With the new plans for a palatial complex, the project at Mafra, entrusted to royal architect João Frederico Ludovice, became much more than a fulfillment of a religious promise, but rather a demonstration of monarchical power and wealth. By 1729, 15,470 workers from throughout Portugal and its colonies were contributing to the construction of the palace, alongside a total of 6,124 infantrymen and cavalrymen, making a total of 21,594 persons involved in the building process and site that year. While the majority of the palace was completed by 1730, John was so consumed in completing the project that he decreed it mandatory for all inhabitants of the villages of Mafra and Ericeira to work at the palace, requiring an excused permission not to participate, and only under extraordinary circumstances. In regard to the exuberant cost of the palatial complex, Merveilleux remarked that "three quarters of the royal treasury and nearly all of the gold brought on the fleets from Brazil were here, at Mafra, turned into stone."