FUNDACIÓN COLEGIO Nª Sª DE LA ANTIGUA.

Mateo Díaz links his future to that of the world. This young monfortino who studied in the Escolapios and in the Daviña Rey is currently in Italy, doing internships in the Spanish representation in the United Nations. It is another step in a career that focuses on work in the international field. He has his sights set on working for the UN or the European Union.

The passion for the world, and above all for justice on Earth, comes from far away to Mateo Díaz, but has deepened as he progressed in his studies. He studied International Relations at the Complutense University and his passion for an area to which he wants to dedicate his life: security and development. These are commitments that the young monfortino lived closely in the Complutense and internalized to turn them into vital objectives.

Now he has just opened a door for him that can help him to clear that future with which he dreams. The monfortino has just obtained one of the coveted postgraduate scholarships of the Barrié Foundation and will be able to go to England to take a master’s degree in Conflict, Security and Development at the University of Sussex.
The studies at that university are in the “premier league”. The center is a world reference in terms of training in cooperation and development, emphasizes the young monfortino, who says that Sussex has an “ambitious and committed” training program. It is just what this twenty-three year old Lucense looks for who believes that development and security programs must be combined, otherwise the policies to advance the world will not be effective.

He is young, but he has already seen some of the most bitter faces of life on Earth and has seen the consequences of political failures and wars. For example, Italy has arrived after spending some time working with refugees in Serbia, where they could learn about the reality of refugees arriving from countries such as Syria, Iran or Pakistan, he explains.

Now in Italy he works in the Spanish mission to the FAO, the United Nations organization for agriculture and food, “a wide and very interesting field”, which allows him to approach the reality of the attention to people in conflict areas.
This accumulation of experiences before starting the master’s degree in Sussex will allow her to reach the United Kingdom with better training and a broader vision, explains Mateo Díaz Rodríguez.

The young monfortino is happy with the possibility of starting those studies in the United Kingdom and do a master’s degree that even in his best dreams he could have studied if not for the Barrié Foundation scholarship, he points out.
It is true that this scholarship is the result of a brilliant academic record, but he says that there were many good students who opted for this scholarship, so he feels honored to have achieved it.

Until the moment of beginning those studies, he will continue to accumulate experience and work on the reality of regions of the world that interest him. In its formation, for example, it has been especially interested in knowing the problems of countries in the Sahel area, such as Nigeria, where the humanitarian situation is often aggravated by the problem of terrorism.

Santo Cristo de Valerio Cioli (1529-1599), also author of the statues of Michelangelo’s tomb. Name and date that appear engraved on the bottom of the purity cloth of the image.
  It is made of marble in one piece, except the arms. It emphasizes in him the majestic and serene expression of his face. It was commissioned by Felipe II for El Escorial (Madrid), but he did not like it, considering it too muscular; he gave it to the Cardinal with whom he was joined by a great friend who sent him to Monforte de Lemos.

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In its place Philip II placed another marble Christ, in this case Bemvenuto Cellini. Christ that Cellini decided to execute as a fulfillment of a vow inspired by a dream he had in the year 1539, being imprisoned in Castel Sant’Angelo by order of Pope Paul III. According to the artist himself in his memoirs, in that dream he had this vision:

“I looked like this sun without its rays, nothing more nor less than a pure gold liquified bath. While I was contemplating this great thing, I saw begin to inflate in the middle of the sun and grow that form of said bulge, and suddenly form a Christ in cross, of the same substance as the sun. And his beautiful grace was so great and his appearance so benign, that human ingenuity could not imagine a thousandth part. “

After twenty years, the sculptor decided to fulfill his promise, with the intention that the sculpture was placed in his grave. However, by a request of Duke Cosme I de Médici, who saw her in his workshop and proposed to buy it, became part of the collection of the Pitti Palace.

In 1576, the crucifix was given by the Grand Duke of Tuscany, Francisco I de Médici, to King Philip II of Spain, and sent specially from Florence to “auction his church in San Lorenzo del Escorial.” The Jerónimo of that monastery Antonio de Villacastín describes it like this:

“On November 9, 1576, King Don Felipe, our founder, sent to send the Pardo, where he was present, for a Crucifixion that had arrived there that was sent to him by the Grand Duke of Tuscany. Batista Cabrera then left with fifty men to carry him on his shoulders, and this was done. San Lorenzo el Real arrived here on Saint Crucifixo on the eve of San Martín, November 11 of that year. He stood in the Chapter, in the doorway, until his Majesty dictates otherwise. Note: that the one who made this Christ wrote a book that is entitled Benevenuto Celino, in the way that it should be to work in marble, in which book deals with the work he had in labralle and the curiosity that ended him and how is the first piece of crucifix that has been carved to this day. He also has the said book out of two sonnets in Tuscan, admirable.”

After a restoration of the year 1994, the Christ was placed in the chapel of the Doctors, on the left side of the foot of the Basilica, continuing modestly covered with a cloth since the Christ is absolutely naked to the Renaissance taste.

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In the doctoral thesis entitled “Methodological and compositional process of the Renaissance in Galicia. 1499-1657 “, whose author is D. Víctor Grande Nieto, simple data are given that clarify the time that lasted the construction of the School of Nª Sª de la Antigua. The concrete text is the following:

“Receiving the plans of the College, made by the Jesuit Andrés Ruiz, made the Cardinal to see the teacher Vermundo Resta, whose name appears linked to Ruiz as coauthors of the College initiating the signature of the Contract of 1592, but Vermundo himself was in Seville in 1592, being his contribution as master teacher of works of the Sevillian miter5 what made him be an advisor to Don Rodrigo in this factory, making certain changes, but without his being a predominant role in terms of the general conception of School.
With the arrival of Juan de Tolosa and later of Simón de Monasterio the initial traces of the set will be modified.
The main part of the construction was developed between 1593 and 1619: the church, the main facade and part of the bodies that are articulated around two patios placed on both sides of the church are finished. Then the works stopped and practically nothing new was built until 1919, date in which two cloistered canvases were finished and new dependencies were made in the back. “

He was born in Monforte de Lemos, on September 22, 1877, dying in Barcelona, ​​May 12, 1939) was a magistrate, prosecutor, jurist and Spanish politician.
He studied at the College of Nª Sª de la Antigua, PP. Escolapios de Monforte de Lemos. He graduated in Law from the University of Santiago de Compostela in 1903, and in 1905 he approved the examinations of prosecutor and judge. After the proclamation of the dictatorship of Primo de Rivera in 1923 he was appointed member of the Organizing Board of the Judiciary, where he gained great prestige as a specialist in criminal and procedural matters. In 1924 he was appointed judge of the Chamberí district and in 1929 he represented Spain in the International Criminal Conferences of Paris, Brussels and Budapest.

In spite of his past linked to the primoriverist dictatorship, on May 31, 1931 he was appointed Prosecutor of the Republic, although he resigned on July 31 to be appointed magistrate of the Supreme Court of Spain. In the general elections of 1931 he was elected deputy for the Radical Republican Party in the province of Lugo. In the Spanish Cortes he participated in all the discussions about the organization of the judicial power in Spain, which would confront his party, which would end up abandoning. He did not stand for election in 1933 and continued as Magistrate of the Supreme Court.

Since the Civil War began, on August 26, 1936 he was appointed president of the Third Chamber of Contentious Administrative Matters of the Supreme Court of Spain, and on September 16 he was appointed Special Examining Judge of the cause for the insurrection in all the barracks and military cantons of Madrid. In the instruction he kept the legal formalities, which did not please the extremists, who demanded an exemplary punishment of the coup plotters, to the point that he was removed from the investigation for having admitted from General Joaquin Fanjul Goñi the evidence he had proposed. On August 27, 1937, he was appointed President of the Court Inspection Board of Madrid. In October 1937 he moved to Catalonia, where in June 1938 he defended the officials of the Courts of Barcelona accused of fifth columnism.

When the republican troops left Catalonia in January 1939, he decided to stay and offered to collaborate with the new regime, but was arrested and on February 26 was prosecuted for the death of General Fanjul and the deaths in prison Model Madrid on 23 August 1936. He was condemned to death and executed in Barcelona on May 12, 1939 together with General Fernando Berenguer de las Cagigas

The shape of the dome is hemispherical, the average orange characteristic of the Spanish Renaissance. Its light is approximately 10 m and the key of the dome of its torch rises just over 35 m above the level of the pavement. The inner surface is slightly banked. It is reinforced by eight double ribs that protrude both inside and outside. The outer surface, also hemispherical, is not concentric with the interior, but its center moves downwards. The thickness is, therefore, variable and decreases as it rises.
The lantern rises above the oculus, with six windows, covered by a semi-spherical and banked dome. The dome is surrounded by a balustrade and is completed with a high pyramidal pinnacle with a square base topped with a metal cross with a weather vane. The drum that supports the dome is cylindrical. Its interior surface is uniform throughout its height, but its backyard, however, shows two distinct parts. In the lower one, from the cornice to the level of the trestle of the roof, the extrados is octagonal and the structure robust, while in the upper part the wall is noticeably thinned and its transverse, cylindrical in this area, rises and reaches a higher level than that of the imposts of the interior orange stocking. Dome and drum are set on an inner circular cornice, and is on the set of four pendentives and four arches and pillars torales.
(Taken from ROSA ANA GUERRA PESTONIT Arquitecta).

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UNIT OF MEASURE USED in the construction of the school (data taken from the Manuel Ángel Feal Antelo study). Freire Tellado has previously investigated the unit of measurement in the school. Comparing the measurements described in the historical documents with those taken in the building, 3 possible values ​​for the foot are obtained:

a) 281.27 mm
b) 296.06 mm and
c) 282.222 mm.

In the end, based on other verifications, the next foot value used in the construction of the Cardinal’s school was chosen.                                   

Unit Multiple Submultiple
Units School pie vara 1/2 * -1/3 -1/4 -1/8 – 1/16
Centimeters 28.22 cm 84.66 cm 14.11 -9.41 -7.06 -3.52 -1.76

This study should be taken with caution, since different stonemasons who were successful at work may have used different measures. Even so, the unit has proven to be consistent in later studies. There are some coincidences with the rules given by Palladio, Simón García and Fontana. In the book by Andrea Palladio I Quattro Libri dell’Architettura (1570) includes the descriptions and drawings of several ancient domes. It follows that Fontana from the drawings of Palladio established a rule of 1/9 for the thickness in the starts.

The dome of the College coincides with two of the rules of Palladio. The first coincidence is the thickness of the starts. In the School, the maximum light is 36m and the outer radius is 44m. The difference between the corresponding radios is 4 feet, which means 1/9 of the section.

The foot of today: If we move by the information that is given today about the size of the foot unit, we find this definition “The foot is a unit of length of artificial origin, based on the human foot, already used by civilizations ancient.” To measure the length, in almost all the world the meter is used, except in Anglo-Saxon countries such as the United States, Canada and the United Kingdom, which is usually used the foot. The exception is in aeronautics, in which the height is still measured in thousands of feet in almost all countries. The equivalence to meters is the following:

1 current foot = 30.48 centimeters = 0.3048 meters
1 meter = 3.2808 feet

The Roman foot, or pes, was equivalent, on average, to 29.57 cm; the Carolingian foot, formerly called the Drusian or Drusian foot -pes drusianus-, was equivalent to nine eighths of the Roman, that is, approximately 33.26 cm; and the Castilian foot was equivalent to 27.8635 cm.

The first entry of the month of May we want it to be dedicated to the Virgin, because this is her month according to our tradition. The Virgin of Antigua is an invocation of the Virgin Mary. The Virgin is usually depicted standing with the baby Jesus in her arms offering a white rose. This image is in the Cathedral of Seville. Probably it is a Castilian-Leonese invocation of the Middle Ages.
This dedication, holder of our School, is doubly present in the church of the school of Our Lady of the Ancient of Monforte de Lemos. This is due to the fact that Cardinal Rodrigo de Castro Osorio, archbishop of Seville, was a devotee of this Virgin, founded this school which he placed under this invocation and ordered to bring to him a copy of the Virgin of Antigua of Seville, which He had in his oratory for his particular devotion. The painting is from the 16th century. Francisco de Moure made a sculpture of this Virgin that is in the center of the main altarpiece.
The virgin is usually represented with a white robe, as well as a cloak that covers her head and shoulders. The fabric of the tunic and mantle are white and decorated with golden vegetable motifs. On the underside of the mantle is dark and golden stripes. The neck of the Virgin’s tunic is curvilinear. With one hand he holds a white rose and with the other he holds the Baby Jesus. The boy has a dark tunic with golden vegetable details. The Virgin holds the child above the hip, next to his chest. The Child’s tunic has a neck with a slightly pointed toe. Both the Virgin and the Child appear with aura. In the upper part there are two angels holding a crown on the head of the Virgin. The baby Jesus has no crown.
Let us ask Our Lady of Antigua, in this month of May, to protect our school and bless the students, their families as well as the teachers and employees of their school.

He was born around 1884 in Monforte de Lemos. He was a student at the PP school. Escolapios de Monforte de Lemos. During his youth he also cultivated the drawing.
He graduated in Law from the University of Santiago de Compostela in 1897, and was part of the Military Legal Corps, with fates in Mahón, Palma de Mallorca and Seville (1913). In this Andalusian city he attended the workshop of the painter Manuel Alarcón, where he learned painting and restoration, which led him to authenticate works of art, and to make the catalog of some collections of individuals, both Spanish and foreign. He was a member of the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando in Madrid, being proposed in 1934 to fill the vacancy produced in the Painting Section by the death of José Ramón Mélida Alinari, as an art critic. He entered on September 21, 1939.
He was a contributor to periodicals such as ABC and Blanco y Negro. Méndez Casal, who was an academic at the Royal Academy of Fine Arts of San Fernando, 2 died in Madrid on January 14, 1940.1 He has a dedicated street in his hometown.

On the occasion of the celebration of the 20 years of the “Association Camiños a Santiago pola Ribeira Sacra” and organized by this association took place on Saturday April 27 a magnificent concert by singer-songwriter Amancio Prada. The interesting repertoire included ancient themes and some more current, full of feeling, depth and strength.
Amancio Prada was born in Dehesa del Bierzo, León. It has endowed the song of author in Spain of a great elegance. His music, largely popular roots, is composed of his own compositions and songs based on texts by the most diverse ancient and modern poets, such as Rosalía de Castro, Federico García Lorca, Agustín García Calvo and Chicho Sánchez Ferlosio.

He debuted in Paris in 1973 and a year later he published his first album “Vida e morte”, composed of six songs in Spanish and another in Galician. His artistic presentation in Spain took place in 1975, in the Little Theater of Madrid. From then on, his performances took place on stages in Spain and abroad

In the photo Amancio Prada with Fr. Javier Agudo, Manager of the Foundation Nª Sª de la Antigua School, before beginning the magnificent concert he offered us.

Awards
Gold Medal of the Círculo de Bellas Artes de Madrid (2001)
Medal of Castilla y León Award for the Arts (2005)
Gold Medal for Merit in the Fine Arts (2010)

Outstanding works
• Life and death
• Lelia Doura
• Spiritual canticle
• Dark love sonnets
• Roses to Rosalia
• From sea to terra
• Songs of the soul
• Until another day, Chicho
• Artist’s life Songs of Léo Ferré
• Living love concert

Carlos Salgado, a physicist from the University of Santiago de Compostela and former student of our College of Nª Sª de la Antigua Piarist Fathers , was born in Monforte de Lemos in 1971. He left school in 1985. He is director of the Galician Institute of High Energy Physics. He is a professor of Theoretical Physics. He is currently investigating about states of matter immediate to the Big Bang. He has just received a grant called “Advanced Grant” for his research of 2.5 million euros.

The objective objective of the project led by the director of the Galician Institute of High Energy Physics, is supported by the funding of the “European Research Council (ERC)” that has just granted “Advanced Grant” aid, for a period of five years. The project is entitled “Yoctosecond imaging of QCD collectivity using observable jet” (YoctoLHC).

The “Advanced Grant” grants are designed to support scientists “exceptional leaders in terms of originality and meaning of their research lines”. OR ERC provides financing for the development of frontier science with excellence as the main selection requirement.