Location: La Calahorra, Granada Map
Constructed: 1509- 1512
Tel. 958 67 71 32
Open: 10am- 1pm, 4- 6pm Wed
The castle of La Calahorra stands on a hill at
1,250 m above sea level, which visually dominates the Marquisate of
Cenete, in the Spanish municipality of La Calahorra, province of
Granada, autonomous community of Andalusia.
The building was
one of the pioneers in the introduction of the Renaissance style in
Spanish civil architecture. Sober mass of military character on the
outside, offers a wrong image of the superb and distinguished
decoration of its interior. Built in a short period of time (the
decoration was completed in the period 1509-1512), for its execution
part of the stonework of the Arab fortress that was previously
located on the hill was used and, for its decoration, materials were
imported from Italy, techniques and artists. The original layout of
the building is currently unknown, the direction of the works was
initially entrusted to the Segovian architect Lorenzo Vázquez who,
due to disagreements with the Marquis of Cenete, was transferred to
the Genoese Michele Carlone. He would first work in his workshop in
Genoa, from where he would send the already carved Carrara marbles
to the port of Almería, and later exercise direction in the castle
itself to inspect the assembly and work with local materials. La
Calahorra is considered the first major work in which the work of
Italian artists in Spain is documented, although the different
origins of the authors who made its pieces (Lombards, Genoese and
Carraresis) explain the stylistic differences in the decoration of
the building, which nevertheless exhibits a surprising unity unlike
the parallel example in the Vélez-Blanco castle.
Regarding
its historical value, it stands out as a testimony of a fundamental
chapter in the history of the Cenete region in the 16th century, an
estate founded by Cardinal Mendoza in favor of his son, Don Rodrigo
Díaz de Vivar. It represents an anachronistic case at a time when
the monarchy ordered the demolition of the fortresses to consolidate
its presence before the people, and in order to prevent the
perpetuation of the relations of the old feudal nobility, orders
that have this exception made to the powerful military house of the
Mendozas.
As a recent fact of tourist interest, we can say
that both its exterior and interior were used for the filming of
some chapters of the series "The House of the Dragon", a prequel to
the great production "Game of Thrones".
The castle of La Calahorra is located on the highest part of a
level hill, a privileged place to control the lands of the
Marquisate and its communications and forming part of a unique
landscape in the foothills of the Sierra Nevada.
Archaeological excavations confirm that preceding the Renaissance
fortress there was another one from the Andalusian period. The
current one was erected at the beginning of the 16th century by the
illegitimate son of Cardinal Mendoza, who founded an estate in this
region in favor of his heir, Don Rodrigo Díaz de Vivar y Mendoza,
first Marquis of Cenete and Count of Cid, the last related title.
with his possession of the fortress of the mythical Cid Campeador in
Jadraque, a character of whom he would declare himself successor and
of whom he adopted his surname. Don Rodrigo Mendoza erected his
castle-palace in the south of the plateau, from where the best
visual control of the surrounding territory was obtained.
The
La Calahorra project must have been conceived during Don Rodrigo's
trip to Italy between 1506 and 1508, during which he must have
commissioned and obtained the first plans and designs for the
decoration of his castle. On the other hand, the inventory carried
out by the governor of Valencia of the library of Don Rodrigo Díaz
de Vivar, largely inherited from his father Cardinal Mendoza,
reveals the family's outstanding humanist training, a fact that
would also be reflected in the decorative program of the interior of
the castle. With 632 volumes, the library had an important presence
of classical Greco-Latin texts, as well as literature, treatises on
architecture and philosophy by authors of the Italian Renaissance.
The castle was inhabited by Rodrigo de Mendoza and María de
Fonseca for only eight years after the works were completed, and it
would be inherited by his daughters. It regained an important role
during the Alpujarras Rebellion or Moorish War (1568-1571),
especially violent in the Marquisate of Cenete, serving as a refuge
for the proclaimed Old Christians and quartering for the Marquis of
Mondéjar. It was subsequently abandoned for centuries, until at the
beginning of the 20th century it was almost sold and moved to the
United States before passing to its current owner.
As for the
documented remains of the Arab fortress from a previous period,
walls of towers and a bastion are preserved, as well as two small
pools and part of a wall. Due to the concentration of tile and lime
mortar inside the primitive enclosure, it is very likely that the
fortress housed a small population.
The fortress has a quadrangular plan, with approximate dimensions of
46.5x32 meters, with the long sides oriented north-south. Another
rectangular body of 26x15 meters is attached to the west façade,
equipped with an artillery bucket and inside which the staircase is
arranged. The castle is made up of masonry and ashlar walls, with a
cylindrical tower covered by a dome located in each of its corners, with
a diameter of 10 meters on the south wall and 13 meters on the north
wall. A walkway runs along the top of the walls, being semi-covered to
protect the guard from the weather. The property has a single access
door to the interior located in the northeast corner and which still
maintains the original materials: the wood of the gates and shutters
armored with overlapping and riveted iron slats, as well as its
clapboard, bolts and eyebolts. The access door is finished with the coat
of arms of the Fonseca, the family to which Don Rodrigo's second wife
belonged.
The backbone of the interior rooms is a cortile or
square patio measuring 20x20 meters, surrounded by two floors of
superimposed galleries with five arches on Corinthian columns. The
galleries are covered by groin vaults that rest towards the interior
wall on black Italian stone corbels, using cast iron braces in Valencia
to counteract the thrust, an element used here for the first time in
Spanish architecture.
The lower body of the gallery presents
semicircular arches on columns with high Corinthian capitals supported
by collars in which grotesque or geometric decoration alternates. The
arches adorn their intrados with flowers and garlands of alternating
designs, rings and threads are highlighted by moldings, and reliefs with
the heraldic shields of the Mendoza and Fonseca family are represented
on the spandrels. The lower gallery is made with limestone from the
area, and originally had a Latin inscription that read: «The first
marquis, Don Rodrigo de Mendoza, in the year 1510 and his 37th, ordered
the construction of this house ; but not for his own solace, but forced
to unjust leisure, on the occasion of fleeing from our unhappy Hesperia,
then, sheltered by this hill, he liked a little to wander thus far away,
while it was not lawful even to think of pretending anything else. in
reference to the harassment that the monarchy exerted on the old feudal
nobility in order to definitively end their privileges, something that
also justifies the tight deadline in which the works on the fortress
were carried out.
In the upper gallery, supported by
significantly lowered semicircular arches, the columns rest on pedestals
joined by a Carrara marble balustrade. In this gallery the decoration
focuses on the arms of the Fonsecas, the coats of arms of the Marquis
and the Mendoza family, decorating the intrados of the arches with
caskets of black Italian stone. Finally, on the entablature, Latin
inscriptions with texts from the biblical psalms, which together with
the Greco-Roman mythological references present in the decoration of the
patio and interior rooms, offer a humanist reading of the building.
The decoration of the doorways of the interior rooms stands out,
which are directly related to the character of the room. Among the most
relevant are those of the Hall of Justice, the Hall of the West, and the
Hall of the Marquises. The entrance to the Oratory is currently located
in the Museum of Fine Arts of Seville. Among the ornamental motifs there
are animals, fantastic beings, plant, fruit and floral motifs.
The façade of the Hall of Justice stands out for the presence of columns
decorated with thematic bands, garlands in the first section and heads
of angels in the second. The jambs offer profuse decoration supporting
an entablature with a curved pediment of coffered panels with floral and
fruit motifs. The lintel has marine beings linked together and
containers with fruits. This decorative program is completed with cups
between birds on the lintel and grotesques on the jambs.
The one
known as the Hall of the West has an ornamentation based on chiaroscuro
and horror vacui, with numerous agilely articulated animals that rest on
grotesques. A wide spectrum of animals and hybrid beings appear such as
eagles, dolphins, satyrs and mermaids.
Finally, the façade of the
Hall of the Marquises is resolved as a Roman triumphal arch,
highlighting its iconographic program based on classical mythology and
with a strong influence of the drawings of the Codex Escurialensis. On
the side pilasters, four are carved niches with reliefs of Hercules
Farnese, god Apollo and the goddesses of Fortune and Abundance. On the
pedestals, representations of the labors of Hercules: the battle against
the Hydra of Lerna and the capture of the Cretan bull. On the upper
frieze there are reliefs of sea goddesses and tritons, and on the jambs
two busts of Roman emperors.
The wide monumental staircase,
clearly reminiscent of Genoese in terms of conception and perspective,
is located in the compositional center of the west wing of the patio.
Composed of three large sections, its construction forced the perimeter
of the fortress to be expanded, nullifying a good part of its defensive
capabilities but demonstrating that the purely military character of the
castle-palace had taken a backseat.