Stone Crosses, in Puebla del Caramiñal
According to the centennial elements, there were registered 27 transepts in A Pobra. They were spread along the barely 34Km of the municipal area, a clear indicator of its high density of monumental traces.
Transepts are the proof of a Medieval deep rooted art. As such, architecture and sculpture appear to be closely bound.
The transept is not only the art of stone but also a reminder of the union between the death and the living, that is, a permanent pray, an expression of any private devotion. There are funerary transepts (in the cemeteries); others were built to show holy places (as those in the atriums, the holy crossroads) and finally, those delimiting the frontiers between parishes.
A whole world of rites and ancestral traditions turns around the transepts and this usually opposes to orthodoxy, which labels them as “popular beliefs”. That’s why they have such an ethnographical value.
The traditional “vara” transepts, also called timber transept, present in A Pobra municipality have a stone grandstand, a pedestal, a timber, a capital and a crucifix. They can also hold a figure of the Virgin with angels and even symbols of The Passion. The transept in San Lázaro Beach standouts for their antiquity and its great artistic value (now it can be seen in the garden of Castro Dios family, in the entrance of A Pobra coming from Boiro). This is also the case of the transepts of A Mercé, San Isidoro, Santa Cruz de Lesón (1595) and O Xobre’s graveyard, which all belong to the end of the 16th and 17th centuries. But most of the transepts belong to the 18th century; there are splendid those in the atrium of O Deán (1750), Cristo do Pichón (1750), Casás (177-), Ouxo (1774), O Pumadiño (1774), A Silva (1775), Abuín (1779), A Ponte Barbanza (1706) and restored in the 20th century, and so on. It is easy to recognise the repairing effect of the workshops.
The transept built by the Franciscans in O Mano Bridge (1620) still keeps a “peto das ánimas” or Alms’ box. Its aim is to collect the coins left by the believers in order to save those alms trapped in the Purgatory.
Apart from the timber transepts, there are other transepts called “loretos” or “de capeliña”, which are the genuine from O Barbanza. These transepts differ from the timber ones in the fact that they substitute the timber for a thick pillar and the capital for a niche holding a figure of the Virgin. The oldest transepts could belong to the 16th century although they were widely spread from the 17th century onwards. This is the case of the transept of Moldes, Xunqueiras (1679), A Pontenaveira, A Banda and O Cruceiro Novo. Almost all of them were painted (Moldes – until 1983 -, Xunqueiras, A Pontenaveira).
Transepts are the trees of faith and popular monuments, the preserved evidence of the fact that the cult and the popular are two different worlds that coexist in close contact:
Stone Cross of San Lázaro-Stone Cross of Moldes"Loreto"-Stone Cross of San Isidro
According to the centennial elements, there were registered 27 transepts in A Pobra. They were spread along the barely 34Km of the municipal area, a clear indicator of its high density of monumental traces.
Transepts are the proof of a Medieval deep rooted art. As such, architecture and sculpture appear to be closely bound.
The transept is not only the art of stone but also a reminder of the union between the death and the living, that is, a permanent pray, an expression of any private devotion. There are funerary transepts (in the cemeteries); others were built to show holy places (as those in the atriums, the holy crossroads) and finally, those delimiting the frontiers between parishes.
A whole world of rites and ancestral traditions turns around the transepts and this usually opposes to orthodoxy, which labels them as “popular beliefs”. That’s why they have such an ethnographical value.
The traditional “vara” transepts, also called timber transept, present in A Pobra municipality have a stone grandstand, a pedestal, a timber, a capital and a crucifix. They can also hold a figure of the Virgin with angels and even symbols of The Passion. The transept in San Lázaro Beach standouts for their antiquity and its great artistic value (now it can be seen in the garden of Castro Dios family, in the entrance of A Pobra coming from Boiro). This is also the case of the transepts of A Mercé, San Isidoro, Santa Cruz de Lesón (1595) and O Xobre’s graveyard, which all belong to the end of the 16th and 17th centuries. But most of the transepts belong to the 18th century; there are splendid those in the atrium of O Deán (1750), Cristo do Pichón (1750), Casás (177-), Ouxo (1774), O Pumadiño (1774), A Silva (1775), Abuín (1779), A Ponte Barbanza (1706) and restored in the 20th century, and so on. It is easy to recognise the repairing effect of the workshops.
The transept built by the Franciscans in O Mano Bridge (1620) still keeps a “peto das ánimas” or Alms’ box. Its aim is to collect the coins left by the believers in order to save those alms trapped in the Purgatory.
Apart from the timber transepts, there are other transepts called “loretos” or “de capeliña”, which are the genuine from O Barbanza. These transepts differ from the timber ones in the fact that they substitute the timber for a thick pillar and the capital for a niche holding a figure of the Virgin. The oldest transepts could belong to the 16th century although they were widely spread from the 17th century onwards. This is the case of the transept of Moldes, Xunqueiras (1679), A Pontenaveira, A Banda and O Cruceiro Novo. Almost all of them were painted (Moldes – until 1983 -, Xunqueiras, A Pontenaveira).
Transepts are the trees of faith and popular monuments, the preserved evidence of the fact that the cult and the popular are two different worlds that coexist in close contact:
Stone Cross of San Lázaro-Stone Cross of Moldes"Loreto"-Stone Cross of San Isidro