San Gabriel, Cholula, Interior of Royal Chapel

1555-1570

Name(s) currently unknown

Cholula, MEX

Adjacent to the monastic church of San Gabriel is an extraordinary building, the Royal Chapel (or Capilla Real). It was not built for the Spanish kings, since none would ever visit New Spain. Rather, it seems to have been designed to play the role of an open chapel, a large space where Cholula’s faithful would gather to worship.

The multiple aisles create the impression of a forest of columns supporting the domes of the roof. Originally, the sides were open arcades with nine arches, but were closed sometime in the colonial period, and windows and doors added

In creating this chapel, Cholula’s Franciscan friars may have been inspired by Islamic buildings in Spain or in Jerusalem. The great mosque of Córdoba, which was under Spanish control by the 16th century, has a similar form, as does the Al-Aqsa Mosque in Jerusalem. Whatever the friars’ sources, for the people of Cholula who built the structure and worshipped within, the building was a home-grown product.

Barbara E. Mundy

Dana Leibsohn and Barbara E. Mundy.
Vistas: Visual Culture in Spanish America, 1520-1820. http://www.fordham.edu/vistas, 2015.

Edgerton, Samuel. 2001. Theaters of Conversion: Religious Architecture and Indian Artisans in Colonial Mexico. Albuquerque, New Mexico: University of New Mexico Press.

Lara, Jaime. 2004. City, Temple, Stage: Eschatological Architecture and Liturgical Theatrics in New Spain. Notre Dame, Indiana: University of Notre Dame Press.