Sierra Gorda Part 13: Misión San Miguel Concá

Atrium, church, and cloister of Misión San Miguel Concá. The original mission in Concá was established by the Augustinians. However, in 1739 Spanish Col. José Escandon y Helguera reported its poor condition to the Viceroy, so the mission was turned over to the Franciscans.  This is the smallest of the five Sierra Gorda missions that they built. The church and cloister seen above were constructed between 1750 and 1754 under the supervision of two friars, José Antonio Murguía and Joaquín Fernández Osorio . As always, the actual labor and craftsmanship were performed by the local Pame tribesmen .

In this posting, I'll show you some of the exterior features, including the church steeple and facade. While there are plenty of Catholic statues and symbols, there are also many unusual indigenous images, some of which relate to pre-Hispanic religious beliefs. The inclusion of these native features was a deliberate strategy of  Junipero Serra, the Sierra Gorda's Franciscan chief. He wanted to appeal to the Pame by incorporating some of their symbols into the way the Christian message was presented. This strategy is called syncretism. 

Overview

Google map showing the route from Jalpan de Serra to Concá. To reach Misíon San Miguel Concá, take Highway 69 from Jalpan de Serra 36.9km (23mi) to the northwest. When you reach Concá , look for Restaurant Los Arcos on your left. About 100m further is an intersection with a bus stop on the right. Take a left there and follow the street until you reach the mission. For a Google interactive map showing how to get to Jalpan de Serra from the Guadalajara/Lago de Chapala area, click here . 

Steeple

Unlike the other missions, the mission's bellfry has only one level. The bellfry , called a bell tower,  is octagonal and has openings for four bells. It sits on a tall quadrangular tower with interesting trompe d'oeil designs painted on its sides. Each bell opening is framed by fluted columns  on either side. In the narrow spaces between the columns are relief carvings of vines and there is more relief vegetation along the cornices. Above the capitals on the top of the columns are finials in the shape of flowers. Notice the thin, conical structure with a spiral design in the lower right. I'll talk about this with a subsequent photo.   

The four-petal flowers along the cornices have pre-Hispanic religious meanings . The inclusion of these images were part of the Franciscan strategy of synchronicity. Four-petal flowers  are a common symbol on pre-Hispanic pagan temples. They relate to the belief that the cosmos is based on the four sacred directions (north, south, east, west) .  

Each of the four directions had its own god, color, and myths.  The center of the flower represented the fifth direction: up and down, or heaven and earth. It was also the center of the universe and some believed it was where the rain god Tlaloc lived in a room made of turquoise. I have seen the four-petal flower symbol in the temples of a variety of different pre-Hispanic civilizations, although they are separated by great distances and many centuries.

The conical structure with a spiral design is a finial.  It stands on top of one of the two buttresses that bracket the church entrance. Just below the cone is an odd little creature of uncertain species, with long hair cascading down its back. The figure's posture suggests that it is supporting the base of the cone. On the other side of the entrance is another buttress, topped by another cone and supported by a similar creature. Both are probably related to Pame religious beliefs, which incorporated the animals as well as plants of the Sierra Gorda. 

On the same buttress, but just below, is a comical relief carving . The face of the mop-haired figure has a curling handlebar mustache similar to those worn by Spanish men. This suggests that it is a caricature of a Spaniard. While native people did sometimes grow facial hair, it was generally too sparse to support an extravagant mustache like this. The figure's nose is bulbous, its tongue lolls out, and its arms are widely spread. 

The comical "Spaniard" is bow-legged, as many Spanish men would have been, since they virtually lived on their horses. The Pame artisan seems to have been having a little fun at the expense of his Spanish overlords.  This figure reminds me of a bit of the traditional Purepecha "Dance of the Old Men" , which also subtly satirizes the Spanish. On the inside face of each buttress is a double-headed eagle. This was the emblem of the Hapsburg dynasty, whose empire once ruled Spain, its colonial possessions, and much of the rest of Europe. 

A trompe d'oeil design covers the sides of the bell tower . The French term  means "deceive the eye" and refers to an artistic style that produces images that appear to be three-dimensional but are actually two-dimensional. This particular design seems to have been popular in 18th and 19th century Mexico. I have seen very similar ones in many colonial and early Republic structures.  

Facade

Like the other missions, Misión San Miguel has a highly decorated facade . There are five niches with statues and one triple statue at the very top. In addition, there are relief carvings of at least four cherubs and a profusion of plants and flowers. In this photo, you can see the two buttresses with conical tops that frame the entrance. The doorway has a trefoil arch , which differs from the smoothly rounded arches of the other four churches. Trefoil arches are architectural features introduced by the Muslim Moors between 711 and 1492, the era when they dominated the Iberian Peninsula.

Four-petal flowers decorate the base of the facade, along with ears of corn.  Like the flowers, corn also had deep meaning to native people. It was not only the most important food crop of pre-Hispanic Mexico, but of the entire Western Hemisphere. It was the agricultural foundation for nearly every sedentary culture and almost all of the great pre-Hispanic civilizations. As such it was viewed as a gift from the gods and various cultures had myths about how and why humans received it. For example, the Aztecs believed corn was given to humans by Quetzalcoatl , the famous Feathered Serpent.

To the left of the entrance,  St. Francis stands with a wolf at his side .  The statue was beheaded during the Revolutionary era. The wolf is a reference to a legend about St. Francis. When he visited the small Italian town of Gubbio, he  learned of a wolf that had been terrorizing the residents and he persuaded the people to let him intercede. The wolf charged Francis, but stopped when confronted by the sign of the cross. Together, Francis and the wolf visited the town to bring about a reconciliation. The wolf would stop killing and the people would feed it. More four-petal flowers line the wall on the left and above the trefoil arch. 

A statue of St. Anthony of Padua on the right was also beheaded . St. Anthony (1195-1231) was canonized by Pope Gregory IX in the year 1232. This occurred only 11 months after his death making it one of the quickest in history. In many cases, it has taken hundreds of years for someone to become a saint. Anthony was ordained as a priest at a very young age but, after hearing of the martyrdom of several Franciscan friars in Morocco, he decided to join the Franciscan Order.  He became a trusted associate of Francis of Assisi, the Order's founder.  He was famous for being a great preacher and friend of the poor.

The Franciscan emblem is between the top of the door and the choir window. The emblem was described in previous posts so I won't cover it here. Just above the emblem are two winged cherubs, one on either side. Each grips a crown with one hand while holding the Franciscan rope in the other. The rope's knots symbolize the vows of poverty, chastity, and obedience. Each knot has five coils representing the Five Stigmata, which were the wounds suffered by Jesus at his crucifixion. Two more cherubs hold curtains open on either side of the choir window.

On the middle left is a  n iche containing St. Ferdinand (Ferdinand III of Castile) . King  Ferdinand III  (1199-1252) is remembered as a just and tolerant king. He founded the University of Salamanca, as well as hospitals, bishoprics, monasteries, churches, and cathedrals. Ferdinand frequently pardoned offenders against his throne. However, he was also a warrior king, who fought against the Spanish Moors. Ferdinand III not only defended his realm but expanded it by capturing their city of Cordoba. 

While he was King, Ferdinand decided to become a Secular Franciscan. This required that he be a devout Catholic, but allowed him to be married and live in the world. When he died in 1252, he was buried wearing his Franciscan habit. Of the 10,000 recognized Catholic saints, only about 60 have been monarchs . This small percentage (0.006) does not surprise me, given how monarchs typically behave, particularly prior to the 20th century.

San Roque, with his dutiful dog, occupy a niche on the middle right.  Also called St. Roch, he was born in 1349 in Montpellier where his father was the local governor.San Roque and his dog also appear on the facade of the mission at Tancoyal. In Part 12, I told the story of this saint and the dog who saved him. His niche is framed by two Solomonic columns with ears of corn hanging on them. Miracles associated withSan Roquebegan even before his birth. His mother was thought to be barren, but miraculously conceived and when the future saint was born, he had a cross-shaped birthmark. 

Saint Michael waves his sword in triumph over Satan . St. Michael , as he is also known, is an Archangel, one of the most important of all angels. According to Catholic belief, he is the leader of God's armies and drove Satan from Heaven. St. Michael is nearly always shown with a sword in his hand and his foot on Satan, who is usually portrayed as a dragon. Above, Satan looks like a mountain lion with a semi-human face. The big cat was probably chosen rather than a dragon because the Pame craftsmen would have been familiar with mountain lions. Ears of corn hang down between the columns on either side of St. Michael.

A portrayal of the Trinity tops the facade . According to Catholic belief, the Trinity consists of the Father (God), the Son (Jesus), and the Holy Ghost. Since God is the most important of the three, I assume he is the one in the center. Each of the three stands with one foot on the ground and the other raised and resting on a globe, presumably representing the world. This oddly casual group appears to be having a nice chat about the events of the day.

This completes Part 13 of my Sierra Gorda series. I hope you enjoyed it. If so, please leave any thoughts or questions in the Comments section below or email me directly. If you leave a question, please include your email address so that I may respond in a timely fashion.

See you later, Jim