The King of England is informed of Saint Ursula’s Proposal
Ca. 1410. Tempera on panel.Room 051B
This work, together with the three others (P007630, P007632, P007633), used to be part of the upper register of an altarpiece devoted to the legend of the Eleven Thousand Virgins in the church of San Pablo de los Dominicos in Palencia.
This monastery suffered the consequences of the 1835 Ecclesiastical Confiscations that left it practically abandoned and subject to damage until it was returned to the Dominicans in 1884. There is a 19th-century photograph of the entire altarpiece, possibly from around 1879 (Ruiz Vernacci Archive; Pérez Suescun and Rodríguez López, 1995). The dismantling and subsequent sale must have taken place shortly thereafter, since four of those pieces were in England in 1909, acquired by F. Beaufort Palmer. In 1920, they were exhibited at the Royal Academy in London and were transferred to Lord Laverhulme’s collection, eventually entering into Lady Lever Art Gallery in Port Sunlight, near Liverpool. The altarpiece consisted of four upper panels – which are those in the Prado’s collection – and four other lower panels, as well as a wide predella, which was split up and, as a result, some of panels are lost. Four figures of saints belonging to this predella – in groups of two in two – are kept in the Johnson Collection in Philadelphia, having come from the Cobot Collection in Barcelona. Two others are in the Zorn Museum in Mora, Sweden.
The altarpiece quite accurately depicts the story of Saint Ursula as told in The Golden Legend. This story begins with the description of Saint Ursula, who was born in Brittany to a Christian king named Notus or Maurus and who was famous for her striking beauty. The King of England sent a delegation to Brittany in order to ask for Ursula’s hand in marriage. In the first scene, the monarch and the young woman receive an ambassador who transmits the marriage proposal of Conan, the son of the King of England. In the second scene, the English ambassador returns to the suitor and his father with the response of Ursula, who accepts on the condition that her betrothed be baptised and accompany her on a pilgrimage to Rome. Beside the king, who is seated on his throne over a rostrum, is his son, who reads the letter detailing these conditions. Several courtiers contemplate the scene, one of whom holds the monarch’s sword, a symbol of his authority.
