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456 Rubén González Cuerva

and avoided further cultural clashes. A dais with cushions was
prepared for the king to sit on the ground (a practice familiar to
Spaniards where the Iberian-Moorish tradition of domestic estrados
was maintained long after the expulsion, albeit for noble women who
continued to sit on raised platforms covered in cushions ). Moreover,
34
Mulay and his retinue were offered suitable refreshments, sweet
waters and delicacies that took into account and respected their
restrictions with regards to wine and meat.
35

2 act: The campaign
nd

Mulay Hassan was easily accepted in the society of princes: he was
lodged in the pavilion of Louis of Flanders, a distant relative of Charles
V, and received a company of German infantry as escort. In the public
appearances during the campaign, the King of Tunis formed a
monarchic triumvirate with Charles V and the infante Louis of
Portugal, all of them separated from the rest of the military leaders .
36
The imperial chroniclers and painters had no major problem
accepting Mulay Hassan and his retinue as a king with his court .
37
The Flemish painter Jan Vermeyen portrayed both the king and his
eldest son, Mulay Ahmed (Abû al-`Abbâs Ahmed III al-Hafsi), who was
referred to as «the prince», using the rhetorical devices of princely
portraits . Vermeyen followed with great interest the customs and
38

34 B. Fuchs, Exotic Nation: Maurophilia and the Construction of Early Modern Spain,
University of Pennsylvania Press, Philadelphia, 2009, pp. 14-15, 121-122.
35 P. de Sandoval, Historia de la vida cit., p. 246.
36 N. Guldin, Relato de la jornada cit., pp. 125, 126; L. del Mármol Carvajal, Libro
tercero, y segvndo volvmen cit., p. 255r.
37 S. Subrahmanyam, Courtly Encounters: Translating Courtliness and Violence in
Early Modern Eurasia, Harvard University Press, Cambridge Mass., 2012, p. xiv; E.N.
Rothman, Afterword cit., pp. 258-259.
38 J. L. González García, “Pinturas tejidas”. La guerra como arte y el arte de la guerra
en torno a la empresa de Túnez (1535), «Reales Sitios», 174 (2007), pp. 33-34. Both oil
canvases are lost, but an engraving of Mulay Hassan’s portrait (1) and an etching (2)
and a Rubens’s copy of Mulay Ahmed’s portrait (3) remain: (1) S. de Parijs (after
Vermeyen), Mulay Hassan («Cecy est le roy de Thonis contrefaict a la vie»), Antwerpen,
1535, Bnf, Cabinet des Estampes, reproduced in S. Haag, K. Schmitz-Von Ledebur
(eds.), Kaiser Karl V. erobert Tunis cit., p. 49. (2) J.C. Vermeyen, Portrait of Mulay Ahmad,
circa 1535-1536, etching, Rotterdam, Museum Boijmans Van Beuningen. (3) P.P.
Rubens (after a painting by J.C. Vermeyen), Portrait of Mulay Ahmad, circa 1609, oil on
panel, Boston, Museum of Fine Arts, studied in J. S. Held, Rubens’ ‘King of Tunis’ and
Vermeyen’s Portrait of Mulay Ahmad, «Art Quarterly», 3 (1940), pp. 30-36.

Mediterranea - ricerche storiche - Anno XVII - Agosto 2020
ISSN 1824-3010 (stampa) ISSN 1828-230X (online)