provenance: he bought it from stieglitz, tel aviv - this medal was shown in the Frick Collection (see ther catalogue)

Donna Gracia’s costume here is similar to Pastorino medals of Girolama Sacrata, Cicilia Bonzagna, and Catarina Bonzagna, all done in the same period. "The first unequivocal Jewish medal with a Hebrew legend." D.M. Friedenberg, Jewish Medals from the Renaissance to the Time of Napolean (1970) pp.43-5. See also M.D. Birnbaum, The Long Journey of Gracia Mendes (2003) pp. 63-4; Musee d’Art et d’histoire du Judaisme, Catalogue p.36; and C. Roth, Great Jewish Portraits in Metal (1963), p. 84 Gracia Mendes Nasi (Gracia is archaic Portuguese or Spanish for the Hebrew Hannah, also known by her Christianized name Beatrice de Luna Miques, 1510-1569) was one of the wealthiest Jewish women of Renaissance Europe. She married into the international banking and finance dynasty of Mendes and was an eminently successful business-woman in he own right. In 1558 she leased Tiberias from Sultan Suleiman, for a yearly fee of 1000 ducats and by obtaining ruling authority over Tiberias and Safed, developed major new centres of Jewish settlement