San Francisco de Borja

(Pedro Roldan)

PEDRO ROLDÁN
(Seville 1624 – 1699)
14. Saint Francis Xavier and Saint Francis Borgia
c. 1656
Wood, polychromed and gilded
Each 114 cm (approx. 45 in.)
PROVENANCE: Andrés Gonzaléz Moro, Seville 1960; Juan Salas, Madrid
The Jesuit saints Francis Xavier and Francis Borgia were the two key figures in the early
history of the Society of Jesus – the religious order founded by Ignatius Loyola in 1534.
Francis was co-founder of the Society and Francis Borgia its third vicar-general between 1565
and 1572.
The Navarran Jesuit Francis de Jaso y Azpilicueta, better known as Francis Xavier, was one of the
Society’s very cornerstones, largely through his extensive missionary work in Africa, India, the Maluku
Islands and Japan. This was so highly commended that it earned him the sobriquet ‘the giant of
missionary history’.1 He was canonized on 12 March 1622 by Pope Gregory XV.2 Images of Francis
Xavier can be identified by two main attributes: the Crucifix and the flaming heart.3 In sculptures, he
is generally depicted alone, while in paintings his image is often included as part of a narrative cycle.
Occasionally, sculptures of Saint Francis Xavier are paired with those of Saint Ignatius Loyola, or as
part of a group with other Jesuit saints. The present sculpture portrays the Jesuit standing and dressed
in priestly vestments including a cassock, surplice, stole.4 The vestments fall gently and naturally in
simple folds with no Mannerism or artifice. The head is lifted to regard the crucifix that would have
been held aloft in the left hand (now lost). The right hand is held loosely open, the arm slightly away
from the body; a pose that gives the composition a vaguely triumphant gesture of restrained
expressiveness. In terms of its original polychromy, the piece retains only the encarnaciones on the
hands and head, and the original gilded base of the vestments. Judging from the limited traces of
original colour, just visible at the neckline of the cassock and the lace of the surplice, the vestments were
originally decorated with black and gold estofado on the cassock and white and gold estofado on the
surplice, with some additional ornamentation on the stole.5
Francis Borgia (1510–1572) was, in addition to being the third vicar-general of the Society of Jesus,
fourth Duke of Gandia, Marquess of Lombay, a peer of the Spanish realm, and Viceroy of Catalonia.
He was also a cousin of the Emperor Charles V, who had appointed his young kinsman to be Master
of Hounds and equerry to his empress, Isabella of Portugal. When she died in 1539, it was Francis
Borgia who was entrusted to convey her remains from Toledo to Granada for interment in the royal
mausoleum. The Jesuit historian Pedro de Ribadeneyra recorded that during his transport of the
empress’s remains Francis was compelled to open the coffin to identify the corpse before it was officially buried. He was so shocked by the transformation death wrought upon her features that he swore an
oath then and there ‘never again to serve a mortal master’.6 This episode is generally held up as the
Francis’s first step towards joining the Society of Jesus, but some writers cite it as one of several such
events that formed the saint’s spiritual identity.7
Francis Borgia was canonized on 12 April 1671,8 almost fifty years after his Jesuit brother Francis
Xavier was elevated to sainthood. It is perhaps this relative delay that influenced the formation of
Francis Borgia’s more moderate iconography, which usually focused upon his reflections on death and
mortality, and generally portrayed him contemplating a crowned skull. There were however, other
episodes in this saint’s life, which are also referred to in his imagery, such as Francisco Goya’s painting
of the saint exorcizing a dying man.9
This sculpture of Saint Francis Borgia is pendant to the Saint Francis Xavier and also depicts the saint
standing and dressed in a cassock. The right hand is held aloft, to hold the aforementioned (possibly
crowned) skull, which is unfortunately now lost. The face reflects a distant expression that
communicates Francis’s musings on the fragility of human life and the vanity of power. Again, as is the
case with Saint Francis Xavier, this sculpture has not retained its original black and gold estofado
decoration, though traces are just visible between the folds of the vestments. These traces became even
more evident in the process of restoration, when the later violet floral motifs were removed. These
particular motifs were added during the nineteenth century to many earlier works and often appear to
obscure the original polychromy like so many unwanted weeds.
The style of both sculptures indicate that they were made at the height of the Baroque period, and are
aesthetically already far removed from the style and technique of Juan Martínez Montañes. The poses,
treatment of the facial features and the hair all reflect a greater naturalism, and, together with the
absence of any forced contrapposto or intense chiaroscuro, point towards a date around the mid
seventeenth century. This is precisely the time when Roldán had begun working in Seville. Roldán went
on to establish the city’s most prestigious workshop, snaring the majority of his sculptural commissions
during the second half of the seventeenth century.
The attribution of these two works to Roldán should now be discussed in terms of stylistic and
iconographic comparisons with the sculptor’s other known commissions. With regard to works
commissioned specifically by the Society of Jesus, we have, as yet, no documents that connect any of
these contracted works with Roldán. Nevertheless, we can be certain that there was some professional
contact between the Society and the artist, since one of Roldán’s contemporaries places some of his
works in the Jesuit school of the Immaculate Conception, nicknamed in the Sevillian dialect ‘Las Becas’.
In his paper on Roldán, researcher Jorge Bernales considered the artist’s intervention in Las Becas
‘debatable’,10 since the destruction of the temple during the nineteenth century11 resulted in very little
available data surviving that related to the site’s artistic history. Bernales wrote that Roldán was said to
have contributed to the works on two levels: architectural (the church’s floor plan was attributed to him); and ornamental, since he was the author of the main altar sculptures and the sculptures on the
facade. Bernales dated these sculptures to 1656.12
As with other works by Roldán, we have little supporting documentation. Based on stylistic analysis
and comparisons, we can support this attribution and will trace all existing testimonies about this Jesuit
school and its property. Such testimony attributes to Roldán the execution of the chapel’s layout as well
as the sculptural ornamentation.13 The starting point is the writing of one of his contemporaries, the
painter and essayist Antonio Palomino, who had firsthand knowledge of Roldán’s work, as well as that
of his famous daughter, Luisa Roldán.
In El Parnaso español pintoresco laureado, the third volume of his main theoretical work, Museo
pictórico y escala óptica, Palomino offers us valuable information and the biographies of the Spanish
Golden Age painters. Here, he introduces Roldán as an ‘eminent sculptor, painter and architect’, and
even goes on to note his work at ‘Las Becas’ as amongst the most famous in Seville: ‘And in Las Becas,
the Jesuit school in Seville, he made the plan for the temple, and the stone sculpture, and the
Inmaculada figure by the entrance’.14 The school, founded in 1598, had an ‘old church’ in addition to
the church built in 1622. The church was probably designed by Roldán as a result of destruction of the
former church,15 which was caused by the flooding of the Guadalquivir River on 24 January 1626. The church’s completion was postponed by the school’s economic crisis during the 1630s, when priority was
instead given to building new dormitories.16 With regard to Roldán’s sculptures, Palomino only
mentions some stone figures and an Inmaculada that decorated the temple’s exterior.
On the night of 2 April 1767, the grounds and contents of this Jesuit school were confiscated. Despite
this the monks were only compelled by the Inquisition to vacate the buildings in 1784;17 this spelt the
end for the seminary.18 It is precisely at this date that the Secretary of the Royal Academy of San
Fernando, Antonio Ponz, writes in his work Viage de España that the school’s church: ‘…belonged
before […] to those said Regulars. It is oval in plan, very pleasant to the eye, and the sculpture on the
high altar is by Pedro Roldán; but its interior ornamentation is extravagant. At its entrance there are
sculptures of various saints and an Inmaculada in the centre, some of which are [also] by Roldán, who
is also thought responsible for the church’s layout’.19 Ponz, an educated traveller, confirms Palomino’s
testimony but extends Roldán’s work to the interior, and credits him with the creation of the
Inmaculada (the main sculpture of the school). Moreover, Ponz also criticized what he deemed to be
the ‘extravagance’ of the church’s ornate interior, which grated on his Neoclassical convictions. Later,
the Dominican historian Fernando Díaz de Valderrama (writing under the pseudonym Fermín Arana de
Varflora) briefly quoted Palomino’s and Ponz’s comments.20
What is particularly telling is the manner in which the erudite Juan Agustín Ceán Bermúdez began his
description of Pedro Roldán: ‘…a sculptor, the last of any merit in Seville’.21 Ceán Bermúdez then went
on to describe Roldán’s work as modest, of fine form and correct line. Moreover, he portrayed the
sculptor’s lifestyle as ‘philosophical, in a country house away from Seville, enjoying Nature and
studying it without the nuisance of visits and compliments, which take so much time away from
artists’.22 Indeed, all testimonies of Roldán’ s career, from those of his contemporaries through to Ceán
Bermúdez’ writings in the nineteenth century, confirm his architectural and sculptural work, and note
his authorship of this church’s and interior/exterior decorative schemes. However, the most enlightening
data comes from the Sevillian historian Félix González de León.
During the nineteenth century, The Artistic News, first published in 1844, was the main point of
reference for everything concerning the city of Seville and its monuments, and is the printed source that
offers the most information on the school of Las Becas, covering its architecture, assets and history.
Excerpted from the text, we can read:
In the main chapel or chancel (testero) opposite the door, approached by proportioned steps, stands the
high altar surrounded by an iron grill, and within is the main altarpiece made of two sections of carved
wood, painted red and golden. The first section had at its centre the image of the Inmaculada, titulary of
this church, flanked on either side by sculptures of Saint Joseph and Saint Joachim, all three having been
made by Pedro Roldán. In the aisles of the church were four additional altars, two on each side, all
sculpted in wood, and unpainted: the first altar on the Gospel side venerated Saint Ignatius Loyola, and
included two sculptures side by side of Saint Stanislas [Kostka] and Saint Aloysius Gonzaga. The second
altar was dedicated to Saint Francis Borgia. On the opposite side, the first altar was dedicated to Saint
Francis Xavier, whose statue is flanked by those of Saint James and Saint John the Evangelist; in the final
altar is a sculpture of Saint Stanislas. All of these images were made by Pedro Roldán.23

Such a detailed account, referring to the iconographies as well as the altarpieces’ characteristics, must
have been based on direct observation. Moreover, the building’s documentary history supports this
description. Although the Inquisition’s tribunal moved there in 1784, the church continued to be used
complete with all its ornaments until 1826 or 1827, when the Jesuits, ‘its presumed owners, took
everything they had and left’.24 Although we have no proof of it, an explosion on 13 June 1823 caused
considerable damage to the building and the loss of much of the sculptural ornamentation, and may
have forced the Jesuits to return later in an effort to recover whatever had survived.25 Taking into
account González de León’s description, as well as the quality and finishing of the present two
sculptures, we may assume that the Saint Francis Xavier would have enjoyed a more prominent position
than that of Saint Francis Borgia.
Furthermore, a notation in the Order’s surviving minutes, in which the construction of a sanctuary and
a niche for the altar of the school of Las Becas was approved, mentions ‘the ensamblador and
entallador Pedro Ruiz Paniagua and Pedro Duque Cornejo’ (Pedro Roldán’s grandson), and confirms
that in 1710 there already existed an Inmaculada: ‘…charged to make seraphim for the niches; and a
base, all shown on the drawings, [the niche] that above the Sanctuary contains the image of the
Immaculate Conception. This latter need not be done as it has already been made…’.26
Finally, regarding the exterior sculptures, there is little left to add, save for a good description of the
facade, which survives according to a copy taken from Pablo de Olavide’s map of the city (1771): Its exterior entrance is majestic. The first part consists of four very tall Doric half-columns, with their
corresponding cornices. Between the columns there are three doors, the main one is arched and flanked
by two smaller square ones. Above the main portal there is a balcony and above the two smaller doorways
are two niches with images of Jesuit saints. Also between the two central columns is an image of the
Inmaculada, and in the other two niches, images of Saint Isidore and Saint Leandro; all made in clay by
the famous sculptor Pedro Roldán. On the cornice there is another balcony that [with] the image of Faith;
the whole thing capped by two attractive towers that grow on either side of a tall and airy half-domed
lantern…27
Based on formal analysis and accepting Bernales’s dating of the works to 1656, these sculptures of Saint
Francis Xavier and Saint Francis Borgia would fit perfectly into Roldán’s known corpus. They can be
placed between his first two documented commissions, the sculptures ornamenting the retablo of the
main altar in the convent church of Santa Ana in Montilla (Cordoba), which date between 1652 and
1654 (Fig. 1); and the two versions of Saint Michael Archangel in Seville, one in parish the church of
Marchena (Fig. 2), and the other for the Confraternity of the Seven Words, both of which date to 1657.
The masterly strokes of the gouge, used to suggest the scant Jesuit beards, and the finesse of the fingers
that give the poses a particular elegance are all hallmarks of Roldán’s work. Another example of
Roldán’s signature style is illustrated in a Saint John the Evangelist, a documented work from 1662,
which is conserved in the priory church of El Puerto de Santa María, Cadiz (Fig. 3). Even more
illuminating is the carving of Saint Ignatius Loyola in the Museo Nacional Colegio de San Gregorio in
Valladolid (Fig. 4). Here, the saint is depicted standing dressed in a Jesuit habit decorated in black and gold estofado and looking intently at the crucifix held in the left hand, while in his right he holds the
book of the Constitutions of the Society. This work has been attributed to Roldán on the basis of the
formal and stylistic characteristics it shares with other known sculptures by Roldán, including the
present works. Moreover, given the work’s Jesuit subject the Saint Ignatius Loyola could well have
formed part of the sculptures located at Las Becas. Magnificently well preserved and with its original
polychromy, this work shares the same technical refinement as the Saint Francis Xavier, as well as the
beautifully articulated draperies and estofado decoration of the Saint Francis Borgia.
Again, there is to date no documentary evidence directly connecting Roldán to the Society of Jesus.
However, the congregation of Nuestra Señora de la Alegría entrusted Roldán (along with the
ensamblador Bernardo Simón de Pineda) to produce an altarpiece for a chapel in their Church of San
Bartolomé in Seville. In essence the artists were entrusted: ‘To deliver perfectly finished sculptures of
Saint Ferdinand III and Saint Ignatius Loyola, both to measure each a height of around siete quartas’.28
This sculpture of Saint Ignatius Loyola (Fig. 5), along with the other version in the museum in
Valladolid (Fig. 4), provides us with an important parallel to our Saint Francis Borgia. All three
sculptures exhibit the same approach to figure type, arrangement of vestments, and execution of
polychromy and estofado decoration, particularly the latter two sculptures where traces of the original
decoration are still clearly visible amongst the drapery folds. A valid comparison may also be made to
another version of the subject in the Church of Saint Domingo on Tenerife, which also shows the same
pose, and which is clearly Sevillian in origin (Fig. 6). Because this work retains some of its original
polychromy, it could give us some idea of how the original polychromy of the present Saint Francis
Xavier may have appeared.29
In conclusion, these sculptures of Saint Francis Xavier and Saint Francis Borgia were made in Seville by
Pedro Roldán around the mid seventeenth century. Based on their subject and technique they were
possibly part of the sculptural decoration of the chapel of the Jesuit College of Las Becas, which was
destroyed in the early nineteenth century.

1 I. ARELLANO, Misión y aventura: San Francisco Javier, Sol
en Oriente, Madrid 2008, p. 147.
2 Also canonized on this same date were Saint Ignatius
Loyola, Saint Teresa of Jesus, Saint Isidore the Labourer and
Saint Phillip Neri. See M. PONCE, ‘Relación de las fiestas a la
canonización de cinco santos (1622)’, in Revue hispanique,
no. 110, New York 1919, pp. 583–606.
3 More rarely, a large crab is included scuttling at Francis’s
feet, a reference to one of the saint’s miracles. In 1546,
travelling to Malacca, Francis was caught in a storm.
Praying for deliverance, he threw his crucifix into the sea in
the hopes of calming the waves. The storm stopped and
when Francis reached the shores of Malacca, he saw a crab
crawling towards him bearing his missing crucifix in its
claw.
4 Regarding the costume iconography of Saint Francis
Xavier in Navarran images, see a published example
conserved in Elgorriaga (M. J. TARIFA CASTILLA, ‘San
Francisco Javier y San Fermín, en un cuadro de la iglesia
parroquial de San Pedro de Elgorriaga’, at http://www.
unav.es/catedrapatrimonio/paginasinternas/pieza/sanfrancis
cojavierysanfermin/default.html, Navarre, July 2008,
[accessed on 6 June 2009]).
5 Further in this study, we will see how a sculpture with
similar iconography, conserved in the Church of Santo
Domingo de Santa Cruz de la Palma (Tenerife), can give us
an approximate idea of how this type of estofado decoration
would have originally appeared on the present work.
6 P. DE RIBADENEYRA, Vida del padre Francisco de Borja,
Madrid 1592, pp. 16–17.
7 T. EGIDO LÓPEZ, Los jesuitas en España y el mundo
hispánico, Madrid 2004, pp. 54–58.
8 An illustrated pamphlet commemorating the canonization
was written in August 1672 by Padre Pedro de Fomperosa
entitled: San Francisco de Borja, duque de Gandía and
published five years later under the pseudonym Melchor
Fernández de León (see J. SIMÓN DÍAZ, ‘Fiesta y literatura en
el Colegio Imperial de Madrid’, in Dicenda: cuadernos de
filología hispánica, Madrid 1987, vol. VI, p. 534).
9 Saint Francis Borgia Exorcizing a Dying Man (a boceto),
c. 1788, oil on linen, 38 x 29 cm, Madrid, Coll. Marquesa
de Santa Cruz. See B. ALCÁNTARA ROJAS, ‘Francisco a tu
voluntad lo dejo… Aproximaciones a la lectura de una
composición novohispana sobre San Francisco de Borja’, in
Anales del Instituto de Investigaciones Estéticas, no. 72,
Mexico 1998, pp. 137–142.
10 Called ‘de Las Becas’ because these scholarship students
wore blue cassocks.
11 J. BERNALES BALLESTEROS, Pedro Roldán, Seville 1973, p.
63.
12 BERNALES BALLESTEROS, Pedro Roldán cit., p. 64.
13 This theory of a single author for the series is supported
by the fact that later in his career Roldán executed other
similar architectural commissions and decorative
programmes, for example the Chapel of Nuestra Señora del
Rosario in the Sevillian Convent of Regina Angelorum,
executed for the Royal Cavalry Arsenal between 1661 and
1668 (see A. DÁVILA-ARMERO DEL ARENAL and J. CARLOS
PÉREZ MORALES, ‘Capilla de Nuestra Señora del Rosario’, in
AA.VV., Pedro Roldán, Seville 2008, vol. II, pp. 72–81).
14 A. PALOMINO DE CASTRO Y VELASCO, Museo pictórico y la
escala óptica, Madrid 1795, p. 678.
15 This is pretty much the extent to which Palomino
discusses Roldán as an architect, and, in fact, we have very
few studies that connect this artist to architectural works.
Apart from Palomino’s reference, there is one other that cites
that in 1691 there were supply problems in the construction
of the parochial church of the Sagrario (see A. MARÍA BRAVO
BERNAL, El Sagrario, un problema y su historia, Seville
2008, p. 259, 369–370).
16 A. MARTÍN PRADAS and I. CARRASCO GÓMEZ, ‘El colegio
de la Inmaculada Concepción de la Virgen María, Nuestra
Señora, de la Compañía de Jesús de Sevilla, vulgo de las
Becas, (1598–1634)’, in Atrio, revista de historia del arte,
no. 12, Seville 2006, pp. 71–80.
17 I. LÓPEZ BERNAGOSI, Prisiones de Europa, Madrid 1862,
vol. I, p. 322.
18 F. AGUILAR PIÑAL, Historia de Sevilla. Siglo XVIII, Seville
1989, p. 237.
19 A. PONZ, Viage de España, Madrid 1780, vol. IX, p. 88.
20 F. ARANA DE VARFLORA, Compendio histórico descriptivo
de la muy noble y muy leal ciudad de Sevilla…, Seville 1789,
pp. 20–22, 75. See also another of his studies, which
examines the work of Roldán, ‘La traza del Templo y […] la
imagen de la Concepción que está sobre la puerta’, in ID.,
Hijos de Sevilla, ilustres en santidad, letras, armas, artes o
dignidad, Seville 1791, p. 69.
21 J. A. CEÁN BERMÚDEZ, Diccionario histórico de los más
ilustres profesores de las Bellas Artes en España, Madrid
1800, vol. IV, p. 240.
22 Ibid., pp. 242–243.
23 F. GONZÁLEZ DE LEÓN, Noticia artística, histórica y
curiosa de todos los edificios públicos, sagrados y profanos
de esta muy noble, muy leal, muy heroica, e invicta Ciudad
de Sevilla, Seville 1844, pp. 3–4.
24 Ibid., p. 5.
25 MARTÍN PRADAS and CARRASCO GÓMEZ, ‘El colegio de la
Inmaculada Concepción’ cit., pp. 79–80.
26 M. SALUD CARO QUESADA, Noticias de escultura
(1700–1720), Seville 1992, pp. 190–191.
27 LÓPEZ BERNAGOSI, Prisiones de Europa cit., pp. 323–324.
Works by Roldán in materials other than wood are securely
documented, for example the stonework in the Cathedral of
Jaén, and the sculptures attributed to the artist in the
Church of Santa María Magdalena in Seville.
28 A. DÁVILA-ARMERO DEL ARENAL and J. CARLOS PÉREZ
MORALES, ‘Retablo de Nuestra Señora de la Alegría’, in
AA.VV., Pedro Roldán cit., p. 167.
29 The author would like to thank José Guillermo Rodriguez
Escudero for his inestimable assistance in providing a
photograph of this sculpture.

Andrés Gonzaléz Moro, Seville 1960; Juan Salas, Madrid