Main Patio of Casa de Pilatos in Seville
The main courtyard is typically Mudejar in style, with exquisite plaster-decorated arches, and later elements of Gothic, Renaissance and romantic. Built at the end of the 15th century by Pedro Enríquez and Catalina de Rivera, the patio features an open patio surrounded by irregularly sized arches. The wider arches lead to doors, while the narrower ones are in line with windows. Only one door is visible on each side of the patio; the main doorway, ahead of you as you enter the patio, leads to the chapel.
Pedro and Catalina's son, Don Fadrique, on his return from the Holy Land and Italy, began the palace's Renaissance transformation. He opened balconies above, substituted the mudejar brick pillars for the Genoese marble columns we see today, and placed in the patio's centre a fountain from Genoa made of the same marble. This was the first use of such material in Seville.
The patio is adorned with the four finest sculptures from the collection of Don Fadrique's nephew, Per Afan, also an Italophile. All four are Roman figures - one depicting Minerva, another a dancing muse and the third Ceres. The fourth statue, and most valuable, is a Roman copy of a Greek image of the Athena Medici; it is the only such statue which conserves its original Roman head.
In the lower tiled galleries of the courtyard are 24 marble busts of Spanish kings and Roman emperors, writers and historical figures, some collected from the ruins of Italica.
In the 19th century, neo-classical Roman-style elements were introduced, such as the substitution of the brick floor by a marble one, as well as pseudo-Nasrid mullioned windows.
