The Beautiful Lady at the Haunted Gardens of the El Greco House and Museum in Toledo Spain

The ghostly beauty’s appearance in El Greco House-Museum gardens accords with prevailing northwest Mediterranean looks. The young lady communicates:

• Sadness;
• Sallowness;
• Spareness.

A lack of bejeweled, cosmetic adornments additionally conveys sixteenth- and seventeenth-century behavioral and emotional restraints in:

• Crete;
• Italy;
• Spain.

El Greco’s artworks preserving his signature as Δομήνικος Θεοτοκόπουλος Κρής (Doménikos Theotokópoulos, Krēs [“Cretan”]) indeed evoke attachments to:

• His mother and tax collector father, Geórgios Theotokópoulos (died 1556);
• Manoússos Theotokópoulos (1529? – December 13, 1604), whose freefall from wealth to indebtedness relocated him to his brother’s household from 1591 onward.

But excepting a possible marriage, no female Cretan likely explains the spectral beauty’s manifestations. El Greco had to work overtime to distinguish himself among Crete’s artistic over-achievers.

The Scuola di San Luca in Crete’s modern-day Herakleion area channeled:

• Draped textures, highlighted cheeks, and precise contours on Byzantine icons;
• Landscaped backgrounds and naturalist depictions on Flemish Primitives.

Fluency in Byzantine space and Renaissance composition facilitated El Greco’s achievements as:

• Guild master and workshop operator, 1563-;
• Painter of Dormition of the Virgin, 1566.

Status as son and sibling to functionaries and merchants serving the Duchy of Candia -- controlled by the Venetian Republic, 1205 – 1669 -- inspired El Greco’s:

• Arrival in Venice, 1568-;
• Assimilation of Tintoretto’s (Jacopo Robusti, April 29, 1519 – May 31, 1594) and Titian’s (Tiziano Vecelli, 1480? – August 27, 1576) free-handed, rich-colored styles;
• Avoidance of the Byzantine-oriented Greek Confraternity of San Giorgio dei Greci.

Scholars sometimes associate a six-panel triptych in Modena with El Greco’s possibly accompanying Manoússos on merchant- and tax-related trips northwestward around 1567. Despite the polyptych’s feminine figures, no candidates emerge in peninsular Italy. Fluency in Byzantine tempera and Venetian oil techniques necessitated devotion and diligence. Their domination overlapped with El Greco’s:

• Accumulation of Italian Renaissance-related literary and philosophical writings and practical and theoretical treatises;
• Arrival in Rome, 1570-;
• Friendship with miniaturist Giulio Clovio (Juraj Julije Klović, 1498 – January 5, 1578);
• Lodging with Cardinal Alessandro Farnese (October 5, 1520 – March 2, 1589), 1570 - 1572;
• Miniature-painting membership in the Academy of St. Luke, 1572-;
• Portraiture of Malta Defender and Rhodes Knight Vincenzo Anastagi (1531 - 1586), around 1576.

Historians generally attribute El Greco’s travels westward to:

• Independence;
• Inquisitiveness;
• Irascibility.

They typically connect his relocation from Italy to Spain in 1577 with:

• Fallout from criticizing Giorgio Vasari’s (July 30, 1511 – June 27, 1574) and Michelangelo di Lodovico Buonarroti Simoni’s (March 6, 1475 – February 18, 1564) architecture, painting, and writings;
• Friendship with Murcia Cathedral painter Baltasar de Castro Cimbrón (flourished 16^th century);
• Introduction to Luis de Castilla -- son of Toledo Cathedral deacon Diego de Castilla (1507? – November 7, 1584) during the young priest’s stay in Rome;
• Opportunities at the Royal Site of San Lorenzo de El Escorial, the Madrid-area royal residence of King Philip II (May 21, 1527 – September 13, 1598).

They never hypothesize broken hearts.

Westward oceanic and overland voyages deposited El Greco in Spain. The architect, painter, and sculptor lived initially and temporarily in Madrid, central Spain’s cultural and politico-economic center. But before summer’s end, he moved everything -- including his library -- to Toledo, King Charles I’s (February 24, 1500 – September 21, 1558) imperial city. Through Deacon Castilla and García de Loaysa Girón (1534 – February 22, 1599), he obtained contracts -- completed in 1579 -- for:

• Altarpiece retable and sculptures for Santo Domingo el Antiguo Monastery;
• Expolio (The Disrobing of Christ) for the Toledo Cathedral, in replacement of and succession to Adoration of the Kings and St. John the Baptist altar-piece painter Hernando de Ávila (1538? – 1595), at 320 ducats.

Toledo-based contracts established El Greco’s artistry despite Philip II’s disdaining Martyrdom of Saint Maurice in 1582. They preceded:

• Raising Jorge Manuel Theotocópuli (1578 – 1631), his son with Jerónima de las Cuevas;
• Renting the Marqués de Villena’s Houses, 1585-;
• Sheltering Manoússos, released from arrests, 1582 – 1588, to installment-repay over 12 years government-embezzled monies, 1589-.

They prefaced:

• Decorations: Augustine College, Illescas Charity Hospital, Isabel de Oballe Chapel, Saint John the Baptist Hospital, San José Chapel, Talaverilla Church;
• Funeraries: Count of Orgaz (died December 3, 1323), Marguerite of Austria (December 25, 1583 – October 3, 1611);
• Landscapes: Toledo;
• Portraits: Jerónimo de Ceballos, Fernando Niño de Guevara (1541 – January 8, 1609), Hortensio Félix Paravicino y Arteaga (October 12, 1580 – December 12, 1633).

Only paintings attest to El Greco’s Toledan years. The artist’s tomb does not exist because:

• The Santo Domingo Church Convent Sisters removed his and daughter-in-law Alfonsa de los Morales’s (died 1617) remains in 1618;
• The San Torcuato Monastery was destroyed in 1868.

His palatial lodgings exist no more because of fire. But thanks to artist Benigno de la Vega-Inclán y Flaquer (1858 – 1942) and architect Eladio Laredo y Carranza (1864 – 1941), the nearby El Greco House-Museum exists as a:

• Sixteenth-century building and courtyard;
• Twentieth-century extension and garden.

Is it Jerónima -- the love of El Greco’s socio-economically troubled life -- who stops on transits between her possible San Isidro birthplace and Santo Domingo de la Rioja deathplace?

My special thanks to talented artists and photographers/concerned organizations who make their fine images available on the internet.

Exterior of El Greco House Museum: site of ghostly beauty
Paseo del Tránsito, s/n, 45002 Toledo, Spain: José Luis Filpo Cabana, CC BY 3.0, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Casa_de_El_Greco_(Toledo)._Jardines.jpg

"The Dormition of the Virgin": ca. 1565-1566 Tempera and gold on panel by El Greco
Holy Cathedral of the Dormition of the Virgin, Hermoupolis (Ερμούπολη), Syros, South Aegean Greece: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Dormition_El_Greco.jpg

The Modena Triptych (front panels): tempera on panel, attributed to El Greco
Galleria Estense, Modena, Emilia-Romagna region, north central Italy: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:Triptico_de_Modena_El_Greco.jpg

The Modena Triptych (back panels): tempera on panel, attributed to El Greco
Galleria Estense, Modena, Emilia-Romagna region, north central Italy: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:The_Modena_Triptych.jpg

The Disrobing of Christ (El Espolio): ca. 1577-1579 oil on canvas by El Greco
Sacristy of the Cathedral, Toledo, central Spain: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:El_Expolio_del_Greco_Catedral_de_Toledo.jpg

"Martyrdom of St. Maurice and His Legions": 1580-1581 oil on canvas by El Greco
Chapter House, Monastery of El Escorial, Community of Madrid, central Spain: Public Domain, via WikiArt @ https://www.wikiart.org/en/el-greco/martyrdom-of-st-maurice-and-his-legions-1581

"Portrait of Don Fernando Niño de Guevara": ca. 1596-1601 oil on canvas by El Greco
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:El_Greco_049.jpg

"La dama del armiño (lince) [ A Lady in a Fur Wrap (lynx)]": 1570s oil on canvas by El Greco, believed to be portrayal of Jerónima de Las Cuevas
Burrell Collection, Glasgow, West Central Lowlands, Scotland: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:El_Greco,_Dam_i_p%C3%A4ls.jpg

"Portrait of a Man": believed to be El Greco's self-portrait
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:El_greco.JPG

"Vista de Toledo (View of Toledo)": ca. 1596-1660 oil on canvas by El Greco ~ spectral atmosphere in one of El Greco's most famous paintings
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York City: Public Domain, via Wikimedia Commons @ https://commons.wikimedia.org/wiki/File:El_Greco_View_of_Toledo.jpg

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