[54] Wood is the usual material for these altar-screens, though sometimes marble was employed, or stone, or silver. Of Genoese marble is the _retablo_ (end of the fourteenth or beginning of the fifteenth century) of the Cartuja del Paular in the Lozoya valley; of stone, those of the parish church of San Nicolás at Burgos (end of the fifteenth or beginning of the sixteenth century), and of the "chapel of the tailors" in Tarragona Cathedral; while a silver _retablo_, in the Renaissance style, was that of the church, now demolished, of Santa María at Madrid. The Golden Age of the _retablo_ embraces the end of the fifteenth century and the whole of the sixteenth. Notable examples belonging to this period are the screens of the monastery of Santo Tomás at Avila, San Martin of Segovia, the Cartuja de Miraflores, the Colegiata of Covarrubias in the province of Burgos, the cathedrals of Avila, Toledo, Tudela, and Tarazona; several in the churches of Toledo, two in the church of San Lesmes (Burgos), two in Burgos Cathedral (Plate xxxvi.), and three, including those of _Reyes_ and of _Buena Mariana_, in the church of San Gil in the same city. Not one of these, however, has the grandeur or variety of the altar-screen of Seville (Plates xxxiii. and xxxiv.), which is carefully described in Cean's monograph. "The style is Gothic; the material, undecaying larch; and the screen, which reaches nearly to the vaulting, is the largest in the country, although at first it spanned the presbytery only, not including either side. It was designed in 1482 by Dancat or Danchart, who began work upon it as soon as his sketches were approved, and worked at it till 1492, in which year he seems to have died. [Illustration: XXXVI DETAIL OF _RETABLO_ (_Chapel of Santa Ana, Burgos Cathedral_)] "Dancat was succeeded by Master Marco and Bernardo de Ortega, whose carving reached, by 1505, the canopy or _viga_, and who were followed in their turn by Francisco, Bernardo's son, father and teacher of Bernardino and Nufrio de Ortega, his assistants. Some of the statues were carved by Micer Domingo. The rest of the _imaginería_ was finished in 1526; and the gilding and painting were done by Alejo Fernández, his brother, and Andrés de Covarrubias.