The Mural Painting of the Portería at Cholula

The convent of San Gabriel, in San Pedro Cholula, Puebla, was founded around 1529 (Maza, 1959, pp. 61–62), although the current church was built between 1549 and 1552 (Kubler, 1983/1992, p. 562), and the paintings studied below must be of the last third of the sixteenth century in their finished version. Their subject matter takes on special meaning in accordance with one of the functions that the porterías acquired in the New Spanish convents, as reported in the Constitutions of the Province of the Holy Gospel, in their 1569 compilation. These rooms and other public places in the convent served as confessionals for sick Indians (García Icazbalceta, 1889, p. 154). The paintings at Cholula were designed to offer the dying a paradisiacal image of the prize they were sure to reach in the afterlife.

The term portería refers to the conventual access space, conveniently controlled by a door, the opening and closing of which is in the charge of a friar or another person acting as doorman. In the case of Cholula, this area is located behind the western portal, composed of three arches. To enter the convent, one first enters the aforementioned portal, then through the anteportería and finally the portería, which connects directly with the convent, the cloister, and its dependencies. In it is the authentic door of the convent, which communicates directly with the cloister. Both the anteportería and the portería have openings (now closed) that connected with the church and that could have originally been confessionals; in them the friar would stand on the church side, and the sick in the entrance to the convent (figure 9.1).

The portería of Cholula still preserves elements of its exceptional decoration (figure 9.2). Today there are fragments of what probably were two different pictorial programs in grisaille, which are thematically related and were surely painted in close succession. The northern wall and part of the southern wall still have well-preserved vertical bands with vegetable ornament, which were used to divide the surface of the wall and which must have belonged to the first decorative program. A different painting is featured on the eastern wall and a short section of the southern wall, where these simple bands probably have been replaced with painted columns, with strings of plants arranged in spirals. Furthermore, the blank space between the divisions has been filled with the representation of a peaceful grove. In the margins of the room, two friezes also run across the wall: the upper frieze, which is associated with a Franciscan cord motif, and the lower frieze, which is just above the baseboard; both appear to belong to the first decorative scheme. The western side of the portería, which leads to the anteportería, is completely occupied by a large basket-handle arch with two trumpeting angels painted in the spandrels.

Murals depicting landscapes are also found in other convents of New Spain. In various rooms such paintings can be found, serving as either the background in a Calvary or on their own as the sole focus of the viewer’s attention. That said, the painted garden in Cholula’s portería represents a paradise that should be distinguished from more typical scenes such as the hortus conclusus [enclosed garden] found in the convent’s cloister (Badenhorst, 2009). Indeed, in the portería we encounter a different sort of allegory. To make the point succinctly, let it suffice to say that at the base of the two complete preserved columns in the painting, the viewer finds two reclining animals, a jaguar and a stag, the first of which stands out for its touches of color. As we shall see later in this chapter, these two animals are loaded with meaning.

While there is no direct documentary evidence that allows us to date the two pictorial programs, the following analysis suggests that the painting belongs approximately to the final third of the sixteenth century. In 1568 the provincial gathering of Franciscans got together in Cholula, since it was the second largest convent after San Francisco in Mexico City (Kubler, 1983/1992, p. 562). It is possible that the first version of the paintings of the portería at Cholula was renewed for this event.

Next, the two pictorial programs are studied in a related way, because it is considered that the second (the grove with the animals), qualifies what is expressed in the first, the most important elements of which are the decoration of the cloister door and the friezes. The analysis of the paintings begins with them.

The Bud of Jesse’s Tree

The most important tree found in the painting is the smallest, although it is strategically placed above the door that leads to the cloister. Furthermore, it does not represent a fully grown tree, but rather a tender bud that needs protection. It is in the center of an emblematic composition that is horizontally divided into two registers (figure 9.3). The lower section is found on the sloping surface on the inside of a basket-handle arch, where we find a sort of underworld dominated by a skeleton, the muerte arquera [archer of death], who is flanked by two crowned skulls with snakes and crossed tibiae. This macabre skeleton is prepared to shoot one of his terrible arrows into the register above, where we find a vulnerable tree, which is shown as a branchless trunk with only a few acanthus leaves with fruit clusters. The archer’s deadly arrows could never hit the tree, since two fantastic guardians, each of which has the body of a lion and the head of unicorn, hold up a large strapwork shield that would intercept any arrow.

Accordingly, this sapling will not yield to Death’s attack, since it is not mortal but rather belongs to the spiritual realm and is immortal. Indeed, it is a sacred object, even though it does not symbolize the cross of Christ but rather a different element of deep messianic significance: the branch of Jesse where the spirit of God, in the form of Christ, resides (Isaiah 11:1–2). In the Book of Revelation (22:16), the root and lineage of Jesse plays an important eschatological role, considering that it is worthy of opening the book and its seven seals (Revelation 5:5). In the portería at Cholula, Jesse’s tree is given prominence and is placed high on the wall as an allusion to God’s holy mount (Isaiah 25:6–9).

As mentioned above, the branch is protected by two visually striking lions with unicorn heads that could come from Psalm 22, in both the Latin text of the Vulgate and the Greek version of the text. According to Saint Justin, in this Psalm Christ on the cross turns to the Lord in order that his soul [unicam meam] be saved from the mouth of a lion and the horns of unicorns (Psalms 22:22) and hence from eternal death (Justin. Dialogus cum Tryphone 105.1–2; Granados, 2005, pp. 365–367). For Pope Gregory I in the sixth century, Christ, whose divine essence could not be destroyed, was chosen as the only man who could save the world (Gregorius Magnus, 1971 [Homiliae in Hiezechielem prophetam 6]).

Saint Justin’s interpretation of the psalm sets the stage for the depiction of these fierce beasts in Cholula, where they have been converted into ideal guardians of the sole vessel of God’s spirit: instead of going on the attack, these fantastic animals surrender to his greatness. The lion, the protector animal par excellence, is also an emblem for Jesus, because as the Messiah he also incarnates the lion of Judah’s tribe (as cited in Charbonneau-Lassay, 1997, Vol. 1, pp. 35–53). Furthermore, Dom Leclercq has argued that the unicorn can also serve as a symbol for Christ, the pure among the pure (as cited in Charbonneau-Lassay, 1997, Vol. 1, p. 343). In Cholula the attempt to create the strongest (lion) and purest (unicorn) possible protector animal is patent, and to a certain extent this creation serves as a reflection of the charisma of a convent’s inhabitants, the Franciscan friars, men as strong as the lion in their tasks of evangelization and pure as the unicorn, almost angelical.

Just as Jesse’s branch, where the spirit of God resides, plays a leading role in Isaiah 11, so too does it form the centerpiece of the entire portería composition. The following analysis argues that the upper frieze, and the later arboreal decoration found on the eastern and southern walls, depict two prophetic episodes that are closely connected to one another; furthermore, and in accordance with the type of concordances that were so beloved by Joachim of Fiore, the two depicted episodes were foreseen in the Old Testament and the Book of Revelation: the peaceful rule of the new David (Isaiah 11:1–9) and its eschatological analogue, the first resurrection (Revelation 20:4–5) after the opening of the fifth seal (6:9–11), and then the millennial reign of Christ with his elect (20:2–7), during which all exiles would return to their homes and unite around Jesse’s root (Isaiah 11:10–16).

The Souls of the Indigenous Witnesses to Faith are Glorified Like Those of the Gentiles

As was alluded to above, the portería at Cholula contains a frieze in which two powerful representations are juxtaposed (figure 9.4). In the first, two angels with grotesque features raise up the image of an indigenous man, like a portrait on a clipeius (round shield), while in the second, two monstrous birds vainly seek the lush fruits placed in a beautiful container. Both motifs find precedents in the art of classical antiquity and, despite their originality, are not unparalleled in the New Spanish context. Indeed, the same motifs are also found in the Franciscan convent in Tecamachalco, where they undoubtedly are endowed with the same eschatological meaning, because although these forms belong to pagan antiquity, they have been moralized and Christianized.

In these images the natives wear the ayate, which, as Muñoz Camargo (1892, p. 9) explained, was a typical garment worn before the conquest. Furthermore, since the portraits take the form of busts, this traditional garment comes to closely resemble the Roman paladumentum, which was also fastened at the shoulder, revealing the corresponding arm. After the evangelization, Franciscans introduced new types of clothing for men, but this traditional lightweight cape maintained its place in indigenous society and was worn by individuals belong to all social classes (Escalante & Rubial, 2004, p. 497). What is particularly noteworthy in the Cholula frieze is that the ayate is used as a visual shorthand to differentiate the indigenous peoples from the Spaniards.

The similarity between these representations of indigenous people and the classical models was undoubtedly intentional and allows for two things: first, to establish a connection between the indigenous population and gentiles, that is, to unite the paganism of antiquity with that of New Spain; second, to glorify the Christianized natives by means of a Roman motif. The consideration of the New World natives within the human race and their filiation was a very important theological question. Motolinía (2014) reflects the lack of definition about this and makes clear his opinion:

Algunos españoles, considerados ciertos ritos, costumbres y cerimonias de estos naturales, los juzgan ser de generación de moros; otros, por algunas causas y condiciones que en ellos ven, dicen que son de generación de judíos; mas la más común opinión es que todos ellos son gentiles

[Some Spaniards, considering certain rites, customs, and ceremonies of these natives, judge them to be related to the Moors; others, for other causes and conditions which they see in them, say that they are related to the Jews; but the most common opinion is that they are gentiles]. (p. 15)

Given this consideration, the most important celebration pertaining to the birth of Christ was the Epiphany, during which the indigenous were represented as the Wise Men, the gentiles to whom the divine and messianic nature of Christ was shown (Surtz, 1988, pp. 333–344). It was quite convenient to categorize indigenous people as gentiles, that is, as men who had never known the word of God and, in the best of circumstances, lived in accordance with the law of nature: in Motolinía’s words, “gentiles idólatras y sin conocimiento alguno de su majestad [de Cristo]” [idolatrous gentiles and lacking any knowledge of (Christ) his majesty] (Motolinía, 2014, p. 345). This freed them from the negative burden carried by the Jews, as some prominent Franciscans had repeatedly insisted (Monsalvo Antón, 2013). For the Christian, the Jew was the deicide who had not wanted to recognize in Jesus the Messiah of the prophecies. The Franciscans in New Spain considered that, within the system of natural law by which the indigenous people were thought to have lived, one could find traces of the true God which would have especially entrusted the conversion of the gentiles to Christ. It seems that Motolinía recalls the text from Isaiah about God’s expectations of his “suffering servant,” whom he identifies as Christ. God was not going to be contented with the conversion of the Jews; on the contrary he asks that “se extienda el precio de tu redención a la redondez de la tierra . . . quiero que seas por mí enviado, saluda a todos los gentiles y por ti reciban la luz de la verdadera fe” [the price of your redemption be laid out around the Earth. . . . I want you to me my envoy, greet all the gentiles and may they receive through you the light of the true faith] (as quoted in Motolinía, 2014, pp. 367–368).

The busts of the natives in this frieze are shown within a shield in a way that parallels the imago clipeata [representation/portrait on a shield] (see Macrob. Sat. 2.3–4). Furthermore, the shields are lifted by angels (derived from the winged geniuses), according to how the images of the deceased rise in ancient Roman sarcophagi. By using this iconographic model, the implicit glorification is transferred to the indigenous people. The use of the clipeus in heroic representations is well documented in Greece and in Rome, where it was adopted in the late Republic, both in public and funerary contexts, as a means to represent an apotheosis. In Rome, such clipeus originally depicted deities and deified individuals and hence were used in the Imperial cult from the Augustan period onwards (Beltrán, 1999, p. 83). In funerary contexts, the clipeus was incorporated into sarcophagi from the second century CE and was understood as a symbolic allusion to the apotheosis of the deceased. In instances where figures like Erotes, Victoriae, centaurs, or tritons held up or presented the imago clipeata, the composition alluded to the deceased’s success, understood in the broadest of terms and as a victory that the honorable obtained at the time of death (Hidalgo & de Hoz, 2003, p. 546).

The use on Roman sarcophagi of imago clipeata was continued in the Middle Ages, a fact that not only led to the endurance of its motifs and meaning but also allowed it to be taken up as a model in new appropriate circumstances. But the reuse of this artistic motif at Cholula is quite unusual, since it recaptures the entire original logic of the imago clipeata and makes use of all the associated meaning and significance. More than an adaption, it constitutes an aggiornamento, a bringing up-to-date. The image is designed to show how the angels protected the souls of the indigenous from lurking dangers (the angels are shown stepping on plant-like monsters with giant mouths that rival those of Leviathan) (figure 9.5). The souls remain honored atop a sort of thrones with backs like scallop shells, which is a likely allusion to the chairs reserved in the heavens for the chosen, mentioned in the Book of Revelation (7:4). The Baptistery of Neon in Ravenna (fifth century) presents under the dome a colonnaded portico in a pleasant garden with a series of empty thrones housed by scallop-shell niches, all of them around that of Christ in the hetoimasia, “the preparation of the throne” for his next coming as judge, a common theme in Byzantine art.

Friar Gerónimo de Mendieta described the terrible situation that the native population endured at the end of the sixteenth century, when people were dying in droves due to the diseases and work overload to which they were subjected by the Spanish. Nevertheless, according to Mendieta, the epidemic was a punishment meant not for the indigenous peoples but rather for the Spaniards, who would lose the labor force that sustained their opulent and greedy lifestyle. The Franciscan’s lamentation contained an important consolation, because the Indians died after being rescued with the last spiritual aid, including the absolution of sins, provided in the portería. In Mendieta’s opinion, this was a sign of the imminent end of the world:

Y así de las pestilencias que entre ellos vemos, no siento yo otra cosa, sino que son palabras de Dios que nos dice “Vosotros os dais priesa por acabar esta gente; pues yo os ayudaré por mi parte para que se acaben más presto, y os veáis sin ellos, si tanto lo deseáis.” Y en una cosa vemos muy claro que la pestilencia se la envía Dios, no por su mal sino por su bien, en que viene tan medida y ordenada, que solamente van cayendo cada día solos aquellos que buenamente se pueden confesar y aparejar . . . De donde podemos colegir, que sin falta va hinchiendo nuestro Dios de ellos las sillas del cielo para concluir con el mundo

[And concerning the plagues that we see among them, I can only feel that they are God’s words saying “You hurry to finish off these people; I shall aid you so that they finish more quickly, and you shall find yourself without them, if you want it so much.” And we see one thing very clearly: that the plague is sent by God, not to harm them but to benefit them, as it comes with such measure and order, that each day only those fall who are able to confess and prepare themselves. . . . From this we can gather that our God surely is filling the chairs of heaven with them to end the world]. (1997, Vol. 2, p. 201 [4.36])

Mendieta, in this lament for the incessant movement of the sick and dying, seems to have in view the corresponding images of the conventual atrium included in the Rhetorica Christiana by Diego de Valadés (1579/1989, p. 107). Both the written testimony and the engraving show a dramatic situation corresponding to a very specific time, given the interest in showing the prize that corresponded to the deceased Christian Indians in an especially difficult time for them: the last third of the sixteenth century, the time when the murals of Cholula probably acquired their current appearance.

Nettel (1993, p. 45) rightly identified the church literally carried on the shoulders by the Franciscans, in the atrium of Valadés’s engraving, with the church of the Holy Spirit, due to the large dove depicted in its interior. Furthermore, Valadés depicted over this church a Deesis with the Trinity in the Compasio Patris [Compassion of the Father] style. This was likely meant to comfort the sick who were on their deathbeds, since it invokes the pity of God and his intermediaries. For Mendieta, the natives who died in such circumstances went directly to the “chairs in Heaven,” which the fallen angels had left empty and which are visually represented in the Cholula frieze containing the souls. In the Christian tradition, these seats are reserved for the martyrs, and therefore the natives are martyrs.

This idea is already found in Saint Bonaventure’s Legenda Maior Sancti Francisci [The Life of Saint Francis of Assisi]: a companion of Saint Francis experienced an ecstasy that revealed the truth of this matter, when he was praying alongside the saint in an abandoned church. As he gazed at the heavens and saw many thrones, among which one stood out for being more resplendent and adorned with precious stones, a voice spoke out to him, explaining that the throne had belonged to one of the fallen angels and was now reserved for the humble Francis (Guerra, 1985, p. 417 [6.6]). Coronel (2018, p. 722) has shown that, according to his Doctrina Pueril [Puerile Doctrine] (1274–1276), Ramon Llull (1232–1311) believed that the triumph of the saints would take place when they filled all of the empty seats from which the demons had fallen, since at that moment the general resurrection would arrive.

This line of thought is developed in the Book of Revelation (6:11), where those who died for expressing their faith were told by God to rest a while, until the number of their fellow servants and their brethren, who were to be killed as they were, should be complete. The text goes on to explain that the first resurrection is reserved for these individuals (Revelation 20:4–5). In Cholula, this resurrection is shown as imminent for the worthy who are depicted on the clipeus, since in the spandrels of the oval arch found on the western wall, there are two angels who are already sounding their powerful tubas. This act is surely meant to summon the souls to their judgment (Matthew 24:31, 1; Thessalonians 4:16; Revelation 8:2).

This eschatological episode is related to the messianic prophecy of Isaiah (11) about the reign of Christ that serves as the scriptural basis for all of the Cholula decoration studied in this chapter. The passage in Isaiah 11:4 describes how the spirit of the Lord, clothed with all his gifts, will judge the weak with justice and decide with righteousness for the meek of the earth.

The Punishment for Impious Souls or the Gods of the Old Religion

The composition prepared for the witnesses to the faith in the frieze is linked to an opposed, negative image: several birds with ugly pointed feathers, curved necks, and snouts filled with teeth instead of beaks cannot reach the ripe and abundant fruit before them. These birds may depict the antithesis of the just souls, because formally they are drastically in contrast with the beautiful birds (mostly doves and peacocks) that peck at some of the Christological symbols (grapes, pomegranates, or the Chrismon) associated with eternal life. They played an extremely important iconographic role in Christian funerary art from the beginning of the faith. All are commonly found in catacombs and continue to be found on sarcophagi dating to the High Middle Ages. They can, however, also allude to the gods (or demons, according to the friars) of the old religion, which until the arrival of Christianity would have collected—but not taken advantage of for the salvation of the natives—their fruits (virtues and good works) (Sahagún, 1979, Vol. 1, f. 2r [prologue]).

In any case, the grotesque birds from Cholula are shown as unable to snatch the fruits that they so desperately seek. The weakness of their necks symbolizes their lax morality. They do not manage to firmly resist the demon’s onslaught, as Saint Paul advised his followers to do (Ephesians 6:10–13). Indeed, these ugly creatures lack the shield of faith and obviously are not awarded the virtue of strength, which is one of the gifts of the Holy Spirit and with which the bud of Jesse’s tree was endowed (Isaiah 11:2). Their lack of virtue prevents these birds from overcoming their sins. In visual terms, they are unable to penetrate the powerful vegetable volute that stands between them and the food that they so covetously desire.

The abovementioned vessel and its contents deserve special attention: the vessel is made of a series of elements that resemble the parts of the columns painted in front of the grove in the portería. The foot is made of acanthus (as the base), the belly is wrapped with large leaves, and the vessel’s neck is reminiscent of a capital with a sort of triglyph motif in the section corresponding to the echinus. It is, fundamentally, an abstraction of a new tree with acanthus leaves and round fruit, which will be discussed in relation to the columns mentioned above. As symbols of the Eucharist that provide eternal life, the food of the vessel appears to be reserved for the chosen, and hence others are prohibited from enjoying it.

Little remains of the room’s lower frieze, painted on top of the red ochre baseboard, but it is also present, with some variations, on both floors of the cloister; thematically, it is closely related to the one we have just discussed. The main motif is a pair of vegetable-fish that the angels try to stop from devouring a bird. The position of the bird seems to be imported directly from the eagle that appears on some Roman sarcophagi below the clipeus, such as the one dating to the second half of the third century CE from the Baths of Diocletian, now housed in the National Roman Museum. In Cholula, as in early Christian art, extracted from its original context, the bird represents the soul that, as will be explained, is in danger of being attacked by the surrounding beasts.

A Wooded Paradise for the Birds

The section of landscape painting in the portería creates a tapestry effect, which is only kept from being truly immersive by the unnatural tones of the grisaille (figure 9.6). This second decorative version would likely only have been developed in this part, which is a thematic complement to the first. The image with its columns, grove with birds, flowers, and perhaps mushrooms (Ashwell, 2003, p. 6) can all be interpreted symbolically.

From the beginning of Christianity, birds were used as emblems for the martyrs and, more specifically, their souls. In an analysis of First Corinthians, where Saint Paul distinguishes the different types of bodies for men, animals, birds, and fish, the second-century author Tertullian associated the martyrs with the flesh of birds (Tert. Re res. carnis 52). Indeed, for this Church Father the flight of birds is reminiscent of the liberation of the martyrs’ souls ascending to the heavens. For that reason, the birds that adorn Christian graves from the time of the martyrs could even be labelled with the names of the deceased (Charbonneau Lassay, 1997, Vol. 2, p. 518). Soon the dove was connected to the martyrs, since its whiteness is that of the clothing bestowed on the martyrs just before their glorification (Revelation 6:11). In the Cholula mural, however, birds of the family Psittacidae, including New World parrots, provide a quite apt symbol for the indigenous populations, who the Franciscans thought of as “martyrs” in the etymological sense of “witnesses,” just like the decollati (beheaded) and interfecti (slain) of the Book of Revelation (6:9, 20:4).

The gardens filled with birds from the catacombs find parallels in several illustrations from the beati, which are also meant to allude to the martyrs as they happily await the resurrection. In the eighth century, Beatus of Liébana firmly believed that the end of the world was impending: everywhere, ruin reigned and the Church of God was under attack. It was a time of the sort of persecution and suffering described in the Book of Revelation. In face of such a dire situation, this text provided some hope, since it assured that the suffering would soon end and that the just would have their due reward. According to Beatus, just before the end of time, Earth would experience the millennial kingdom of the Church (as cited in González, 2009, p. 130).

While there is not any illustration of the first resurrection in the beati, since it is an uncomfortable idea that could easily lead to heresy, the opening of the fifth seal (Revelation 6:9–11) is depicted below the altar of Heaven, not below an earthly one—with the martyrs, who, after asking for justice, await the necessary number of companions so they can receive their prize.

For our present purposes, the image in the Emilianense Beatus, which dates to the tenth century and is currently housed in the Spanish National Library, is especially important (figure 9.7). In the composition three birds are placed above a vegetable element that is framed by an arcade. For Antonio Cid (1984), with these birds “posadas en jugosas plantas, el artista quiso sin duda evocar la idea del paraíso, con lo que se apartó de la representación estricta del texto sagrado” [perched on juicy plants, the artist surely wanted to evoke the idea of paradise, by which means he diverged from the strict representation of the sacred text] (p. 64). Near the bodies of the interfecti found below the altar (which, in this case, are decollati, in line with Revelation 20:4), the painter added the enthroned figure of Christ along with the abovementioned idyllic garden filled with plants, birds, and multilobed arches, representing Heaven. This figurative design is well suited to depict the “beatific vision” or, in other words, the joy that the angels and the souls of those who died in God’s grace experience when they gaze directly upon Christ before being judged. According to Duns Scotus, the joy that provides perfection is achieved through this beatific vision (Elías, 2013, p. 74).

The birds in the Cholula grove, which are placed near the bud of Jesse’s tree, seem to be awaiting the first judgment and the first resurrection, in the company of the divine, in the garden of Heaven and without the threat of any danger.

The Colonnade with Helical Garlands

The columns painted in front of the trees present shafts wrapped by a vegetable stem that gives them an aspect very close to Solomonic columns. These supports form a harmonic sequence where certain animals settle placidly and present two of the characteristics that Saint Augustine attributed to peace: order and tranquility (August. De civ. D. 19.13). For this Church Father, peace is the very name of happiness, the aim of human aspiration, both for the individual and for society (Álvarez, 1960, p. 50).

Twisted columns with different kinds of decoration were born in the Palestinian art of the Hellenistic period and remained constant until the Middle Ages, both in architectural works and in illustrated codices. Following Tuzi (2016, p. 234), the early widespread popularity of this form throughout Europe long before the second half of the fourteenth century forces us to think about its symbolic potential. The use of spiraling columns in the medieval period evokes—at least in certain contexts—the Temple of Jerusalem and the Holy Land, since at that time the mythical temple was believed to have had such columns.

In the portería at Cholula, the columns are not properly Solomonic, but they are very similar as they also possess, as has been said, a prolonged vegetable element arranged helically. In the Middle Ages, a support wrapped in a vegetable bud alluded to the miraculous resurrection, and this is how Aaron’s rod (Numbers 7) was represented in the Speculum Humanae Salvationis [Mirror of Human Salvation] (Yale University Library, Beinecke MS 27, fourteenth or fifteenth centuries, f. 22r). This twisted plant in Cholula appears to generate more than one sort of product: spherical fruits in clusters (like the eucharistic grapes) and unitary spheres with protuberances at their bases, more difficult to identify.

These spherical fruits play a special role, since they appear on the capitals and bases of the columns, together with the large elliptical leaves with serrated edges that are characteristic of the cultivated acanthus. The story of the origin of the Corinthian order, recounted by Vitruvius in the first century CE, closely associated these leaves with the world of the dead, reaffirmed them as a symbol of immortality, and gave fame to the Greek sculptor Callimachus, who systematized them and interpreted them in stone (Vitr. De arch. 4.1, 8–9). What is important is that the clear association between the spherical fruit and the acanthus is not coincidental, given that the same pairing is also found in the very different context of the monumental frieze in the Augustinian church in Ixmiquilpan, where the leaves and fruit serve as loincloths for some members of the band of victorious warriors. Furthermore, these fruits are greedily sought by the birds at Cholula, as discussed above.

Throughout the Western tradition there are many examples of fabulous trees. The prophet Ezekiel announces that, on both sides of the river of the New Jerusalem, there will be trees of evergreen leaves and inexhaustible fruits, renewed every month. The fruits will serve as food, and the leaves for healing (Ezekiel 47:12). The version of this theme in Revelation (22:2), conveniently updated, allocates the healing function of the leaves especially for gentiles.

In the apocryphal Book of Enoch, one of the most widespread apocalyptic pre-Christian rabbinical texts, there is a mention of a very special fragrant tree that is beautiful to behold, has ample, elegant foliage, and possesses attractive fruit. It is found next to the seventh mountain, which is God’s throne (24.3–4, 25.3). From there, the archangel Michael says:

25.4 And this beautiful and fragrant tree, and no creature of flesh has authority to touch it until the great judgment, when he will take vengeance on all and bring everything to a consummation forever, this will be given to the righteous and the humble.

25.5 From its fruit, life will be given to the chosen; towards the north it will be planted, in a Holy place, by the house of the Lord, the Eternal King.

25.6. Then they will rejoice with joy and be glad in the Holy place. They will each draw the fragrance of it into their bones, and they will live a long life on Earth, as your fathers lived. And in their days sorrow and pain, and toil and punishment, will not touch them. (McCracken, 2010, p. 40)

The prototype of the tree of life and its variants described in Ezekiel, the Book of Revelation and the Book of Enoch could have inspired not only the painting of Jesse’s tree in Cholula, but the columns and vases found there. In the mural analyzed here, after the first resurrection the smell of its fruits would feed the chosen from among the indigenous people.

Opposed Animals: The Jaguar and the Stag

In the foreground in front of the two remaining columns in the portería of Cholula, we find two large animals that are meekly reclining: a jaguar and a stag (figure 9.8). Given the observable pattern, it is safe to assume that there must have been another animal resting in front of the third column, but unfortunately all traces of this animal have been lost along with the painting’s lower section. That said, the animals that we see are not the original ones, since, as Ashwell (2003, p. 5) has pointed out, below the stag we can still glimpse traces of a polychrome jaguar.

Both the jaguar and the stag are key elements in the composition, due to their symbolic importance in the pre-Hispanic worldview. The jaguar is, of course, the preeminent predator. Due to its habits, this large feline was associated with the night, darkness, and, in accordance with the Mesoamerican belief system, the humid and cold forces of the Earth and the different spheres of the underworld. The jaguar is identified as “the heart of the mountain” and “the lord of the echo.” Furthermore, the jaguar is connected to the night, the night Sun, and the rain and is also one of the nahuales [animals alter ego] of the shamans (Olivier, 1998). For the Olmecs, the jaguar was their ancestor and justified their royal ascendance. Sixteenth-century Franciscan chroniclers stressed the ferociousness of the jaguar; Sahagún (1979, Vol. 3, f. 155r) called it a tiger and named it king of all animals (see González Torres, 2001, pp. 123–144).

The stag is associated with hunting and sacrifice. It is a symbol for prey and is connected to the Sun. While by the beginning of the sixteenth century hunting had long ceased to provide the bulk of nourishment for Mesoamerican communities, the ritual hunt continued to be an operative concept due to its association with sacrifice via the flower war. Olivier has discussed the last hunting expedition of this type, which was carried out by Moteuczoma Xocoyotzin on October 23, 1518, on Mount Zacatepetl, where the prey, including stags, were captured and then sacrificed to the gods. In Mesoamerica the flower war was meant to nourish the Sun and the Earth with the blood of sacrificed warriors. But in Huichol culture, where human sacrifice never took root, the blood of the stag continued to serve as the preeminent offering for the Sun (Olivier, 2015, pp. 17–19, 280–281).

These two quintessentially American animals came to be associated with the tiger and the deer, which were also understood as epitomes of opposed forces in European bestiaries. The tiger’s ferocity connected it to Christian notions of the forces of evil; for this reason, the Physiologus [The Naturalist] claims that it is similar to the serpent (Guglielmi, 2003, p. 32). The deer, on the other hand, provides an allegorical image of Jesus Christ and Christianity, and accordingly is associated with good. Its enemy is the serpent (of original sin) whom it unremittingly pursues. Beginning in the fourth century with Saint Ambrose until the thirteenth with Saint Buenaventura, the deer was an emblem of Christ, who squashed the infernal snake (Charbonneau Lassay, 1997, Vol. 1, pp. 241–242).

Isaiah (11:6–9) provides a clue to help understand the meaning with which the jaguar and stag painted at Cholula were endowed. According to the prophet, after the judgment made by the spirit of God, a period of great peace would arrive. The image employed in Isaiah to drive home the importance and profundity of this peace is the harmonious coexistence of animals that are traditionally contrasted as hunters and hunted: the wolf will live peacefully beside the lamb, the leopard will rest with a goatling, and the cow and bear will live together, since there will be neither violence nor pillage on the holy mount of the Messiah.

As the preserved animals in the Cholula mural show, autochthonous animals were painted to represent this scene from the Old Testament in an adaptation to the reality of New Spain from the Franciscans’ point of view. In this sense Motolinía (2014) wanted to show the reasons why the indigenous professed a special love toward the brethren of his order, having the natives express these arguments:

Porque éstos andan pobres y descalzos como nosotros, comen de lo que nosotros, asiéntanse entre nosotros, conversan entre nosotros mansamente

[Because these people go about poor and barefoot like ourselves, they eat like us, they sit among us, they talk among us peacefully]. (p. 178 [3.4.310])

Doubtless these actions remind us of those of Isaiah’s animals and their roles: the friars could have attacked the indigenous people, but instead, according to Motolinía, they meekly mixed with them, as equals. The Franciscans, unlike other Spaniards, were neither proud nor aggressive, but as humble and peaceful as the men of the New World.

The Allegory of the Peaceable Kingdom for the Holy Gentiles of the New World

Millennialism was not totally cast aside by those who held Protestant beliefs. On the contrary, those who sought out the truth of their ideas also sought to prevail over old beliefs, so as to come to a better world that was essentially peaceful. The Quaker minister and artist Edward Hicks (1780–1849) painted more than sixty versions of the Peaceable Kingdom to memorialize the birth of an idyllic Quaker community in Philadelphia in 1681 (figure 9.9). This community was the brainchild of William Penn, who saw it as an undertaking that would become a model for all the world’s nations (Bourne, 2002). Hick’s paintings always contain two important images: on the left side of this one we see the signing of the treaty of peace and friendship with the natives of Delaware in Shackamaxon that took place in November 1682, while on the right side in the foreground this fact is shown as an allegory: there is an array of animals, some wild and others tame. They live in peaceful harmony and are governed by a child. The painting’s composition allows the viewer to visually understand that mutual respect between the old and new inhabitants of the American lands would be the seed of, and foundation for, the peaceable kingdom. This thought was taken into the world of New Spain by Motolinía, as shown in the quote at the end of the preceding section, about the peaceful relationship between the friars and the indigenous people.

The colonnade with the animals at Cholula is devised around the same theme as Hicks’s paintings, though with key differences. In the first place, the iconic elements in the mural are more complex and not as obvious as they are in the Quaker paintings, where the scene is directly lifted from Isaiah (11:6–9). And indeed, Jehovah’s Witnesses have employed the same visual efficiency as Hicks had in their own representations of the millennial kingdom: often in these illustrations the peaceful landscape is depicted as a sort of garden for New Jerusalem. But in Cholula those who will reap the benefits of this new kingdom (i.e., the indigenous people, painted on the clipeus of the upper frieze, who had been witnesses to Christ and the word of God) are depicted in order to clearly show the promise of the first resurrection laid out in the Book of Revelation (20:4–6). As explained above, these individuals were considered gentiles on theological grounds, and this circumstance justified the adaptation of both the imago clipeata from sarcophagi, as a means to show their glorification, and the prophetic allegory from Isaiah, to which the indigenous population was bound, as will be explained in a moment.

The Sibylline Oracles are a collection of prophecies that arose in Jewish circles and played a propagandistic role. They are exceedingly important for understanding what Sibylline divination could be in the Greco-Roman world and in the official religion of Rome (Caerols Pérez, 1989/2011, pp. iv–v). Furthermore, these texts interact with the apocalyptic theme by their claims and subversive nature (Suárez de la Torre, 2001, pp. 246–247). For our purposes, book 3, which was traditionally attributed to the Sibyl of Eritrea or the Sibyl of Cumae, and which contains the oldest kernel of the collection (Suárez de la Torre, 2001, p. 249), is of special interest. The text predicts that oppressive Rome would fall and a new period of peace for eastern peoples would arise in its wake. The Discalced Carmelite Friar José de Jesús María (1652) referred the prediction in the following way:

En tiempo largo, después que muchos años dieren vuelta, se dexarán las adargas y escudos, y servirán las lanças y los dardos de leña para el fuego . . . No temerá la tierra las armas, ni el tumulto de la guerra, quando del alto empíreo embie Dios al Rey porque todo el mundo goçará de tanta paz que juntos y mezclados parecerán los leones y corderos, y con las ternerillas habitarán los osos siguiendo sus piaras

[A long time from now, after many years have rolled by, they will put down their shields, and their lances and arrows will be burned as firewood. . . . The land will not fear weapons, nor the tumult of war, when God in the heavens shall send the King, so that all people should enjoy such peace that, mixed together, they shall seem like lions and lambs, and the bears shall live with the young calves, following their herds]. (p. 531)

After a series of destructive civil wars, the Roman poet Virgil hoped that in the aftermath of the Battle of Actium (31 BCE) there would be a new, peaceful world providing a worthy abode for humankind (González, J., 2007, pp. 10, 16). Among Christians, Virgil was believed to be a sort of prophet due to Eclogue 4, in which he uses the Cumaean Verses (l. 4), which refer to the abovementioned Sibylline prophecy. He goes on to announce the birth of a child who would govern a peaceful and just kingdom (pp. 44–45). Of course, the declaration from Isaiah (11:18–23) parallels the uncultivated and good-natured spirit that prevailed in this kingdom where tame flocks of sheep would no longer fear lions.

The Millennial Kingdom for the Righteous Dead Painted in Cholula

In the field of Catholic iconography, there are hardly any artistic creations that visually represent the two dominant themes found in Cholula, the first resurrection and the millennium with its Old Testament parallels. From the beginning of the Christian tradition, both doctrines proved to be extremely controversial: though they found a scriptural basis in the Book of Revelation, they were never incorporated into Catholic dogma. On the contrary, the Church followed the precedent set by Saint Augustine and strictly rejected these ideas. The great doctor of the Church rejected the literal interpretation of Revelation and instead proposed an allegorical reading of the biblical promise of the messianic kingdom that would endure for a thousand years. In his opinion, at the end of time Heavenly Jerusalem would be the destined place for the chosen, and in this holy city “the resurrected along with their Prince, the King of the centuries” would all congregate “and rule eternally with him” (August. De civ. D. 15.1–2). In no way did Saint Augustine believe that the New Jerusalem would exist on the physical plane during a historical period.

Nevertheless, during the Middle Ages, oppressed and rebellious people, for different reasons, firmly believed that those who had given faith to Christ during the tribulation would enjoy a happy period on Earth as a reward, as the Book of Revelation expresses. Among these individuals, we must include the first Franciscans who arrived in New Spain. The famous group of twelve friars, with Martín de Valencia as their leader, belonged to the reform of Friar Juan de Guadalupe, who offered for his followers a radical interpretation of Franciscan charisma. In what he calls “torture,” Andrés Martín recounts the lives of the followers of Guadalupe from the death of the reformer until a select group of them were sent to the westernmost part of world (1991, p. 150). General Friar Francisco de los Ángeles, the frustrated evangelizer of New Spain, imparted his expectations and plans, which were laid out in the Instrucción [Instruction] and the Obediencia [Precept], both of which were given to Friar Martín de Valencia shortly before the latter friar left Spain in 1523.

Maravall (1948, pp. 202–204) has analyzed the Franciscan utopia of a tutelary government that would control the native population, both religiously and politically, in a way that suited their docility. If the friars studied the local language and history, it was in an attempt to know what would be a good starting point to found a golden age; thanks to the natural and primitive state of the men found there, the Franciscans expected to have more success with these new Christians than with the old ones back in Europe. Taking up an old requirement, Mendieta demanded the complete separation of the natives and Spaniards:

Débese considerar esta república de la Nueva España que consiste en dos naciones, scilicet, la española y la de indios . . . [que] son repúblicas independientes

[It should be considered that this republic of New Spain consists of two nations, that is to say, the Spanish nation and that of the Indians . . . which are independent republics]. (as quoted in Maravall, 1948, p. 206)

The Franciscans suffered, since they knew that the indigenous people had lost due to their contact with the Spaniards:

sin comparación era mejor su estado y consideración y manera de vivir antigua, como tuvieran la fe y sacramentos que tienen, que su ser y estado de ahora

[without comparison, their condition and consideration and old way of life were better, since they had the faith and sacraments that they have, than their present being and state]. (as quoted in Maravall, 1948, p. 206)

For Maravall (p. 215), these ideas are tinged with Savonarolism. In the 1950s, however, Marcel Bataillon and John Phelan pointed out that the will to create the world’s third age, in the tradition of Joachim of Fiore, was implicit in the Franciscan project. In 1950, Bataillon (as cited in Herrejón Peredo, 2000, p. 192) saw traces of a prophetic Joaquinism in Friar Martín de Valencia, and in 1956 John Phelan interpreted Friar Gerónimo de Mendieta’s Historia Eclesiástica Indiana [Ecclesiastic History of the Indies] as a lament for the situation the missionary work of the Friars Minor found itself in at the end of the sixteenth century, unable to attain the coveted third stage of history (Phelan, 1956/1972). George Baudot (1983, 1990) developed these ideas, studying the entire Franciscan enterprise from a Joachimite perspective. In reaction to this historiographic tendency, developed fully in the 1990s, theologians and Church historians have not recognized the clear signs of Joachinism in the behavior of the Franciscans, due to their fear that the very claim of heresy that has always dogged Fiore had been implicit in the earliest stages of the evangelization of the Americas (Gómez Canedo, 1990; Saranyana & Zaballa, 1995; Zaballa & Saranyana, 1990). That said, over the last few years studies have resumed the Joachimite theses. Especially noteworthy is the work of Fontana Elboj (2016) who, through the study of medieval millennialism, connects and differentiates the Franciscan plan that was carried out in New Spain—that had, in the opinion of the friars, a message of hope for the natives—from the chiliasm that dates to the earliest periods of the Church.

Fiore, a twelfth-century Benedictine abbot, interpreted history progressively and allocated each member of the Trinity a particular age of the world, reserving the last age for the Holy Spirit (Valentinetti, 1998). This is quite similar to the millennium announced at Revelation 20 for the witnesses to God; therefore, for Fiore and in contrast to the position of Saint Augustine, that period, which would have monastic characteristics, would come to pass not in the heavens and after the final Judgment but rather on Earth: he foresaw a communal heaven on Earth that was led by men. Hence the problem.

The Tecamachalco sotocoro prepares the indigenous people to enter New Jerusalem (i.e., the very church they were entering) by means of a visual program which, in part, is synthesized in the opposition of the two Augustinian cities: Babylon and Jerusalem. Respectively, these cities find an analogue in Mexico Tenochtitlan (an Aztec capital before the arrival of the Spaniards) and Mexico City (the Christianized capital)—that is, the place, understood broadly, chosen for establishing a monastic lifestyle for the natives and friars, men who were nearly angelic. But the paintings that are seen in the porterías in Tecamachalco and Cholula do not show the community of the living, but rather that of the indigenous deceased, who during the days of the tribulation caused by Spanish abuse and greed would have died after being baptized. Their souls, already glorified, are seen waiting in the Cholula frieze for the impending first resurrection so that they can enjoy an idyllic period of peace with Jesse’s root as their sign, in accordance with the prophecy from Isaiah (11). The portería, used as a confessional for the sick, is the ideal place to show the dying natives the paradise (the grove) of the beatific vision. This will be the prize for their souls, as painted in the imago clipeata portraits, while their bodies—in a dissociation reminiscent of Emilianense Beatus—will be buried in the atrium adjoining the convent.

For Georges Baudot, the politico-religious Franciscan utopia was abandoned at the end of the sixteenth century, “disminuida en las posibilidades de realización por la instalación progresiva de una Iglesia seglar altamente jerarquizada” [with diminished possibilities of realization, because of the progressive installation of a highly hierarchical secular Church] (Baudot, 1990, p. 11). However, Mendieta at that historical moment cried out to God, asking the king of Spain to support the monastic project once again. And if in case this call did not work, the Franciscans strove to instill in the natives the hope of a better future, not only in life but after their death, because according to Revelation 20 they, like the martyrs, will be protagonists of the first resurrection and also will enjoy in it a time of perfect peace with Christ, as the prophecy of Isaiah 11 announces. This is how it was promised in the portería of Cholula, where the spirit of God resides.

Notes

This chapter is part of the I+D+i research project HAR2014–57067-P, Religious Acculturation in the Old World and Colonial America, directed by Dr. Francisco Marco Simón from the Universidad de Zaragoza. I would like the give special thanks to Dr. Gonzalo Fontana Elboj for his painstaking revision of this text, and also Dr. Francisco Morales Valerio (OFM) and Lic. Adrián Mendoza Leal, who have provided me with the plan of the convent of Cholula and photographs taken expressly for this research during the COVID-19 pandemic.

References