Santa María la Real Monastery (Aguilar de Campoo)
The Santa María la Real Monastery in Aguilar de Campoo , a municipality in the Palencia province of the Spanish Autonomous Region of Castile and León , is a former Premonstratensian monastery , the end of the 12th and beginning of the 13th centuries in the period of transition from the Romanesque was built to the Gothic . After years of decline, the complex , known as the convento caído (dilapidated monastery), was fundamentally restored from the 1970s. Today the building houses the headquarters of the Fundación Santa María la Real , which contributed significantly to the restoration of the monastery. It also houses a distance university and a hotel. A museum of Romanesque architecture ( Museo ROM: románico y territorio ) has been set up in the church.
history
According to legend, the founding of the Santa María la Real monastery goes back to the abbot Opila, who headed a Benedictine monastery on the banks of the Ebro . This monastery is said to have left Opila to settle at an abandoned church on the Río Pisuerga , which his brother Alpidio is said to have discovered while hunting a wild boar. The monastery is documented from the 11th century. For the year 1020 donations to the monastery are recorded in a cartular , which was initially run as a double monastery and later as a male convent of the Benedictine Abbey of Cluny .
In 1169 the Castilian King Alfonso VIII gave it to the Santa María de Retuerta monastery near Valladolid , the first foundation of the Premonstratensian Order in Spain. Although the monks who had lived in the monastery up until then revolted against this, a papal bull decided in 1173 in favor of the Premonstratensians, who held the monastery until it was disamorted under Juan Álvarez Mendizábal in 1835. The Premonstratensian Canons had the late Romanesque church, the convent buildings and the cloister built. The completion of this construction phase is dated around the year 1213.
In the 17th century, the canons gave up the shared dormitory and individual cells were created for each , for which the upper floor of the cloister was rebuilt. In addition, the two buildings were built on the large entrance courtyard in the west. Construction work was completed at the end of the 18th century.
With the abolition of the monastery in 1835, the buildings began to decline. In 1871, a large part of the capitals of the cloister and the church were removed and brought to the Museo Arqueológico Nacional de España in Madrid . A capital came into the Fogg Art Museum at Harvard University in 1932 . Despite the declaration as Monumento Nacional ( architectural monument , since 1985 Bien de Interés Cultural ) in 1914, the monastery was completely neglected at the beginning of the 20th century, vaults and walls had collapsed. During a restoration campaign from 1955 to 1968, the roof of the church was re-covered, the cloister and the chapter house cleared of rubble and almost completely rebuilt. The fundamental restoration only took place after the establishment of the Asociación de Amigos del Monasterio de Aguilar in 1978, from which the Fundación Santa María la Real emerged in 1994 .
church
Exterior construction
A tapering bell gable (espadaña) rises above the west facade, which is pierced at the top in the middle by a round arched opening and on the lower level by an arcade of four .
portal
The west portal as well as the arched window above come from the late Romanesque construction phase. The portal is surrounded by simple archivolts , the capitals of the set columns, decorated with large leaves, are badly damaged.
inner space
Inside, mighty pillars with pillars divide the three-aisled nave into four bays , which are covered with ribbed vaults. A transept opens to the Gothic choir , which was built in the mid-14th century.
Funerary monuments
Several sarcophagi from the 13th and 14th centuries are kept in the church. They are decorated with the arms of the Castañeda and Villalobos families. Some are furnished with reclining figures such as the graves of Nuño Díaz de Castañeda and Pedro Díaz de Castañeda, whose names and the dates 1293 and 1300 can be found in an inscription at the head end. A sarcophagus with only one lid and decorated with many coats of arms bears an inscription on the side with the name of the sculptor: "JOAN ALFONSO DE MUDA CANTERO ME FIZO" (the stonemason Juan Alfonso from Muda created me).
Cloister and Chapter House
The cloister dates from the early 13th century and is already Gothic , even if the capitals, of which only a few are still in place, are closely related to the Romanesque capitals of the region. The original wooden ceiling was replaced by a ribbed vault in the 18th century when the cells for the canons were set up on the upper floor.
The chapter house adjoins the eastern gallery of the cloister , to which a large round arch opens, next to which two further arched openings are arranged on both sides, flanked by slender columns and standing on plinths. Two central pillars with pillars divide the chapter house into six yokes covered with ribbed vaults. Most of the original capitals of the Chapter House and the cloister are in the National Archaeological Museum in Madrid.
Chapter House
Cloister
Capital of the cloister
Capital of the cloister
literature
- Jaime Cobreros: Las Rutas del Románico en España . Vol. 1, Madrid 2004, ISBN 84-9776-010-7 , pp. 103-104.
- Carlos M. Martín Jiménez: Las mejores rutas por el Románico de Palencia . Edilesa, León 2008, ISBN 978-84-8012-632-8 , pp. 126-129.
- César del Valle Barreda: Antigua Merindad de Aguilar de Campoo . Fundación Santa María la Real , Aguilar de Campoo 2009, ISBN 978-84-89483-55-2 , pp. 14-16.
Web links
- Aguilar de Campoo - Santa María la Real romanicoaragones.com (Spanish, accessed August 16, 2013)
- Monasterio de Santa María la Real Fundación Santa María la Real (Spanish, accessed August 16, 2013)
Coordinates: 42 ° 47 ′ 45.2 " N , 4 ° 16 ′ 18.6" W.