LEER BAJO EL CIELO: UNA IMAGEN DE LECTURA ORAL EN EL MUNDO RURAL A FINALES DEL SIGLO XVIII.

Of the groups included in the Nativity scene of the Riquelme Collection at the Museo Salzillo, the one traditionally called The Reading of the Romance provides an exceptional example of a public reading at the twilight of the Ancien Regime. It depicts a young shepherd reading to an audience set against a natural background. The paper analyses the group and its relation to the Nativity scene where it belongs, and studies aspects of the commission by Jesualdo Riquelme - a rich and educated local nobleman- of Francisco Salzillo, the artist who devised and started the group in his old age. The paper considers the group as a testimony of his age. It illustrates the behaviour and reactions of the reader and his audience demonstrating public readings as a means of socialising and transmitting knowledge for the illiterate working classes, an unusual theme for a Nativity scene. It bears witness to the attempt by some Enlightened rural figures to educate the illiterate poor in a context of celebration of life in Nature and affirmation of the authenticity of rural people at a time of land reform and social criticism offarmers. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]