During the age of Charles V architecture did not develop along the same lines in all his territories. In the eastern kingdoms inherited from the Catalonian Crown (Aragon, Catalonia, Valencia and Majorca), sparsely populated, center of a long-established, industrious but fragile Mediterranean empire, the need for conservation is reflected in the paucity of their artistic creativity or, at all events, in the pure Italianism of the forms used.
It was in the much more heavily populated dominions of the Crown of Castile, suddenly thrust into the stupendous American venture, that practically all the dynamic spirit and drive of the times were concentrated, and so it is there that the most characteristic works of this historic period are to be found.
Renaissance architecture in Castile falls into four distinct geographical regions. The first important area_the triangle formed by the basin of the River Duero_may be described as the Plateresque zone because of its fidelity to the spirit of the times of Mendoza and Cisneros, with their hedonism and love of rich decoration. It was the real heart of the Castilian states; of its three leading artistic centers_Salamanca, Leon and Burgos_Salamanca, the old intellectual and university capital of the country, was the most important.
The second of these regions is New Castile, or the basin of the Tagus; here new intellectual circles had been formed around the University of Alcalá de Henares and the ecclesiastical capital of the country, Toledo. Just as New Castile was the heir to Old Castile, and the University of Alcalá to the University of Salamanca, so the architecture of this region owed much to the Plateresque, although it showed fewer archaisms and was much more modern in spirit.
The third area is that of Granada, which had been a Moorish kingdom until I492. Charles V wished to celebrate openly and ostensibly its union with Europe; he strove to foster a cosmopolitan spirit and violently suppressed all purely local rights and privileges. Very often in the history of art we see this phenomenon: countries steeped in tradition hold back when confronted by modern innovations and broader horizons, while those countries which break with tradition and accept new ideas in a new world understand, assimilate and experience intensely all that this newer and fuller world has to offer.
The fourth region of Renaissance art in the lands of Castile is that of Seville, the fabulous city that was the hub of all the vitality unleashed by the conquest of the Americas, the real political and economic capital of the Indies, through which all the riches of the New World had to pass, however briefly.
A great Andalusian capital like Granada, Seville had been invaded and taken over by the Castilians two centuries earlier. This dual national character is reflected in its art, which is a combination of the Plateresque style, more rooted in the traditional, and the newer classical style which found favor in Granada.
Salamanca owed its exalted position to the prestige of its University, the oldest in the Peninsula. A description of the capital of the Plateresque should, therefore, begin with this building, the very heart of the city. The façade of the University of Salamanca, designed by an unknown architect but attributed variously to Enrique de Egas, Pedro Manso and Juan de Torres, seems to have been erected between 1519 and 1525. Architectonically, it owes nothing to the Italian Renaissance; its origin must be sought in Andalusian Moorish architecture, as, for instance, in the portals of the Cuarto de Comares in the courtyard of the chapel of the Alhambra. The façade resembles a huge, well-proportioned rectangular tapestry where the profuse, detailed arabesques, almost uniform, evince a systematic abhorrence of a vacuum and are in striking contrast to the bareness of the adjacent walls.
This pattern was followed in such Mozarabic façades as that of the Alc_ázar of Seville, erected for the Castilian kings in the fourteenth century by architects inspired by the style of the Nasride dynasty of Granada. This concept was faithfully translated into Flamboyant decorativeness, romantic and exuberant, in the Late Gothic fronts built by Simon de Colonia for the church of Santa Maria la Real at Aranda de Duero (Burgos) and for the monastery of San Pablo in Valladolid. It was also to be imitated by one of his disciples in the remarkable façade which, with its profusion of plant forms mingled with exotic figures, crowns the doorway of the Colegio de San Gregorio, also in Valladolid, executed in the Late Gothic style known as Isabelline, direct forerunner of the Plateresque and the Portuguese Manueline style.
These successive changes in style were not really changes in concept. Moorish Nasride art and Mudejar, Flamboyant Gothic as well as Isabelline, were constant manifestations of the art of tapestry learnt from the Arabs and diametrically opposed to the classical. It was by definition an art of flat patterning, an art of matter rather than space, visual and not tactile, independent of its context and movable like a piece of furniture, and not fixed firmly in its surroundings; all idea of the concrete becomes lost in a tumult of forms and the mazes of an endless arabesque where there is no strong central accent.
Another influence to be seen in the façade of the University of Salamanca is that of Renaissance Grotesque, which was more typical of Lombardy than of Florence. A kind of tapestry of bas-reliefs crowns a Flamboyant structure of two segmental arches.
The façade is set out in rectangles, like those forming the panels above Moorish doorways; each rectangle, as well as the pilasters and friezes, is profusely adorned with acanthus leaf, armorial bearings, laurel wreaths and busts. These themes and figures express the meaning of the façade, like the Cufic inscriptions in Granada. In the lowest zone are the figures of the Catholic Kings who inspired the work. In the central part the escutcheon of Charles V is surrounded by the collar of alternate fire-steels and flints of the Flemish order of the Golden Fleece, between the Eagle of St John, protector of the Catholic Kings, and the double-headed imperial eagle of the House of Austria. In the center of the highest zone is the papal throne, surmounted by the tiara, symbol of the Church's teaching. It is crowned by the same kind of cresting as is found in the Medinaceli Palace at Cogolludo.
Old Salamanca is very rich in buildings of a similar nature, with some features of the Flamboyant style of decoration and luxuriant with Plateresque ornamentation: the church of San Esteban, designed by Juan de Álava, with a façade even more overloaded with decoration than the Carthusian Monastery of Pavia, and the Colegio de los Irlandeses (seminary for Irish priests) built by Alonso de Covarrubias, which is almost like a smaller replica of the University.
But it is in the secular architecture of palaces and mansions, rather than in ecclesiastical buildings, that the spirit of the age is better expressed. The most representative of the monuments of Plateresque architecture is beyond doubt a nobleman's palace, the Palace of Monterrey, which was begun in 1539. It was designed for Don Alonso de Acevedo y Zúñiga, Count of Monterrey, by Rodrigo Gil de Hontañón and his collaborator Fray Martin de Santiago, and built by Pedro de Ibarra and Pedro and Miguel de Aguirre, who were also responsible for the sculptural decoration.
Only one of its lateral façades was completed, but from this we can gain an idea of the grandeur that the main façade would have possessed if the building had been finished. It shows, too, that in only a few years Plateresque had developed from an amusing diversion borrowing themes from all sides_from Italy, Flanders and Islam_ into a coherent and national style with a strong personality of its own.
The logical arrangement of this façade is comparable to that of the great Florentine façades, yet quite different. It is built up in layers, from a strong, thick base, austere and unadorned, to a light, ornate skyline, with the accent on strength decreasing and the embellishments increasing in beauty as it rises.
The massing and decoration of the Palace of Monterrey remind us of a tree with its robust trunk and abundant foliage. The ornamental cresting follows the rhythmical pattern of those of Cogolludo and the University of Salamanca, and can be seen as a final manifestation of the Gothic taste for open work.
Rodrigo Gil de Hontañón designed other noblemen's palaces in Salamanca, including the one built for the Fonseca family known as the Casa de la Salina. In Leon, where he also worked, he built the huge mansion of the Guzmán family. But his masterpiece is the graceful façade of the University of Alcalá de Henares, erected between 1543 and 1583, a clear and striking example of the Plateresque style of New Castile.
Examples of the Plateresque more rooted in the traditional are the buildings erected in Burgos by Francisco de Colonia, member of the German family "from Cologne" which worked in the cathedral, and by Diego de Siloe, son of the sculptor Gil de Siloe, also of German origin, who worked for the Catholic Kings. These include the Palaces of Saldañuela and Miranda, the Casa de los Cubos and the Casa de Angulo.
In Leon, the masterpiece of the Plateresque style is the façade of San Marcos, impressive both in its monumental size and in the richness of its decoration. It was erected between 1533 and 1541 by Juan de Horozco, on plans drawn up by Pedro de Larrea. The arrangement is extremely rhythmical: groupings of two elements alternate with single elements. The decoration is as profuse as that of the Carthusian Monastery of Pavia and recalls other, non-Italian, Renaissance fronts_the ones in the courtyard of the Louvre, of the Palace of Heidelberg, for example. Semicircular embrasures and flat arches, paraments and niched shells, garlands and medallions, cornices and cresting _all are combined in a spirit of free fantasy.
The imposing Alcázar of Toledo is a unique example of New Castilian Renaissance architecture, and evokes better than any other monument the time when the city was virtually the capital of Charles V's empire. This massive pile, with its four sturdy towers, standing on the highest ground in Toledo, dominates and dwarfs the whole city. It was the product of several different epochs, but its chief architect_the one who was most responsible for its monumental grandeur_was Alonso de Covarrubias, working on the orders of the Emperor himself. Covarrubias studied both architecture and sculpture in the school of the Colonia family in Burgos. He went through a Gothic period before turning to Plateresque, and finally gave to this style the purity and serenity which typify the second, more refined phase known as purist Plateresque. In this purist style, the rhythm is slower, there are more empty spaces, decoration is more refined and more concentrated, proportions are vaster and nobler, and the whole becomes much more important than the details in this limpid, monumental architecture which is no less elegant for all its grandiosity. All the archaic features derived from Gothic, Flemish and Moorish art characteristic of early Plateresque have disappeared.
The façade of the Alcázar of Toledo, begun by Alonso de Covarrubias in 1538, is the most typical expression of this purist Plateresque style. It recalls in many ways the Palace of Monterrey in Salamanca; but the arrangement is quite different in that the lower part is less severe and more elegant while the upper part is more harmonious and restrained, with none of the decorative foliation found on the Salamanca building.
With the Hospital de Tavera, also in Toledo, begun in 1541 according to the original design of Bustamante, Covarrubias' style has become even more simplified, and purer. With its Italianesque courtyards surrounded by spacious arcades, this structure has a grandeur that is joined to the most refined elegance.
The Palace of the Archbishops at Alcalá de Henares is also the work of Covarrubias. His influence may have been a factor in the change that can be noted in the style of Rodrigo Gil de Hontañón from 1543 on, when he constructed a stone façade for the University of Alcalá de Henares, built in brick under Cardinal Cisneros. All the attributes of purist Plateresque that were indicated in the description of the Alcázar of Toledo can be found here, perhaps in even more refined form. The stress on smooth elegance is more pronounced here than in the Toledo building; the ponderousness as well as the rich foliation found in the Palace of Monterrey have completely disappeared. Soft curves predominate: in the archivolts of the segmental arch of the main doorway, in the Roman pediments and in the arcading of the upper storey.
The imperial coat-of-arms on the double-headed eagle of the House of Austria has pride of place in this simple but lively façade, which retains a last trace of the old open-work crestings of Germanic or Nasride origin, but in the form of a garland borne by putti in the style of the Rossellino brothers or Desiderio da Settignano.
Unlike the Castilian schools of architecture, the school of Granada cannot be described as Plateresque. Here the Renaissance triumphed and flourished in its most universal form, most faithful to the canons of the ancient Roman, ecumenical tradition and to the precepts of contemporary Italian teachers.
Charles V decided to build an imperial palace on the wonderful hill of the Alhambra, in the very heart of the last fortress of Islam in Europe. This palace would express in the loftiest and purest way the image of the Europe which had just conquered that bastion. The design of this royal residence was therefore put in the hands of Pedro Machuca, who was able to execute it in a spirit that was completely European in its search for classical norms and universalist concepts.
Both architect and painter, Pedro Machuca had studied in Florence, perhaps working in the atelier of Giuliano da Sangallo, at the beginning of the century. As a painter, he is thought to have been a direct follower of Raphael. We know that in 1524 he was already working as a painter in Granada, where Charles V commissioned him to build his palace.
Construction was started around 1527 and supervised by Pedro Machuca until 1550, when his son Luis took over. After the death of Luis the work was carried on by Juan de Orea under the direction of Juan de Herrera and, later, Juan de Mijares. Building operations ceased in 1633, for lack of funds, and the palace has never been completed.
It is built in the form of a quadrangle, around a circular courtyard; in a typically classical manner it was planned with absolutely no regard to the surrounding countryside or the nearby Nasride palace. The arrangement of the interior is determined by the regular proportions of the exterior; it is divided into areas, all of which are rectangular except for a gallery and the octagonal chapel, placed in an angle.
The façades are two storeys in height, each of which has two levels of openings, following the Italian arrangement of mezzanines or half-storeys. The ordonnance is harmonious and methodical: the lower part is rusticated, the upper part smooth. The classical orders are superimposed according to established norms, Tuscan below and Ionic above. The embrasures are surmounted by acroteria alternating with pediments, and there are massive middle sections, in high relief, with matching double engaged columns. But the most original feature of this palace is the magnificent circular courtyard, which is surrounded by two superimposed linteled colonnades, also Tuscan in the lower stage and Ionic in the upper.
Quintessence of classicism, the Palace of Charles V is the purest example of the style of architecture developed in Granada during the sixteenth century, but it is not the only one. Several Italians were also working there, including Francesco Florentino and his brother Jacopo Florentino; the latter, also called Jacopo L'Indaco, had worked with Michelangelo in Rome. It was these two Florentines who built the Palace of the Vélez in Vélez Blanco, the church of San Jerónimo in Granada and the tower of Murcia Cathedral. All these works are characterized by the grandeur of the overall design combined with an almost precious fastidiousness in the decorative details which adorn them, albeit sparingly.
The architectural style initiated in Granada by Pedro Machuca and the Florentino brothers was brilliantly continued by Diego de Siloe, member of one of those German families of sculptor-architects settled in Burgos of whom we have already spoken.
Although he had received his early training in the Plateresque school, Diego de Siloe had studied in Italy together with his fellow-citizen, the sculptor Bartolomé Ordóñez. When, in 1528, he was assigned to take over the building of the church of San Jerónimo in Granada, begun by Francesco and Jacopo Florentino, he was able to set aside minor projects and to carry out his ambition to produce something vast, spacious and simple in the purest classical style. This first essay in the Granada style was followed by his greatest achievements: the Cathedral of Granada and, it is believed, the Cathedral of Malaga. These buildings are remarkable for their spaciousness, gentle rhythm, sober restraint, luminosity and purity.
It is interesting to note that Granada Cathedral, like the Palace of Charles V in the Alhambra, had a symbolic significance in that it represented the triumph of the European spirit in the last capital on the continent to be wrested from Islam. That is why Charles V personally defended the universalist conceptions of the Renaissance as represented by the art of Diego de Siloe against popular taste in Granada which would have preferred to keep to the Late Gothic style of the plans originally drawn up in 1521 by Enrique de Egas.
The most important part of Granada Cathedral, the chancel, was completed in 1540. It is a rotunda with a domed roof 72 feet in diameter and 148 feet high, ringed by an ambulatory, with two superimposed sets of Corinthian columns backed by pilasters, with two storeys to each order. This rotunda looks rather like an awkward addition to the nave, which had to be continued on earlier foundations.