EnglishCathedral of Our Lady of Victory, Former Church of Our Lady of Light
São Luís, Maranhão, Brazil
Religious Architecture
As in so many other cases, the former Jesuit church of Our Lady of Light, in the house of the same name, was converted into a Cathedral after the expulsion of the Jesuits from Maranhão and the confiscation of their property (1761). The Church of Our Lady of Light, the best in the State, marked the end of the block of the College on the south side. Its façade overlooked the sea, or rather, the back of the old Cathedral, which looked down from on high. It was the second and definitive church that the Jesuits built there, replacing the small chapel built in 1627. They obtained permission from the Town Hall in 1687 to “build the new church”, receiving four palms of land for the construction of a tower and 23 braças and 6 palms for the enlargement of the nave, occupying part of the street, which shows how small the former chapel had been in comparison to the College, which housed a library with over 3000 books. Its foundation stone was laid in 1690 (in the sacristy, a relief carving displays the inscription ihs and the date 1697) by chief engineer Pedro Carneiro de Azevedo and was inaugurated on 30th July, 1699. It was a large building with an imposing appearance, designed by the Luxembourgish artist Father João Filipe Bettendorf, S. J., who arrived from Lisbon in 1688 and who planned it, in his own words, “according to the guidelines of Vitruvius, the master of the architects, in imitation of the Church of Our Lady of Loreto, in Lisbon”. In addition to the erudite allusion to Vitruvius, which he must have read, it is extremely curious to note that he said he based his work on the Church of Loreto in Chiado. This church of the Italian colony in Lisbon was the jewel of the city in that period. Rebuilt in 1651-1676 by Marcos de Magalhães, its interior was entirely renovated in a new style, using the fortune of the Genoese merchant Ghersi: wall covering in coloured marble blocks from Genoa, sculptures by Filippo Parodi (1680), Carrara marble statues, panneled ceiling with scenes from the Old Testament (Della Ponte, 1684), and others in which one finds the first painting in perspective (Bacchereli, 1700), the first Solomonic columns in the country, in green stone (1671) – i.e., the Roman-Genoese Baroque style. Obviously we cannot expect to see in São Luís Carrara marble statues by Parodi, the greatest Genoese sculptor of his period, but what is important is the general inspiration. The Church of Our Lady of Light was a baroque church, having identical proportions to those of the Church of Our Lady of Loreto in Lisbon with its single nave with four shallow side chapels and a wide chancel, a veranda with windows overlooking the interior according to the Jesuit modo nostro, a barrel-vaulted ceiling depicting scenes from the life of the Virgin, which were certainly painted over in the 20th century and a magnificent high altarpiece in gilded and carved woodwork – the church’s masterpiece – which has fortunately remained intact until today. It covered the entire back wall with two orders of twisted columns decorated with foliage, creating four panels with beautiful images of Jesuit saints (now in the Sacred Art Museum) and a high attic storey supported by five simple corbels. The background is entirely covered with gold-leaf vegetal scrolls: a typical altarpiece in the “national style”, but which is notable for being the first complete one in Brazil. Only the tabernacle was replaced in the 18th century with a Joanine one in gilded, carved and polished wood, which strangely evokes the tabernacles in Goa. Fortunately enough, we know the altarpiece maker: the woodcarver from the metropolis, Manuel Manços, who had already finished it in 1693, according to a sketch by Father Bettendorf. He also did the side altarpieces, which have since been lost. This shows that the Jesuits were not concerned with the cost of the decoration of their church: with several experienced carvers among their number, they preferred to hire one from the metropolis. The church was tall and narrow (a design that Bettendorf justifies with the “guidelines of Vitruvius” and its width imitating the vault of the Church of Our Lady of Loreto...), embellished with the depiction of the Mysteries of the Virgin Mary, rendered and whitewashed by Brother Marcos Vieira. The façade, in the Jesuit style, was simple and unadorned: it had a 2:3 ratio, three rows of almost plain pilasters with no capitals, having a high window in each space, a broken wavy pediment with an oculus at the centre and a semicircular cusp surmounted by a cross. Its single tower – set back on the left hand side, with an oval cupola and a cornered baluster – has the same structure. The relocation of the Cathedral of Our Lady of Victory (the diocese had been created in 1677 – the same year as the one in Rio de Janeiro – and the building demolished in 1763) on 11th June, 1761, and in actual practice on 17th January, 1762, does not seem to have led to many changes. There were renovations, the dates of which are unknown, but the structure remained unchanged. It was only in 1922, during the wave of “modernisms” that swept across the city, that the façade was significantly altered: another tower was built, as well as colossal pilasters with large composite capitals, windows with curved lintels and architraves and a triangular pediment topped by a statue of Our Lady of Victory, which gave it a more cathedral-like and neo-baroque appearance. This look remains the same nowadays. When the Cathedral was relocated, its vestments, liturgical instruments and other decorative items went with it: an Indo-Portuguese Cross, certainly a gift from the first bishop, Dom Gregório dos Anjos, a bishop from Malaca who came directly to São Luís in 1679; two vases for the holy oils in solid silver, each weighing over 13 kilograms, completely plain except for a cross of Christ in high relief on the bulge and the date of 1683, a gift from the king that was notable because only the Cathedrals of Lisbon and Porto had bigger ones; an ivory Virgin Mary made in Goa, a present from Bettendorf, who had received it in Lisbon in 1688. The sacristy houses the tomb of Dom Gregório in polished schist. The Cathedral of Maranhão must have suffered great “loss” with the passage of time.