ABSTRACT
In the previous chapter I presented the Alameda as an example of how practices are incepted into vacant spaces by means of a bricolage. The humanist project was truncated in Seville, mainly because of the opposition of the Counter Reformation, but also due to the decline of American commerce, which culminated in 1717 when the Casa de la Contratación and Indian trade, altogether, were transferred to Cadiz. A number of natural catastrophes succeeded one another, creating a context in which ‘Christianity closed ranks against the type of human “felicity”, attainable in this world, that philosophers used to proclaim’ (Aguilar Piñal 1974, p. 119; Alberola Romá 2009). In this atmosphere of demise, of hostile nature and the disappearance of encompassing frames of reference – international commerce, political influence and the imperial project – representational space became monopolised by the religious hierarchies. Sevillians withdrew into religious practice and the parish as the basic spatial frame (Romero Mensaque 2008).
