I thought it was cool because it is where Christopher Columbus really is buried. There are rumors saying that he has been buried in West Indies, Portugal, Spain, and Cuba. The truth is he has been buried in all those places and the distance his remains have traveled is almost as far as Christopher himself traveled. His body had been passed around all of those places, but now is in this cathedral in Spain. His tomb is very, very fancy. It has been lifted above the ground by four metal men, one on each corner of the tomb which represent the four kingdoms of Aragon, Castile, Leon and Navarra.
A very important feature to this church is the Giralda. It was a minaret for the mosque and now is a clock tower for the church. Sadly, we weren't able to go up in it because of on-going preservation. Although, many clock towers in the United States were fashioned after it.
This church is cool for other reasons as well. This cathedral is the place where Ferdinand Magellan started and ended his around the world journey in 1515.
This church also has many elegant and beautiful features to it. For example, there is an over 100 pipe organ that is well decorated and has teeny tiny pipes and pipes longer than your car. I could only imagine how wonderful it would sound when someone actually played it, although we did hear a small snippet of the organ when we arrived at the church.
Like many large cathedrals, this one has many separate chapels or rooms off the main cathedral, some hold tombs or relics of popes or saints or art and mosaics.
Some even hold separate little areas to pray or sit and listen to the organ or just to think. One of the chapels held flags of the countries that Ferdinand Magellan passed on his journey.
A couple of interesting facts about this cathedral are, one; it is the third largest cathedral in the world compared to Saint Peter's in Rome and Saint Mark's in Venice. And second; it was a mosque before it was a church.
Lastly, in the back of the church is a garden where there are orange trees, fountains and benches. The fountains date back to when this church was still a mosque. They were used for ablolutions. An abolution is when a person who is Muslim, wash their feet, hands and faces before they go in to the mosque. This garden is also interesting because of the drainage system. The drains are open and carved into the ground, when it rains, the drains run the water down to the orange trees to water them.
This church is quite touristy but don't forget to stop by if you ever are in Sevilla.
-Marin-
Hello Marin,
ReplyDeleteSounds like a beautiful place with an abundance of history. My favorite part is that there are separate wee rooms to listen, think & pray.
Thank you for sharing!
So much love from CC