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Updated: May 11, 2025
Vastly superior in all respects to the lower body are the upper stories, of which the first is begun by a pinnacled balustrade running from tower to tower; in the centre, between the two towers, there is an immense rosace of a magnificent design and embellished by means of an ogival arch in delicate relief; the windows of the tower, as well as in the superior bodies, are pure ogival.
The three portals are massive Romanesque without floral or sculptural decoration of any kind; the central door is larger and surmounted by a large though primitive rosace.
A vast rosace behind the choir, a window with tortuous branchings above the entrance, shimmer with the tints of amethyst, ruby, emerald and topaz like leafy labyrinths in which lights from above break in and diffuse themselves in shifting radiance.
The rosace is substituted by a three-lobed window, the central pane of which is larger than the lateral two. As this northern façade is almost fifteen feet higher than the ground-plan of the temple, on account of the street being much higher, a flight of steps leads down into the transept.
The cathedral's outline was traced: a Roman cruciform Gothic structure of five aisles and a bold transept; two flanking towers, of which only the northern has been constructed, the other having been substituted by a cupola of decided Byzantine or Oriental taste, and a noble western façade of three immense doors surmounted by a circular rosace thirty feet wide.
The western porch from its unfinished state does not offer any thing remarkable except the rosace of which we have already spoken. The southern porch, commonly called des Marmquzels, merits much more the attention of the curious, by the astonishing variety of sculptures, which ornament it. We may especially admire two pendants of a very bold execution.
The sacred edifice, standing in solemn isolation amongst the converging avenues of enormous trees, as if to put grave thoughts of heaven into the hours of ease, presented a closed Gothic portal to the light and glory of the west. The glass of the rosace above the ogive glowed like fiery coal in the deep carvings of a wheel of stone. The two men faced about.
The northern and southern extremities of the transept differ from each other as regard style. The southern has an ogival portal surmounted by a rosace; the northern, one that is plateresque, the rounded arch, delicately decorated, reposing on Corinthian columns.
The portal of the southern arm of the transept is an ugly addition, more modern and completely out of harmony with the rest. The rosace above the door is one of the handsomest of the Transition period in Spain, and the stained glass is both rich and mellow. The interior shows the same harmonious mixture of the stronger and more solemn old style, and the graceful lightness of the newer.
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