A unique architectural case
The Franciscan Monastery of St. John the Baptist in Motul, on which construction began in 1567, and terminated on the 2nd of February 1651, is an austere building, characterized by thick walls and narrow corridors.
It consists of an atrium, the church, the ex-monastery, a chapel (to Our Lady of Solitude) and the old orchard. The 17th-century church has a classical façade reminiscent of Merida Cathedral. The cloister appears rudimentary and sober: the heavy arches forming the portico are completely unadorned.
“The beautiful parish church of Motul is architecturally unique in these parts… The façade is interesting, but the beautifully constructed dome even more so”. So reads the caption on an antique photograph, stamped on the back: “Yucatecan Photographic Company, Merida. Tel. 28-40 Calle 63 No. 512” and preserved in the National Photographic Library.
According to the historian Miguel Bretos, this religious complex shares many features with that of Dzidzantún, such as the porticos – which are similar in the two ex-monasteries, and the atriums, which each had four capillas posas, although only one survives, at Motul, which is reminiscent of a similar one at Mani, although larger.
The researcher Manuel Arturo Román Kalisch, in The Building of Franciscan Monasteries in 16th-century Yucatan, states that the monastery was begun in 1567 by Friar Hernando de Guevara, with the collaboration of Friar Francisco de la Torre, the same Friars who were involved in the construction in Valladolid.
By 1588, Román continues, the monastery was finished, but work had barely begun on the church, and the project had to be re-started in the mid-17th Century by Friar Diego de Cervantes. However, Bretos mentions that the work was again halted and then continued by Friar Marcos de Menzieta, who made some modifications to the original plan.
The Indian Chapel and its adjoining chambers, located to the right of the church, were walled off, and when the church was finished, an entrance was opened in the wall to the baptistery, which thus preserved its original position, says Bretos.
Menzieta provided the monastery with the first example in Yucatan of a service passage built inside the walls, a peculiarly local architectural feature. It runs from the upper cloister to the apse windows, and helped to prevent bats and birds getting into the church.
In 1648, by which time the original developers of the complex had died, conclusion of the project fell to Friar José Narváez, prelate of the monastery in 1651, according to Kalisch.
The building has a beautifully sculpted Renaissance-style entrance way, with torsos of the patron of Motul, St. John the Baptist, whose feast is the 24th of June, and St. John the Evangelist.
In the opinion of Dr. Fernando Garcés Fierros, the façade of the complex is a testament to high quality of stone sculpture which distinguished Yucatan in Colonial times.
In his book Architecture of Franciscan Monasteries in 16th-century Yucatan, the archaeologist Luis Millet Cámara notes that this entrance is very similar to that of the church at Tochimilco, Puebla.
In 1651 Friar Diego López de Cogolludo, a major Spanish missionary and chronicler of Yucatan, was appointed superior of the monastery.
The ex-monastery lost its atrium during the 19th century, when it was used to extend the town’s main square.
The name of Motul, which is 36 km (22 miles) from Merida, is Maya in origin: Mutul may refer to the mut, a bird with black plumage; although it could also be Multul, from múul, a hill or mound, and tul kosom, a vine. Thus, according to the Dictionary of Yucatecan Spanish, the name means “hill covered in vines”.
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