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CHAPTER 21
“Portò Firenze al Nuovo Mondo”:
The Viceregal Palace of Diego Columbus
in Santo Domingo (1511-1512)
By Julia Vicioso
Historian and Dominican diplomat at the United Nations Agencies in Rome
•
he Palace of Diego Columbus, known in Santo Domingo as the Alcázar de Colón, was built be-
tween 1511 and 1512 to house the court and government of Diego, son of the Genoese navigator
Christopher Columbus, after he was appointed governor of Santo Domingo and first viceroy of the
newly discovered territories.
New evidence shows that this palace was originally built following the specific model of a Florentine pal-
ace and conceived to reflect, with its imposing structure, a new era for this first Spanish viceregal capital in the
recently colonized territories.
The palace was constructed on a rocky promontory on the banks of the Ozama River, with large blocks
of local golden limestone and under the direction and supervision of Spanish masons from the deeply rooted
medieval tradition that existed on the peninsula during that period. It was built using enslaved indigenous la-
bor that had been officially assigned to the service of the viceroy Diego Columbus.
The symmetrical layout of the architectural plan and the double-arched loggias on both façades of the
palace add a particularly Renaissance feel to the structure, which can be considered the first work of the Italian
Renaissance in the Americas.