El Románico Segoviano

If you ask people to choose their most boring high school class, many will tell you, "history." But as one of the most diverse and interesting courses in general studies, I have to ask, why? It is not that the facts are not exciting, or that it's difficult to comprehend, or even that the professors are unenthusiastic. The answer to the question lies in the fact that for most students, these facts are intangible, an incident recorded on a piece of paper that holds no physical value for the learner. I personally love to read into the past and study stories before my time. But here in Segovia we can read about and look at history simultaneously, a way of learning so deep, my brainwaves extend to the bottom of the ocean.

In class, we are studying the artistic movement of Románico and its presence in Segovia. The movement dates back to the ninth century and has its origins in the French order of Cluny, a monastery of benedictine monks. Just as Cluny received land in Aquitaine and became independent of other authorities in France, the bones and relics of the Apostle Santiago were discovered in in Compostela. Similar to the Muslim pilgrimage to Mecca, Cluny publicized to the people the motive to walk the el camino de Santiago and go in peregrination to Santiago de Compostela. After arriving in Spain, the movement caught on like an alluvium, with the greatest quantity of its works built in Segovia.

Because churches were used as cemeteries (which did not exist in these ages), dozens were built in Segovia, each one housing the dead of a different family. And at all fourteen churches still standing, our class can now proudly name the architectural components and their meanings and understand them in a way we never would have if we hadn't got to stroll through them ourselves. All the architectural characteristics of the churches serve a purpose: to tell stories of the Bible to the faithful (most of whom could not read) through symbols and pictures. We know the floor plans of the buildings, a cruz latina, that is established to remember the cross of Christ and his mystical body that is the Church. We can show you that this body generally forms three naves, or aisles in every church. From the outside we see the sillares, or blocks, as symbols of the faithful and the pilares, pillars, as the apostles and saints that make up the church. It's easy to find the cabecera, the altar, the most sacred part of the church that forms three ábsides that jut out of the sides of the building in semicircles. We have turned 360 degrees with our retina the image of the pórticos, or porches, that are characteristic to Segovia because of its cold yet sunny climate. We can reason why the windows are so small, why the arcs are shaped the way they are, what the symbols mean above the doors and on top of the columns, and the function of the towers that stand tall over the city. All this not just from a textbook but from leaving our very own footprints in the structures we're studying.



More than just a museum tour, the possibilities of learning about Spanish history in this environment are endless. Class cannot be boring because we are not only talking about events that occurred in the past, but journeys we have taken in our own lives. We're not only learning about history, we are living it. And as for our exam tomorrow, we're all shooting for an A.