Structurae

The Santiago de Compostela Cathedral Archive possesses a manuscript titled Memoria de la Catedral de Santiago, written and illustrated with twelve drawings by the young Canon José de Vega y Verdugo between 1655 and 1656. The text deals with his ideas the renovation of the old Romanesque cathedral, especially his plan for hiding the ancient basilica behind newly constructed façades, cupolas and steeples of new construction, giving it a new external unity following the new European style, the Baroque. The author informs us about construction techniques to support his proposals, which he learned in the Escorial monastery, in whose seminary he became a priest (¿1637-1645?), and in the Rome of Bernini, Borromini and Pietro da Cortona, a city where he lived for several years, working for the Spanish ambassador Count Íñigo Vélez de Guevara and for Cardinal Gil Carrillo de Albornoz, and where he was named canon of Santiago by Pope Inocencio X (1647?-1649). He also cites prestigious national and Italian monuments as models which, I am convinced, he knew personally.