The cathedral of Leon in Nicaragua, whose construction began in mid-eighteenth century, was entered Tuesday in the World Heritage List, announced the United Nations Educational, Scientific and Cultural Organization (UNESCO) based in Paris.
León Cathedral, built between 1747 and early nineteenth century with designs of architect José de Porres Guatemalan Diego Esquivel, "expresses the transition from Baroque to neoclassical architecture and its eclectic style can be seen," said Unesco in a statement.
This cathedral is one of the largest in Central America. It was the first episcopal seat of Nicaragua, since 1531, making it one of the oldest dioceses in the Americas. It is the tomb of the poet Rubén Darío, at the foot of the statue of St. Paul, leading figure of modernism and considered the Prince of the Castilian literature. In its crypts, designed to withstandearthquakes, are buried some illustrious people of the nation as Salomón de la Selva and Alfonso Cortés, the hero Miguel Larreynaga and musician José de la Cruz Mena.
There are a number of tunnels that connect this church with other churches in León. In the early 20th century the first bishop of León and last in Nicaragua, Archbishop Simeón Pereira y Castellón (the same who presided over the funerals of Darío on 13 February 1916) commissioned the Granadan sculptor Jorge Navas Cordonero make the statue of the Virgin Mary above the front of the facade, the Atlanteans that are among the gables and the towers. Navas also sculpted the statues of the Twelve Apostles, along with the columns of the central nave, like the lion of the tomb of the poet, much look like at the Lion of Lucerne, Switzerland, and various decorations inside the church and its Tabernacle Chapel.
