not unexpected when in 1928 King
Alfonso XIII came here to supervise the canonical coronation of
the Virgin of Guadalupe; henceforth, she would be one of the
official Virgin Queens of Spain.

There are three reasons why one should visit Guadalupe: to see
the Virgin, to see her robes, and to see the Zurbaráns, and in the
company of Don Pedro Rivas, the practical-minded mayor of the
village, I proceeded to do so. Don Pedro was a different kind of
mayor, a farmer with a rough-and-ready approach to his position
and a manifest delight in the dark Virgin of Guadalupe. ‘To
approach her with due reverence,’ he said, ‘we must pause here
in the anteroom. Look at those marvelous paintings! By Luca
Giordano, who must have been an Italian. Aren’t they glorious?
And big? Look at that dear little angel with the bare bottom who
leads Mary’s donkey on the flight to Egypt. And the angels flying
overhead with flowers. Isn’t that a fine presentation of the Virgin
protecting her child?’

I found the Giordanos (1632-1705) overpowering—nine huge
canvases—but the eight polychromed statues of ‘the strong
women of the Old Testament’ were delightful. They were carved
in the fashion of eighteenth-century Versailles and showed
shepherdesses with crucifixes, jewels, straw hats and those lovely
flouncy skirts and aprons which milkmaids were supposed to
wear at court revels. Ruth, Jael and Esther were especially
charming, the first with wide black eyes and porcelain skin and
under her arm a sheaf of gleanings from the fields of Boaz.

‘But this is the room!’ Don Pedro said with visible excitement
as he led me to the shrine itself. How disappointed I was. There
really wasn’t much to see, just a wealth of gold and jewels and
ornate carving. The Virgin, apparently, was not visible to ordinary
eyes, and I must have shrugged my shoulders as if to say, ‘Well,
that’s that,’ when the mayor signaled two young frairs, who slowly
turned a revolving pedestal. As they did so, the Virgin came
mysteriously into view, and she was so resplendent that no amount
of previous reading could have prepared me for what I now saw.
In a niche with wings, each inch of which was covered with either
gold or enamel scenes from the Bible, stood a relatively small
Virgin, an adorable figure, with dark mottled face and black right
hand which held a scepter. She looked as if she had lain in earth
for six hundred years, but her charm derived from the tradition
of dressing her in a gown and cape made of luminous cloth of
gold encrusted with jewels. Her robes flared out, hanging straight
across at the bottom and tapering upward to her crown and halo
of precious stones, forming a delicate, bejeweled triangle.

‘?Estupenda, eh?’ the mayor asked. She was. It was the only
word which applied, for visually she was one of the most appealing
religious figures I have ever seen. I doubt if the leading prelates
of Spain, sitting in conclave, could have come up with a more
appropriate figure to epitomize their country’s attitude toward
religion.

‘Do you like the Jesus?’ Don Pedro asked. I looked about for a
statue of Jesus and it was some moments before I discovered that
in her left arm, which was of course invisible, the Virgin held a
precious little doll-like figure of Jesus, also scarred in the face,
also dressed in robes which duplicated the triangle formed by
those of his mother. He too was crowned, but far less gloriously.
As I looked at the two figures I reflected that it was at about the
time when the series of buried Virgins was being uncovered in
various parts of Spain that the country began to dedicate itself to
Mary, long before the movement became common in other parts
of the world, and I concluded that some two hundred years from
now Spanish religion may well focus exclusively on the Virgin,
with Christ having receded to a background position somewhat
like that enjoyed by the Holy Ghost in Protestantism half a century
ago. Already a Virgin like this adorable one of Guadalupe seems
much closer to the heart of Spain than does a remote figure like
Jesus.

I am not one to waste time marveling at the routine tapestries
held in the usual monastery treasury, but at Guadalupe I was
stunned when Don Pedro and the friars showed me where the
robes for their Virgin were stored. One large shallow drawer after
another was pulled out to display the many alternate sets of
vestments. ‘This one filled with flowers woven in silver,’ explained
the mayor, ‘was sent here from the Netherlands in 1629. This one
laden with diamonds and gold was made in the time of Carlos
Quinto. And this one, well, who can describe it? The most costly
piece of fabric in the world. A hundred and fifty thousand pearls,
handfuls of diamonds, gold so heavy the cloth can scarcely be
lifted. We have loved our Virgin and we have wanted her to dress
well.’

‘How many complete sets of robes has she?’ I asked.
‘These are just the precious ones,’ and he indicated some thirty
drawers. ‘The lesser ones are over here. Peru, Chile, these three
from Mexico with Mexican gold, Poland. She has many robes.’ I
had stopped looking at the robes, for I felt smothered in pearls
and gold; instead I tried to imagine how a large meeting room
nearby must have looked on that fateful first of January in 1577,
when King Felipe II of Spain entered by this door and his nephew,
King Sebastián of Portugal, entered by that to conduct the meeting
which started the curious story that I shall be speaking of at the
end of this chapter. It must have been an extraordinary scene and
I wondered how kings could have covered the journey from
Madrid and Lisboa to such a spot.

 

Finally, in the vestry of the monastery Don Pedro showed me
that row of eight masterpieces painted by Francisco Zurbarán; if
one does not see his work in this room one misses his talent. His
commission was one of those ordinary jobs which have defeated
so many good painters: ‘Portraits of the leading friars in the
history of this monastery.’ The Hieronymites chosen were all of
advanced age and position, mostly bald, and of monotonous
history, but what Zurbarán accomplished with them is well-nigh
miraculous, for the tall, powerful paintings unfold with a richness
of style and imagination that one would never expect if he knew
only Zurbarán’s lesser work. The fine series impressed me as
something that might have been done by Domenico Ghirlandaio,
for though Zurbarán lived from 1598 to 1664, he painted with
the style of an earlier age.

 

For me, the apex of the series was the third picture on the
left-hand wall; it showed Zurbarán at his best. It was a portrait
of Father Illescas, a political priest who ruled Guadalupe and later
Córdoba. His cluttered desk provided an opportunity for one of
Zurbarán’s great still lifes; the figure of the Hieronymite became
the occasion for a splendid hard-edge portrait of uncompromising
intensity; the De Hooch-like scene beyond the pillars shows the
entrance to the monastery with a friar at the door dispensing alms
to beggars in a style recalling the best work of Giovanni Bellini.
If this magnificent work were housed where large numbers of
people visited, it would be an acknowledged masterpiece. It excels
its seven companions only in the excellence of its parts and the
variation shown therein. As a straight piece of painting I rather
preferred the simpler picture of Father Yáñez, founder of the
monastery, as he kneels before King Enrique III, who bestows
upon him the biretta of Bishop of Toledo. It is uncluttered, direct
and powerful. Spanish critics are amused by the fact that King
Enrique, who ruled 1390-1406, is dressed in the costume of King
Felipe III, who ruled 1598-1621. The courtier who looks out from
the background is supposed to be a self-portrait of Zurbarán, and
I wish this work were located in some capital city where I might
see it more often.

 

One of the reasons why it is so rewarding to see the Zurbaráns
in Guadalupe is that the vestry where they hang is a magnificent
room well suited to the display of tall canvases. The walls are white
and gold; the richly ornamented ceiling is studded with windows
that admit good light; and the altarpiece of an attached chapel
has a heavy ornateness that glistens. It is sometimes difficult for
a foreigner to believe old accounts of how wealthy the religious
buildings of Spain once were, but a visit to Guadalupe corrects
that.

 

‘But the thing to remember about this room,’ says the mayor
as we leave, ‘is that lamp suspended from the ceiling.’ He points
to a huge bronze brazier of Oriental design, suspended on a fine
chain. ‘It was brought here,’ the mayor explains, ‘by Don Juan of
Austria after the Virgin gave him victory at the Battle of Lepanto.
Captured from a Turkish galleon. The point is, we Spaniards
fought to attain buildings like this…rooms like this.’