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Hospital Bed Tile
Production: Unknown
Light-buff earthenware, tin-glazed white on the upper surface and painted in blue, green, yellow, orange and manganese. Square. Within a narrow border of geometrical shapes and leaves, a crown with below it the crowned initials 'F' and 'Y', for Ferdinand and Isabella. Below, 'RL. HOSPTL,/No,53,'. Within a metal frame with a hinged carrying handle at the top.
History note: Unknown before the donor
Given by Mrs Shearer in memory of her husband, Dr Cresswell Shearer
Depth: 3.3 cm
Height: 24.5 cm
Width: 24.5 cm
Method of acquisition: Given (1941-03-20) by Shearer, Mrs
17th Century
Circa
1600
-
1700
The record of the acquisition of this tile by the Fitzwilliam Museum was accompanied by a note ‘Spanish tile from the hospital built by Ferdinand V and Isabella, his wife, outside Granada during the siege of that place begun in 1483. There were over 150 beds in the hospital and one of these tiles placed at the bottom of each bed.’ However, a comparable tile with the number 96 in the Wellcome Institute's collection on loan to the Science Museum in London, is described in its catalogue as one of the tiles which were fixed to the wall of houses which belonged to the hospital, and bore the street number of the house.
Decoration
composed of
high-temperature colours
( blue, green, yellow, orange and manganese)
Frame
composed of
metal
Glaze
composed of
tin-glaze
Inscription present: with a crown over each
Accession number: EC.1-1941
Primary reference Number: 15893
Stable URI
Owner or interested party:
The Fitzwilliam Museum
Associated department:
Applied Arts
This record can be cited in the Harvard Bibliographic style using the text below:
The Fitzwilliam Museum (2025) "Hospital Bed Tile" Web page available at: https://collection.beta.fitz.ms/id/object/15893 Accessed: 2025-03-26 08:28:36
To cite this record on Wikipedia you can use this code snippet:
{{cite web|url=https://collection.beta.fitz.ms/id/object/15893
|title=Hospital Bed Tile
|author=The Fitzwilliam Museum|accessdate=2025-03-26 08:28:36|publisher=The
University of Cambridge}}
To call these data via our API (remember this needs to be authenticated) you can use this code snippet:
https://collection.beta.fitz.ms/api/v1/objects/object-15893
To use this as a simple code embed, copy this string:
<div class="text-center">
<figure class="figure">
<img src="https://data.fitzmuseum.cam.ac.uk/imagestore/aa/aa9/EC_1_1941_281_29.jpg"
alt="Hospital Bed Tile"
class="img-fluid" />
<figcaption class="figure-caption text-info">Hospital Bed Tile</figcaption>
</figure>
</div>
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