Mecenazgo y representación: imágenes de Álvaro de Luna en el Libro de las virtuosas e claras mugeres , el castillo de Escalona y la Catedral de Toledo

Abstract

Through an interdisciplinary approach, this article describes the means by which Álvaro de Luna’s Libro de las virtuosas e claras mugeres (Book of the Illustrious and Virtuous Women) and the decorations of the Castle of Escalona promote an image of power and patronage praising the patron. The same image was later utilized by don Álvaro’s daughter, doña María de Luna, when she sponsored the reconstruction of the Chapel of Santiago at Toledo’s Cathedral, where the late don Álvaro rests. The decorations of the Palace depict the same iconographic motifs of the Libro ’s main manuscript, and the Chapel forms a continuity with both the Palace and the Libro and develops stories present in the latter. Thus the image put forward in the three of them combines the same elements of power, noble self-fashioning, and patronage.