struction at the hands of the Moors, once in 967 when the castle was
taken by Al-Coraxi, emir of Seville, and thirty years later when
Almansor[39] in 998 swept northwards towards Galicia, sacking and
burning as he went. At the time when Count Henry and Dona Teresa were
living in the castle, the double Benedictine monastery for men and women
had fallen into decay, and in 1109 Count Henry got a Papal Bull changing
the foundation into a royal collegiate church under a Dom Prior, and at
once began to rebuild it, a restoration which was not finished till
1172. Since then the church has been wholly and the cloisters partly
rebuilt by Joao I. at the end of the fourteenth century, but some arches
of the cloister and the entrance to the chapter-house may very likely
date from Count Henry's time. These cloisters occupy a very unusual
position. Starting from the north transept they run round the back of
the chancel, along the south side of the church outside the transept,
and finally join the church again near the west front. The large round
arches have chamfered edges; the columns are monoliths of granite about
eighteen inches thick; the bases and the abaci all romanesque in form,
though many of the capitals, as can be seen from their shape and
carving, are of the fourteenth or even fifteenth century, showing how
Juan Garcia de Toledo, who rebuilt the church for Dom Joao I., tried, in
restoring the cloister, to copy the already existing features and as
usual betrayed the real date by his later details. A few of the old
capitals still remain, and are of good romanesque form such as may be
seen in any part of southern France or in Spain.[40] To the
chapter-house, a plain oblong room with a panelled wood ceiling, there
leads, from the east cloister walk, an unaltered archway, flanked as
usual by two openings, one on either side. The doorway arch is plain,
slightly horseshoe in shape, and is carried by short strong half-columns
whose capitals are elaborately carved with animals and twisting
branches, the animals, as is often the case,

[Illustration: FIG. 16.

DOOR OF CHAPTER HOUSE, N.S. DA OLIVEIRA.

GUIMARAES.]

[Illustration: FIG. 17.

CLOISTER.

LECA DO BALIO.]

being set back to back at the angles so that one head does duty for each
pair. Above is a large hollow hood-mould exactly similar to those which
enclose the side windows. The two lights of these windows are separated
by short coupled shafts whose capitals, derive