ABSTRACT
Rivers and water seem, symbolically and physically, to have played only a minor role in festivals on the Iberian peninsula in the Renaiassance and Early Modern periods. A survey of the major bibliographies of Spanish festivals quickly confirms this: naumachiae, naval battles, regattas, waterborne decorations are all but missing, festival books dedicated to them non-existent, images of them extremely rare and those that exist mostly from later centuries. In fact, it seems that the only image of a mock naval battle from Spain is an engraving from Valencia of a naval spectacle staged in 1753 between two bridges on the river Turia, obviously modelled on the famous Pitti Palace naumachia of 1589 in Florence.1 In 1586 Valencia honoured the visiting Philip II with decorations incorporating five mock battles, including the key naval victory of Lepanto, but all were performed as tableaux vivants on stages along the entry route.2 The term naumachia scarcely appears in Spanish festival literature, one rare example being in the festival book on Anna of Austria’s entry in Burgos in 1570, where it is used to describe a mock naval battle. Yet contrary to the claim of reviving ancient Roman naumachiae, the spectacle actually re-enacted episodes from the chivalric epic Amadis of Gaul and was performed on a dry city square.3 Few other naval battles were staged
1 On this spectacle see Victor Minguez, ‘La Naumaquia del Turia del 1755. Un hito en el espectaculo barroco valenciano’, in Millars Geografia-Historia, 12 (1988-89), pp. 55-69.
