6 December 2007
Conference
The Shrine of Our Lady of Fair Love de la Purísima de Cintruénigo in its historical-artistic and devotional context.
D. Ricardo Fernández Gracia.
Chair of Navarrese Heritage and Art
The sanctuary of La Purísima de Cintruénigo has come to be, in the popular imagination of these lands, as the first of the temples dedicated to the Conceptionist mystery in Spain. Today, in the light of documentation, no such claim can be made, although it is the great church in Navarre dedicated to what, at the time, was known as the Conceptionist mystery, centuries before the dogmatic declaration of Pius IX in 1854.
In the Navarrese context, it is the second Shrine of Our Lady of Fair Love dedicated to the Immaculate Conception, after that of Torralba del Río, now disappeared and without the monumentality of the riverside example.
The first data records of its construction date from the second half of the 16th century. Work began around Easter Week in 1570 and the primitive enclosure was completed in 1572, thanks to the initiative of some private individuals and the "...".
However, its current appearance, with a Latin cross typology with a choir at the foot and a beautiful stone and brick façade, is due to the centuries of the Baroque and, particularly, to the 17th century, when the immaculist religious phenomenon was lived with intensity and exaltation. Its clean volumes show a clear influence of the convent architecture of the time. plenary session of the Executive Council Particular devotion soon took a quantitative leap forward in the 17th century, as the town's regiment became fully involved in the celebration of the feast, exercising a real board of trustees. It is possible that a municipal agreement of 1622, which determined the special solemnisation of 8 December, could be related to the immaculist vow that the town possibly made, in line with what the Kingdom of Navarre (1621), Pamplona (1618), Tudela (1619), Estella (1620), Olite (1624) and Sangüesa (1625) were doing at the time.
The major renovation and extension work on the sanctuary began in 1654 and was completed around 1660. The great promoter of the entire project was Don Juan Francisco Escárroz, the town's beneficiary and custodian of the building's accounts until his death in 1667. The ensemble was completed with the Solomonic altarpiece, the work of Sebastián de Sola (1674), a stone doorway in 1726, the chapel between 1738-1739 and the paintings in the presbytery, the work of Diego Díaz del Valle in 1801. Most of the funds for all the works and projects were collected from alms, testamentary bequests and the collection of wheat in summer and grapes in autumn.
Throughout the 17th century there were extraordinary celebrations centred on the sanctuary. In 1662, the patron saint of the Shrine of Our Lady of Fair Love was named in the documentation as the "patron saint" of the town, at the same time as it was decided to celebrate the Brief of Alexander VII, which provided ample instructions for the future dogmatic definition. In 1672, extraordinary celebrations were arranged, with the transfer of the image to the parish church, with theatrical performances and dances accompanied by violin and guitar.
The polychrome wooden sculpture that presides over the Shrine of Our Lady of Fair Love must have been commissioned from Bernal de Gabadi in the last decade of the 16th century, and was polychromed around 1636 by the painter Silvestre Carcavilla. The sculpture should be considered as an excellent example of Mannerist sculpture of great refinement and refinement, comparable to other works by the aforementioned sculptor who died in Tudela, such as the bust of Santa Catalina in the parish church of San Nicolás in Tudela. Both carvings display the skill and delicacy of a master who had worked on the altarpiece of Astorga cathedral under the orders of Gaspar Becerra.
