Pastrana and the Ducal Palace

Pastrana, a small historic town in the Guadalajara province of Castile-La Mancha, Spain, sits at the heart of the Alcarria plateau and is most visited for its Ducal Palace and the tapestries housed in its Collegiate Church — together forming one of the most complete 15th- and 16th-century aristocratic ensembles in the region. The Ducal Palace, built in the 15th century and associated with the powerful Mendoza family, later came into the possession of Ruy Gómez de Silva, Prince of Éboli, and his wife Ana de Mendoza (the famous one-eyed Princess of Éboli, later made famous in Spanish Romantic literature). The palace interior retains period furniture, portraits, and documented rooms associated with the Princess, who was confined to house arrest in Pastrana by Philip II in the 1580s and 1590s. The Collegiate Church of Nuestra Señora de la Asunción, on the Plaza de la Hora, houses the Four Tapestries of Pastrana — a set of large-scale Flemish tapestries commissioned by Alfonso V of Portugal in the 1470s to celebrate his African campaigns (the capture of Arzila and Tangier). These four tapestries, measuring around 4 metres in height and collectively nearly 50 metres long, are among the most important examples of 15th-century Flemish tapestry weaving outside Belgium. Pastrana's Plaza de la Hora is a pleasant arcaded square, and the old town's narrow streets preserve a largely intact medieval plan. The drive through the Alcarria plateau in spring, when the landscape is covered in wildflowers, is an added pleasure.