Basilica of San Isidoro, Leon

BASILICA DE SAN ISIDORO, LEÓN

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The Basilica de San Isidoro (aka the Royal Collegiate Church of St Isidore of Seville) dates from the days of King Sancho the Fat in the mid 900s. It contains the reliquary of San Isidoro (below below) and some of the tombs of the early Kings and Queens of León, which are housed in a vaulted pantheon / narthex, with one of Europe's earliest surviving painted ceilings (below).

Team P only realized much later that those are monthly activities happening on the roundel paintings on the arch at the top right, with the base occupied by an old man warming himself in front of a brazier fire in winter. What is more there are some bas reliefs of Zodiacs on the church door archivolt (see below).

Link to page on Medieval Labours of the Month and Zodiacs

Only a very few tombs are still there, because this beautiful place was occupied by Napoleon's French Army on 30 December 1808, and they not only looted it and melted down / sold most of its treasures, but they also smashed most of the royal tombs and scattered and burned the contents.

San Isidoro (of Seville) lived in Visigoth (pre-Islamic) Spain from 560 - 636 (76) and is recognized as a Doctor of the Church. He was Archbishop of Seville for 30 years and probably the greatest church scholar and promoter of scholarship of his time and to emerge from Spain. He wrote the first known encyclopaedia in western civilization (called the Etymologiae). He shares a place with Saint Bede the Venerable from northern England in Dante's Divine Comedy.