Andrea Vaccaro, (baptised on 8 May 1604 – 18 January 1670)
Sant 'Agata
Oil on unlined canvas
FONDAZIONE FEDERICO ZERI - Università di Bologna
Saint Agatha of Sicily (231 AD – 251 AD) is a
Christian saint and virgin martyr. Agatha was born at Catania or Palermo,
Sicily, and she was martyred in approximately 251. She is one of seven women,
who, along with the Blessed Virgin Mary, are commemorated by name in the Canon
of the Mass.
She is the
patron saint of Catania, Molise, Malta, San Marino, and Zamarramala, a
municipality of the Province of Segovia in Spain. She is also the patron saint
of breast cancer patients, martyrs, wet nurses, bell-founders, bakers, fire,
earthquakes, and eruptions of Mount Etna.
Although the martyrdom of Saint Agatha is
authenticated, and her veneration as a saint had spread beyond her native place
even in antiquity, there is no reliable information concerning the details of
her death. According to Jacobus de Voragine, Legenda Aurea of ca. 1288, having
dedicated her virginity to God,[ fifteen-year-old Agatha, from a rich and noble
family, rejected the amorous advances of the low-born Roman prefect Quintianus,
who then persecuted her for her Christian faith. He sent Agatha to Aphrodisia,
the keeper of a brothel. The madam finding her intractable, Quintianus sent for
her, argued, threatened, and finally had her put in prison. Amongst the
tortures she underwent was the cutting off of her breasts with pincers. After
further dramatic confrontations with Quintianus, represented in a sequence of
dialogues in her passio that document her fortitude and steadfast devotion,
Saint Agatha was then sentenced to be burnt at the stake, but an earthquake
saved her from that fate; instead, she was sent to prison where St. Peter the
Apostle appeared to her and healed her wounds. Saint Agatha died in prison,
according to the Legenda Aurea in "the year of our Lord two hundred and
fifty-three in the time of Decius, the emperor of Rome." More on
Saint Agatha of Sicily
Andrea Vaccaro (baptised on 8
May 1604 – 18 January 1670) was an Italian
painter of the Baroque period. Vaccaro was in his time one of the most
successful painters in Naples, a city then under Spanish rule. Very successful
and valued in his lifetime, Vaccaro and his workshop produced many religious
works for local patrons as well as for export to Spanish religious orders and
noble patrons. More
Andrea Vaccaro
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