Point d'Espagne, in the usual sense of the word, signifies that gold or silver lace, sometimes embroidered in colours, so largely consumed in France during the earlier years of Louis XIV.'s reign. Ornaments made of plaited and twisted gold and silver threads were produced in Spain during the seventeenth century, and mention of them is to be found in the ordinances of that time. Towards the end of the century, Narciso Felin, author of a work published in Barcelona, quoted by M. Aubry, writes that, "edgings of all sorts of gold, silver, silk thread and aloe fibres are made at Barcelona with greater perfection than in Flanders." In the sixteenth century, Flanders was part of the Spanish dominions, and from Flanders Spain imported artistic goods, linen and lace included. Mr. A. S. Cole concludes from this that the Barcelona lace-making was more or less an imitation of that which had previously existed in Spanish Flanders. {92}Apart from this, the gold and silver lace of Cyprus, Venice, Lucca and Genoa preceded that from Flanders, and it appears that Spain was later in the field of artistic lace-making than either Italy, Flanders or France. Even the celebrity of the gold point d'Espagne is probably due more to the use of gold lace by Spanish grandees,[267] than to the production in Spain of gold lace. The name point d'Espagne was, I think, a commercial one, given to gold lace by French makers.[268] Dominique de Sera, in his _Livre de Lingerie_, published in 1584, especially mentions that many of the patterns of point couppé and passement given were collected by him during his travels in Spain; and in this he is probably correct, for as early as 1562, in the Great Wardrobe Account of Queen Elizabeth, we have noted down sixteen yards of black Spanish _laquei_ (lace) for ruffs, price 5s.