Tuesday, February 19, 2019

St. JOSEPH OF THE CARPENTERS

S. GIUSEPPE DEI FALEGNAMI
1546 for the Confraternity of Carpenters
1597/1602 G.B. Montano (1543/1621)
Sacristy 1621 and expansion of the oratorio 1627 by G.B. Soria (1581/1651), pupil of G.B. Montano, to whom he succeeded in the direction of the works
Completed in 1663 by Antonio Del Grande (about 1625/79) and consecrated in the same year
Restored in 1880 by Antonio Parisi

On the FAÇADE paintings on slate “Flight into Egypt” and “Sts. Peter and Paul”, now barely visible, maybe by Avanzino Nucci (1552/1629)

STAIRS IN FRONT OF THE FAÇADE
1625 G.B. Soria, modified and restored in 1884. The left ramp was eliminated in 1932

CEILING
Made of wood with central relief “Nativity” 1612 by G.B. Montano

WALLS OF THE NAVES
Frescoes on the right:
“Salathiel”, “Zerubbabel”, “Zadok”, “Ealzar”, “Nathan” and “Joachim”
Frescoes on the left:
“Abraham”, “Isaac”, “Judas”, “David”, “Solomon” and “Asa”
Frescoes on the sides of the presbytery:
“Joseph” and “Noah” painted in 1883 all by Cesare Mariani (1826/1901)

COUNTER FAÇADE
“Josiah” and “Hezekiah” 1883 by Angelo Maccaroni, a pupil of Mariani

1st RIGHT - CHAPEL OF St. JOSEPH
Above the altar “Death of St. Joseph” 1648 by Bartolomeo Colombo
Panels on the wooden choir “Stories of St. Joseph”, “David” and “Prophet” 1634 by G.B. Speranza (about 1600/40)

2nd RIGHT - CHAPEL OF St. ANNE
Above the altar “Holy Family with St. Anne” by Giuseppe Ghezzi (1634/1721)

PRESBYTERY
Transformed from a quadrangle apse in a semi-circular one in 1880 by Antonio Parisi
Above the MAIN ALTAR “Marriage of the Virgin Mary” 1605 by the French Horace Le Blanc (about 1580/1637)
On the right “Journey to Bethlehem”, on the left “Workshop of St. Joseph” 1883 by Cesare Maccari (1840/1919)
In the lunette “Eternal God and Holy Spirit” 1610 by Antonio Viviani aka il Sordo (1560/1620), a pupil of Federico Fiori aka Barocci

NICHES ON EITHER SIDE OF THE CHANCEL
Statue to the right “St. Paul” by Cesare Aureli (1843/1923) and to the left “St. Peter” by Pietro Jacometti

TO THE LEFT OF THE PRESBYTERY - CHAPEL OF OUR LADY OF SORROWS
“Our Lady of Sorrows” mid 1800s

2nd LEFT - CHAPEL OF THE NATIVITY
“Nativity” 1651 by Carlo Maratta (1625/1713)
It was his first public work and it contributed much to his personal success
“The Nativity was the brilliant prelude to an unbroken succession of commissions, which would have quickly established his primacy on the Rome scene and his role of arbiter of the artistic taste for over half a century. In the works carried out by the middle of the century one can already recognize the stylistic essential ingredients of Maratta's pictorial language, in which the classicism of Andrea Sacchi functioned as the basic component enriched by a plot of suggestions as articulated as wisely governed. In his style coexisted the universal and supreme model of Raphael, a special admiration for the soft luminosity of Correggio, the references to models of Annibale Carracci, Francesco Albani, Guido Reni and Domenichino, a most sumptuous coloring typical of Venice (especially Titian) and weighted openings to the baroque style, to be modulated between the dominant manner of Sacchi and the ones of Pietro da Cortona, Giovanni Lanfranco and the younger Giacinto Gimignani” (Luca Bortolotti - Dizionario Biografico degli Italiani Treccani)
Panels on the wooden choir “Rest on the Flight into Egypt”, “Two Prophets” and “Two Allegories” 1634 by Giuseppe Puglia aka Bastaro (about 1600/36)

1st LEFT - CHAPEL OF THE MAGI
On the altar “Flight into Egypt” by Niccolò Berrettoni (1637/82) copy from the original of Carlo Maratta for the Duomo of Siena, now housed in the Villa Chigi in Castelfusano
On the reverse of the canvas the painting “Marriage of the Virgin Mary” was rediscovered during a restoration in 1989
The altarpiece was originally used as a door for an organ, and it later replaced an altarpiece by Avanzino Nucci

ORATORIO
Renovated and enlarged in 1627 by G.B. Soria (1581/1651)
Wooden ceiling of the years 1628/29 and walnut wood stalls of the years 1639/43
Frescoes with “Stories of Joseph” 1631/37 by Marco Tullio Montagna (1594/1649) from Velletri, a pupil of Federico Zuccari
On the altar “Immaculate Conception with Sts. Joachim and Joseph” 1715/16 by Pier Leone Ghezzi (1674/1755)

SACRISTY
Built in 1621 by G.B. Soria
In the ceiling “St. Joseph in glory among four angel” by Marco Tullio Montagna

Carcere Mamertino

Mamertine Prison
Under the church. Also known as CARCERE TULLIANO (Tullian Prison)
Maybe it's just the most ancient and secret sector of the ancient prison (carcer) that was in this area

FAÇADE
Built in travertine limestone in the early imperial period (39/42 AD), with names of the consuls Caius Vibinus Rufinus and Marcus Cocceius Nerva
It covers an older façade in tufa from Grotta Oscura

INTERIOR
Trapezoidal room built in blocks of tufa from Monteverde and from the Aniene River in the second half of the second century BC
It was consecrated by Pope Sylvester I (314/335) as an oratory
It was considered to be the prison of Sts. Peter and Paul only from the fifteenth century without any documentary evidence
It was restored for Gregory XIII Boncompagni (1572/85) and in 1726 for Benedict XIII Orsini (1724/30)

TO THE LEFT OF THE STAIRS
Concavity in the stone where tradition has it that St. Peter hit his head
According to tradition, St. Peter converted his two jailers, Process and Martinianus, who later become saints, and forty-seven other prisoners. He baptized them with water from a source miraculously appeared at that very time, water that is still flowing and that was considered miraculous

ABOVE THE PRISON - CHAPEL OF THE CROSS
“Wooden Crucifix” maybe of the sixteenth century
A small door, now walled up, led to the other rooms of the prison along the foot of the Capitoline Hill, known as Lautumiae, carved in an ancient tufa quarry
There is a circular hole in the floor that was the only entrance to the room below: this was the Tullianum
Here the most important prisoners of state were thrown and strangled after the triumphs of the winners. Among the ones killed here: Jugurtha, Vercingetorix, the partisans of Caius Gracchus, the Catilinarians, Sejanus and his sons

TO THE LEFT OF THE PRISON
There were the SCALE GEMONIAE (the Gemoniae stairs) to the Capitoline Hill, perhaps coinciding with the Gradus Monetae
They came up from the Forum and had to be, as the current modern stairway, between the Temple of Concordia and the Mamertine Prison
On these stairs, close to the prison, were thrown the bodies of those condemned to death for crime of treason under Tiberius (14/37) and later also several victims of conflicts linked to the imperial power, as the Emperor Vitellius (69)

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