TOLEDO, ARCIDIOCESI DI

TOLEDO, ARCHDIOCESE OF. – Archdiocese and chief town of the homonymous province in Spain.

It covers an area of 26,802 sq km with a population of 762,220 inhabitants, almost all Catholic, distributed across 364 parishes served by 323 diocesan priests and 86 regular clergy; 18 male and 106 female religious communities (Ann. Pont. 1953, p. 425). It is the primatial see of Spain and has as its suffragans the dioceses of Coria, Cuenca, Madrid, Plasencia, and Sigüenza. Its patrons are Sts. Eugene and Ildefonso.

T. is ancient Toletum, a Roman municipality mentioned by Livy. Occupied first by the Alans, then by the Goths, the latter made it the centre of a new empire linked to Gallia Narbonensis, and Leovigild I in 579 was the first of a dynasty that remained there until 709, when after violent struggles the infante Don Rodrigo ascended the throne; but two years later the Arabs, led by Tarik, took the city, which for three centuries remained under the rule of the caliphate of Córdoba. In 1012 the governor of T. rebelled against the Umayyads and proclaimed himself king, but Alfonso I reconquered the city in 1085; it was unsuccessfully besieged by the Muslims in 1107 and 1205; in 1212 the Saracen invasion was finally repelled. In 1470 T. was visited by King Ferdinand and Queen Isabella, who founded there the votive convent of “San Juan de los Reyes.” At the beginning of the reign of Charles V, T. became the centre of the “Comuneros” uprising, defending municipal privileges under Juan de Padilla; when the city was besieged, its resistance was led by his widow María Pacheco; but Charles V made it his capital. Philip II abandoned it in favour of Madrid; however, the city retained the title of imperial and crowned city. T. endured a heroic siege from 21 July to 27 September 1936.

The origin of the diocese is traced to the 1st century, and St. Eugene is said to have been its first bishop, but documents are lacking for the first three centuries, and the first certain notice appears in the famous Council of Elvira (c. 300; V. ELVIRA), where Bishop Melantius subscribed. The see was not suppressed under the Arabs, who preserved the city’s splendour; indeed, under their domination the obstinate heretic Elipandus could defy the thunderbolts of Pope Hadrian I and Charlemagne. Greater splendour, however, came after the city’s reconquest in 1085 by King Alfonso VI. Famous are the Councils of Toledo, the first of which was held in 400, the second in 531, and the third, the most celebrated of all, in 589 with the attendance of the Visigothic king Reccared, brother of the martyr St. Hermenegild and son of the cruel Arian Leovigild; at this council the Catholic faith was acknowledged and the religious unity of the kingdom affirmed. The Church of Toledo boasts such figures as Sts. Ildefonso, Julian, Eulogius (elected bishop), and Eugene; it was also distinguished by Cardinals Egidio Albornoz (restorer of the Papal States in the 14th century), Francisco Jiménez de Cisneros (the great statesman and patron at the beginning of the 16th century), Gaspar de Borgia (Spanish ambassador to Rome), and many others, since from the 16th century the archbishop of Toledo was almost always a member of the Sacred College. Well known are the prelates who were not cardinals, Rodrigo Jiménez de Rada and Bartolomé Carranza, who died in Rome in 1576 after a notorious trial.

The cathedral was founded in the 6th century under the Visigothic king Reccared. Converted into a mosque by the Arabs, its reconstruction began in 1227 under King Ferdinand and was completed in 1493. The first architect was a Petrus Petri, called Pedro Pérez; it is in the French Gothic style with later modifications. Access is through five monumental and three secondary doors. The main façade, begun in 1418 and completed at the start of the 16th century, has three portals: the central one, called the Door of Pardon, features a large pointed arch adorned with figures of angels, prophets, and saints; in the tympanum, the Virgin presenting the chasuble to St. Ildefonso; above, the Last Supper. The two side pillars are adorned with statues. On the left is the pillar called “of Hell” or “of the Tower,” on the right that called “of the Scribes” or “of Judgment.” To the left of the façade rises the tower, 90 m high, built between 1380 and 1440 by Rodrigo Alfonso and Álvaro Gómez. On the southern side stand the “Puerta Llana,” of Ionic order, erected in 1800, and the “Puerta de los Leones,” with six columns surmounted by lions bearing heraldic shields, a work by A. de Egas of Brussels, decorated by Juan Alemán. Restored in the 18th century; the bronze doors date to 1545. On the eastern side, large red inscriptions on the walls list the names of doctors of theology (16th–17th centuries). On the northern side are the “Puerta de Presentación” of 1585 with a bas-relief of the Presentation in the Temple from 1565; the “Puerta de Santa Catalina” from the late 16th century with the scene of the burial of St. Catherine; the “Puerta de la Feria,” also called the “Door of the Clock” or “of the Lost Child,” from the early 14th century, decorated with figures of angels and prophets. The interior measures 113 m x 57 m, with a height of 30 m, divided by massive

piers. On the right is the Mozarabic chapel built in 1504 by Cardinal Jiménez, a work by E. de Egas; it was restored in 1922 and daily Mass is celebrated there in the Mozarabic rite, a rite that, by special agreement, continued in six churches of the city during the period of Arab rule. On the altar, the mosaic of the Blessed Virgin and Child was executed in Rome in 1794; there is also a fresco depicting the taking of Oran in 1509, painted by Gregorio di Borgogna in 1514. In the chapel of St. Eugene, the statue of the saintly bishop is by D. Copín; there is also the tomb of Bishop F. de Castilla, who died in 1521. In the transept, the interior of the “Lions’ Door,” of ogival architecture, contains 35 carved wooden panels: on the door, the Tree of Jesse in high relief, and a medallion with the Coronation of the Virgin, works by Gregorio di Borgogna.

In the ambulatory is the Gothic chapel of St. Lucy from the 13th century, then the chapel of “Reyes Viejos” or of the Holy Spirit, erected in 1290; then one passes to the chapter house with a coffered ceiling carved and painted in 1508, on whose walls are frescoes by Gregorio di Borgogna and portraits of the archbishops of T. from St. Eugene to Cardinal Moreno.

In the apse are the octagonal chapel of St. Ildefonso, transformed by Cardinal Albornoz, who is buried there (d. 1364 in Viterbo), and the tomb of Archbishop J. Martínez de Contreras (d. 1431). The chapel of Santiago is hexagonal, decorated in flamboyant Gothic style; it was erected in the mid-15th century by Constable Don Álvaro de Luna, who is buried there; it also contains the tomb of Archbishop J. de Cerezuela (d. 1448). The chapel of “Reyes Nuevos,” built between 1531 and 1534, contains the funerary monuments of Henry II, Henry III, and statues of John I and II. The sacristy was frescoed by Luca Giordano and El Greco; in the room called the vestry are paintings by Rubens and El Greco; it preserves a precious series of sacred vestments belonging to Cardinals Mendoza, Cisneros, Fonseca, Albornoz, and also the so-called Bible of St. Louis, a French illuminated manuscript of the 13th century in three volumes; some leaves of the Apocalypse are now in New York in the Pierpont Morgan collection. To the right of the ambulatory is the tomb of Cardinal Portocarrero (d. 1709). Then come the chapels called “de los Doctores” or of St. Marina, and the chapel of “la Virgen del Sagrario” with the venerated image of the Madonna. In the left transept are admired the chapels of St. Peter, erected by Archbishop Sancho de Rojas (d. 1422), who is buried there; the chapel of the Baptismal Font; the chapel of “la Virgen de la Antigua,” so called from an ancient icon of the Madonna; and the chapel of the Descent, erected in 1533 on the spot where the Madonna appeared to St. Ildefonso.

The chapel of the Tower, also called “de S. Juan” or “de los Canónigos,” situated beneath the tower, contains the Cathedral Treasury. On the north side of the building, from the “del Mollete” door, one enters the cloister, begun in 1399 and built on two levels: opening onto it is the 15th-century summer chapter house, the chapel of S. Blas with the tomb of Archbishop Tenorio (d. 1399), to whom the cloister is owed; the vault is frescoed by Arnaldo di Cremona; access is also had to the Chapter Library, rich in manuscripts and illuminated choir books. A covered gallery leads to the Archbishop’s Palace (18th century), whose lower part houses the Provincial Library.

This cathedral enjoys many papal privileges, and its canonical dignities have the faculty of wearing the mitre. A major chaplain and several other chaplains and beneficiaries conduct the Mozarabic rite, restored through the royal generosity of Cardinal Ximénez de Cisneros at the beginning of the 16th century in the said chapel, after he had commissioned several learned investigators of ancient codices for the reconstruction of the liturgy, of which Toledo had been the center and defender until, under Gregory VII, it had to yield place to the Roman rite.

In Toledo there is the major seminary, formerly the Pontifical University of S. Ildefonso, founded in 1848 by Cardinal Inguanzo, and the minor seminary of S. Tommaso da Villanova, the former University of S. Caterina, an edifice enlarged in 1917 by Cardinal Guisaloa and in 1926 by Cardinal Reig.

Among the churches are those of S. Andrea, of

S. Juan de la Penitencia, with the attached convent founded in 1514 by Cardinal Cisneros; it is of mixed architecture with a cedar-wood dome and pendentives lined with stalactites; it contains the tomb of Bishop F. Ruiz (d. 1528); the Mozarabic church of S. Luca, recently restored; the church of S. Juan de los Reyes, united to a convent erected in 1746 by the Catholic Monarchs after the victory of Toro, in the architecture of the Fleming J. Guas; its interior is a single nave. The cloister is a fine example of florid Gothic; recently remains of frescoes have been discovered on the walls; on the friezes and above the capitals are inscriptions in praise of the Catholic Monarchs. S. Maria “la Blanca” is the oldest synagogue in Toledo (c. 1180), converted into a church in 1405; S. Vincent Ferrer preached there; it has recently been restored. Nostra Signora del Transito is another synagogue converted in 1492 into a church then called S. Maria de los Pobres; it is a single nave and still contains inscriptions in Hebrew characters in praise of the God of Israel.

Other churches to be mentioned are: the church of “El Salvador,” where in the chapel of S. Catalina the doctors of the university used to meet; the church of S. Tomé (14th century), with its interior restored in the 18th, contains the famous painting by El Greco of the burial of Gonzalo Ruiz, Count of Orgaz, and the apparition of SS. Stephen and Augustine. The church of S. Domingo el Antiguo also contains five paintings by El Greco.

The church of Santo Cristo de la Luz is the former mosque Bib el-Mardom of the 10th century, converted into a church with the addition of a transept and an apse. The church of Santiago del Arrabal, in Toledan style of the 13th century, was transformed in the 18th. The church of Cristo de la Vega or basilica of S. Loccadia is modern. The church of S. Vincente, erected in 1595 and now used as a parochial museum, contains sacred vestments from the 15th to the 18th centuries; Brussels tapestries of the 17th century; a Mozarabic missal of Cardinal Cisneros; sculptures from the 13th century onward; tombstones from the 14th century and later; majolicas, goldsmith work, and paintings by various artists, including several by El Greco, among them the Assumption.

Cardinal P. González de Mendoza had the Hospital of S. Cruz erected between 1514 and 1544 by E. De Egas; it was damaged in 1936 and is one of the most notable Renaissance buildings in Spain, with a rich portal where the founder is represented in adoration of the Holy Cross, between SS. Peter, Paul, and Helen; above is the Visitation. The interior is now used as a provincial museum. The Hospital of S. Giovanni Battista or “de Afuera” was founded by Cardinal J. De Tavera; it is the work of Bustamante (1541–99); its interior now houses the museum established by the Duchess of Lerina, who has reconstructed therein a noble mansion of the 16th century; furniture, tapestries of the period, and paintings by Ribera, Luca Giordano, Tintoretto, Zurbarán, El Greco, Sánchez Coello, etc. In the church is the tomb of Cardinal J. De Tavera (d. 1545).

Other notable structures are the Alcázar, a fortress erected by Alfonso VI on a Roman encampment of the 3rd century; Alfonso X gave it a quadrilateral form with four corner towers; Charles V had it rebuilt by A. De Covarrubias, who constructed the north façade, while the south façade is the work of J. De Herrera under Philip II. Burned in 1710, it was restored under Charles III by V. Rodríguez (1744–74) and until 1776 housed the “Royal House of Charity.” It was again burned in 1810, restored between 1867 and 1882, burned once more in 1887, and rebuilt as the seat of the Infantry Academy, which sustained a heroic siege there from July 21 to September 28, 1935.

On the Tagus there still stands the Alcántara Bridge, built by the Romans; restored by the Arabs in 997, rebuilt in 1258 by Alfonso VI, and again at the beginning of the 15th century; it is preceded by a Baroque portico erected in 1721; at the western end stands a tower completed in 1484 bearing the arms of the Catholic Monarchs. The ancient Roman circus outside the city is now a garden.

Near Toledo are the hermitages of “la Virgen de la Cabeza” and “la Virgen del Valle,” where before the Arab conquest stood the monastery of SS. Peter and Felix. But the most famous monastery of Toledo is that of SS. Servandus and Germanus on the Tagus, erected c. 1090 by King Alfonso (F. Fita, *El monasterio toledano de S. Servando en la segunda mitad del siglo XI*, in *Bulletin de l’Académie historique*, 49 [1906], pp. 280–331; R. De Los Ríos, *El castillo y monasterio de S. Servando en Toledo*, in *Revista dos Archivos, Bibliotecas y Museos*, 15 [1911], pp. 167–88).

In the extreme west of the diocese, which forms part of Extremadura, is the wonderful monastery of Our Lady of Guadalupe, founded in the 14th century, the largest monastery of the Hieronymites before the construction of the Escorial, which they held until 1836, when they were succeeded by the Franciscan Friars Minor. The church and the surrounding buildings belong to the 14th century and later. The great Arabesque cloister, unique in the world in this style, with its most graceful little temple, is of striking effect: begun in 1389, it was completed in 1406; a cloister of the following century is also present. To the many works of art in the church must be added the very notable richness of the illuminated choir books (surpassed by no other church, not even cathedrals), the vestments of the 15th–16th centuries, and the paintings by Zurbarán.

The Councils of TOLEDO — The most important institution for the disciplinary and dogmatic activity, and at the same time the most distinctive constitutional feature of the Spanish Church in the Visigothic era, were the Councils of Toledo: eighteen synods, spread throughout the history of the Visigothic Church in the period from 400 to 701, which represent the principal source for knowledge of the ecclesiastical life of Spain in that epoch and of the relations between Church and State.

They constitute a unique institution of their own kind, a special type of mixed assembly, fundamentally a legislative and episcopal body, but at times also a royal court and supreme tribunal in numerous matters of a purely civil nature. They have been compared to the assemblies of the Campus Martius among the Franks or to the warlike assemblies of Pavia among the Lombards, but they surpass both in their ecclesiastical character; to the Witenagemot of the Anglo-Saxons, but in favor of the Spanish assemblies is the greater preponderance of the episcopate; to the Synods of Merovingian Gaul, with regard to the concord between ecclesiastical and civil powers, but among the Visigoths this concord was closer and more harmoniously fused than in other countries.

The memory of Constantine, expressly mentioned by the Biclarensian chronicler in the presence of Recared at the Third Council of Toledo, is an indication that in the Visigothic king seemed to be perpetuated an imperial prerogative. From another aspect, the legislation of Justinian in his dramatic sanction of 554, introduced into the Byzantine region of the Levant and later into Visigothic law, invested the bishops with a control over justice and a superior jurisdiction in wide areas of civil affairs. The bishops, fathers of the Council by right of their office, intervened in all kinds of matters, while the Gothic magnates, chosen by the free determination of the king, decided only in civil causes. This altogether distinctive character of the Councils of Toledo makes of them a distinctly indigenous institution.

Their literary and social activity was extremely brilliant and fruitful. In them was formulated and sanctioned the Mozarabic liturgy, rich and varied in its context, with an oriental richness and splendor in its language, an intimate and delicate theology in its piety, and a precious and at times subtle composition, at times magniloquent and elevated, always noble, sincere, and fervent. Begun at the end of the 5th century by Peter of Lérida, it developed throughout the Visigothic era with the cooperation of all its great writers, from St. Leander to St. Julian, whose traces are visible in its forms. The Liber Ordinum, the Liber Comicus, and the Liber Sacramentorum are the principal monuments of this literary treasure. Various notable episodes in ecclesiastical and civil history have their origin in the activity of these Councils: the condemnation of Priscillianism at the First Council (400), various provisions regarding clerical celibacy and seminaries at the Second Council (527 or 531). The Third Council, with the intervention of St. Leander, proclaims the abjuration of Arianism by Recared and the Gothic people. The Fourth Council (633), under the presidency of St. Isidore, unifies the liturgy and proscribes various abuses. The Fifth (636), Sixth (638), Seventh (646), and Eighth (653) Synods contain provisions and penalties against crimes of high treason and lèse-majesté. The Twelfth Council (681) confirms the new king Erwig. The Fourteenth Council (684) condemns Monothelitism. The Fifteenth and Sixteenth Councils, under the presidency of St. Julian, clarify various dogmatic formulas of this great theologian.

The Councils of Toledo thus serve as an indication of the close union between the Church and the Visigothic monarchy, consecrated from the time of Recared’s conversion. In them political questions are frequently addressed. The distinction between Visigoths and Hispano-Romans gradually disappears: Christianity merges with the population; laws follow a single disciplinary code in their unity. Only the Jews remain refractory to this fusion and persist in maintaining themselves as an irreducible element that will soon ally itself with the invading enemy.

SYMBOLS OF TOLEDO — Notable are the creeds elaborated by the bishops of the Visigothic Church in the Councils of Toledo, especially those contained in the First Council (c. 400), Fourth Council (633), Sixth Council (638), Eleventh Council (675), and Sixteenth Council (693).

Theological criticism delights in weighing the precision and clarity of their formulations; it highlights their immense patristic erudition and exceptional theological certainty, admiring the skill and mastery of thought that, while not exceeding the limits of a traditional composition, fuses with harmonious synthetic homogeneity the purified heritage of the past.

With few exceptions, the occasion for drafting these creeds was simply the singular devotion of the Spanish Church to the traditional faith, which, in the century following the conversion of the Visigothic people to Catholicism, inaugurated its most solemn acts with a profession of faith as the portal to its conciliar decisions.

After the First Symbol, following Arianism and Priscillianism with their anathemas, completed in 447 by Bishop Pastor, the Symbols of the Fourth, Sixth, Eleventh, and Sixteenth Councils follow one another in an organic chain with unmistakable characteristics, preserving the same familiar aspect in the Spanish tradition of symbols. The Fourth, surrounded by the glorious memory of St. Isidore of Seville, president of that council, definitively establishes the Spanish theological basis on the Trinity and Christology. The Sixth follows with the same direction, adding a profession of faith in the Catholic Church as the Body of Christ, which with its Head must reign eternally in the future kingdom. The Eleventh gathers the currents of the Fourth and Sixth and expands its content with various patristic citations on the relations of the three Divine Persons, on the Augustinian psychological theology of Trinitarian processions, and other aspects, to produce a form of faith—a brief theological treatise on those mysteries, rich in conceptual precision and symbolic formulas. Finally, the Sixteenth expands the content of the Eleventh with new clarifications regarding the psychological explanation of the Trinity, the two wills in Christ, the perpetual virginity of Mary, etc., always within the grand style of Symbol-treatise initiated by the Eleventh Symbol, whose formulas it largely repeats.

The patristic sources represented in them, in order of importance, are: St. Augustine, Fulgentius of Ruspe, Isidore of Seville, St. Ambrose, Gregory of Elvira, the Quicumque, etc.

Contrary to Künstle and others, who attributed some of these symbols to earlier periods, it has now been demonstrated through the study of their sources and the history of their circumstances that they are the work of the Councils whose names they bear, drafted by the Fathers of the Visigothic Church who remain anonymous. The use made by theology of these precise theological formulas in the principal dogmas proves that they are regarded as an important manifestation of traditional ecclesiastical teaching. — See pl. XXIII.