City of the dead

Sounds like a bad B movie. Yet in late Roman times cities of the dead or necropolises were springing up all over the place. The largest of these burial grounds found by archeologists in Tarragona and its surroundings is the so-called Paleochristian or Early-Christian necropolis along the old Roman road to Valencia. It is said to be not only the largest and most important Early-Christian necropolis in Spain but also one of the most significant in the entire Western Roman world. Not bad for a B movie!

The excavations of this ancient world of the dead in the 1920s and 1930s unearthed a gigantic number of tombs of different types - in total 2050!; and a small number of funerary buildings and sarcophagi of those with more money. Since then other late-Roman burial sites have been uncovered in Tarragona (in fact all the way along the present-day C/Eivissa down to the necropolis complex), but none like this one. This was at the time of its construction - in the 3rd century AD - suburbia, located outside the walled city, on the western edges of Tarraco. What was found are the kind of things that have usually got lost in past excavations. The Romans´pagan burial rites, ceremonies and art forms (such as the funerary banquet and the washing and preparation of the deceased) merged with new Christian funerary customs and symbols (such as the use of primitive Christian images on the grave). What I found most fascinating about this place is that this is eclectic stuff; this is Christianity not quite the way we know it, adopting well-established and effective pagan art forms and rituals; a peculiar mix between things Roman and things pointing to the Christian Middle Ages.

The human remains that were exhumed, the inscriptions, the sculptures, statues, mosaics and the artifacts found inside the tombs have given archeologists and historians an unusual insight into the everyday life of the common people of Tarraco. One of the museum´s most emblematic artifacts is an ivory doll, a toy found in a sarcophagus containing the skeleton of a five-year old girl. This is fast becoming one of the Tarragona´s symbols. The surprising thing is that the necropolis complex - an open air zone and a museum pavillion - is not open for the public. It´s been closed since 1994 due to lack of funding! Unbelievable but true; one of Tarragona´s great public scandals. What is open to the public, however, is one exhibition room (Av. Ramon i Cajal, 84) which under the name ´El Mundo de la Muerte´ presents some of the most representative finds of the necropolis. A great starter, while the main dish remains hidden away on the closed grounds and behind the closed doors of the complex.

The site is perhaps a bit tricky to find for a tourist because it is located at the other end of the city, a 20-minute walk away from the circus and amphitheatre - so a city map and the right address is essential. Interesting to know as well that the southern part of the necropolis still lies unexplored below the next-door tobacco factory (now in the process of being converted into a new arts centre and possibly new seat of the grand national archeological museum now located in the Parte Alta), while the northern edges, including the remnants of a 5th-century basilica, have been uncovered and are now part of an archeological site that´s been incorporated into the Parc Central shopping centre that lies next door. There are now talks to re-open the entire necropolis complex, including the open air zone. This is the very least a site that carries the World Heritage label deserves. But I leave you with this exquisite, 4th-century funerary portrait in mosaic of bishop Optimus that is on display in the exhibition.

In search of the lost temple

The ghost of Augustus haunts Tarragona. The subject of speculation for centuries, Tarraco´s temple dedicated to this Emperor-God thought to be buried underneath the Romanesque-Gothic Cathedral of Tarragona is slowly revealing its secrets. Its exact location and characteristics have long remained shrouded in mystery. According to most specialists, the steps leading up to the cathedral were built on top of the Roman steps and the cathedral was built on top of the Temple of Augustus. That´s the way it goes in Tarragona. Built in the 1st century AD and restored by Hadrian in 122-123AD, the Roman imperial temple, located on the highest and most prestigious point on the uppermost terrace of the Parte Alta of the city, was the most sacred site of Hispania Citerior, a site of religious ceremonies dedicated to Augustus. He was of course the man who resided in Tarraco in 27-25BC - which made the city the centre of the Roman Empire during those years- and elevated the city´s status to that of capital of an imperial province.
The model for this sacred complex - a porticoed plaza with the dominating Temple of Augustus at is centre - was the monumental complex built by Augustus in Rome itself, reproducing the Hellenistic ideal of an organic sequence of temple, public area and circus constructed from the summit of a hill downwards. Tarraco was the first city after Rome itself to boast a Temple dedicated to Augustus. One of the wall portions of the sacred complex can be seen in the seat of the College of Industrial Engineers in C/Escrivanies Velles; and an apse in the Bible Museum and seat of the Consell Comarcal in C/ Coques. Many, many fragments of pedestals for statues, of columns, of friezes and of marble decorative elements have been retrieved in a variety of archeological sites. In 2007 a team of international experts using highly advanced radar and geophysical technologies scanned the underground of the medieval cathedral to uncover the base of the Roman sanctuary buried 1,5 metre below the cathedral. The results were published last year. The Dan Brown-esque search for the ghost of Augustus in Tarragona is taken to new scientific heights in the intriguing high-resolution images of the subsurface of the cathedral attached below. The next step might be a number of small excavations in specific spots in the central nave of the cathedral. No news so far in this respect. Yet it is thanks to work like this that Tarraco´s acropolis ensemble - along with that of the city of Lyon in France - is now the best known of its kind in the entire Western Roman Empire outside Rome.

Poblet and Mount Athos: spiritual twins

Spirituality is definitely back on the agenda of the 21st century. Even the old (and especially the oldest) monasteries are creeping into the newspaper headlines. Which brings me to the Delos Initiative whose agenda is to help secure the sanctity and biodiversity of sacred natural sites in developed countries across the world. Sprung from the World Commission on Protected Areas of the International Union for the Conservation of Nature (IUCN) - one of the world´s biggest environmental organizations and lobbies - the Delos Initiative has so far selected 27 sacred natural sites: 1 in Australia, 1 in Bulgaria, 2 in Finland, 3 in Greece (inclsuing the Athos Peninsula), 1 in Israel, 2 in Italy, 2 in Japan, 1 in Morocco, 2 in Romania, 1 in Russia, 1 in South Africa, 1 in South Korea, 2 in the US, 2 in the UK (Arran Island Marine Reserve and Lindisfarne National Nature Reserve) and five (!) in Spain. Coincidence? Spain has plenty sites that would qualify. Among those selected so far four (! - again) are based in Catalonia: Poblet Monastery, Montsant, Montserrat and the (Buddhist) Tashi Ling Monastery in the Park of Garraf.

The idea behind the Delos Initiative is to investigate and learn from the relationship between, e.g., Poblet Monastery and its surrounding landscape - a protected nature reserve with different types of Mediterranean forests and vineyards in the lowlands. It is all about re-valuing the spirituality of nature reserves and about recognizing the traditions, know-how and skills of the ancestral custodians of nature such as the monastic communities. In the words of Josep Maria Mallarach, geologist and environmental consultant, "the protection of natural sites is a very recent phenomenon, whereas the concept of sacralization of nature stems from remote times...when national parks managers only take into consideration material values and devalue non-material ones, the spiritual foundation that has kept these landscapes intact is being undervalued". Wise words. A series of concrete proposals and projects exploiting the synergies between Poblet and its woodland-cum-vineyard landscape are in the pipeline - I´ll keep you posted!

For more on this initiative see: www.med-ina.org/delos/sites.htm

Spirits & Wine in Poblet

The austere, majestic monastery of Poblet – since 1991 a World Heritage site - is one of the most important, largest, most complete and most perfect medieval monastic complexes that exists in Europe. Poblet has also served as a massive military complex, and as a royal palace, residence and pantheon.
Lying midway between Tarragona and Lleida, in the comarca of the Conca de Barbera, the old Cistercian monastery was founded in 1150 to colonize the (re)conquered lands of New Catalonia - the last Moors were driven out in 1149 -, introducing agricultural and viticultural know-how into these lands. In the 14th century it was transformed into a military stronghold. The Real Monasterio de Santa María de Poblet is also a royal residence, directly associated with the history of the houses of Barcelona, Aragon and Castile. It houses a sumptuous dynasty burial place for several kings of the houses of Catalonia and Aragon (such as James I the Conqueror). Poblet was both the necropolis and the home of kings. In later centuries the monastery fell from being a seat of kings to the function of being a place of refuge. It is still nowadays a working monastery and draws over 150,000 visitors a year.

A great gallery of images of Poblet and the surrounding comarcas can be found on the website of a new magazine, entitled ´Cultura i Paisatge a la Ruta del Cister´, a spin-off of the now well-established ´Ruta del Cister´ or Cistercian Route, connecting Poblet with the other two Cistercian monasteries of Southern Catalonia (Santes Creus and Vallbona de les Monges): go to http://www.culturaipaisatge.com/

All roads lead to TAU

Tau or the letter ´T´ in the Greek alphabet has been associated with the city of Tarraco/Tarragona since early Christian times. It is still the logo of the Archbishopric of Tarragona nowadays. In the Roman imperial era the imperial temple of Tarraco was the seat of the cult of the Emperor on the Iberian peninsula, then in late-Roman times it became the headquarters of Christianity on the Iberian peninsula and in the Middle Ages - to reconquer Tarragona from the Moors was as good as going on a Crusade to Jerusalem! - this mystical city was the seat of a province of the Spanish Catholic Church that stretched all the way from Pamplona to Mallorca. Tau symbolizes the cross, resurrection, life. No wonder then that Montsant, the Els Ports mountain range and many spots in between housed and still house a innumerable quantity of hermitages, singular spaces of retreat and spirituality.