The Lions of Catalunya

by Jeremy D. Rowe

  His son took a breath, and then blurted out, “I want to be a teacher. I want to teach all the children round here the Catalan songs and stories; and most of all I want to teach them all to read and write our precious language.” He paused and there was a silence. “Well father, what do you think? I have told you my dream.”

  Antoni continued to sit in silence, regarding closely his son, and struggling to find the best way to reply. At last he spoke quietly.

  “You could not have had a better dream, my son,” he said, “but I am fearful. What you ask is dangerous, illegal, against the law. I do not want to see my son imprisoned or punished as you surely will be if you pursue this goal. Your love of Catalunya pleases me more than I can say, and your desire to teach others is wonderful. I have carried a heavy burden all my life, knowing that at any day a knock may come at the door and I would be arrested for teaching the songs of our land, spreading the language which is banned. Heaven knows how hard it has been to find the few Catalan books I have managed to buy for your library, each one bought in dangerous circumstances. And you tell me you want to teach it. How can I answer with anything but pride and fear?

  “Father, just now you called me thoughtful. I know I have youthful enthusiasm and optimism, but I have thought a lot, and I think I have a way. I should like to be a teacher of Castilian, and a writer, which should please the authorities and quietly, in the evenings, and to a very few people judged to be safe, I would teach and write in Catalan. There must be some who will pay me to learn to read. If our land should ever rise again, it will be though the effort of maintaining our culture secretly.”

  Antoni sighed. “You little know what you say, boy, but your words are wiser than your years. Let us start carefully: not as a teacher – yet – but as a reader and scribe. When I was apprenticed to the master mason, my father, your grandfather, could not read the words of the deed of apprenticeship, and I had to read it to him. You know that there are many in this situation. You could read letters to people, and write letters for them; and if it’s all in Castilian, so let that be a smoke-screen. Your skills in French and English mean you could even translate for merchants receiving messages from foreign lands. And all the while, you’ll be nurturing the Catalan, and ready to share it with those for whom it is safe to share.”

  “Will mother mind?” asked Francesc. “She’s never told me what she thinks, but perhaps she wishes I was following in your footsteps.”

  “She will be more pleased than I can say, Francesc,” said his father, “And your grandparents will also be proud and pleased. Talking of whom, I believe we must invite them all to dinner some time soon, and tell them your news. You may well be a little surprised by their reaction.”

  “Will it be a good surprise?” asked Francesc.

  Antoni laughed, “Oh, I think it will be very good!”

  A few days later, the four grandparents were excited to come to dinner at the house in Carrer Sant Miquel, and after the meal, Alissia was left downstairs with the other children, whilst the grandparents climbed the steep staircase to the upper room. Antoni and Francesc carefully carried lighted candles upstairs and Antoni looked around at the four old people. Rafael was now sixty-nine, he knew that, and although he was unsure, he assumed the other three all to be of similar age. The four old faces, in the flickering candlelight, lined and wise, beamed at their favourite grandson.

  Antoni chuckled. “What have we here? Nearly three hundred years of Catalonia life!”

  Susana smiled, “We may not be quite as old as that, but certainly between us there are many years experience.”

  “We could tell some stories,” said Rafael.

  “And that is why you’re here,” said Antoni. “Before you get too old to remember, or you die, you must tell the story to this boy who has all his life before him.”

  “Where do we start?” said Susana, “There is so much to tell.”

  “Let Rafael tell the tale,” said Alissia’s father. “After all he knows it so well. He was there at the siege.”

  “The story is older than that,” began Rafael. “Let me think. My tale begins with my grandfather’s grandfather. That makes him my great, great grandfather. His name was Joan Blanxart and I think he was born around the year 1600. He was murdered.”

  Rafael paused for effect, and Francesc’s eyes became as round as saucers. “Murdered?” whispered the boy.

  “Yes, murdered,” went on his grandfather. “Let me tell you all about it.”

  Long into the night the tale was spun. With the children asleep downstairs, Alissia crept into the room with a bottle of wine, and Rafael told the family history. It was gone midnight when he reached the story of his own father, and how the sword was given to him on the night Perez was arrested.

  Hardly daring to breathe, Francesc his voice hushed, interrupted, “So grandfather, you’re the Lion of Catalunya?”

  “No young man, no longer. I was once the Lion of Catalunya, but look now at my grey hairs. The Lion of Catalunya sits beside you there: the Lion of Catalunya is your father. See his golden curls!”

  “But…..” the question remained on Francesc’s lips.

  There was a silence, and they all looked towards Antoni. “Yes, boy,” he said, “you will be next. You will inherit the mantle and the awful responsibility.”

  “So…..” again Francesc could not finish the sentence.

  “Where is the sword?” said Susana, finishing the question for him.

  “Yes, where?” chorused Alissia’s parents.

  Antoni laughed. “Here in this house. But until the day comes to hand it to you, Francesc, only your grandfather Rafael and I will know exactly where it is.”

  Long after everyone else had fallen asleep in various chairs and corners of the room, young Francesc lay awake, his mind a turmoil of all he had heard. One day he would become the Lion of Catalunya, inheriting a sword hidden somewhere in the house! And his grandfather had spoken of the Catalan flag, the senyera. He had never seen one, and was full of curiosity that there was one, in the house, hidden with the sword. He vowed that he would write the story… somehow… secretly… he would write it in Catalan, he knew the language well enough. He knew such a document would land him and his family in trouble if it were ever found, but he was resolved that the story must be preserved for the future.

  One day the people of Catalunya would escape the yoke of Castile; he dreamed that he would be the one leading his people to freedom, the sword in his hand, the flag round his shoulders, and he would show his people the book, the book he had written himself, giving them back their history… he tossed and turned, his imagination running riot as he marched, in his dreams at the head of a Catalan army.

  Antoni, also awake and watching his son, pondered on the events of the night. How would this thoughtful, bookish boy take on the mantle of history? Antoni knew that he himself had been an active carefree youth, and had grown into a strong and muscular man, able to handle himself in any situation. Hadn’t they called him a ‘man of the world’ when he achieved his apprenticeship? He had travelled far and wide in Spain, fulfilling the commissions of the rich and fashionable Castilians who had the money to pay for grand new churches in the revolutionary baroque style. He had what others called ‘charisma’ and he revelled in his secret status as Lion of Catalunya. But this boy? This delicate son, this Francesc? True he had the blond curls of the first born Blanxarts, but he was a quiet, studious lad, more interested in books than anything else, and he wanted to be a teacher. Perhaps the fire of Catalunya smouldered in him.

  Life in the barrio settled. The new houses gradually filled up, and then filled to overflowing. With their usual casual cruelty, the Castilian-controlled city authorities cleared all the old beach shacks and had a huge bonfire on the beach. Rafael, now an old man, watched the blaze. His own home, the chiringuito, was saved from the conflagration, since many of the Mossos liked eating there. The acrid smell of burning homes brought back to him that day, nearly sixty years ago, when
he had watched La Ribera consumed. Francesc, sixty years younger, stood with him and watched the fire, aware that tears were trickling down his grandfather’s face.

  “You’re right, boy,” said Rafael. “Someone must write down the story. Oh, our poor Catalunya, such a fragile country. We cannot lose our heritage in smoke and flames. The countryside is ravaged, the city oppressed…” the old man’s thoughts trailed off.

  “I’ve started,” replied Francesc, “And I would like to read it to you, grandfather. I must get the story right, I must have it clear. If no-one else is writing it, what would become of us if I fail?”

  Later that day, with the old man carefully seated with a glass of wine in his hand, Francesc started to read. He had got no further than the opening few pages, than he slipped in a question, as casually as he could, “By the way, it would help me to write about the sword, I mean, to describe it, if I saw it, wouldn’t it?”

  His grandfather roared with laughter. “You’ll not catch me as easily as that, young man, although you may be right. I will talk to your father. But read on, you are bringing Joan Blanxart to life!”

  It came about, after that first reading, that grandfather and grandson spent much time together as Franscesc pieced together the story, and Rafael rummaged through his memory. In trying to remember the words of songs, they had to bring Susana in, who had a better memory, and Francesc was able to include many of the folk legends and the words of the songs even if he had no way of writing the music.

  An agreement was reached with Antoni, that Francesc’s book, when it was finished, would be hidden with the sword, and at that moment, the sword and senerya would be revealed to the boy. With this additional motivation to get the words onto paper, Francesc wrote industriously whenever he had the time. His chores for his mother still had to be done, and his few Catalan books were much read and reread as he developed his own writing style and ability to express himself in Catalan.

  As a reader and scribe he was much in demand, and started to establish a profitable business. He resented the time he was taken away from writing his family history, but was delighted to be adding successfully to the family income. From reading and translating, he started teaching a very few to read themselves, and he constantly watched for the moment when he encountered someone keen to learn Catalan. He worked at his own skill in the language, referring often to the few books his father had found for him, and started to make some notes, as best he could, of the complex grammar of the language. He found links with French as well as Castilian, but he found many aspects of the grammar very challenging.

  He loved the way in which people started to recognise him as a teacher, and his quiet studious personality, whilst not as charismatic as his famous father, was strong and distinctive. His mother would sometimes look at him and wonder if she had produced a son who could be called wise.

  It was not just the languages that fascinated Francesc. The more he read, and the more he learned of the world, the more he came to hate what the Castilians stood for. Castilians were slothful and greedy, and enjoyed oppressing others. In one highly valued book written in Catalan, he discovered that the aristocrats of Madrid were called the “occupying leeches.” He liked that phrase. He believed that he was trapped in a lowly position in a massive spider’s web of social conventions; a whole social system based on subjugation to a foreign king in Madrid. He thought of himself as a Catalan citizen; citizen of a state which did not exist, speaking a banned language, reading books that the authorities, given the chance, would burn; a citizen unable even to fly the flag of his country, in his country. Although at the time he did not know the word ‘socialism’, in his mind he was forming the kind of socialist ideals which would one day influence the future Catalunya. Occasionally a book would fall into his hands which helped him understand these things, and clarify his own thinking; and he was mightily frustrated by his poor English when such a book arrived from London.

  Meanwhile, the population of Barceloneta was mushrooming. The clean lines of Prosper Verboom’s elegant classical houses were rapidly become destroyed by the resident’s efforts to enlarge their homes. Master Verboom had provided flat roofs, suitable for drying washing, and sleeping on hot summer nights; these were the first casualties of the itinerant building: even Antoni’s own home had its residents on the roof, two of his sisters and their families had arrived when their shack on the beach had been destroyed.

  In despair, Prosper and Antoni experimented with removing the heavy baroque cornice, and building some of the houses one more storey high; they then replaced the cornice above the second floor. This looked elegant at first, but then, inevitably, another family would appear on the roof of that dwelling, and another shack would be built on an even higher level.

  Slowly Master Verboom’s sunlit streets turned into shady canyons, and the washing, no longer discretely out of sight on the roof, was hung across the streets in a riot of underwear and bedlinen. As time went by, some of the buildings had grown to four floors high, and Antoni and Prosper wondered how they could remain upright, with their shallow foundations on sand. The place did remain standing, but the architect and sculptor decided that if one fell, they would all fall like dominoes, each one dependent upon its neighbour for support.

  With his family history book finished, and Rafael becoming a very frail old man, the time came for Francesc to be shown the stone chamber under the floor containing the sword and the flag. Antoni’s legendary great strength was also beginning to wane, and he strained to lift the great limestone slab. Although most of the family had been banished to the chiringuito for the occasion, Francesc asked for his mother to remain and learn the secret of the hiding place, and so Alessia also watched with baited breath as the slab was raised.

  Kneeling at the edge of the small chamber, Alessia smiled. “To think I’ve been walking over this spot for all these years,” she reflected. “Just beneath my best rug. Antoni, how clever.”

  “Well done,” said Rafael. “You created a dry safe place for the sword to lie in hiding. See how the colours of the flag remain bright. I am sure the sword will still be sharp and shining.”

  “Let us see the sword!” exclaimed Francesc impatiently.

  Antoni carefully lifted the bundle and handed it to his father. “I may be the Lion,” he said, “but I would like you, father, to unwrap the sword.”

  Slowly and shakily, Rafael unwound the senyera, the fabric still strong and the yellow and red stripes glowing in the dim light of the room. He turned to Francesc, and draped the flag around his grandson’s shoulders. “Future Lion of Catalona,” he declared. Antoni took the sword from his father and held it silently for a moment.

  “I have been strong and steadfast in my love of my country,” said Antoni, “but I do not think I will live long enough to see Catalunya rise again. When you are a man, my son, this sword will be yours. It may not be that you are chosen to be there when the yoke of Castile is finally destroyed. Perhaps it will be you, maybe it will be your son, or even your son’s son. Who knows? But with this sword, and this flag, and now your book, we continue to dedicate ourselves to the cause of our homeland.”

  Spontaneously the other three put their hands upon the sword, and swore, “Our Catalunya.” Francesc stepped forward with his book. Completed and bound in leather, it was a precious document. He had read the entire manuscript to his grandfather, who had approved of every detail. Rafael, his hand shaking, touched the book lightly as Francesc handed it to his father, and then Antoni wrapped the sword and the book carefully in the senyera, and lowered the precious bundle into to the tiny stone chamber. In silence, Antoni levered the flagstone back into position and Alissia replaced the rug.

  After the ceremony of the secret chamber, Francesc was silent and thoughtful. Antoni and Alissia looked from him to Rafael who was sunk into a chair. Suddenly the old man seemed small and even more frail. Francesc moved quietly to his grandfather’s side, and sat on the floor at his feet.

  “What is it, my son?�
�� asked Antoni quietly. Francesc looked long and hard at his grandfather, and then at his father. Then he spoke.

  “It’s serious, isn’t it? It’s not just a story. We really hold the key to Catalunya here in our hands, in our house, here beneath the floor of this room. Castile would destroy us. Who am I to inherit such responsibility? You, grandfather, who fought at the siege of Barcelona, and carried the sword for so long; and you, father, singing the folk songs of Catalunya in defiance of all, a great sculptor and a famous man, now the Lion of Catalunya; and now me. I don’t have grandfather’s courage or father’s strength. I could not even lift the slab to reveal the sword. How can I be the Lion? How can this responsibility be mine?”

  There was another silence as the three older members of the family looked at one another; and then Rafael spoke, slowly and quietly, with the wisdom of an old man at the end of his life.

  “We all have our strengths. Oh I was strong and foolhardy in battle, and obstinate in my guarding of the sword, and your father is physically strong and commands great respect wherever he goes, both at home and throughout Spain; but you, dear boy, have an inner strength that surpasses us both.”

  Rafael paused to gather his thoughts. “We were merely the bearers of the sword and senyera, but you have contributed your book, the story so far, the very lifeblood of Catalunya. This is a great achievement. Your mother and father and I have often watched you and spoken amongst ourselves. We are proud of you, enormously proud, and we know the future is in safe hands. The future may be symbolised by a sword, but it will be persuasion and knowledge which will win in the end. You are a thinker, and one day may be called a philosopher. I see already the beginnings of a political understand beyond the thinking of your father or I.”

  “I was a humble working man,” he continued. “Working long hours to sustain the family on the beach, coping with the daily grind of the chiringuito. Your father broke away with his talent for drawing and sculpture, the first of our family to become a master craftsman, the first to be welcomed into a guild. But you have gone beyond, the first to be really educated. Your father got called a man of substance, and he was; but you are destined to be a man of the world.”