Cathedral façade
Highlights of the Cathedral / Cathedral façade
The façade of the Cathedral, built in the mid-14th century, has three entrance doors. The central one is framed by a superb Gothic flared portal flanked by enormous abutments and a plinth decorated with large sculptures representing apostles and prophets. Its mullion houses the marble image of the Virgin of Mainell, carrying the Christ Child on her hip. Many of the sculptures are the work of Jaume Cascalls and Jordi de Déu, great Catalan Gothic sculptors. A large rose window measuring eleven metres in diameter crowns the façade, the construction of which was abruptly interrupted in 1348 due to the Black Death.
The sides of the façade, which are purely Romanesque, are no less interesting: above the right portal is a Roman sarcophagus from the end of the 4th century, of great artistic quality and representing the triumphal entry of Christ into Jerusalem and the miraculous healing of the paralysed man in Bethesda; on the other side, the tympanum of the left portal displays the Adoration of the Kings.
Above the right-hand portal is a Roman sarcophagus from the Theodosian period (BCE 370-400), the front of which depicts various moments in the life of Christ: the healing of blind Bartimaeus, the supplication of the Canaanite woman, the healing of the paralysed man at the pool of Bethesda, the conversion of Zacchaeus and the triumphal entry of Jesus into Jerusalem. The tympanum of the left-hand portal is decorated with the scene of the Adoration of the Kings in the Bethlehem Portal.
