Vitruvius and Borromeus in the Chancel of the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela: Proportion and Symmetry according to Canon José de Vega y Verdugo (1656-1657)

Abstract

The Archive of the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela contains a record addressed to the chapter, today known as the Memoria sobre las Obras de la Catedral de Santiago (Report on Works in the Cathedral of Santiago), written between 1656 and 1657 by the then young Canon José de Vega y Verdugo. This exceptional manuscript, a masterpiece of Baroque artistic literature, contains the author’s ideas on reforming the mediaeval chancel, the area containing the tomb of the Apostle St. James visited by pilgrims from all over Europe. His proposals, in Classicist style and illustrated with a number of drawings of his own making, reveal the infl uence of Vitruvius’ De Architectura, the Instructiones Fabricae of Carolus Borromeus, and other writings influenced by the Counter-Reformation. This paper is dedicated to a study of these sources.