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Updated: June 23, 2025
Beneath the natural ogival cavity in which the apparition had appeared, at the spot where the pilgrims rubbed the chaplets and medals they wished to consecrate, the rock was quite worn away and polished. Millions of ardent lips had pressed kisses on the wall with such intensity of love that the stone was as though calcined, streaked with black veins, shining like marble.
It is a handsome area of Romanesque sculpture covered by an ogival vaulting, and would be an important monument if its rival and prototype in Santiago were not greater, both as regards its perfection of design, and the grand idea which inspired it. Of the three doors which lead into the cathedral, the western is crowned by three rounded arches reposing on simple columns.
What a pity that the huge choir, placed in the centre of the church, should so completely obstruct the view of the ensemble of the nave and aisles, separated by massive Byzantine arches between the solid pillars, which, in their turn, support the nascent ogival vaulting of the high nave!
This, in turn, was mostly rebuilt, and, two hundred years later , took the form of the present cathedral. It was completed, in a rather plain and heavy ogival style, under the capable direction of the William who came to Canterbury, in response to a call, to rebuild the choir of that English church in 1174.
The choir, as is most usual, is the masterpiece of the collection, the windows, in particular, being of the purest ogival style. In the first chapel, on the right, is a painting, "The Martyrdom of St. Sebastian," and behind the choir is an ancient work commemorative of "Le Peste de St. Dié." This ancient episcopal city has ever been devoted to the cause of Christianity.
By way of conclusion: the cathedral of Leon, restored to-day after years of ruin and neglect, stands forth as one of the master examples of Gothic workmanship, unrivalled in fairy-like beauty and, from an architectural point of view, the very best example of French ogival to be met with in Spain. Moreover, those who wrought it, felt the real principles of all Gothic architecture.
The windows which let in the little light that enters are ogival, proving the Transition period to which the crypt belongs; it was originally intended as the pantheon for the abbots of the monastery.
Documents that have been discovered state that in 1281 a hundred years after the city had been newly baptized the principal temple was a church and castle combined; in the fourteenth century this was completely torn down to make room for the new building, a modest ogival church of little or no merit.
Between the leaves, along the lofty plumes of greenery, within the large ogival arbour, and even along the branches strewing the flagstones, star-like beams glided drowsily, like the milky rain of light that filters through the bushes on moonlit nights.
Consequently, the cathedral church of Lugo, which otherwise might have been an architectural jewel, does not inspire the visitor with any of those sentiments that ought to be the very essence of time-worn religious edifices of all kinds. The nave shows decided affinity to early Gothic, as shown by the ogival arches and vaulting.
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