Several material testimonies linked to the identity image of towns and cities have come down to us and are susceptible to a careful analysis. Naturally, as municipal power grew, so did its visibility, and good sample are the town halls. From the architectural point of view, in addition to the town halls, the balconies of bullrings, squares, some urbanization works, butcher's shops, jails, fountains, irrigation systems, bridges and, later, some commemorative monuments stood out. All this constituted the expression of power through architecture and the arts. Many of these buildings bore splendid coats of arms, many of which are still preserved, some of them relocated in the new factories.

Other buildings that were not municipal property, in which corporations exercised the right of board of trustees, also bore the heraldic emblem of the town, and the authorities ensured strict compliance with that right in parishes, chapels and other foundations.

Finally, in the municipal public image, it always emphasized its staging, in corporation, in the great festive moments, highlighting their costumes, scallops, flags, ceremonial maces, music, dances and groups of giants.

Town halls and other buildings

In relation to the buildings of the town halls, we have numerous data studied in the book about them in Navarra (1988) or the synthesis we made with prof. Echeverría Goñi (1991) and the most recent one by P. Andueza (2014).

The buildings of Allo and Sangüesa belong to the 16th century. The first is dated 1575 and has a delicate coat of arms in a box like the attic of an altarpiece. The one in Sangüesa consists of a loggia built in 1570 with lowered arches and Tuscan columns to connect the place de Armas of the old castle-palace of the Prince of Viana with the Main Street. It is the work of Domingo de Aya, a stonemason from Aibar. Its rich coat of arms was carved by Miguel de Casanova and polychromed by Miguel de Arara. The noble brick body, from 1602, was built by local masters: Juan de Echenagusía and Juan de Biniés. In 1582, a beautiful design or design by Diego Berges for the town hall of Cascante, with a clear Vignolesque layout, alternating stone and brick and arcades on its floors and the usual gallery typical of the Ebro valley in the attic, is dated 1582.

A good issue of town halls corresponding to the Baroque centuries are preserved, in spite of the numerous destructions and modifications. Their documentation speaks of great works of stonework, masonry, carpentry, plasterwork and locksmithing, which shows the importance given by those responsible for the councils to the dignity and magnificence that those buildings that represented, even emblematically, the locality should have.

Examples as important and significant as the town halls of Viana, Lesaca, Baztán, Corella, Larraga, Estella, Corella, Vera and, of course, Pamplona, constitute an excellent sample of that splendor. Some of them were built in new areas of the urban fabric. In them we can appreciate the different typologies, materials, techniques, influences and artists that make all the Navarrese architecture of the time so diverse. Their stylistic characteristics are practically the same as those of the palaces and great mansions of the different areas of Navarre, from the great closed brick blocks of La Ribera to the magnificent stone examples of the northern valleys. A common feature is usually the existence of porches on the floor leave, intended for meetings, trade or receipt inclement weather. Their interiors usually house vestibules, staircases of rank and plenary halls. Occasionally, depending on the needs, they were added from prisons to bonded warehouses or alhóndigas and spaces for the sale of different products, and even schools, inns and taverns.

Its constructions offer a wide range of possibilities in which influences are mixed, from La Rioja in Tierra Estella, from Aragon and the Ebro Valley in general in La Ribera and from Guipúzcoa in Baztán and Cinco Villas. The artists themselves who work in the different factories belong to these same bordering regions.

With respect to the presence of allegorical images on the exterior, very few examples have been preserved. In the town hall of the capital of Navarre, the sculptures of the allegories of good government -prudence and justice- are associated with the Fame of the top and the two Hercules, which allude to the virtue that annihilates all discord. The town hall of Vera (1773-1776) also has later paintings of the four cardinal virtues -prudence, justice, fortitude and temperance-, and in the Casa de la Ciudad de la place Nueva de Tudela we find in simulated niches two allegorical paintings of the arts and abundance, made in 1859 by the painters José Basc and Patricio Andrés, possibly based on earlier models.

Another decorative subject that some town halls boasted until recent times were the cheers that were also hung in the ancestral homes of those who obtained distinctions. In Tudela, we know of several documented cases in which it was decided to celebrate those events by running a bull through the streets, lighting a bonfire, hanging cheers and illuminating the balconies of the Town Hall with axes. The town hall of Baztán, built from 1696 by the stonemason of Elizondo Juan de Arozarena, had numerous cheers hung on its façade, at different times, coinciding with the promotion or appointment to important positions of several sons of the Valley. At the same time that they were placed in the native house - as still they can be contemplated in some cases - another one was placed in the city council, being accompanied of celebration and popular rejoicing. A very interesting photograph by Laurent from the end of the 19th century, probably commercialized after the death of the famous photographer, sample shows us the façade totally ornamented by the aforementioned elements. Postcards of the building from the second decade of the 20th century already show its complete disappearance.

If the exteriors of the town halls had their propaganda function, the plenary halls with portraits of illustrious sons, kings and even historical episodes, did not lag behind. It is necessary to take into account the changes that occurred due to fashions, changes of regime, reigns, etc., although their decoration with civic, religious and moral motifs was always an expression of a specific status , generally adapted to historical contexts. The staircases, as reception and propaganda staircases, were very careful both in their typology and in their decoration. At the top of the list is the one designed for the Pamplona City Hall by the master from Tudela, José Marzal y Gil, "master of much credit and intelligence", around 1756, following a play of perspective only matched by the staircase of the palace of the Marquis of Huarte de Tudela.

Among the architectural projects that numerous localities carried out, the bridges and their continuous reforms stand out, as well as important urban reforms, especially the configuration of squares. The place Nueva de Tudela, built between 1687 and 1691. Its construction responded, as in other cases, to the need to create a regular space, capable of congregating the crowds during the numerous acts and spectacles of civil and religious character. Since the town hall was in another place, the institution ordered the construction of a house called the town house, distinguished from the rest of the buildings by its elevation, with a rich iron balcony made in Elgoibar by Bartolomé Elorza to witness the bullfights and two coats of arms of the city, the work of Pedro Viñes and polychromed by Francisco de Aguirre.

In relation to the use of that place and that of the Pamplona Castle for bullfighting, mention should be made of the sumptuous buildings destined for bullfighting balconies erected for the municipal corporations in some towns such as Viana (Santiago Raón, 1685) and Los Arcos.

Of other works undertaken by the municipal councils, especially in the 18th century, taking advantage of the economic boom, we must mention buildings related to charity and public health, such as hospitals, and others related to public services such as granaries, butchers, meat markets, meat markets, weights, bridges and portals such as those of Los Arcos or Olite. The best preserved groups, precisely because of their solidity, are some bridges designed and built in stone by important local masters such as Juan Antonio Jiménez, José Gil e Ibarra, Juan de Larrea or the Navarrese stonemason Félix Iriarte, who lived in Zaragoza.

Municipal heraldry

As Faustino Menéndez Pidal recalls, the heraldic emblems of the towns were born from the seals, whose process of training was very special in Navarre, since before the existence of the seal "of the town" there were several seals of the groups of neighbors who resided in it (infanzones, Jews, farmers ...), being a great resistance to attribute a seal to the whole, being one of the most outstanding examples the case of Pamplona.

The municipal coats of arms traditionally consisted of the representation of the sigillary emblems in the field of a shield, although in an intermediate phase, the emblems of the good towns were represented in circular fields, as can be seen in the refectory of the cathedral of Pamplona.

The compilation of the municipal heraldry of Navarre was carried out by J. L. Otazu between 1975 and 1978; M. Ramos studied the royal concessions of coats of arms to different towns in 1991 and, lately, it has been the object of numerous and documented works of analysis and synthesis by A. Esparza Leibar. The latter researcher compiles and studies the origin of some of these coats of arms at different times since the Middle Ages average, from the collective arms of the valleys and their origin, to those of royal concession or those that had their origin in feudal confrontations.

In any case, it should be noted that the seals and then the dry stamps or the validation stamps of the documentation of the municipality, had their version both in works of sumptuary arts (keys, ballot boxes, stamping plates, locks, embroidery ...etc), and large format in the representations sculpted in stone or wood present on the facades of the town halls and other places such as hospitals, parishes or chapels in which the municipality held the board of trustees. These are authentic visual signs of corporate identity.

Numerous armorial stones with municipal heraldry, preserved in Allo, Sangüesa, Tudela, Cascante, Sangüesa and Ujué, among other examples, date back to the 16th century. The 17th and 18th centuries have left abundant examples, many of them dated or documented, most of which still stand out on the façades of their town halls. In some cases, as in Elizondo, the arms of the Baztán Valley can be seen in the plenary hall in a rich polychrome wooden example, which is enriched with all those symbols of ecclesiastics, merchants and military men who played a leading role in the phenomenon that Julio Caro Baroja baptized as the Navarrese Hora of the XVIII century.

In exercise of the right of board of trustees: some examples

The right of board of trustees included privileges that, since the 12th century, the Church granted to those who built a temple and gave it to the patrimony of the Church, or committed to support it with goods or rents. The patrons could be individuals (generally the king or nobles) or institutions, such as municipalities or councils. In municipal or council patronages, in exchange for the obligation of the patron to attend to the upkeep of the church or its furnishings when repairs were needed, the Church frequently granted three types of rights. The first, of subject honorary, such as being received in the temple with honors and occupying a special place (the town council pew), placing its coat of arms or emblem in the church or chapel, etc. The second ones referred to the right of presentation of candidates to ecclesiastical positions, whose appointments were made by the bishop if the proposed candidates passed the corresponding examination. The third ones granted the right to intervene in the process of administration of the first fruits, not of the tithes, whose destination was to pay the works of the temple, by means of boards of diverse composition and operation. The patron was involved in the administration of the first fruits, but did not receive anything from them, because he was not the owner of them and they could only be destined to the temple, whose owner was the Church.  

Those cities and towns that held board of trustees over the parish churches or chapels of their patrons ensured that their heraldic emblems were displayed on various parts of the building. Due to their size and arrangement, we can highlight those that decorate the chapel of Santa Ana in the cathedral of Tudela, whose board of trustees was granted to the city in 1680 and was erected from 1712 with the undisguised intention of erecting the "most ostentatious chapel that can be found in the whole region".

In some buildings in which the municipality had acted with great commitment, whether or not it was the patron of the same, the coat of arms was placed, as we can see, among other examples, in the basilica of the Immaculate Conception of Cintruénigo, the Capuchin convent of Los Arcos and some chapels of the latter locality, administered from the first time, and studied by V. Pastor Abaigar.

Among the major altarpieces that bear the arms of the localities we will mention, among others, the examples of the parishes of Isaba, Puente la Reina, Corella, Lesaca and Lumbier, as well as the sanctuaries of el Romero de Cascante, Purísima de Cintruénigo, Yugo de Arguedas and Nuestra Señora de San Salvador de Urzainqui.