Tarragona´s Heritage Watchdog speaks out

Under the title ´The defence of our heritage is no obstacle to development´, a local weekly newspaper of Tarragona (noticiestgn) published an interview on 11 November with the chairman of the Royal Archeological Society of Tarragona, a venerable institution which for decades now has defended the city´s Roman legacy and has often found itself in the position of having to police and keep a watchful eye out for archeological predators of different kinds. I am translating the interview with its chairman, Rafael Gabriel, here in full.

"Q. One of the aims of your organization is the preservation of the city´s heritage. What does that entail?

A. Keeping an eye on our heritage, promoting research and disseminating research. Our organization was established in 1844 at a critical moment for our heritage. This was the age of the ecclesiastical confiscations of Mendizabal, the construction of the port and the uninterrupted plunder of the port´s quarry. People from across Europe came here to carry off part of our heritage. It was then that a group of local citizens decided to establish an organization whose aim was to defend our history and to set up an archeological museum.

Q. Our forefathers were clearly concerned about the city´s heritage. Do we nowadays still have that same spirit of fighting for our culture?

A. I think so. A sign is the membership of our organization: there are more than 550 members, many of whom young people. Some have joined us out of love for the city, others because they concerned about heritage issues. The big problem is that people lose hope, think that nothing can be done. And it doesn´t have to be that way: we can always fight to try to improve things.

Q. Your organization is often critical of the role of public institutions. Just by looking at your website (www.arqueologica.org), one can find a whole catalogue of complaints...and not just one or two.

A. Correct. Someone has to play this role and that´s why we are here. Irrespective of our politicians´ political orientation, our organization will denounce whatever we think causes harm to our heritage. Of course, being critical in the good sense of the word: nobody has a monopoly on the truth. So, what we provide is constructive criticism.

A CITY WITHOUT AN ARCHEOLOGICAL PROTECTION PLAN

Q. Does the fact that there is a long list of criticisms mean that things are not being done well?

A. Absolutely. Since 1993, when the Catalan government introduced the Heritage Law (Llei de Patrimoni), cities which are recognized as heritage sites are under an obligation to develop an archeological protection plan, something which the city council has never been willing to do. Such a plan is absolutely essential in order to lay down the basic guidelines and for everyone to know what rules to follow. An entirely unlogical situation is that builders are responsible for the cost of the archeological excavations on building sites. It is the builder himself who pays the archeologists.

An archeological protection plan would lay down the overall guidelines and uniformize the criteria. The administrative work would be optimalized and would even be more cost-effective, something very important at a time when resources are squeezed and are having to be allocated to other essential services like health, education... The city council tries to sell us other products such as a Development Plan for the Parte Alta...but don´t be fooled: they are no archeological protection plan.

Q. Why do you think heritage issues are always so controversial?

A. There is a dichotomy between the future and the preservation of the past and there is no reason why that should be so. They are not incompatible. We don´t seem to be able to appreciate the true greatness of the historical legacy of our city.

Q. Has there been any councillor with responsibility in this field who had this spirit of preservation and promotion of the city´s historical legacy?

A. No, never. All of them have clung to that false dichotomy, believing that heritage is an obstacle to development. One of them had even been a member of the Archeological Society. The aim should be to convert the historical remnants that we have into a monumental complex.

SEVEN ARCADES OF THE FACADE OF THE ROMAN CIRCUS DISMANTLED TO MAKE WAY FOR A CINEMA

Q. What kind of outrageous things have happened to the city´s heritage?

A. I´ll give you a few examples. I could talk about a well-known cinema which up to some years ago existed on the Rambla Vella. To build the cinema, seven arcades of the facade of the circus were dismantled. The Royal Archeological Society denounced this but we were told that there was no way to go against the decision because the cinema was very important to the growth of the city. Priority was given to a cinema - which has only lasted 20 years (and has since been turned into an English pub)- over a 2000-year old legacy.

Another case is Eroski (the location of an Early Christian basilica): the site could have been left intact if the mall had been constructed just five metres further. Instead the finds were removed and replanted somewhere else. What was most important, the connection with the Early Christian Necropolis, was lost.

And let´s not forget the famous monumental fountain found in Carrer Eivissa, a unique piece in the Iberian peninsula. It wasn´t destroyed but now it lies underneath a house. What are we playing at?

Q. At the present time, which renovation works are you most concerned about?

A. The aqueduct (Pont del Diable); the restoration of the Roman walls and its patrol path. We also want the underground tunnel of the circus - which attracts most of our visitors - back in condition: it has been closed recently due to a problem with the sewers and now it´s closed again due to leakages.

WE WANT THE TABACALERA TO BECOME A LITTLE LOUVRE

Q. We have talked about current renovation works. Now, are there any other deficiencies heritagewise?

A. Tarragona ought to have a City History Museum. The current archeological museum should move to the Tabacalera building. Take into consideration that 30% of the Tabacalera complex is built on top of the Necropolis. We are in favour of the idea of building a small Louvre on that site rather than just using the Tabacalera for exhibitions. All of the archeological finds which are now kept in different storage rooms - because of lack of exhibition space - should be on display there. One could even reconstruct the Roman theatre at the Tabacalera. The Praetorian Tower can then be used to house the City History Museum, with displays of the different epochs of our city. We have done something great with our folkloric history: every child knows about our festivals and folk traditions, but if you ask them about the War of Independence against Napoleon, the significance of the wine industry or the medieval period, there is little they know. We have to explain to them the period of the Enlightenment, the construction of the port and what it meant for the city. We cannot loose our identity."

Secrets of the circus, part 2: Antiquity at the antiques shop

In a rather unassuming antiques shop in Tarragona, located on the impressively named Baixada de la Misericordia (´Slope of Mercy´) - a curvy, cobbled, sloping street of barely 100 metres that connects the Plaça de la Font with the Carrer Major and all the way up to the Cathedral - antiquing meets Antiquity with a capital A. Castellarnau Antiguitats is the name of the shop. Castellarnau is the surname of a powerful family of urban notables in Tarragona whose city residence is now the seat of the city history museum.

But back to the antiques dealer. This is not your usual bric-à-bracy type place. What makes the difference is the workshop, the antiquarian´s back office where apparently he also runs restoration techniques classes. The workshop is built into one of the many vaults that in Roman times were designed to support the circus stands. There are quite a number of such places around this street and on the Plaça de la Font where bits of Roman history continue to shape the look and layout of cellars, backrooms, cafés and restaurants.

This is living, breathing history. This is not just amazing because the circus vault is virtually perfectly intact but also because there is a morality tale here. A tale of how, once abandoned (around 500AD), the circus was partly destroyed but also partly reused. What happened to many of the vaults is a piece of ingenuous engineering by the masses. These strong cement caverns were converted into dwellings. For many centuries (till the early 20th century?) there were people who called these walls their home, who lived, ate and drank here, who had children here. That´s why even more than the remains of the circus that are exposed to the naked eye, out in the open air, I prefer to gaze at this place - its walls have history written all over them: the history of Great Men and the history of small men, Roman history as well as medieval and modern history, from sports show cum political performance to pots and pans hanging from the walls, from the devil´s playground (which is how early Christians saw the Roman circus) all the way to domestic bliss.

Secrets of the circus

With this post I want to open a new series of posts dedicated to secret Tarraco, the remnants of Tarragona´s great monuments that are hidden from the naked eye in homes, cafés and restaurants or that are simply lost in the city´s streets and walls. The tourist guides all point you towards the great musealized sites where you can see what´s left of the amphiteatre, the circus, the theatre and the provincial and local forums. But remnants of two of the great monuments located in the old part of the city - the circus and the provincial forum - can be found in unlikely places as well.

The circus fits this picture very well. The eastern sector of the circus is now part of the city history museum and includes part of the circus facade, vaults and remains of the podium, the tiered seating, the stairs and the arena. Another series of circus vaults in the open air belong to the northern perimeter of the circus, along Trinquet Vell street and in Plaça dels Sedassos. But absolutely fascinating are a set of vaults and portions of the circus wall of the southern perimeter that are hidden away in cafés, restaurants, a hotel and even a bank on Plaça de la Font, the central square and meeting place of Tarragona´s parte alta.

Banking in style! The office of La Caixa on the Plaça de la Font (no.47) is without doubt the most glorious example of the hidden delights of the circus. Tastefully preserved inside this office is one of the few surviving arches of the circus facade. Unfortunately, only business clients of the bank can enter and even they are not allowed to take pictures. A pity. I was lucky to enter. At the very least you can peer through the windows of the bank, so you can see the architectural spectacle of a Roman hippodrome meeting 21st-century finance. A sight, I am sure, you´ve never seen before.

Moving to the right, towards the city hall, you´ll see several other places where Roman history meets modernity. Houses were built here on this location, from the Middle Ages onwards, within the circus vaults. Modern-day houses have replaced medieval dwellings but the Roman foundations are still to be seen here and there. From banking in style to dining and drinking in style: Cappuccino (a café on Font, 43) has remnants of a vault and of tiered seating, while the restaurant-hotel Forum (Font, 37) also has a set of two millenia old circus arches. In Candil (Font, 13) you can also have a coffee or a beer inside a beautifully intact circus vault. For a snapshot of each these three sites see the pictures below. When in Tarragona, these charioteering caverns are definitely where you should go to have a drink!

The tempting tale of a hidden hippodrome

Tarraco´s circus, built in the late 1st century, was located right in the middle of the city – very unusual for a building of this kind – between the Via Augusta and the Provincial Forum. From the late 5th century onwards the hippodrome was abandoned and over the next centuries the 325-metre-long and 115-metre-wide arena and ascending tiers of seating disappeared under layers of housing. The only open space remaining – a quarter of the entire circus arena – was a small plaza, now known as the Plaça de la Font, the commercial nerve centre of medieval Tarragona and home now to the city council, cafés, restaurants and terraces. The recovery process only started in the 1990s. A part of the southern facade of the circus survived as part of a new defensive wall constructed in the 14th century. The stands, stairways and upper platforms have been exposed in a number of places, sometimes to a height of 7 metres, as between C/ Enrajolat and C/ Trinquet Vell and on the Plaça Sedassos, but much more lies below housing. Those in the south-western section are best preserved and are visitable, as is part of the northern vault (see picture) which also functioned as an internal passageway leading spectators from one end of the building to the other. These monumental Roman circuses have generally not weathered well, with very little remaining even of the most famous one, the Circus Maximus of Rome. Despite so much having been destroyed, the circus-complex of Tarraco is exceptionally well preserved and certainly the best preserved one in Spain. Because the area is largely covered by housing, it´s true that you don´t get a sense of space which you will get in the ruins of circuses located outside the city walls or now lying in city parks (e.g. the Circus Maximus of Mérida), but what you will get, by contrast, - and this is rare – is lots of evidence of the circus´ architectural structures, not just at street level but also in several shops, restaurants and even in a bank (about which more another time!).

The virtual reality of Tarraco

A three-part, Spanish-language documentary (21 minutes) on Roman Tarraco which offers a virtual trip through the city and its major monuments (the aqueduct, the fortifications, the theatre, the circus, the amphitheatre, the provincial and colonial forums, the Via Augusta, the triumphal arch of Barà, the tower of the Scipios). An illuminating introduction for anyone keen on making sense of the Roman remains of Tarragona. As always with virtual recreations, there is a great dosis of hypothesis and speculation based on the findings of other Roman cities, with Pompey of course being the greatest fountain of our knowledge of the urbs romana. Technology as a true eductional tool, not as a gimmick. This is the first part; for the second and third parts just click on at the end of the first piece.