Museum of San Juan de la Cruz

The Museum of Saint John of the Cross, is the only existing one in the world dedicated to his figure, it was inaugurated in 1978 in the premises of the convent of San Miguel de los Carmelitas Descalzos, where the mystical poet went to get cured of the “fever” :

(…) “I received here in La Peñuela the batch of letters that the servant brought me. I am very careful. Tomorrow I am going to Úbeda to heal from some fever, for which, (as there have been more than eight days that they give me every day and they do not cease) it seems that I will need medical help “(…).

This Carmelite convent was founded in 1587, under the invocation of San Miguel, patron of the city, as a result of the impulse that the Order of Carmel will receive from the hands of Saint Teresa of Jesus. Saint John of the Cross remains here from September 28 until his death in a poor cell at midnight between December 13 and 14, 1591.

In 1627, an Oratory was attached to the convent to house the tomb of Saint John of the Cross, being the first temple in the Catholic world built in his honor. It is thought that the Oratory is located in the same space as the cell where the Saint died, and there is an inscription on the façade that recalls this fact.

The Saint John of the Cross Museum is made up of various rooms, where the old Conventual Sacristy stands out, with various relics of the Saint, such as two fingers of his right hand and which are one of the main attractions of the Oratory. In other rooms, other spaces and objects that were related to the Saint are shown (iconography, the cell where he died, writings, etc.). The Museum has also been enriched with a notable library specialized in Saint John and spirituality issues.

Monument to San Juan de la Cruz

The monument to Saint John of the Cross stands very close to the museum, in the Plaza Primero de Mayo (First of May Square).

A monument in the form of a sculpture, made of polished white marble and limestone, which is the work and donation of the Malaga native sculptor Francisco Palma Burgos.

It was inaugurated on November 24, 1959, and in that year various events were held in honor of the Saint.

The monument, in perfect harmony with the square and the Church of San Pablo, was not the original idea. There was another more ambitious project, whose model you will be able to contemplate. But that is something you have yet to discover.

Puente Ariza (Ariza Bridge)

The Ariza Bridge, projected by the illustrious architect Andrés de Vandelvira, under the direction of works by the stonemason Antón Sánchez, from Úbeda and financed by the Bishop of Jaén, Don Diego de los Cobos de Molina, was built on the Guadalimar river and has great importance important because it was the main communication route between Úbeda and La Peñuela (La Carolina), so it was an obligatory passage from Saint John of the Cross to access the city where he went to “get cured of fever.”

The bridge, remarkable in itself because it is a masterpiece of Vandelvira´s civil engineering, for the treatment of the ashlars, the size of the main arch and its fit in the landscape, has a length of 99.5 meters and has been declared Cultural Heritage, in the category of Monuments, on February 4, 1993.

Since 1998 it has not been passable, as a consequence of the Giribaile Swamp coming into operation, being partially submerged under the waters and emerging in periods of drought.

Ariza bridge

El Puente Ariza, proyectado por el ilustre arquitecto Andrés de Vandelvira, bajo la dirección de obras del cantero Antón Sánchez, de Úbeda y financiado por el Obispo de Jaén, don Diego de los Cobos de Molina, está construido sobre el río Guadalimar y cobra importancia porque se trataba de la principal vía de comunicación entre Úbeda y la Peñuela (La Carolina), por lo que fue paso obligado de San Juan de la Cruz para acceder a la ciudad a la que acudió a “curarse de unas calenturillas”.

El puente, importante en sí mismo por ser una obra cumbre de la ingeniería civil de Vandelvira, por el tratamiento de los sillares, el tamaño del arco principal y su encaje en el paisaje, tiene una longitud de 99,5 metros y es Bien de Interés Cultural, en la categoría de Monumento, desde el 4 de febrero de 1993.

Desde 1998 no es transitable, como consecuencia de la entrada en funcionamiento del Pantano de Giribaile, quedando sumergido parcialmente bajo las aguas y emergiendo en periodos de sequía.

«Santísima Trinidad» Institute of Baeza

The “Santísima Trinidad” Institute of Baeza is where Machado takes possession of the French language chair, then called the General and Technical Institute.

The institute belongs to the Lorca itinerary because it was an obligatory meeting point on Martín Domínguez Berrueta’s study trips to Baeza, as evidenced by photographs by the professor of Theory of Arts and Literature at the University of Granada. Leopoldo Urquía, director of the institute with his daughter Paquita, whose sister Lorca dedicates Ciudad Perdida to, also appears in some of them. Thus, the young Lorca visited the Institute on his study trips.

The Institute, which currently belongs to the Andalusian Historical Educational Institutes Network, is located in the former Renaissance headquarters of the old University of Baeza. It still conserves intact the classroom where Machado taught his classes and in which furniture, belongings and documentation related to the life of the Sevillian poet as a teacher are exposed: old desks, teacher’s chair with brazier, wooden coat rack, umbrella …

Jabalquinto palace

The Jabalquinto Palace belongs to the interesting Lorca itinerary because it was one of the spaces visited by Federico García Lorca in Baeza, as specified by Rafael Laínez Alcalá, Machado’s student at the General and Technical Institute:

“(…) I saw a group of strangers accompanied by the archpriest of the Baezana cathedral (…) who were contemplating the façade of the Seminary, the old palace of Jabalquinto (…) Among the boys (…) Federico García Lorca, whom a few years later I would meet in Madrid. (…) “

At that time, the Palace belonged to the Seminary of San Felipe Neri, where future priests were trained. It is currently the headquarters of the International University of Andalusia (UNIA), an institution to support the Andalusian science and technology system in postgraduate training, research, knowledge transfer, digitization, permanent training and internationalization. In homage to Antonio Machado, the UNIA headquarters in Baeza bears his name. The UNIA is based in two buildings: the Old Conciliar Seminary, a baroque building located in the Plaza de Santa María, opposite the Cathedral and the Renaissance Jabalquinto Palace, a benchmark of the Renaissance civil architecture of Baeza, with an impressive main façade with Elizabethan Gothic decoration, beautiful windows and prominent diamond points.

Old artisan Casino

Undoubtedly, one of the places with the greatest literary impact in Lorca’s life. This is where his encounter with Machado occurred, when he was still more a musician than a writer. This event would mark his artistic orientation towards letters and will make him one of the most universal poets in our literature.

On June 8, 1916, a soiree was organized, in which Machado recited verses by Rubén Darío – who had died months before – and fragments of La Tierra de Alvargonzález for the travelers, while Lorca played Andalusian pieces on the piano such as the Danza de la Vida Breve of Falla. In this recital he met María del Reposo Urquía, who also performs some pieces.

Antonio Chicharro, in the collaboration that he makes in the book tribute to the centenary of Machado’s arrival in Baeza One Hundred Years of the Antonio Machado y Baeza Encounter or the Celebration of Poetry as an Essential Word in Time, indicates that this meeting also meant the beginning of a respectful friendship between Antonio Machado and the young García Lorca, underlined in a poem signed in 1918 by the young student from Granada in the first pages of a book borrowed from the first edition of Poesías Completas de Antonio Machado:

I would leave my

whole soul in this book.

This book that has seen

the landscapes with me

and lived holy hours.

The echoes of this meeting were also to materialize in the first poem he wrote, according to his brother Francisco García Lorca, dated June 1917: Song. Dreaming and Confusion, in a prominent Rubenian style.

Song. Daydreaming and Confusion

(…)

Here comes the dusky soundless night

here comes the brazen, splendid flesh

here comes the sweet ecstasy bliss

But alas! death came and sorrow followed.(…)

Cathedral, Square and Fountain of Santa María

The space that makes up the Cathedral of Baeza, the square and the fountain of Santa María are main elements in Federico García Lorca’s description of the city in Lost City (“Ciudad Perdida”).

Plaza de Santa María is the one that contains part of the main buildings of interest such as the Cathedral itself, the Palace of Jabalquinto or the old Town Hall.

LOST CITY (BAEZA) I Baeza (…)

This square, an impressive romantic expression where antiquity displays its ancestry of melancholy, a place of retreat, of peace, of manly sadness, was planned to be desecrated when I visited Baeza.

(…)

Besides, Santa María fountain, which takes the name of the square and which, together with the fountain of the Lions in the Plaza del Pópulo, is the most emblematic of Baeza. Built in the Renaissance style by the middle of the 16th century, it has a lower body made up of three openings, together with a columnar structure with two fronts, where the coat of arms of Felipe II can be seen.

LOST CITY (BAEZA) I Baeza

At its center a source of pagan severity, it looks like the final body of a triumphal arch that the earth has swallowed up.

(…)

Finally, the Cathedral of Baeza, an Asset of Cultural Interest since 1931 and which has been erected over successive buildings: a Roman temple, later a mosque, until its conversion to Christian worship in the 13th century.

Since then, it has undergone numerous architectural transformations to its current state, with multiple elements from different periods, such as the Moon Gate (Puerta de la Luna), in the Gothic-Mudejar style; the Absolution Gate (Puerta del Perdón), in the Gothic style; or the main facade, which is in the Renaissance style, which is its most dominant character. Andrés de Vandelvira collaborated in the Renaissance reform.

The interior of the Cathedral of Baeza also presents different styles, with Gothic pillars, ribbed vaults, Renaissance grills, Mudejar chapels and Renaissance chapels, as well as the main altarpiece, in the Baroque style. The Cathedral Museum also preserves pieces of great value and recognized prestige

LOST CITY (BAEZA)

I Baeza

(…)

The cathedral covers the square with its shadow, and scents it with its smell of incense and wax that seeps through its walls as a reminder of holiness.

(…)

Jaén´s landscape

The encounter with the landscape of Jaén and its people surprised the young Lorca, accustomed to the flat fertility of the gardens and plains of Granada. Undoubtedly, this landscape clearly influenced him during his long peri-urban walks along the Cerro del Alcázar, on the remains of the old wall. A place that Machado also frequented assiduously.

The display offered by the skyline of “blue mountains, in which the towns shine their diamond whiteness of faded light”, in clear reference to the Aznaitín and Mágina massifs, will leave a mark on his work, as explained below:

LOST CITY (BAEZA)

I Baeza

(…) If you walk further, the grasslands are so strong that they swallow up the stones on the ground, anxiously licking the walls …, and if we cross a few more alleys, we can contemplate the majestic symphony of a splendid landscape. An immense basin surrounded by blue mountains, in which the towns shine their diamond whiteness of faded light. Shady and brave chords of olive groves contrast with the sierras, which are deep purple on the skirts. (…)

Carrera de Jesús street house

On his trip to Jaén, Federico García Lorca stayed at the house of Don Manuel Montero Sola on Carrera de Jesús Street. The building consists of three floors with a lateral façade of exposed stone, while on the main façade there are two central balconies flanked by two viewpoints with bars and a noble coat of arms on one side. The Aqueduct of Carmen was in its back gardens.

Aqueduct of Carmen and path of the Orchards

On November 2, 1925, García Lorca dated a postcard with the image of the Aqueduct of Carmen and the Senda de los Huertos, very close to the address he uses as his residence, on Carrera de Jesús Street. In this postcard, addressed to his friend Melchor Fernández Almagro, who lived in Madrid, he recommends his visit to Jaén: “I’m sure you would find the character of this landscape magnificent.”

Senda de los Huertos was one of the city’s scenic heritages until it was urbanized, in the years sixties of the 20th century. This area, steeped in history (Roman and Muslim remains have been found), constituted a landscape of orchards distributed in terraces and terraced gardens of the courtyards of the houses upon which the towers of the Cathedral magnificently stood out, and conferred to the Path its hallmark. Next to these orchards was the ancient Aqueduct of Carmen, of Roman origin, with sixteen semicircular arches built in stone and brick that supported the canal. The Aqueduct was eliminated by demolition in 1976 and nothing of it is preserved today.