Un inventario de reliquias inédito de San Salvador de Valdediós (Asturias)

Abstract

The church of San Salvador de Valdediós (in Villaviciosa, Asturias), the last monument of the time of the Asturian Kingdom, has preserved in a niche of the main chapel a text in very poor condition, until now almost unnoticed and without deciphering. It was painted in red on the plaster that also served as the basis for pre-Romanesque painting. Through the photographic retouching and the comparison with related texts from the Visigothic and medieval times, especially in the current territory of Asturias, a list written in Latin of the relics that had been deposited in the main altar has been read. This inventory of relics is preceded by a formula referred to their deposition, with the characteristic participle recondite. The text read covers eleven and a half lines, and includes sixteen relics of thirteen saints, biblical or of the III-IV centuries, very well ordered. Those of the Savior, head of the chapel and the temple predominate. It is similar to other Asturian catalogs, especially linked to the see of Oviedo, although with the singular mention of Saint Basilissa. The arrangement and shape of the letters, as well as the linguistic quality of the text are remarkable. The morphology of the letters, the abbreviations used, a linguistic detail, and also the formulas and the relics consigned allow us to conjecture its chronological proximity to the pre-Romanesque parietal decoration of San Salvador, during a second phase of the building, generally dated around 893, year of the consecration or, in any case, a dating prior to 968.