In the composition, El Greco also included an allegory of the Tagus River, a scene of the Virgin Mary placing a chasuble on Saint Ildefonsus, and an elevation of the Tavera Hospital floating on a cloud.

It was probably originally commissioned by Pedro Salazar de Mendoza [es] and is currently preserved in the El Greco Museum in Toledo, Spain.

[4] These narrative works, including for example Laocoön and Saint Joseph and the Christ Child, use the landmarks of the city as a backdrop to a religious or historical scene.

On the left of the Metropolitan Museum of Art's View of Toledo, across the Alcántara bridge and beneath the Castle of San Servando, is a small cluster of buildings on a cloud-like form.

[9] On the lower left of View and Plan of Toledo is a reclining allegory of the Tagus River, holding a cornucopia and a vessel pouring water.

Most scholarship, significantly that of Richard Kagan and Fernando Marías, indicates that the map was drafted by El Greco himself before it was drawn onto the painting.

[13] These arguments are supported by a surviving letter from El Greco's time in Venice indicating he knew the luxury mapmaker Georgios Sideris, called Callapoda.

Pedro Salazar was the administrator of the Tavera Hospital, depicted centrally in the painting, and was also an early collector of maps and city views.