The socioeconomic aspects that contextualize cultural goods are of great interest, since they help to knowledge them in their integrity. From the 16th century onwards, we possess numerous data that illustrate us about the economic value of many works, also of sculptural genres, among which altarpieces are included. In previous collaborations in this same newspaper we dealt with their reading (17-X-2017) and the way to proceed in their realization (20-XI-2021). On this occasion we will review their costs, using some examples and data published by M. C. García Gaínza, P. Echeverría Goñi and in our research.

Let us remember that the altarpiece evolved until it became, at the end of the Middle Ages, a gigantic machine, generally made of wood, which housed iconographic cycles, mostly painted, of the life of Christ, the Virgin and the saints, occupying the entire chevet of the church. At that time, the altarpiece was usually in the hands of the painters, who were in charge of their masonry or sublet it.

That practice continued during the 16th century, in the Renaissance, although sculptural altarpieces soon competed with pictorial ones and painters ceased to be the main protagonists in the contracting of those pieces of liturgical ornament. But, undoubtedly, it was in the Baroque, during the 17th and 18th centuries, when the altarpiece reached the greatest Degree of plenitude and development.

As we have pointed out, in the Renaissance, panel painting, as the bearer of iconography, competed with sculpture, particularly in the lands of La Ribera. At the beginning of that century, we know that the Navarrese queen Doña Catalina paid for the altarpiece for the cathedral of Pamplona, a work that was valued at 80 florins, distributed as follows: one third for the carpentry and wood decoration, another third for the gilding and the last third for the painting of its seven panels. The Obanos altarpiece was valued in similar proportions in 1531.

At the end of the century, the altarpieces with painted panels, such as the one in the monastery of Fitero, still followed the same distribution correlations of expense. Its cost amounted to almost 3,000 ducats. Their assembly and sculptures amounted to 700 ducats and the beautiful tables of Rolan Mois 2.200, an amount that the abbot of the monastery judged to be exorbitant "price and it is only done for the good opinion that the said Rolan Mois has in painting, on condition that all the main painting of the said altarpiece the said Mois has to do it by his own hand and for everything that is gilding and braiding he brings very intelligent people of art and with attendance his is done and with very vivid and perfect colors as it is capitulated". That of the monastery of La Oliva, with great pictorial prominence, amounted to 3,152 ducats and 7 tarjas.

As the century progressed, the wood artists were taking over the lucrative business of that sculptural genre, although the overpricing of the gilders' work was always a verifiable fact, due to the employment of the gold leaf.

From more to less, we will point out the valuation of some of them. Undoubtedly, the most expensive was the one that disappeared from the parish of Santa María de Cascante. Its cost was calculated, in 1594, at no more and no less than 7,500 ducats. It was followed by that of Valtierra, a work that took a long time and which, in 1598, was valued at 6,247 ducats. In 1592, the major of Santa María de Tafalla, made by Juan de Anchieta and Pedro González de San Pedro, was estimated at 5,511 ducats. That of San Juan de Estella was auctioned off in 1563 by Pierres Picart at 1,340. Those were times when, as Professor Echeverría Goñi recalls, a sheep cost one ducat, the same as one hundred loaves of gold, while a theft of wheat was paid between five and a half and six reales, equivalent to 50 loaves of gold.

To correctly quantify the amounts paid is sometimes difficult to value the piece in its full dimension. Below, we present the prices of some Navarrese altarpieces of the period, but not without first pointing out some amounts that relate these ducats with the rents of some prelacías or prices of the time. Thus, we know that the bishopric of Pamplona rented about 20,000 annual ducats, that a good house would reach 240 ducats, that the salary of a maid amounted to 7 annual ducats plus a sackcloth and shoes; a good mule, a very appreciated animal, cost 65 ducats, a horse 45 and the theft of wheat, half a ducat. These are prices that we can situate in the second half of the XVII century. We have placed the examples from the highest cost.

A brief analysis of these data, limited to the late seventeenth century and the first decades of the eighteenth century, shows us that the quality of the altarpieces of the Tudela workshop was in relation to their price (altarpieces of Recoletas de Pamplona, Falces, Caparroso or Cárcar). Likewise, the amounts paid in Los Arcos and Echarri-Aranaz are surprising, undoubtedly because they are of large proportions and have many reliefs, in the first case, and because of the extraordinary quality, as the work of the prestigious Ursularre, in the second case. It is striking that large altarpieces, such as the largest of Mendigaña, the work of Juan Angel Nagusia and the masters of Estella, or one of those of the cathedral ambulatory, the work of the Pamplona overseer Fermín de Larráinzar, did not cost particularly high amounts, practically what a rich collateral of the Tudela workshop was worth.

The whole long process of making an altarpiece generally ended a few years later, with the adjustment of the polychromy with a master gilder, which began another path in many ways similar to that of the construction itself, from the conditions, request for licence, its concession, auction, contract and appraisal. 

The polychrome was a fundamental complement to the sculptural piece. Antonio Palomino, in his well-known work, already in the 18th century, dealing with the work of gilding and steaming of the sculptures of the painter Francisco Camilo, affirms that "these two Schools go hand in hand, perfection rises much higher". 

In the 16th century, in an altarpiece from Roncal, specifically the one in Isaba, the manager of its polychromy, in 1583, the Palencia painter from Becerril de los Campos, Simón Pérez de Cisneros, together with other masters, left some inscriptions. In one of them we read "FECERUNT LUCERE" -they made it shine-. The content of lucere must be related to the medieval aesthetics of Saint Thomas, who considered beautiful the things that please the eye: quia visa placent, with three conditions: integritas, consonantia et claritas (sharpness, splendor, luminosity, brightness, brilliance, clarity and brilliance .....).

The polychrome process of the altarpiece was undertaken, as a general rule, with a period that ranged between five and ten years, from the date of completion of its architecture and sculpture, so we can consider the resulting work a hybrid and unitary art. In the Renaissance period, this coetaneity is more exceptional due to the costly and time-consuming nature of the work. On several occasions it was customary to first polychrome the tabernacle and the images, to later undertake the gilding of the architecture, when the funds of the first fruits were more recovered.

If the altarpiece was polychromed with a great distance of time, the artistic unity was affected, since certain pieces demanded their own gilding characteristics. In these cases, it is possible to speak of a fusion of two different artistic languages, with the polychromy having the final epidermal effect that has sometimes led to misleading assessments of the altarpieces. 

In the end, in the price we have to consider both amounts, the amount of the piece as such and that of its polychromy. Let's see some examples and how the price of gilding and polychromy far exceeded that of the assembly and its sculptures, by using as a fundamental subject gold leaf, prepared by the gold beater or batihojas that, through a slow and complex process, turned the golden pieces into very fine sheets of gold leaf to enrich furniture, altarpieces and other pieces.

The aforementioned Isaba altarpiece, the work of the sculptor Miguel de Gárriz, was valued at 700 ducats in 1560, while its gilding was contracted in 1583 for 4,610 ducats, almost four times more. The set of the altarpieces of Ochagavía, work of the image maker Miguel de Espinal (1581), were valued at 4,150 ducats, while its polychromy amounted to the astronomical figure of 7,825. The largest of Allo, the work of Bernabé Imberto was estimated, in 1609, at 3,082 ducats, while its gilding was valued in 1632 at 4,949. In the largest of Caparroso, contracted for 1,700 ducats in 1691, its gilding rose in 1754 to 1,800 ducats. The set of Recoletas of Pamplona was agreed at 2,000 ducats with Francisco Gurrea and its gilding, at 2,800, with Francisco de Aguirre. The altarpieces of the ambulatory of the cathedral of Pamplona amounted to 320 ducats each, while their gilding was 520.

The amounts of assemblages, sculptures and polychromies reached outstanding amounts for which first fruits, alms, raffles, donations were used, as well as some municipal taxes, on rare occasions. Among the latter, we should mention the wheat and meat sisas or hunting leases (Esperanza de Valtierra) or liquor (Santiago de Puente la Reina).

In any case, and with regard to gilding, it is worth bearing in mind what Professor Echeverría Goñi warns with respect to the price of gilding, "depending on the size of the structure, the category of the painter, the quality of the gold leaf, the existence or not of stewed work and brush tip, the issue of operators". The contracts give a good account of all this. The Comendadoras of Puente la Reina, when contracting the gilding of their main altarpiece in 1759, stated that the 80,000 gold leafs needed would be brought from Madrid, so as not to detract from the gold employee in the main altarpiece of the parish of Santiago in the same town. The Augustinian Recollect Sisters of Pamplona demanded from Francisco de Aguirre, in 1709, "to give to the said altarpiece the necessary hands of bowl, which must be from Llanes and Arnedillo, mixing the two, according to a good rule so that the gold comes out with a good color, since according to experience it will not come out that way if the said bowl is used separately one from the other alone".