"The day of December 13th we arrived at Compostela, which is situated in the middle of a complete circle of mountains. In the middle is another hill, elevated as if it were raised up in the center of the circle. It has no river, but many and good fountains, that flow with sweet water. It is not big, but very old, and it is fortified with a very old wall and numerous and solid towers. The country is good and the little gardens of the city are full of orange trees, apple trees, lemon trees, plum trees and other fruit trees. But the people are so dirty—they have many pigs that they sell very cheaply—and so lazy that they only concern themselves minimally with the cultivation of the land, and live in general from their earnings from the pilgrims. They have a good climate, and both within and without the city many monasteries, like that of Saint Dominic, in which there is a gentleman, a learned preacher, who showed me many things; the monastery of Saint Benedict, whose abbot the king had sent to Castile as a prisoner as a squanderer of its goods, the monastery of Saint Clare of the Carmelites, and that of the Minor Brothers. The king, may God prolong his life many years, is presently occupied with the reform of the Augustinians.
The church of Santiago is one of the three principal ones, following in order that of Rome and that of Ephesis in Asia, which has just disappeared [conquered by the Turks]. It was built by Charlemagne, King of the Franks, and Emperor of Germany who, as afterwards you will know about his wars, paid for it with the spoils, donations and tribute of the Saracens. It is a marvelous work, in the manner of a cross. The central nave measures a hundred paces, the length of its arms is of a hundred and twenty, the width, fifteen, the width of the central nave, thirty-two, and the length of all the central nave and the retro-choir, of a hundred and twenty. All is constructed and vaulted with very hard dressed stone. It has two side aisles, like the church of Saint Sebald; and in the choir, forming a circle, chapels. It is truly a very robust work. It has in the four angles four very strong towers, and now they are building another, also very strong…The chapels around the choir are twelve, and the vault that forms the head of the cross is very high. In the middle of it they swing, from side to side of the arms of the church, an enormous incense burner with aromatic smoke.
Pope Calixtus conceded many privileges to this church. Its present Archbishop is don Alfonso, Count of Cifuentes, a learned man and a great orator. The church has forty five canons, among which are seven created by Calixtus; they are the only ones permitted to celebrate mass at the high altar, and they are called the Cardinals of Santiago.
The King of Castile has given the Cathedral very beautiful ornaments. Equally, King Louis of France, father of Charles, has given it many donations. The coat of arms of the [French] King with the lilies is seen engraved everywhere. Among the twelve chapels that circle the choir, the first is of the King of France, who had it built and bestowed upon it two hundred ducats annually, so that all the canonical hours may be sung. But the canons collected the rents, and only sing in the principal choir. Seven of the twelve chapels are parochial for all Compostela, where the most distinguished citizens of the parish are buried, and where the sacraments are administered. We attended at two burials. Although the canons sang the hours and the Office of the Dead with much diligence, they applied themselves, however with even more zeal to the profits.
On the day of the festival of the Blessed Virgin the high altar was adorned with two images of saints, of thirty, twenty-five and fifty marks, and others of gilded silver. Among all of them, however, the largest was that of the Blessed Virgin, of pure gold, so they assure me, who held a magnificent scepter in her right hand, and held the Infant Jesus, her son, in her left, with a superb crown, which was carried by a cardinal in the procession under a canopy, that was carried by two priests, trying to keep their equilibrium. Also there was a cross, adorned with gold and precious stones, usually kept in the sacristy that was shown to the pilgrims. I will treat the abundance of reliquaries of Compostela in another section.
So loud is the continual chatter in the Cathedral, that you would think you were at a fair. There is very little devotion there. The very holy Apostle should be shown more veneration. They believe that he is buried with two of his disciples under the high altar, one to the left and one to the right, although no one has seen his body, not even the King of Castile when he was here in the year of the Lord 1487. We believe it only in faith, which is that which saves us as men."
What Münzer Saw:
Münzer did not have a very high opinion of the custodians of Santiago de Compostela or of the Galicians in general--this is clear from remarks made on the trip to Santiago from Portugal. When the party stopped at Caldes, a hot spring he complained: “it has sulfurous and thermal springs and waters, that I tried. But the people there are so incurious that they have not built any buildings or baths there, except a pit, in which one washes.” Later, on the road after Santiago he comments on bad inns on the way to Castile, and much as he states in the Santiago section, he again remarked: “These people eat primarily pork, and in all their habits are truly dirty and pig-like.” Perhaps it was something of a contrast after visiting with ultra-clean, non pork-eating Muslims in Andalusia, and communing with the King of Portugal and seeing that country’s active commerce and exploring enthusiasms. Also, he was there in winter, generally cold, rainy and muddy—and just after pig slaughtering time in November. However, Galician society was divided into self-sufficient, family-centered farms, and there was apparently little interest in the international pilgrims except for revenues brought in.
He was impressed with the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela. It had already been a famous shrine and pilgrimage center for half a millennium (not built by Charlemagne), and though there were probably less pilgrimages made in the 15th century than in earlier times, it was still one of the three principal pious destinations among Christians. Münzer would have seen the church still with its Romanesque exterior. The basic layout of the church hasn’t changed, though as in all churches of the time there were no pews for ordinary people. At that time, the nave would have been partially occupied by the great 12th century stone choir, built by the same Master Mateo who was responsible for the Pórtico de la Gloria. Münzer mentions neither—they were probably too old to interest him, as usual.
Of the original 11 (not 12) chapels in the ambulatory, little remains intact, except for the Capilla del Salvador, the first to be built, Most have more recent decorations and different configurations than when Münzer saw them, as Kenneth Conant’s famous reconstructed plan of 1926 demonstrates. And there is no trace at all of the donations given by Louis XII of France: his chapel has long passed into other hands, and not a single coat of arms is to be found. Decorating the church, however, are 12 plaques with the cross, the alpha and omega and sun and moon, donated by King Pedro IV in 1249 to commemorate the consecration of the Cathedral 38 years earlier. The bones of Saint James that Münzer couldn’t see were lost in the late 16th century, and not recovered until 1879. They reside in the Cathedral’s crypt, in a neo-Romanesque shrine, and are visitable.
Santiago has so many treasures that it is hard to pick out the gilded Madonna and gold cross mentioned by Münzer. Many of the precious relics are enshrined in a giant reliquary retablo in the Cathedral’s museum. The cross may have been the famous one donated by Alfonso II of Asturias to the Cathedral in the 9th century. It was stolen in 1906, but there is a replica in the museum. The giant incense burner, called the botafumeiro is still used (though it's a newer version, as Napoleon's troops stole the olf one in 1808), but only on great feast days. The rest of the time it is unhooked and stored. People still crowd the church and are quite noisy.
All of the monastic sites that Münzer cites still exist, but with the exception of the church of the Dominican convent (now a museum of folklore), most of the others now date to the 17th century. The Augustinian convent church that Münzer cites King Fernando reforming is still there under a different name. When the Augustinians moved to new quarters in the 17th century, the old church became Santa Maria del Sar. It nearly vanished in the 18th century because of structural problems (the nave columns began to tilt outwards), but heavy buttresses saved the day.
What Münzer Could Have Seen:
Aside from the choir and the Pórtico, Münzer could have seen the transept doorway called the Puerta de la Plateria, but, being even older, he does not cite it either. He could have also seen the palace of Archbishop Gelmírez that adjoins the Cathedral, with its secular Romanesque decorations, but since it was Romanesque it didn’t rate a citation. Neither did the tiny church of San Fiz de Solovio.
What Münzer Never Would Have Seen: (June 21-22, 2011)
Münzer would never have seen the 18th century exterior shell that encloses the entire Romanesque structure of the Cathedral, or the great 16th-century Retablo Mayor, though its central image of Saint James was already there.
Pilgrimage has become fashionable again. Modern ones wear big backpacks and hiking boots, and carry ergonomic backpacks. They can get showers and stay in organized hostels—and they carry an official pilgrimage card that they get stamped at each important stop. Most have cameras, some have cell phones. But it’s still a very long hike from Roncesvalles. And they are still awed by their final arrival at the Cathedral.
The city and its people are clean now, and educated. It’s the rainy climate that darkens the stone buildings, not dirt.
Campers of another sort, political protesters, have pitched their tents in the big plaza in front of the Cathedral.
NOTE:
We have one more stop on this year’s Münzer Itinerary: Benavente and its castle, where we’ll arrive tomorrow. Though I’ll post Münzer’s account of his journey there from Santiago, we are taking a different route: many of the locations he cites have disappeared and others do not follow any sort of logical trajectory (perhaps he was mistaken in his notes, as seems to have been the case with Fredes). We’ll go through Ourense in order to stop at some Visigothic and Mozarabic sites.
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