After nearly two weeks of travel, I was excited that we had finally arrived in Santiago de Compostela. We were now in the region of Galicia, in the extreme northwest of Spain. Galicia has its own language, Galician, which has much in common with Portuguese. In fact, for many years, Galicia and Portugal were ruled by the same monarch.
Even though our hotel, located a short walk from Santiago’s old town, was very comfortable, I didn’t linger after check-in. Like the others in my group, I was eager to see the end of point of the Camino – the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela. With Natua leading the way, we set out on foot, walking up the winding rua das Hortas.
We could see the towering spires of the Cathedral rising above us well before we reached the long stone incline that led up to the broad Praza do Obradoiro (Obradoiro Plaza).
At last, we were there, standing awestruck in front of the west façade of the Cathedral.
I glanced around me at the clusters of backpack-laden pilgrims who had completed their journey. That’s when I started to feel a certain sense of uneasiness which persisted throughout the three days we were based here. I’ve struggled to understand it and to write about it. I think it’s because Santiago de Compostela can be experienced in very different ways. For a pilgrim who has set an intention and spent weeks or months on The Way, there is a spiritual connection to the place. That wasn’t the case for me. I came to Santiago de Compostela as a tourist, eager to see an important historical site, to learn about its religious significance, and to appreciate its art and architecture.
Santiago de Compostela’s medieval city is a UNESCO World Heritage site that welcomes close to a million visitors a year. This includes over 400,000 pilgrims. It’s not surprising that the area around the Cathedral is extremely crowded and commercial. The nearby streets are filled with hotels, hostels, restaurants, bars, cafes, and countless souvenir shops. I guess I was expecting a quieter, more spiritual setting.
On our first evening, several of us went to the pedestrian-only run da Franco in search of dinner. It was around 8pm, and the narrow street was so jam-packed that we practically had to elbow our way through the mass of people. Natua had warned us to be very careful about pickpockets so I kept my hand on my cell phone, which was also attached to a lanyard that I wore around my neck. It was hard not to be distracted by the displays of food in the windows and the menus posted outside restaurants.
And sure enough, at some point, one of my fellow travelers had her iPhone stolen right out of her purse. She didn’t even realize it was gone until we were seated in a restaurant. That incident probably left me with some negative feelings about Santiago right from the start.
Over the next few days, I gradually realized that there was something else that contributed to my ambivalent reaction to Santiago. Everywhere I looked, I was surrounded by Christian imagery – not only the massive cathedral, but all of the churches, the monasteries, the shops selling souvenirs decorated with scallop shells, houses decorated with scallop shells, actually everything decorated with scallop shells (the symbol of St. James and The Way). It was a bit overwhelming.
I think I was identifying, at first subconsciously, with my co-religionists, Spanish and Portuguese Jews, who were persecuted by the very same Catholic Church that Santiago de Compostela celebrated and glorified.
Putting aside those complex feelings, I was fascinated by what I saw and learned. The Cathedral is indeed magnificent in scale and in design. Each of its four façades opens onto a large square. Begun in 1075, its primary architectural style is Romanesque. The cloister, one of the largest in Spain, was added in the 1500s. The interior of the Cathedral displays several Gothic and Renaissance elements from later years.
The Cathedral attracted pilgrims during the Middle Ages because the remains of St. James are supposedly interred here. In fact, it was the most important place of Christian pilgrimage after Jerusalem and Rome. And today, people still line up for hours to attend one of the daily masses. Those lucky enough to be admitted for a mass can see witness the Botafumeiro, the enormous censor, swinging over the assembled congregation as it releases its fragrant smoke.
I entered the Cathedral through doors on the Baroque south façade, which faces the Praza das Pratarius. I timed my entrance for right after mass let out, as the crowd was dispersing.
It’s hard to know where to look first when you step inside. The Main Chapel certainly dazzles the eye with its lavish use of gold and silver. While its structure is from the Romanesque period, most of the decoration dates from later times. A 13thcentury stone image of St. James in a silver cloak is framed by the ornate 17th century Baroque altar. (I wonder if all that precious metal came from Spanish conquests in the Americas.) Angels that support the canopy-like covering over the altar are an example of the Galician Baroque style.
The crypt, housing the relics and remains of St. James the Apostle, is located below the Main Altar. According to legend, St. James brought Christianity to the Iberian peninsula.
There are dozens of other chapels, plus the treasury, the sacristy, and so much more. It’s impossible to take in all of the splendor in a single visit. I can only imagine how the Cathedral must have looked to the pilgrims from earlier times.
The Cathedral’s ornate western façade, the most often photographed, dates back to the mid-1700s, i.e. the Baroque era.
Another impressive building facing the Praza do Obradoiro is the former royal hospital, built in the 1500s to care for pilgrims. It is now a five-star hotel.
Directly across from the western façade of the Cathedral is a neo-Classical building, built 200 years ago, that housed the seat of government.
Also, right off the western side of the plaza is the Parish Church of San Fructuoso, which was built in the mid-1700s in the Baroque style.
The north façade of the Cathedral is a combination of Baroque and neoclassical styles.
Facing the north façade (Acibecharia Façade), across the Praza da Immaculada, is the former Monastery of St. Martin Pinario, the second largest religious monument in the city. It now houses the law department of the university.
The east façade of the Cathedral, facing the Praza da Quintana, has two doors – the Royal Gate and the Holy Gate. The clock tower is located at one corner of this façade. Construction of the clock tower began in the early 1300s but it was not completed until several hundred years later.
I sought out some of the quieter streets and plazas in the old town - rua Nova, rua do Vilar, and Praza do Toural.
One of my favorite memories from Santiago has nothing to do with the Cathedral. It was the birthday celebration that Natua, our very creative and dramatic tour leader, arranged for Marie, one of the travelers in our group. After dinner one night, Natua ushered us into the darkened breakfast room of the hotel to make “witches’ brew.” The table was set up with a cauldron and the necessary ingredients: a bottle of wine (40% alcohol), a bag of white sugar, a lemon, an orange, a cinnamon stick, and some ground coffee. After Natua added the ingredients to the cauldron, she said an incantation over the mixture to scare away evil spirits. We then had to repeat the spell. Next, she lit the brew and let it cook until the flames turned yellow, which took quite a while. Of course, we all had to try it. It certainly was a unique way to celebrate a birthday - and probably not one that St. James would have condoned.
No comments:
Post a Comment