ESCUELA MADRILEÑA

(2ª 1/2 S.XVII)

MADRID SCHOOL (2nd 1/2 17th Century) "Presentation of the relic of Saint Peter Regalado to Philip IV as a sick child in Aranda de Duero"

Oil on canvas. With a Baroque-style frame. Provenance: - Madrid, Counts of Sastago. - Madrid, Counts of Glimes of Brabant. This important canvas depicts a curious episode in the life of Philip IV that occurred in the summer of 1610. While with his parents, Philip III and Margaret of Austria, in La Ventosilla (Valladolid), he fell ill while in Aranda de Duero. To cure him, the relic of Saint Peter Regalado was brought to him from the nearby monastery of La Aguilera. The child was healed, and this event was celebrated as a miracle of the Franciscan friar from Valladolid. The scene takes place in a sumptuous room of a house on the Plaza Mayor of Aranda de Duero. The prince sits up in a four-poster bed with Solomonic columns and holds the reliquary presented to him by Friar Francisco de Borja, guardian of the Aguilera Palace. The scene is populated by numerous figures. On the left, King Philip III and Queen Margaret of Austria stand out, surrounded by ladies, pages, and gentlemen, with a charming little Maltese-type dog beside the chair. In front of the bed, a page and a gentleman kneel; the latter is quite prominent, as he carries the golden key of a gentleman, a knight's rapier, and the Order of the Golden Fleece. On the right, a bishop and a Knight of Santiago stand before them, and a luxuriously attired dwarf points the way. Although the scene is set in the early 17th century, the idealization of the royal couple, and especially the anachronism in the ladies' clothing, the dwarf's attire, and particularly the queen's dress—a gold-thread brocade skirt characteristic of the late 17th century—leads us to date it much later and to consider the painter as being connected to the court circle. A contemporary copy of this painting is located in the niche of the tomb of Saint Peter Regalado in the Monastery of La Aguilera. The Churrigueresque-style niche was financed around 1680 by the sixth Duke of Peñaranda, Don Isidro de Zuñiga (1652-1691), Count of Miranda, patron of this monastery. The Marquesses of Denia also had a great devotion to the saint and were also patrons of the tomb. Dimensions: 140 x 253 cm.