| Abstrakt: |
Preserved in the attic of the oratory of Sant'Andrea al Celio are the fragments of a painted decoration, first rediscovered in 1968 and published by Ilaria Toesca in 1972. The work has recently drawn the attention of medievalists, even though it is obscured from view due to its normally inaccessible location. The occasion of an inspection has allowed for the close observation of the state of conservation of the fresco and of its iconographic and stylistic particularities. The arrangement of the entire Celimontan complex by its titular cardinal, Cesare Baronio, specifically the chapels of Santa Barbara, Sant'Andrea, and Santa Silvia, celebrated the memory of the venerated Pope Gregory the Great with the architectural and functional restoration of the nucleus of sites that are the oldest and most traditionally linked to the figure of the founding pontiff. The oratory of Sant'Andrea was rotated according to the axis of orientation, and, by the end of the work, the painting was concealed by the new wooden ceiling designed by Flaminio Ponzio and installed in 1607. The work represents the most significant evidence of the decorative program of a space within the great medieval monastic institution of Santi Andrea e Gregorio al Celio. The re-examination of the sources [Monumenta spectantia ad Patriam Genus, Vita, Acta et Virtutes Caesaris Baronii, Rome, Biblioteca Vallicelliana, MS Q 74, and, above all, the manuscript of the Camaldolese monk Tommaso Mini, Historia del Sacro Eremo et Ordine Camaldolense, Archivio del Monastero di Camaldoli, MS 1082, which predates the works commissioned by Baronio and which provides a heretofore unpublished drawing) leaves no doubt regarding the original position of the painting on the entrance wall of the oratory, perfectly integrated with the uppermost section of the architectural space between the two windows and the apex of the sloping roof. Dating from the sixth decade or so of the n th century, the clipeate image of Christ in benediction flanked by angels in adoration, with the sequence of Prophets depicted in half length with their scrolls on the two long walls of the interior (of which remain Isaiah, and perhaps Jeremiah and the Sibyl), gave shape to a visualization of the Parousia as a prelude to the end of time, and was likely integrated with a scene of Judgment on the wall below. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR] |
