The History of the True Cross
Encyclopedia
Fresco
Fresco is any of several related mural painting types, executed on plaster on walls or ceilings. The word fresco comes from the Greek word affresca which derives from the Latin word for "fresh". Frescoes first developed in the ancient world and continued to be popular through the Renaissance...
es painted by Piero della Francesca
Piero della Francesca
Piero della Francesca was a painter of the Early Renaissance. As testified by Giorgio Vasari in his Lives of the Artists, to contemporaries he was also known as a mathematician and geometer. Nowadays Piero della Francesca is chiefly appreciated for his art. His painting was characterized by its...
in the Basilica of San Francesco in Arezzo
Arezzo
Arezzo is a city and comune in Central Italy, capital of the province of the same name, located in Tuscany. Arezzo is about 80 km southeast of Florence, at an elevation of 296 m above sea level. In 2011 the population was about 100,000....
. It is his largest work, and generally considered one of his finest, and an early Renaissance masterpiece.
Its theme, derived from the popular 13th century book on the lives of saint
Saint
A saint is a holy person. In various religions, saints are people who are believed to have exceptional holiness.In Christian usage, "saint" refers to any believer who is "in Christ", and in whom Christ dwells, whether in heaven or in earth...
s by Jacopo da Voragine, the Golden Legend
Golden Legend
The Golden Legend is a collection of hagiographies by Jacobus de Voragine that became a late medieval bestseller. More than a thousand manuscripts of the text have survived, compared to twenty or so of its nearest rivals...
, is the triumph of the True Cross
True Cross
The True Cross is the name for physical remnants which, by a Christian tradition, are believed to be from the cross upon which Jesus was crucified.According to post-Nicene historians, Socrates Scholasticus and others, the Empress Helena The True Cross is the name for physical remnants which, by a...
– the wood from the Garden of Eden
Garden of Eden
The Garden of Eden is in the Bible's Book of Genesis as being the place where the first man, Adam, and his wife, Eve, lived after they were created by God. Literally, the Bible speaks about a garden in Eden...
that became the Cross on which Christ was crucified
Crucifixion
Crucifixion is an ancient method of painful execution in which the condemned person is tied or nailed to a large wooden cross and left to hang until dead...
. This work demonstrates Piero’s advanced knowledge of perspective and colour, his geometric orderliness and skill in pictorial construction.
The main episodes depicted are:
- Death of Adam (390 x 747 cm). According to the legend, the tree from which the cross was made was planted, at the urging of angels, at the burial of Adam by his son, using a branch or a seed from the apple tree of the garden of Eden.
- The Queen of Sheba in Adoration of the Wood and The Meeting of Solomon and the Queen of Sheba (336 x 747 cm). According to the legend, the Queen of Sheba worshiped the beams made from the tree, and informed Solomon, that the Saviour would hang from that tree, and thus dismember the realm of the Jews. This caused Solomon to hew it down and bury it, until it was found by the Romans.
- Exaltation of the Cross (390 x 747 cm).
- Constantine's Dream (329 x 190 cm) Emperor Constantine the Great, before the battle of Milvian BridgeBattle of Milvian BridgeThe Battle of the Milvian Bridge took place between the Roman Emperors Constantine I and Maxentius on 28 October 312. It takes its name from the Milvian Bridge, an important route over the Tiber. Constantine won the battle and started on the path that led him to end the Tetrarchy and become the...
, is awakened by an angel who shows him the cross in heaven. With the cross on his shield, he slew the enemy, and later converted to Christianity. - Discovery and Proof of the True Cross (356 x 747 cm). Helena, Constantine's mother, finds the cross in Jerusalem. It was not easy to get information and "when the queen had called them and demanded them the place where our Lord Jesus Christ had been crucified, they would never tell... her. Then commanded she to burn them all" or cast them into a dry pit for seven days and there torment them with hunger. He is shown in one fresco being pulled from the pit by a rope, whereupon he confessed that Jesus was his lord and where the cross was located. The proof of the cross was that it was used to resurrect a dead man.
- Battle between HeracliusHeracliusHeraclius was Byzantine Emperor from 610 to 641.He was responsible for introducing Greek as the empire's official language. His rise to power began in 608, when he and his father, Heraclius the Elder, the exarch of Africa, successfully led a revolt against the unpopular usurper Phocas.Heraclius'...
and KhosrauKhosrau II250px|thumb|Khosrau II 250px|thumb|Khosrau II 250px|thumb|Khosrau II (Khosrow II, Chosroes II, or Xosrov II in classical sources, sometimes called Parvez, "the Ever Victorious" – (in Persian: خسرو پرویز), was the twenty-second Sassanid King of Persia, reigning from 590 to 628...
(329 x 747 cm). The cross played a role in battles during the war between the Eastern Roman Empire and the Sassanid Empire (early 7th century).
Piero diverged from his source material in a few important respects, including the story of King Solomon's meeting with the Queen of Sheba in a chronologically inaccurate place and giving greater emphasis to the two battles in which Christianity
Christianity
Christianity is a monotheistic religion based on the life and teachings of Jesus as presented in canonical gospels and other New Testament writings...
triumphs over paganism
Paganism
Paganism is a blanket term, typically used to refer to non-Abrahamic, indigenous polytheistic religious traditions....
.
The cycle ends with a depiction of the Annunciation
Annunciation
The Annunciation, also referred to as the Annunciation to the Blessed Virgin Mary or Annunciation of the Lord, is the Christian celebration of the announcement by the angel Gabriel to Virgin Mary, that she would conceive and become the mother of Jesus the Son of God. Gabriel told Mary to name her...
, not strictly part of the Legend of the True Cross but probably included by Piero for its universal meaning.
Dating of the frescoes is uncertain, but they are believed to date from after 1447, when the Bacci
Bačci
Baćci is a neighbourhood in the city of Goražde, Bosnia and Herzegovina.-References:...
family, commissioners of the frescoes, are recorded as having paid an unknown painter. It would have been finished around 1466. Most of the choir
Choir (disambiguation)
- Choir or quire :* Choir, an ensemble of singers* Choir , the area between the nave and sanctuary in a church or cathedral* One of the divisions of a Pipe organ...
was painted in the early- to mid-1450s. Although the design of the frescoes is evidently Piero's, he seems to have delegated parts of the painting to assistants, as was usual. The hand of Giovanni da Piamonte, in particular, can be recognised in some of the frescoes.