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The three rose windows in the semicircular apse are richly decorated with ogival nervures, and correspond, one to the nave and one to each of the aisles; they belong to the primitive structure, having illuminated the afore-mentioned chapels.
The cathedral itself is a late ogival building belonging to the fifteenth century; though it cannot compare in fairy-like beauty with that of Leon, nor in majesty with that of Burgos, it is nevertheless one of the richest Gothic structures in Spain, especially as regards the decoration of the interior.
This one was embellished with what are known as "ogival arcatures," arranged in zones or ranks, and there were four immense turrets, one at each corner, these being in turn covered with arcatures of the same character. These flanked the large open-work, gilded, clock face.
The new temple was therefore erected beside the former, and, obeying the art impulses of the centuries which witnessed its construction, is an ogival church spoilt or bettered by Renaissance, plateresque, and grotesque decorative elements. The Old Cathedral.
Later, in other centuries, the spirit of architecture had completely died out in Spain, and the additions made in these days are so many lamentable signs of decadence. Not so the ogival introduction in Romanesque churches, which in many cases improved the Romanesque appearance.
Unluckily, additions were made: the pointed arches of the façade were surmounted by a rectangular body which had nothing in common with the principle set down when the cathedral was to have been purely ogival. The interior of the church was also enlarged, especially the high altar, the base of which was doubled in size.
The cloister dating from the fourteenth and fifteenth centuries is another of Galicia's monuments well worth a visit, which proves the local mixture of Romanesque and ogival, and is, perhaps, the last example on record, as toward the fifteenth century Renaissance elements had completely captured all art monuments.
The cloister, bare on the inner side, is nevertheless a modest Gothic structure with acceptable lobulated ogival windows. Western Castile The history of Palencia can be divided into two distinct parts, separated from each other by a lapse of about five hundred years, during which the city was entirely blotted out from the map of Spain.
The apse, with its three harmonizing étages corresponding to the chapels, aisles, and nave, and flanked by leaning buttresses ornamented with delicate pinnacles, is Gothic in its details; the ensemble is, nevertheless, Renaissance, thanks to a perfect symmetry painfully pronounced by naked horizontal lines so contradictory to the spirit of true ogival.
It is a massive, almost windowless, semicircular body, its bare walls unsupported by buttresses, and every inch of it like the corner-tower of a castle wall, crenelated and flat-topped. The same author opines that the transept, a handsome, broad, and airy ogival nave, dates from the fourteenth century, whereas the western front of the church is of a much more recent date.
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