The 1766 edition of the Annals of Navarre, with engravings of its great historical passages, was preceded by another edition that failed and was destroyed due to the lack of fidelity to the original text by Moret y Alesón. However, from the point of view of the images, it was very important because it contained an engraved series of all the private kings of Pamplona and Navarre, in a recreation of them, with their heraldic emblems and allusions to the most important events of their reign. Some years ago we were able to know the complete series and we published it in the book Reges Navarrae. Imagines et gesta (2002).
 

In tune with other European dynastic series

The aforementioned edition destroyed in 1757 had its origin in 1750, when the printer and publisher Miguel Antonio Domech proposed to the Diputación del Reino the reprinting of the Annals. The following year a first agreement was signed and in 1752 the definitive agreement . However, in April 1755 Domech himself presented a memorial together with an engraving of Sancho el Fuerte so that the project publishing house could be enriched with forty-four engravings corresponding to the monarchs of Navarre, which would cost 1,500 pesos. Undoubtedly, Domech had been influenced by rich editions that he could contemplate in his travels or in his own establishment. As Javier Itúrbide has studied, Domech was a book merchant, a cultured man, polyglot and erudite, and no doubt he considered the idea of illustrating the edition of the Annals with portraits of the kings, as different European monarchies had been doing since the 16th century. Among the books of monarchs and notables with portraits we can mention: Austriacae Gentis Imagines by Gaspar de Oselle (Insbruck, 1569); the work of Paolo Giovio Elogia Virorum bellica virtute ilustrium (Basel, 1575); the Pourtraits et vies des hommes illustres by André Thevet, (Paris 1584); Ducum Brabantiae Chronica by A. Barlandi (Antwerp, 1600), or the Effigies imperatorum Austricae stirpis (Harlem, 1644). In this regard, F. Haskell recalls how, throughout the 17th century, collections of engravings of popes, cardinals, soldiers, statesmen, poets and scientists, both from past epochs and from that century, came out of the printing presses of most European countries, aimed at a public that obtained a large part of its impressions of the past from those editions.

In the aforementioned memorial of Domech to the Diputación, he states that he made the proposal after having consulted "with erudite persons" and for the sake of "the greatest showcasing", declaring that the price was not expensive. The deputies understood that with those images incorporated near the texts they glossed, the knowledge of the monarchs was complemented, at the same time that their supposed portraits were accompanied by a series of attributes, symbols and emblems that made their contemplation something that excited the reader's attention. The proposal was accepted and a deed was signed with the condition of making the engravings of half body, incorporating the heraldic coat of arms of each one and that the "borders, trophies and ornamentation should all be varied, as well as the portraits of the kings".

To avoid any eventuality subject it was determined that the preparatory drawings would be presented to the Diputación, "before opening the plate", in case any modification was deemed appropriate. Once C the drawing and the plate was opened, the latter was to be presented with a stamped copy of the engraving, so that everything would be to the satisfaction of the institution and to check if it was necessary to reform any detail, or to reopen the matrix.
 

The commission to José Lamarca and other engravers

In May 1755, the print of Sancho the Strong and other drawings were examined, and the deputies warned publisher that he should vary " ornaments and faces, putting some at half profile and others at profile whole and that, arranging all or as many as possible, he should present them together for the quickest and best resolution and execution of the work". The idea was to provide variety and avoid repetition. Throughout that year, various preparatory drawings were approved and, by the end of February 1756, there were twenty-seven firm agreement . The engraver from Pamplona of Aragonese origin, Juan de la Cruz, was called upon to give his opinion on everything presented, since the Diputación understood that they could not rule on formal and technical matters.

Regarding the choice of masters to carry out the entire project, we must remember the dispute over the engravings that the printer Domech commissioned to José Lamarca. The experienced silversmith and engraver from Pamplona, Manuel de Beramendi, felt aggrieved, entered into conversations with publisher and when he did not reach agreement , he presented a memorial to the Diputación in which, among other things, he defended the burin technique against the etching technique used by Lamarca, stating that he would open them all "with burin, which although it is more laborious, is much more permanent and durable than opening them with etching".

The complaint was to no avail and Domech, from agreement with what was stipulated with the Diputación, commissioned whoever he deemed appropriate, mainly the Aragonese José Lamarca, who initialed thirty-five times, leaving three without signature engraver. Antonio Navaz, a silversmith from Estella living in Pamplona, initialed two engravings and placed the excudit, while José Lamarca used the fecit or faciebat, which indicates not only the authorship of the engraving but also of the composition.

Lamarca's work for the Annals was done entirely in the capital of Navarre, where he moved with his family to carry out his work, as he would do years later to make the headers of the same work, in its 1766 edition, although Lamarca ended very badly with Domech, on account of the portraits of the monarchs and other works he had worked on for the aforementioned printer.

 

The engravings

Unfortunately, the edition containing the royal portraits was ordered to be completely destroyed in 1757 because of inopportune notes and additions, contrary to the rules of reprints. The same fate befell the engravings, which left much to be desired from the point of view of those who analyzed them with all rigor, who were Dr. José Ramón Miranda and the second a Jesuit, Father Mateo Javier Calderón. Even the report of a third one, that of graduate Sagardoy, was used.

Fortunately, we located a bound collection of forty engravings that we used for the aforementioned study. Lately, we have also had access to 13 plates that were used for the printing of those engravings. They are conserved in the file General of Navarre and correspond to the following monarchs: Iñigo Ximénez II, Ximeno, Iñiguez, Fortuño García II, García el Tembloso V, Sancho el Mayor IV, Teobaldo I, Teobaldo II, Enrique, Juana I, Felipe III, Fernando el Católico and doña Juana and don Carlos. The rest must have been recycled in the new matrices of the 1766 edition, since when the complete edition was seized, all the plates were delivered to the Diputación and were reused in the preparation of the open plates for the 1766 edition.

A common characteristic of all the royal portraits is the presence of prisoners, slaves and savages, along with weapons and military trophies that evoke the triumphs of the kings and of the Pamplona and Navarre monarchy of medieval times. Otherwise, the organization is very repetitive, with the more or less ornamented oval and mixtilinear arrangement in almost all the examples, to house the figure or figures of the kings. In the case of marriages or mother and son, they are generally located in the same cartouche, with the exception of those of don Felipe and doña Juana and don Juan and doña Blanca, in which we find two independent ovals for each of the figures. In some cases, in the lower part, on both sides of the architecture or the shield, there are passages of feats of the monarchs. Sometimes, in addition to the heraldic coat of arms, there are also particular currencies or companies of each sovereign.

Another characteristic reiterated in all of them is the presence of the sun in their portraits, with the exception of those who did not die a natural death, in which case the knife, sword or some object that identifies the violence of the death appears. These are authentic solar kings. Víctor Mínguez analyzed in detail in a magnificent work the presence of the solar star and its emblematic significance next to the monarchs. The series of the kings of Navarre is a testimony of sovereigns who reign under the sun, symbol in different cultures of positive and beneficial qualities and virtues, so the rulers used it for their representation.

To these keys of a more general nature, we must add another related to the idea of mentor of the plates, the printer Domech, who claims to be inspired by Diego Saavedra Fajardo, author of the Idea of a Christian political Prince represented in a hundred companies (Munich, 1640), a publication of obligatory enquiry among those who designed images in Spain in the centuries of the Baroque.

 

Three examples

The representation of Fortuño García II presents José Lamarca crowned and wearing a helmet. He appears frontally and is accompanied by the cross and some cilices that allude to his condition of monk, the same as the two lower passages, with a monastery and the monarch himself with habits. Father Calderón, censor appointed by the Diputación, shows his critical sense, in this case about the proportions of people and constructions and the location of the crown, when he says: "This king, when he is already represented as a monk, should have had the crown placed at his feet, or as if he were holding it in his hand. The church and the Shrine of Our Lady of Fair Love are much smaller than the people who are going to enter them". It is indeed known that Fortún Garcés, leader of the Pamplona nucleus at the end of the IX century, retired in his old age to the monastery of Leire, in the year 905, abandoning the world, which is why the Christian sources know him by the nickname of the monk, while the Muslim ones add that of the one-eyed man.

García Sánchez III el de Nájera, who was king of Pamplona from the death of his father until 1054, appears as the fifteenth of the series with the name García el de Nájera VI. In his hands he holds a staff of command and a sword. In the lower part we find a knight kneeling before an altar with the Virgin and a walled city, as well as a vase of lilies with the registration: "Orden de la Terraza Año 1044". The Marian image alludes to Santa María de Nájera, as does the town. The disagreements of father Calderón are limited, in this occasion, to the presence of the sun and to some other details, when he affirms: "If in the plates of other kings that died in war or violently the sun is omitted and in its place is put sword or arrow, having died this don García of a lance and between the arms of the blessed San Íñigo, that reclined him in them, the sun should be omitted and not to dissimulate this so much for notorious lance. Also it could have been arranged some people that accompanied the king in his hunt, although for having this section of the retinue, it was represented to another side. In this plate already grade the foundation of Nájera and of the order of the Terraza year 1044, but for the same reason they are missed when they are omitted in other similar foundations, because they will judge those who are not very fond of the nation and its kings that these did not make the foundations of which they boast and it gives reason to some complaints". The legend of the apparition of Santa María la Real de Nájera and the institution of the order of La Terraza are narrated by Father Moret.

The print of Sancho el Fuerte was made by the silversmith Antonio Navaz and his drawing was the one that Domech presented as model to the Kingdom to convince his deputies to incorporate the portraits of the kings to the edition. Stylistically, it differs from those executed by José Lamarca because of the horror vacui and the use of elements of the baroque tradition. The sovereign appears from the front with armor and golilla, royal crown and helmet, holding the sword and the scepter. In his border stands out the shield with the chains in the superior zone, while in the inferior zone appear great weapons of war, his sword, the shield, an enormous mace, as well as bows, trumpets, pikes and banners, one of them with the image of a Virgin with the Child and the registration "TIBI VICTORIA" and another with a fragment of strings with another text that reads: "ANNO 1212 REGAL MANU NATA".. Father Calderón made a long commentary on several aspects that affect the currency, since "This king used the motto of the black eagle with open wings and a white band running around them and the neck, and another at the bottom, constantly before the battle of Navas, although afterwards he used indifferently the chains and the eagle as motto, as recorded by Father Moret in several places..