Statues of the Duke and Duchess of Lerma at prayer

The two magnificent sculptures exhibited in the chapel represent the first Duke of Lerma, Francisco Gomez de Sandoval y Rojas, and his wife Catalina de la Cerda. The ambitious king's Phillip II favorite, wanted to compete with the monarchs when he ordered these luxurious figures for his pantheon to the same author that made the ones of the king Charles I and Phillip II in El Escorial, Pompeyo Leoni. This sculptor, of Italian origins, dictated the standards to the court school, defined by the magnificence of the works, the elegance in the compositions and the figures' royal solemnity.