DOI Page / Citation link:
https://doi.org/10.11588/diglit.16632#0410
The Renaissance in Spain and Portugal
381
date; the royal court at Batalha is mediaeval, and the garden site still preserved with its
five beautiful fountains may have been just the same in the sixteenth or even the fifteenth
century. It differs in beauty, but otherwise is not very unlike other garden courts of the
time in essentials of style. The courts in actual Renaissance days seem to have had more
sides to them. In the court of San Francisco at Evora there are boxes placed in the figure
of a star and making a pretty pattern with the paths, and a fountain in the centre. The
small walls are covered with tiles. Nowadays places of the kind are still called alegretes,
which may be translated pleasure-gardens. The expression was used as early as Philip II.'s
time, for he writes to his daughters in July 1581: " There are little gardens here in different
parts, which are not bad, and are called alegretes.
We will get the plans of them." One may
suppose there was a likeness to the giardini
secreti of the Italians; but perhaps the only idea
was to show some fixed design in the laying
out, like that found at Evora.
In one of his letters soon after, Philip
particularly admires the monastery garden at
Cintra, the Penha longa, which took its name
from the long rock on which it was built.
"They are pretty, and there are numbers of
them; there are lovely fountains which I should
like to bring away with me." Much is still told
of these gardens enclosed by walls beside the
monastery, and of a grotto near a fountain that
was paved with flags, and other things of the
kind. One of the finest cloister courts of
Portugal, perhaps of the whole world, is the
great court of the cloister at Belem on the out-
skirts of Lisbon, the chief creation and the best
beloved one of the fortunate King Manuel.
TO,: . • i-rr j FIG. 304. QUINTA DI BACALHAO—PLAN OF
1ms court, with an indifferent garden at 3 ^ v
7 ° the site
present, had an unusual one until 1830. The
fountain now on the north-west of the court made the centre piece of an island, which
was connected by bridges with four others. All of these were in the same pond, which
had the shape of a star. The high perpendicular banks were covered with tiles, and the
islands were laid out as gardens. Similar to this was the court of Santa Cruz at Coimbra;
here there were little chapels on the islands which were round a rotunda of open pillars;
these also were united by bridges. Small canals emerged from the pond, and in the extra
corners there were hedges and beds. These cloister courts have a certain relationship with
the court of the Esconal. But they are not only prior in time; they are also superior in the
luxuriance and delicate treatment of the whole garden arrangements.
Of the non-clerical buildings, the villas and their gardens, one treasure has been left
from the first half of the seventeenth century, in the property that Dom Joao de Castro,
the great Viceroy of the Indies, made and called Penha verde. The simple house stands
close to the slope of the Serra, not far from Cintra. The garden, in front of the castle, is a
t—2 c
381
date; the royal court at Batalha is mediaeval, and the garden site still preserved with its
five beautiful fountains may have been just the same in the sixteenth or even the fifteenth
century. It differs in beauty, but otherwise is not very unlike other garden courts of the
time in essentials of style. The courts in actual Renaissance days seem to have had more
sides to them. In the court of San Francisco at Evora there are boxes placed in the figure
of a star and making a pretty pattern with the paths, and a fountain in the centre. The
small walls are covered with tiles. Nowadays places of the kind are still called alegretes,
which may be translated pleasure-gardens. The expression was used as early as Philip II.'s
time, for he writes to his daughters in July 1581: " There are little gardens here in different
parts, which are not bad, and are called alegretes.
We will get the plans of them." One may
suppose there was a likeness to the giardini
secreti of the Italians; but perhaps the only idea
was to show some fixed design in the laying
out, like that found at Evora.
In one of his letters soon after, Philip
particularly admires the monastery garden at
Cintra, the Penha longa, which took its name
from the long rock on which it was built.
"They are pretty, and there are numbers of
them; there are lovely fountains which I should
like to bring away with me." Much is still told
of these gardens enclosed by walls beside the
monastery, and of a grotto near a fountain that
was paved with flags, and other things of the
kind. One of the finest cloister courts of
Portugal, perhaps of the whole world, is the
great court of the cloister at Belem on the out-
skirts of Lisbon, the chief creation and the best
beloved one of the fortunate King Manuel.
TO,: . • i-rr j FIG. 304. QUINTA DI BACALHAO—PLAN OF
1ms court, with an indifferent garden at 3 ^ v
7 ° the site
present, had an unusual one until 1830. The
fountain now on the north-west of the court made the centre piece of an island, which
was connected by bridges with four others. All of these were in the same pond, which
had the shape of a star. The high perpendicular banks were covered with tiles, and the
islands were laid out as gardens. Similar to this was the court of Santa Cruz at Coimbra;
here there were little chapels on the islands which were round a rotunda of open pillars;
these also were united by bridges. Small canals emerged from the pond, and in the extra
corners there were hedges and beds. These cloister courts have a certain relationship with
the court of the Esconal. But they are not only prior in time; they are also superior in the
luxuriance and delicate treatment of the whole garden arrangements.
Of the non-clerical buildings, the villas and their gardens, one treasure has been left
from the first half of the seventeenth century, in the property that Dom Joao de Castro,
the great Viceroy of the Indies, made and called Penha verde. The simple house stands
close to the slope of the Serra, not far from Cintra. The garden, in front of the castle, is a
t—2 c