The Convent of St. Francis (Spanish: Convento de San Francisco), in Valladolid, Spain, was founded in the 13th century and located outside the city walls, in front of the market square (which would become the future Plaza Mayor).

[6] Queen Berengaria of Castile, wife of King Alfonso IX of León, ceded to the Franciscan Fathers the lands of an estate located in the area known as Río de Olmos.

At the beginning, the friars had many difficulties with the move, as they were opposed by the abbot,[note 3] the infante Sancho and the Cathedral chapter, but the support of Queen Violant was definitive for the new location of the Franciscans.

[7] A century later, another queen, María de Molina, would also protect this convent, making a donation of some palace-houses that she kept adjacent to the Franciscan facilities and that overlooked Olleros Street, which would form part of the extension.

[10] It was called Puerta de las Carretas and in 1599 a doorway with arch, cornice and frontispiece with a niche where a sculpture of St. Francis made of alabaster and stone was placed.

Its total disappearance in 1836 was a great loss for the city, although at the same time, the recovery of the extensive site brought with it an important urban transformation in a Valladolid that was growing in that area and that needed the creation of buildings and access roads.

[...] They intoned the Te Deum with a great din of clarinets, timpani, violins, horns and contrabass; there were many foreign musicians, and concluded that it was beautifully illuminated the façade [...]The life of the convent and its relationship with the city went smoothly until the Spanish War of Independence when all these religious houses were suppressed.

[16] Ortega Rubio notes that in February 1811 the main doors, the façade and the patio of the church were demolished and work began on the construction of houses.

[18] The Official Bulletin of Valladolid announced on August 6, 1836, the sale of the ... [...] building that was the convent of St. Francis located on the sidewalk to which it gives its name, with its church, chapels, upper and lower rooms, cellar, courtyards, orchard with its waterwheel, cistern, seven drinking water wells, another for snow, stables and barns [...] valued at 4,520,060 reales 17 maravedíes.There is no record of anyone taking up the offer, so the board for the sale of buildings and effects of the disentailed convents in the province of Valladolid had to take charge and proposed the demolition at the expense of the State.

When this hotel was demolished in the 1970s to begin work on the Galerías Preciados department store, several burial sites[note 7] and the remains of columns and foundations of the convent were discovered.

The Cofradía de la Vera Cruz was born within the convent and even after having its own headquarters at the end of the 16th century, the Franciscans continued to take care of it, and relations were always good between the two.

Sobremonte tells that already between 1455 and 1456, being archbishop of Toledo Alfonso Carrillo de Acuña, the facade was reformed, raising then a second floor with a balcony where an altar could be installed, so that the merchants could hear mass without leaving their work.

[23] The main door of the church had been at the foot, to the west, but was later changed to the north side, between the chapels of Santa Catalina and San Antonio de los Cañedos.

From the beginning of the 16th century, the family of Gómez Manrique de Mendoza wanted to gain access to the patronage of this chapel, although they were strongly opposed by the friars.

In the Provincial Archive there is news that in 1674 the gilder Miguel Jeronimo de Mondragon undertook to execute the gilding of this altarpiece and to have it finished within the stipulated period.

[32] The chapel was sponsored by Fray Hernando de la Rua, a monk of the convent who had held the post of General Commissioner of the Provinces of New Spain.

In the room next to the chapel, for the use of the sacristan, there was a cupboard, sheets with gilded frames, a canopy with tissue lining, seven straw chairs, a bed with three mattresses, a table, two small trunks, an ark.

Carlos de Venero y Leyva (chaplain of King Philip III and canon of the Cathedral of Toledo) obtained the patronage of these two chapels whose deeds for this concession date from 1602 and 1603 and are preserved in the Provincial Historical Archive of Valladolid.

The one called the chapel of Santa Catalina must have been of great proportions and, according to Sobremonte: [...] the most modern and the most elegant, majestic and neatest of the church.... [...]In the same documents of the Archive, there is news about the masses and memorials for the soul of the sponsor and his relatives, and about the works to be carried out in the chapel for its improvement and ornamentation, all in charge of Carlos de Venero, who spent 26,829 reales in the works, plus liturgical trousseau (corporals, altar cloths, purificators, amitos, tisu fronts, chasubles, etc.)

The scholar Rafael de Floranes alludes to a large Christ placed in the "retablo del Crucifijo" (altarpiece of the Crucifix) that gave its name at some point to this chapel.

García Chico, in his work Documentos.... Pintores II (Valladolid 1956), says that in 1612 Diego Valentín Díaz painted a canvas to be placed between the two doors of the choir.

In te confido placuitque mihi tuus ordo.The English translation of which reads as follows Servant of God, Francis, be my guide in death; For that to thee I give myself, accompany my soul when I leave the world.

It was built in 1598, located, according to Sobremonte's comments: [...] between the door of the church or nave of Santa Juana and the wall of the house of Baltasar de Paredes [...].It had an altar with a Christ accompanied by the Virgin and John the Evangelist, where there was always a lighted candle.

In 1686 the chapel must have been somewhat aged because the gilder Manuel Martínez de Estrada was required to clean it and restore the gilding and paintings, repairing and consolidating the deterioration and detachments.

In this restoration contract, all the elements are extensively detailed and it is thus known that the chapel was adorned with cartouches, fleurons, masks, shells, garlands, angels, seraphs, saints and other sculptures, both half and full-length.

Until 1620, this brotherhood used to meet for its activities in various chapels of the convent, until the friars sold them some land near the nave of Santa Juana and a large room that had served as a guest house for the laity.

In 1654 there was a new enlargement under the direction and project of the architect Juan de Répide[note 15] and the church was rebuilt with the inscription: To the honor and glory of God and the Blessed Virgin Mary N. S. conceived without original sin, and N. P. S. Francisco, this Chapel was rebuilt and adorned, with the alms that the brothers of the Third Order of Penance gave for it, being minister of it, the brother Andrés García, year of 1655.After the enlargement, it ended up being a real church, 25.20 m long and 7.84 m wide in the nave, plus 9.80 m wide in the main chapel.

In 1675 the painter Antonio de Noboa Osorio covered them with paintings, and also took care of the gilding and decoration in many other parts of the church (vaults, lunettes, arches, windows, etc.).

They also give an account of the furnishings and the different existing areas: two side altars, a choir with organ, a sacristy with rich ornaments, a pulpit and a small garden.

Only the so-called Acera de San Francisco has remained as a memory, to designate the section of the arcades of the Plaza Mayor, but not officially but as a tradition in people of an already advanced age who heard it named this way in their childhood.