Stone Books: Soria, the church of Santo Domingo

Santo Tomé or Santo Domingo. No matter the name or the invocation, if we really have in mind that we speak of one of the most important and significant Romanesque temples of Soria, if not Romanesque peninsular.

Declared a Historic Artistic Monument in June 1931, its main front, oriented to the west - it would not be surprising, that many pilgrims who came to the Soria capital through the so-called road Castilian-Aragonese, did so with the mind predisposed not only to take advantage the relevant lessons of the different scales of its route, but also looking determinedly towards that extra ultra something further from Compostela, called Finis Terrae, is another one of those stone books, monumental and of a symbolic richness, that it deserves, when less, a mention, brief or not, in this I hope that interesting library - understand in a poetic and comparative way - of immeasurable medieval incunabula that still resist, fiercely, the embites of time and of men.

Its genesis, prologue or capitular tree of Jesse -that every book that boasts, also has its divine genealogy-, is linked to singular characters that by realengo and representativeness conveniently secured a prominent place in the indexes or reprints of History, taking its authors -whose bones rest in anonymous crypt, possibly deeper and safe than those of poor Cervantes, recently desecrated-, an extra-Pyrenean and Poitevin origin, which makes it possible to compare it with that other encyclopedic book located in Poitiers, -smooth with the chisel of the mother tongue of Moliére-, dedicated to the figure of Our Lady.

Nothing more appropriate, then, than to begin to break down chapters, lecturing on the Great Lady, because in the iconography of our temple is located one of the very rare oddities-the Trinity Paternitas of his tympanum-that should already indicate to what extent it was important his figure, introducing the reader, step by step and in addition, in a genuine thriller of Pauline mystery, personality impersonation - malleus malleficarum - and speculation difficult to overcome.

To this we should add that little-known aspect too, but present in the symbolism of some rosettes, which alludes, by its unequivocal shape of a wheel, to another very determined person who is sometimes depicted with a januinately familiar bifrontality - sorry for the orthographic license: the Goddess Fortuna, and in this case, it has a great similarity with the rosette that crowns the church of the nearby Cistercian monastery of Santa María de Huerta, whose founding monks, splinters of Cluny, came, likewise, from the old Frankish kingdom of the praised Charlemagne.

It is not surprising, therefore, that in later centuries, the critical eye of many art scholars, such as Blas Taracena, considered this cover to be the richest and most harmonious of Romanesque churches in Spain. Opinion shared, in addition, by José Antonio Gaya Nuño, who also sent it to us through the mouth of his beloved and immortal character, San Saturio Santero, although this one, undoubtedly more humble but undoubtedly with an exquisite taste, preferred San Juan de Duero, who does not have a chaplain or beatas, but where the warrior worm of the hospitable gentlemen remains.

These were, precisely, those who escorted Leonor-daughter of Henry II of England and Leonor of Aquitaine, from whom he obtained his dukedom-for his betrothal in this church with Alfonso VIII, and those who passed, in the course of his trip to the capital city of Soria, for the parcel they had in Hortezuela, a small town located approximately halfway along two important towns such as El Burgo de Osma and Berlanga de Duero, of which there is hardly any a church practically remodeled from top to bottom, on whose simple main portico there is still a cross of eight beatitudes that distinguished -without that it constituted an exclusive privilege- the aforementioned order.

Like mountainous crosses or calatravesas - later heirs of the Templars -, the stonemasons wanted some warriors on their shields, perhaps with the intention of highlighting that important chapter that, after all, military orders played in another Crusade that had little to envy, in reality, the one that was developing in the East, if we except, of course, the Holy Places: those smelled by the great paradigm that has always been the figure of Jesus.

Scenes of tenderness and cruelty; of pain, of faith, of hope and of charity, the chapters distributed in that figurative half-moon that are the archivolts, direct the eyes of the spectator towards New Testament mysteries, which unfold, sine quanum, under the attentive symphony of the twenty-four Elderly musicians , that confirm, with their presence, that pejorative sense of revelation that always carries the term Apocalypse.

Deployed, then, like the wings of the Sanjuanera eagle, the music that imaginatively emerges from their instruments transports us, as privileged readers, to this fantastic universe of myths representative of the medieval world, in which Salome's lustful dance serves as the culmination of the beheading of the Baptist, produced a few years after the episode of the Jordan and that the Devil woke up in the fearful heart of Herod bloody beats that would lead him to order the slaughter of the innocents, once mocked also by three Magi, in whose dream a angel of rondón - perhaps Gabriel, the same one that accompanied to the prophet Mohammed in his eschatological trip or mi'ray, precursor, according to some sources, of the dantesca Divine Comedy? -, to induce them to continue towards the manger, destiny point to the that would lead them to an intelligent star.

The Adoration, continuation and prelude, at the same time, which suggests the integration in the plot of the Messianic figure par excellence: that which, once purified in man, would embody another even more mystical figure, such as the king's sacred, whose holocaust, is predestined from the dawn of time to be the lamb of God who cleanses the sins of the world. Opus Nigrum. The Work concludes. Above it, the Creative Hand: the same that already figured in the subjective prehistoric mentalities; the ineffable Veil of the Unknown; the hand of God. Worthy scenario for the Betrothal of a King.

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NOTICE to CHEETAH and NAVIGANTES: this article is taken from my blog TRAS LAS HUELLAS DE LOS MEDIEVALES. Both the text, as the photos, and the complementary video, which can be seen in the original entry, belong to me. This entry can be found at the following address: http://canterosmedievales.blogspot.com/2015/05/libros-de-piedra-soria-el-portico-de.html.