280 Apuntes del Alcázar de Sevilla
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However, as the work is carried out, it is observed that the structure
had been readjusted to the ceiling of the room at some unspecified
time. It was initially composed for another narrower room, as several
details show it was modified to achieve a constructive solution that
enabled its adjustment to the Office. In this new location, the forg-
ing had completely lost its constructive use as a floor, becoming a
merely ornamental element.
This process sped up the poor state of preservation of the structure
and its decoration
2
. The pieces were numbered during its first dis-
mantling, most likely to facilitate their subsequent assembling, al-
though their current positions show that the numbering was not
observed: some pieces were included and the beams were arranged
to facilitate the fitting of the structure to the hall.
We do not knowmany details about this ceiling: its first location, ac-
tual size, or the time and place where it was disassembled. Although
some ceilings have been relocated and reused in other rooms of the
Sevillian palace, this situation did not seem to be repeated in the
Office. The ornamental composition of the alfarje is dominated by a
heraldic shield that has nothing to do with the ones that recur in the
palace —allusive to the Castilian Royal Houses, the Banner Order or
imperial emblems—, but belongs to the lineage of a family without
any apparent relation to the Royal Alcazar: the Solis, whose emblem
consists of a golden coat of arms with a red sun, encircled by eight
red wolf heads.
Given the circumstances, we considered making use of the available
sources on the origin of the ceiling, on the basis of its possible re-
location during the restoration of the main floor carried out, since
the 1970s, by D. Rafael Manzano Martos —Curator of the complex
by then—. In the same way, we considered that the alfarje may have
been part of the decoration of the former Solis palace, located in the
current Plaza del Duque in Seville.
Origin of the space and its ceiling
There is little data on this hall, aside from the fact that its current use
is the result of recent reforms. The interventions that have been car-
ried out are difficult to determine; the halls changed as the Court’s
taste and needs evolved, hence their uses and names varied over
time. As stated earlier, the first information about it are from mid
sixteen century, when the Office was part of the Cuarto de Hércules
or Sala de las Cinco Cuadras, an area that must have encompassed
the two upper bays separating the Patios de laMontería and las Don-
cellas, which were already part of the Mudejar project of Pedro I.
One of the features of this complex was the existence of an upper
floor that did not cover the whole lower floor —the so-called High
Royal Chambers—
3
. Among the built sides, the North one was par-
ticularly important, as two parallel bays were arranged between the
Patios de la Montería and de las Doncellas, whose disposition was
related to the Court’s contemporary ceremonial. The first one had a
qubba on its centre with a belvedere facing the Patio de la Montería,
organized in five straight profile spaces. We believe this arrangement
is the one depicted in the Modern fountains as the Sala de las Cinco
Cuadras
4
. The second bay faced the Patio de las Doncellas. Its ar-
rangement was similar to the repeated pattern in the lower floor of
the palace, a rectangular shaped
alhanía
with a central hall and two
bedrooms in the extremes. The first of them (East) had the entrance
to the staircase, and then there was a rectangular room that served
as hall for the aforementioned qubba, and behind that a squared
bedroom used for the private service of the monarch. This room, the
use of which should have been private, ended up being the current
King’s Office.
The arrangement of this area gradually changed although it has
largely maintained its character as a space for audiences. The ad-
dition of the main staircase changed the direction of its traffic, the
rooms were reorganized and its original ceilings were replaced with
flat roofs. Nevertheless, the floor of our room was maintained, al-
though its original ceiling was lost forever.
From this moment on, all the news we have emphasize the restora-
tion of the area. During the rule of the Catholic Kings, works aimed
first at repairing its manufacture —roof repair, water evacuation,
vegetation removal—, and then reorganizing new rooms for the
Monarchs and the Prince Juan
5
. However, it would be in the 1540s
when more news was gathered.
From 1539 to 1546, Sebastián de Segovia worked in the Catholic
Kings bedroom and closed the attics of the Patio de Muñecas. Later,
Juan de Simancas continued repairing the roofs of the high rooms
surrounding the Patio de las Doncellas. In this period he intervened
three times in the armours of the Sala de las Cinco Cuadras, in the
years 1560, 62 and 69
6
. With these interventions, he must have com-
pletely finished the renovation of this space that reappears among
the work reports in 1580, when a stairway communicating it with
the Doncellas was being finished
7
. From this date we do not know
the evolution the Office may have suffered, especially the moment
when its ceiling would be replaced. The area does not seem to have
been affected either by the 1755 earthquake and the fire that affected
the main floor in 1762
8
. However, it was the subject of the first res-
torations of the nineteenth century. In an 1806 assessment which
describes the works by Maestro Manuel Zintora, it can be drawn
that several medieval coffered ceilings were replaced by flat ceilings,
including the ones at the current Hall (Antesala), Sala de Audiencias,
and presumably, the King’s Office
9
. From this moment the works af-
fecting this area were maintenance and painting its flat ceiling. This
seems confirmed by two almost contemporaneous writings: the
report on the works by Joaquín Domínguez Bécquer (1848-54), in
which it is stated that many ceilings had disappeared to give rise to
lime and plaster roofless ceilings
10
; and the report on the restoration
directed by José de la Coba from 1854 to 1857, specifically recognizing
that this room’s roofless ceiling had been repaired and tiled, its walls
had been prepared and its doors had been mended
11
.
Nothing had been heard of interventions until Rafael Manzano
started the restoration of the High Royal Chambers at the end of
the twentieth century, a process which included the restoration of
the Mirador de los Reyes Católicos, the positioning of the salas de
Audiencias and the cession of private rooms for the Royal House,
including the King’s Office as a working space for King Juan Carlos
I. Until that intervention, we believe that the bedroom would keep
its flat ceiling from the early nineteenth century, although we have
no data on this fact aside from the fact that the current ceiling was
placed in that moment.
During that restoration there was the opportunity of installing a
larger structure, replacing the plaster roofing with an alfarje that had
not been part of the Alcazar whatsoever, and which according to the
coat of arms outlined in it belonged to the Sevillian palace house
of the Solis. Its placement in this room meant the recovery of this
unique piece of woodwork; the last journey of this errant ceiling had
begun.
