Convento de San Norberto

The Convento de Premonstratenses de San Norberto, also known as Convento de Mostenses or Convento de San Norberto,[1] in reference to the founder of the Premonstratensian Order, for who was dedicated, is a religious building disappeared it was located on the ground of the current Plaza de los Mostenses, next to the Gran Vía of Madrid (Spain). It was founded[2] in 1611 by the community of the Fathers Canons Premonstratensians with the permission of Cardinal Archbishop of Toledo Bernardo de Rojas and financed by a benefactor, the Count of Miranda, Juan of Zúñiga, the then president of the Council of Castile. Today the site of the convent is occupied by a market built in the 19th century, known as Mercado de los Mostenses.

Convento de San Norberto. Engraving of 1861.

History

Its church had been rebuilt in 1754 by architect Ventura Rodríguez, for be the previous ruined. It had a beautiful convex façade flanked by two towers, but was victim of the unbridled plan of opening of plazas of the king Joseph Bonaparte (nicknamed Pepe Plazuelas precisely for this reason). First it was demolished the convent in April 1810, but in May of the same year also was issued order to demolish the church. However, the architects who were commissioned to direct this operation, Silvestre Pérez (royal architect) and Juan Antonio Cuervo refused, because the artistic value of the work it joined that both had been disciples of self Ventura Rodríguez. However, their negative reports were of no avail and in 1811 a new royal order finished by tearing down what that left of the building.

In 1875 was inaugurated on its site the Former Mercado de los Mostenses work by Mariano Calvo Pereira, and twin to the Former Mercado de la Cebada, although somewhat smaller dimensions. In turn, this new building (a remarkable work of architecture of iron in the city) was demolished in 1925 to build the Gran Vía, being realized a realignment of the route, placing the current market further north, and locating in the site original office and housing buildings (including the one that housed the closed Cine Azul -originally Cine Belusia-).

Description

The convent originally built in the then Calle de la Inquisición, occupying another convent-church that had left the nuns of St. Catherine of Siena to move to another building on the Plaza de las Cortes de Madrid.

Besides the work of Ventura Rodríguez, architecturally also highlighted the early church, with a main façade composed with a semicircular portico flanked by two towers decorated with Corinthian columns. The portico had three entrances with four Ionic columns and on this, rose a second crowned body with a statue of St. Norbert, made of granite from Colmenar Viejo by sculptor Manuel Álvarez.[3]

In the book Historia de la Villa y Corte de Madrid, 1861, second edition in 1867, by José Amador de los Ríos and Juan de Dios de la Rada, it reproduce the engraving that appears along these lines, as shown of the lost artistic treasures of Madrid.

References
  1. http://www.arteguias.com/ordenpremostratense.htm
  2. http://www.madridhistorico.com/seccion5_historia/nivel2_informacion.php?idmapa=9&idinformacion=685&pag=2
  3. Historias de Madrid, 1952, Manuel Iglesias, Editorial I. G., Madrid.

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