Image of the Saint in visigothic aperture. |
San Millán was still alive ( 6th century) when a small building they called a monastery was built, with six horseshoe arches, all unequal and of different apperture and even "badly constructed". Those could have been visigothic arches: the projections of it´s horseshoes went down until a third of the radius of the circumference (as if it was the horseshoe of a mule). At first the monastery existed joined at the front of the first cave, where there is a small visigothic niche that was employed as an altar. In the second there are visigothic niches, rustic and deteriorated. In the centre, was a little cavity that served as a tabernacle or sacrarium to celebrate the holy mass. The church at Suso is unique in Spain becaused it possessed two naves and had three different styles: visigothic, mozarabic and romanic. In front of this cave there are three horseshoe arches in the direction of the sepulchre of San Millán. |
These are not the same as those in the first part of the monastery, the keystones are not central, however the projection of the horseshoe is more closed - like that of a horse, for example -. They were constructed later than the first and with a different function: to be a gateway to receive the pilgrims and devotees that came to the miraculous tomb of the saint. In front of the third cave there is nothing more than a stone wall to close the fissure. In this same direction on two floors eight caves can be found, in which San Millán and his monks lived, orientated towards midday, so as to take heat from the sun. The years went past and after San Millán another hermit occupied his place as guide in Suso. Incognitos existed over the continuation of the monastic life during the 8th and 9th centuries under the muslim domain, but what is clear is that in the 10th century the monastery gained great splendour. In an era when the main body of churches were made of much more modest material (clay, rocks and mortar), the existence of a building in stone implied economic power and capacity of the mobilization of people to work. And so, in the second half of the 10th century the construction of the church was lengthened by two arches, but with horseshoe more closed: they are of mozarabic design. The most primitive part of the church, is supported on the caves excavated in the cliff, it presents an enormous similarity to the caliphal art, undoudtedly developed from Mozarabism here in the year 984. The second element, the part in which the actual naves correspond to the feet, it appears artistically to differentiate from the primitive church. By it´s external character - orientated to that of being romanic - they can be dated to the first half of the 11th century. |
|
|
The abbot says the holy mass, whilst a monk is excluded from the monastic communion as a form of punishment. |
