Art, Travel and Culture: the old cathedral of Salamanca

To be able to enjoy, even if only in part, this magnificent and metaphorical ulyss that is the old cathedral of Salamanca, perhaps it is not so much a matter of luck, and yes, perhaps, a moment of pious weakness of that inflexible spinner of circumstances, causalities and destinies that govern the deepest abysses of the human unconscious, which already the great classical geniuses presented us as Parca.

Parca would be, if we apply the synonyms of poor, short or sparse, that part of Romance idiosyncrasy that, however, with a single glance, induces us to dream or at least to imagine, how it could be, in all its splendor, a great work of art raised ad maiorem gloriam Domine, following the sacred patterns of stone treatment, whose basic model constituted the divine archetype of the one who, after the year 70 a. of C. was devastated by the Roman legions and the posterity considered like the temple of temples: the temple of Salomón.

Surely inspired by the same Masonic principles used by the Phoenician artisans who also provided labor and materials to the architect of that beautiful and at the same time esoteric Song of Songs, the truth is that the stonemasons who justified the subsequent comments of admiration 'unamunianos ', whose pen praised the melancholy of that polished stone sun-kissing, must have incorporated, in its mythical wandering, part of that Compostela style mannerism or architecture of the Way, some of whose effects can still be seen in nearby temples and cathedrals, as they could being Avila's own cathedral, as well as the church of San Vicente from Avila, whose janística or bifurcated west doorway, surely reminds us of the creations of Maestro Mateo or of those others who intervened, at least, on the cover of Platerías.

Likewise, the magnificent dome of oriental aspect, compels us to look for the footprint of those other stonemasons, if not the same ones, who bequeathed the brilliance of some domework as wonderful, which are none other than the ones that look like the cathedral. of Zamora and the collegiate church of Santa María de Toro.

Worthy of admiration, and no less important, after all, are those impressive masterpieces of Romanesque painting, which still survive among the chiaroscuro of a nave whose elegance constitutes that giant step towards a 'nouveau faire', the Gothic, in the one that some see the practical application of that language of the stone or language of the birds, like Fulcanelli, and others, the logical development to the solution of some technical problems, that would make obsolete previous styles.

Magnificent example of plasticity, allegory and archetypes, are the frescoes of the Chapel of San Martín. And with these, the no less artisan and fascinating set of merits and mementos that generated a reliable industry in this and other interesting areas of Castile and Leon: the medieval tombs.

In short: the old cathedral of Salamanca: a historical and artistic universe worth discovering.

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NOTICE: originally published in my blog ROMÁNICA, ENIGMAS DEL ROMÁNICO ESPAÑOL. Both the text, as the photographs, and the video (except music, reproduced under a YouTube license), are my exclusive intellectual property. The original entry, where you can check the authorship of juancar347, can be found at the following address: https://juancar347-romanica.blogspot.com/2016/11/la-catedral-vieja-de-salamanca.html

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