Marble cutting processing used in 16th century for building the “El Escorial” monastery altarpiece

Abstract

For construction of monastery of El Escorial main altarpiece at end of the 16th century, it was necessary to build an important mill to cut the marble. This mill was located next to a flour mill to take advantage of its hydraulic energy. Over time, both buildings were abandoned and came to be called "Molino Caído". There is very little documentary evidence and physical remains of these mills. For this reason, the architectural and technological reconstruction has been very difficult and required the following exhaustive analyzes: 1. Sawing and polishing technology analysis in the Renaissance; 2. Transcription and documentary analysis of data that still exist of the mills; 3. Analysis and investigation of mills physical remains; 4. Comparison between documentary data and physical remains; 5. Historical analysis of the mills drawings; 6. Technological state and constructive of the time. Based on this previous data analysis, this work presents constructive and technological characteristics and a detailed graphic reconstruction, of the marble mill, that is consistent with the existing remains and documentary evidence.