From the Renaissance onwards, religious speculations were largely supplanted by humanistic erudition and symbolic compositions in which allegories, emblems and even gods of the Greco-Latin pantheon were given quotation . All this acquired a wide presence in different figurative works, whose reading became true games of wit and wit.

The works could be contemplated and enjoyed from an aesthetic point of view by the general public. However, those with a broad humanistic culture could also discover moral reflections, political allusions or religious dogmas. This dual structure of form and substance corresponded to the Horatian principle that required all works of art to combine the useful with the pleasant.

Allegory as a form of rhetorical and visual language has been used since classical times. Etymologically, it means "to say something else" or "to speak differently". Through it, continuous metaphors were made in a system of mental equivalences with two meanings, one literal and the other deeper. In the world of images we usually speak of allegories to refer to personifications of vices, virtues, attitudes, aptitudes, territories ... etc. The other element of the symbolic culture with a very wide development was the emblem, which consisted of three parts: a motto or motto, synthesized in a phrase generally in Latin, an image(pictura) and a text, generally in verse that explained the image(subscriptio).

Along with the allegorical and symbolic compositions that, as an example, we will analyze, we must remember that music and literature also provided notable examples of the use of Navarre and the Navarrese people as topic for their creations.

In the context of the Hispanic monarchy

A first allegorization of Navarre is found in a simple drawing attributed to Vicente Carducho (1576-1638), preserved in Florence (Uffizi. Fondo Mediceo), together with those of Aragon, Granada and Valencia and which, with others, must have formed part of a set dedicated to the kingdoms of the Hispanic monarchy, probably destined for a program, not carried out, for the Salón de Reinos del Buen Retiro. It is made with pencil, pen and gouache and presents the figure of a king with crown and scepter next to the coat of arms of Navarre, of which elements and colors are indicated: "canpo colorado, esmeralda y cadenas doro".

Royal funerals and other celebrations throughout the Hispanic monarchy were an excellent motive to deploy propagandistic programs around the dynasty and royal power. Navarre would figure in some of them.

In the cathedral of Palermo, at the funeral of Maria Luisa de Orleans, the first wife of Charles II, in 1689, an exceptional display of allegories of the territories of the monarchy was arranged together with emblems that we know thanks to the engravings of the printed report of those celebrations. The allegory of Navarre presented a spirited armed young man with a plume on his head, holding an olive branch, a tree consecrated to Minerva and allusive to peace. Next to the figure was the shield of chains. The emblem showed a broken chain, the same one that "forged Miramamolin for the enslavement of his crown and broke the memorable effort of King Sancho". In the context of the funeral, the emblem was explained in allusion to the pain for the death of the sovereign, so immense that it could even break the metal. The motto that accompanied the image read "Protinus icta malo" (a sudden blow wounds with force).

The broken chain was the protagonist of another emblem, in this case in the cathedral of Pamplona in the following century. It appeared in one of the hieroglyphs of the funeral of Bárbara de Braganza, celebrated in 1758 in the Navarrese capital. It has been studied by J. L. Molins and J. Azanza and is conserved in the file Municipal of Pamplona. Its graphic composition presents a skeleton releasing one of the links of the coat of arms of Navarre, between whose chains is read: Nectuntur vicissim (They link one to another). Next to the grim reaper we read Iuncta discernit (divide things together) and in the upper part another motif insists on the relationship between the kingdom of Navarre and the destructive power of death: Extinguimur si dintinguimur (We are annihilated if we are separated).

Without leaving the 18th century and the topic of the Navarrese coat of arms, we must remember that, in the funeral celebrated in Barcelona for the death of Maria Amalia of Saxony, in 1761, the walls of the cathedral were covered with coats of arms of kingdoms, provinces and lordships of the Spanish crown. Under each of them there was an emblem or hieroglyphic. For Navarre, under its arms, there was a cartouche with a skull for a bell that contained inside it the tent of Miramamolín crowned by the average moon and the palenque with the chains. The motto read: "Nec vi nec ferro" (neither by force nor by iron). A Latin versified composition completed the emblem.

In the edition of the Annals of the Age of Enlightenment

An allegorization of Navarre in a preparatory drawing was made for the cover of the 1766 edition of the Annals of Navarre by Moret y Alesón. The Aragonese José Lamarca was its author and, in the end, it was not chosen for engraving. In it we see the coat of arms of Navarre on a delicate classical architecture and a curtain. Around it appear the allegory of Fame, another figure with helmet and spear holding some slaves with a chain, which we can identify with Minerva, goddess of just war and wisdom, and a third winged figure, seated on a column shaft, holding a pen or chisel with several books next to her feet, which must be identified with the allegory of history. The reading of the drawing seems quite clear, around the vision of the Kingdom as triumphant over its enemies and favoring the arts and culture.

The cover final of the aforementioned edition was the work of the academic engraver Juan de la Cruz Cano y Olmedilla, opting for a more academic version with a triangular pediment supported by bulls' heads. Below it and on an entablature decorated with classical motifs, appears the coat of arms of Navarre, under a royal crown and surrounded by palms, laurels, garlands of fruit, military harnesses, and even the remains of the defeated, among which is the head of a medusa with snakes. There are also some symbolic animals such as the Phoenix Bird that rises from its ashes, and a griffin, clearly signifying the survival and notoriety of the Kingdom, at all times, as well as its glorious history and resurgence, despite wars and difficulties of all kinds subject. In the architrave we find the registration "EX HOSTIBUS ET IN HOSTES" (Of the enemies and against the enemies), which already appeared as a motto on the title page of the edition of the Investigations of Father Moret (1665). The pediment is entirely occupied by a battle with a victorious horseman, evocative of a triumph of the Navarrese monarchs.

The headers of books XVII and XVIII of the above-mentioned edition of the Annals are illustrated with allegorical-emblematic compositions in relation to the reigns of two Navarrese monarchs: Luis Hutín and Carlos el Calvo. In the first case, a well-known emblem of the sacred enterprises of Nuñez de Cepeda was chosen, consisting of a candle in a lantern over a buffet with the coat of arms of Navarre, together with four winds trying unsuccessfully to extinguish the light. The registration Ut serven immunen (to be keptimmune ) and the content of the composition speak of the preservation of the kingdom for Doña Juana, his niece, or of the stubbornness of Hutín, who refused for a long time to come to take possession of the Navarrese crown.

To gloss the book XXVIII we find a matron with the shield of the chains next to flags, spears and a bundle of arrows alluding to the concord. She directs her gaze to the sun that illuminates the earth, and this one watching the moon with a registration that says Luci me redde priori (Restore me to the first splendor), in allusion to the provisionality of the reign of Carlos the Bald and to its lack of legitimacy for not having mediated the oath before the Courts.

In the foral palace and other works of the 19th and 20th centuries

As might be expected, the image of Navarre, a reality since the average Age and with its essences preserved in different historical contexts, was present on the upper level of the Throne Room of the foral palace. Its author, Miguel Azparren, chose for it a studied allegory, surrounded by the four cardinal virtues, which always offer models of conduct for the common good, both to citizens and rulers. The allegory of Navarre appears as a crowned and seated matron, leaning on the shield of the chains, and carrying some palms, a laurel wreath and a cartouche with the registration "FUEROS", as a justification of the pacifist regime. Some details offer us reading clues from the codification of allegories by Cesare Ripa in his Iconology ( 1593), a work republished on numerous occasions and intended for writers and artists to characterize "virtues, vices, affections and human passions". The matron appears seated, being the proper position of magistrates and princes, "showing tranquility of mind and calm". The royal crown alludes to territoriality and the Old Kingdom. The palm is a symbol of victory, triumph, vigor and strength, since it does not break under the weight or difficulties. The laurel wreath evokes the victors, the truth that always triumphs and perseverance, because of its evergreen leaves. Many of the elements that are represented were always present in programs of exaltation staff or institutional and are linked to abundance, agriculture, industry, war victories and progress, visible in the factories with their tall chimneys and the railroad that arrives between the arcades of the aqueduct of Noain. The cornucopia with fruits and the bundle of cereals were the secular attributes of abundance, contrary to the fearful scarcity. Allusions to the olive tree and the vine could not be missing, the latter signified with barrels, an amphora and a vine with grapes, which speak of its importance in the Navarrese Economics since centuries ago. Finally, the temple of wisdom, the same one that accompanied, among others, the allegories of Europe, also has its presence in the symbolic composition.

In the same context we must place the large map of Navarre made by Francisco Boronat in a large chromolithograph (1879). In the upper part of the composition presides the coat of arms of the capital Pamplona, together with allegories of geography and history that are accompanied by the attributes of letters, arts, progress, strength and sources of wealth.

Another allegory of Navarre, from the mid-19th century (1855), in the form of a large crowned matron with the coat of arms, can be found on the funerary monument of Francisco Espoz y Mina in the cloister of the cathedral of Pamplona. It is the work of the sculptor José Piquer, of which designs are preserved in the file General of Navarra. Compositionally, the sculptor made a replica of the tomb of the poet and playwright Victor Alfieri, the work of Antonio Canova in Santa Croce in Florence.

In the emblematic Monument to the Fueros (1903) one can contemplate the personifications of history, justice, autonomy, peace and work, under the allegory of Navarre, the owner of the monument holding a cartouche with the word FUEROS and a piece of chains. As it is known, the mentioned monument, designed by the architect Manuel Martínez de Ubago, was installed in the Paseo de Sarasate in 1903 and came to sign the Navarrese reaction in defense of their rights before the antiforal project presented in 1893 by the Minister of Finance Germán Gamazo, considering that it undermined the Ley Paccionada of 1841.

In 1912, for the diploma commemorative of the VII Centenary of the Navas de Tolosa, Javier Ciga made a design that was reproduced in print for its submission to institutions and individuals. In it appears the simple allegorical figure of Navarre, without elements of rhetoric, accompanied by one of the Diputación's mace-bearers, imposing a laurel wreath on a farmer who is accompanied by a young woman with a lyre in her hand.

We finish with another allegory present in the heart of the Navarrese capital, in the eastern facade of the Palace of Navarre, of neoclassical style, corresponding to the Avenue of Carlos III, which was raised with design architectural of the brothers José and Javier Yárnoz Larrosa in 1934. In its triangular pediment, we find an allegory of Navarre, sculpted by Fructuoso Orduna, as a matron with a mural crown flanked by the allegories of the Fine Arts, Agriculture, Livestock, Industry, Arms and Commerce, therefore, in the nineteenth-century tradition of the personification of the Old Kingdom, although on this occasion it does not wear a royal crown, no doubt because it was made during the Second Republic.