Title

Admiral Carpet

Generic classification

Object

Date

Century

Cultural context / style

Dimensions

Material

Technique

Iconography / Theme

Provenance

Current location

Inventory Number in Current Collection

Object history

This carpet was acquired by the collector James Deering, owner of the Villa Vizcaya in Miami, in 1915 from the New York antiques firm French & Co. for $13,200. The documentary record of this acquisition states the Admiral Enríquez coats of arms that adorn the carpet, as well as its provenance: the monastery of Santa Clara in Palencia.

From the beginning of the 20th century, when they began to be known and studied, the oldest series of Spanish carpets, characterised by the coat of arms of the Admiral of Castile and members of his family, received the name of ‘Almirante’. They were commissioned in various sizes, both large and small. Doña Juana de Mendoza, widow of the 1st Admiral of Castile, Alfonso (or Alonso) Enriquez granted in her will, dated 22 January 1431, to the monastery of Santa Clara de Palencia: ‘I command two more large carpets of the arms of my lord the Admiral (Don Alonso Enriquez first Admiral of Castile) and mine for in front of the main altar; plus four small carpets for two altars’ (Partearroyo Lacaba, Partearroyo Lacaba). (Partearroyo Lacaba, 2003).

In the will of her husband, the 1st Admiral, there was a clause in which he sent the abbess and nuns of the monastery of Santa Clara de Palencia eleven thousand maravedís to establish four chaplaincies. His wife, Juana de Mendoza, also made a donation to the monastery of ten thousand maravedis, which she had as a grant from the King, annually and by oath of inheritance. In her aforementioned will of 1431, she provided for his burial in the main chapel of the said monastery, which she had ordered to be built, and bequeathed to the abbess and nuns the places of Reinoso, Barrio and Melgar, with many silver jewels, ornaments and tapestries, ordering that there should be forty nuns and certain friars and chaplains there’ (Ortega Gato, pp. 31-33).

Description

The carpet is woven with a single warp knot, popularly known as the ‘Spanish knot’. In the central field there are three coats of arms that identify Alfonso (or Alonso) Enríquez (1354-1429), 1st Admiral of Castile (title granted in 1405), and Juana de Mendoza y Ayala (died in Palencia in 1431). The original Mendoza coat of arms appears (sinople, band of gules outlined in gold). The same coats of arms appear in the Church of San Andrés de Aguilar de Campos (Valladolid). It is a church built around 1400-1431. The lordship of Aguilar de Campos was granted to Alonso Enríquez in 1389 (Details of the coats of arms provided by Rafael Domínguez Casas).

Locations

• ca. 1431

  monastery

  Monastery of Santa Clara, Palencia, Palencia (Spain)

• 1915

  dealer/antiquarian

  French & Company, New York (United States) *

• 1915 - present

  museum

  Vizcaya Museum & Gardens, Miami (United States)