Wandmalereien der Eroberung von Mallorca

These wall paintings tell of a conquest that was already old history when they were made. The island of Majorca fell to James I of Aragon in 1229. This fresco went up around 1285, some 60 years later, on the wall of a grand merchant family's house on Montcada street in Barcelona, the building that centuries on would become the Picasso Museum. Laid out like a painted chronicle, it follows the same episodes told in the Catalan histories of the campaign, right down to the war council and the army's tented camp before the walls. Nobody knew it was there. It was found in 1961, hidden behind later walls during restoration work. To save it, the fragile plaster was lifted off the wall and transferred onto canvas.