Old Buildings 1Old Gothic houses of Funchal
Old Buildings
Original title: Edifícios Antigos
Survey of the oldest surviving civil and religious buildings of Madeira, especially Funchal houses with Gothic twin-light windows, most since demolished, and the churches noted as late Gothic by Dr Neale in 1844.
1Old Gothic houses of Funchal
Besides the customs house (Alfândega) building, whose arcades and interior doorways bear, as Dr Azevedo puts it, the indelible architectural stamp of the Manueline style, there stood in Funchal some half a century ago four buildings whose Gothic twin-light windows likewise suggested considerable antiquity. These buildings drew the attention of everyone versed in architecture. Three of them vanished many years ago beneath the destructive sledgehammer, which in our land generally respects nothing, and only one now remains standing. It must be regarded as a true relic of the times when the Gothic architectural style was still used in the buildings of Funchal.
The building to which we refer, which belonged to the holder of the entail (morgado) Pedro Cipriano de Ornelas, stands in Rua dos Aranhas, or Rua do Dr. Chaves, at the far end of an enclosure whose gateway bears the arms of the Ornelas family and the date 1606. In this building, in 1693, ‘a most noble woman, by the name of Dona Mécia’ was killed by a musket shot fired from the convent grounds of the former Convent of São Francisco (St Francis of Assisi), as she stood at a window overlooking those grounds. The incident, which Camilo Castelo Branco romanticised in his book O Santo da Montanha, was related by António Vanguerve Cabral in a work entitled Epilogo juridico de varios casos civeis e crimes.
According to Vanguerve Cabral, who in 1693 was commissary judge of the bishopric of Funchal and assessor to the bishop, the killing was accidental, ‘its author being a religious who took up a musket loaded with quarter-shot, saying that he wished to shoot at a kestrel, and indeed he fired and missed his shot’.
When we wrote about Columbus, on p. 286 of this Elucidario, we referred to one of the three old buildings since demolished. Of the other two, one stood in the former Rua do Peru, now Rua do Comércio, and the other in Rua da Boa Viagem. Both of them likewise had twin-light windows, marking the transition from Gothic to Renaissance.
The house in Rua da Boa Viagem, which belonged to the chantry (capela) founded by Bento da Veiga, had two windows, whose stones were sold to a British subject, who had them shipped to his own country. The house in Rua do Peru, belonging to the Count of Carvalhal (‘oak grove’), had only one window, and we do not know what became of its stones. The stones of the window of Columbus’s house were in the possession of the heirs of the late Councillor (conselheiro, honorary title of the royal council) Agostinho de Ornelas, and the window itself was photographed by the photographer João Camacho at the time of the demolition.
2Gothic churches noted by Neale
Apart from the buildings mentioned, we know of no other civil construction notable for its age and architectural type. Among the religious buildings, however, there are some that Dr Neale singled out, in a paper read before the Cambridge Camdem Society in 1844, as showing more or less distinctly the tertiary Gothic or Flamboyant style, which appeared in Europe in the 14th and 15th centuries.
The churches mentioned by Dr Neale were the Cathedral (Sé Catedral), the church of Machico, the chapel of the Lord of Miracles (Senhor dos Milagres), the church of Santa Cruz, the chapel of Our Lady of the Snows, the churches of the Incarnation and of St Clare (Santa Clara), the church of São Bernardino (St Bernardino of Siena) in Câmara de Lobos (‘seals’ den’), the church of Estreito da Calheta (‘the narrows of Calheta’), the church of Porto Santo (‘holy harbour’), the chapel of São Sebastião on the same island, etc. It should be noted, however, that many of these buildings underwent more or less considerable alterations after 1844, which gave them a somewhat different appearance from the one they had before.
Dr Neale gave a fairly extensive description of Funchal Cathedral, whose interior beauties he admires, though he adds that on the outside only the chapel of the Santíssimo Sacramento has work and ornament worthy of note.
Funchal Cathedral (the Sé), as is well known, is classed as a National Monument (monumento nacional). Its architecture is Manueline, and its construction began shortly after 1493.
In this article
Time
Years mentioned · 04-
The wine levy was applied to building Funchal Cathedral, whose construction began shortly afterwards.
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The date 1606 was carved with the Ornelas arms on the gate of a surviving Gothic house in Funchal.
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D. Mécia was accidentally shot dead by a friar from the grounds of the São Francisco convent.
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The Rev. J. M. Neale's paper on the ecclesiology and Gothic churches of Madeira was read before the Cambridge Camden Society.
Place
Places mentioned · 17- Old buildings · Subject
Machico
Survey of the oldest surviving civil and religious buildings of Madeira. It deals especially with Funchal houses with Gothic twin-light windows, most since demolished, and with the churches Dr Neale described as late Gothic in 1844.
- Chapel of Our Lady of the Snows
Funchal. Chapel cited by Neale.
The Capela de Nossa Senhora das Neves is a sixteenth-century chapel near the Garajau headland east of Funchal, founded by the early settler João Afonso Mealheiro and his wife Catarina de Sá. It gave its name to the locality, was the seat of a curacy and first housed the parish of São Gonçalo. Popular belief held that a cleric struggled with the devil near it.
- Chapel of the Lord of Miracles
Machico. Chapel cited by Neale.
The Capela do Senhor dos Milagres is a historic chapel on the Largo dos Milagres in Machico, formerly of Cristo or the Misericórdia. It is said to have been founded from the discoverers' vow at the landing site and is claimed to be Madeira's first church, a claim the Elucidário disputes. It was destroyed in the 1803 flood, when its image was found at sea by an American ship; it was later repaired by Roberto Page and is the centre of a pilgrimage on 9 October.
- Convent of St Clare
Funchal. Church cited by Neale.
A convent in Funchal founded in 1492–97 by the second captain-donatary João Gonçalves da Câmara beside the church of Conceição de Cima. It is the burial place of the Câmara family and holds a 1447 document spelling the name 'Zargo'. It was granted in 1912 for a new hospital and was later chosen to house the archaeological museum.
- Convent of St Francis
Funchal. From its grounds the fatal 1693 shot was fired.
The Convento de São Francisco was a Franciscan convent in Funchal founded in 1473, which marked the western limit of the city in 1508. Its church was demolished in 1865, and its fittings, books, tombstones and bones went to the Angústias cemetery, the museum and the Municipal Library. Its buildings briefly lodged prisoners until 1836 and housed the police in 1857.
- Convent of the Incarnation
Funchal. Church cited by Neale.
A Funchal convent founded by Canon Henrique Calaça de Viveiros after 1508. Its chapel temporarily housed the parish seat, and a new seminary building was raised in its grounds in 1909. It was proposed as a site for the hospital, the asylum and the prison.
- Estreito da Calheta
Calheta. Its church was cited by Neale.
Estreito da Calheta is a parish of Calheta municipality in western Madeira, bounded by the Ribeira de São Bartolomeu and the Ribeira Funda. Its parish church of Nossa Senhora da Graça was founded by the França family, and the entry covers its landholding settlers, chapels, localities, schools and irrigation by the Levada Nova do Rabaçal; Prazeres was separated from it in 1733.
- Funchal
City where the old houses stood.
The capital of the archipelago and seat of the principal captaincy, where settlement began; it was made a vila c.1451–52. Its bay, the widest in the archipelago, lies between Ponta do Garajau and Ponta da Cruz and offers sheltered anchorage, though its harbour had never been studied oceanographically. The Elucidário discusses it as a health resort with climate data and records the January 1906 disturbances, the Danish prince's visit in May 1846 and recent volcanic cones in the area.
- Funchal Cathedral (the Sé)
Funchal. Manueline cathedral begun after 1493.
The Sé do Funchal is the cathedral of Funchal, in the parish of Sé. It was begun in 1493, became a parish seat in 1508 and a cathedral in 1514. It was the starting point of processions and the place of the vow to São Tiago, and bishops are buried there.
- Funchal customs house
Funchal. Customs house with Manueline arcades.
The Manueline customs house of Funchal, ordered to be built in 1508, with arcades and a courtyard chapel of Santo António built in 1714, now deconsecrated. It was directed by the provedor until 1775 and repaired after the 1748 earthquake. It was surrounded by mutinous troops in 1626 and stormed in 1641, the 1868 riot took place on the beach nearby, and it later housed the Civil Government offices and archive.
People
People mentioned · 12-
Late councillor whose heirs held the window stones of Columbus's house.
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Commissary judge of the Funchal diocese in 1693 who recorded D. Mécia's killing.
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Author quoted on the Manueline character of the Alfândega building.
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Founder of the chaplaincy owning the Rua da Boa Viagem house.
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Portuguese novelist who romanticised D. Mécia's death in O Santo da Montanha.
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Navigator whose reputed Funchal house was one of the demolished Gothic buildings.
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Owner of the old house in Rua do Peru.
- D. Méciad. 1693
Noblewoman accidentally shot dead at a window of the Ornelas house in 1693.
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Author of 'Casas Madeirenses', cited for further reading.
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Photographer who photographed the Columbus house window at its demolition.
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Author of an 1844 paper to the Cambridge Camden Society on Madeira's Gothic churches.
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Morgado who owned the surviving Gothic house in Rua dos Aranhas.