The Tapestries which are here reproduced in greater number and variety than has hitherto been attempted are known to students and connoisseurs the world over, but the measure of that knowledge is limited. Many of the pieces in the possession of the Spanish Crown were acquired by purchase or inheritance, and others were woven in the Netherlands to the command of its Burgundian rulers, Margaret of Austria and Mary of Hungary. The fabrics designed by Goya owed their existence to the extraordinary interest displayed in the products of the looms by Charles III., while the famous Tunis Tapestries were designed and woven by Jan Vermay or Vermeyen, the Court painter and Wilhelm Pannemaker, the celebrated Flemish weaver, under the personal direction of the Emperor Charles V. Vermeyen accompanied the expedition which was launched against Tunis by Charles in 1535 and made his sketches on the spot; the contract given to Pannemaker by his Imperial patron stipulated the amount and quality of the silk and the number and value of the gold and silver threads to be employed; and both designs and finished pieces had to be submitted to the Emperor’s scrutiny and approval before the purchase price was paid. The Tunis Series was completed in 1554. The Tapestries were displayed in England on the occasion of the marriage of Philip and Mary in that year, and were not seen again in this country until 360 years later. They subsequently figured in all the great functions of the Spanish Court, and it was due to the Emperor’s fear that constant usage would injure the fabrics that a duplicate set, but on a smaller scale, was woven. The twelve pieces were again reproduced, on the same scale as the original frames, in 1740 by order of Philip V. A third copy is preserved in the Museum at Vienna, and a fourth, woven by Pannemaker, was found by the Maréchal de Contades in a castle near Mecklin during the Seven Years War. This collection of Spanish Royal Tapestries has been steadily accumulating since the thirteenth century, but the practice of weaving was not introduced into Spain until the first quarter of the seventeenth century when a little colony of Flemish weavers, subsidised by the King of Spain, settled at Pastrau in New Castile. A century later, at the invitation of Philip V., Jacques Van Der Goten and his four sons, established themselves in an _atalier_ in Madrid, and in 1776 Goya drew the first of the forty-five designs for Tapestries which, in the following fifteen years, were woven in the Royal workshops of Santa Barbara in Madrid.