Rutilio Manetti and Domenico Manetti
Saint Sebastian and the Pious Women
Oil on canvas
124.3 x 148 cm.; 48⅞ x 58¼ in.
Private collection
Estimated for 60,000 - 80,000 GBP in July 2022
Saint Sebastian (died c. 288 AD) was an early Christian saint and martyr. Sebastian had prudently concealed his faith, but in 286 was detected. Diocletian reproached him for his betrayal, and he commanded him to be led to a field and there to be bound to a stake so that archers from Mauritania would shoot arrows at him. "And the archers shot at him till he was as full of arrows as an urchin is full of pricks, and thus left him there for dead." Miraculously, the arrows did not kill him.
Sebastian later stood by a staircase where the emperor was to pass and harangued Diocletian for his cruelties against Christians. This freedom of speech, and from a person whom he supposed to have been dead, greatly astonished the emperor; but, recovering from his surprise, he gave orders for his being seized and beat to death with cudgels, and his body thrown into the common sewer. A pious lady, called
Lucina, admonished by the martyr in a vision, got it privately removed, and buried it in the catacombs at the entrance of the cemetery of Calixtus, where now stands the Basilica of St. Sebastian.
More St. Sebastian
The name
Lucina appears repeatedly in early Christian traditions in connection with the deeds of pious Roman women. It may not designate a historical person, but the topos of the "Quaedam matrona", a noble woman or widow who ensures the appropriate mourning and burial of a martyr, since the time span of the stories extends from the 1st to the 4th century.
More on Lucina
Manetti was born at Siena in 1609, and was probably a relation of Rutilio Manetti. He painted chiefly for the churches of Siena, but also produced historical subjects of an easel size. Lanzi particularly mentions one in the Casa Magnoni, representing the Baptism of Constantine. He died in 1663. More on Rutilio Manetti and Domenico Manetti
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