Chapter 15

THE PIETA AND REMAINING CHAPELS.

The remaining chapels are few in number, and, whatever they may once have been, unimportant in character. The first is

CHAPEL No. 40. THE PIETA.

The three preceding chapels are supposed to be on Mount Calvary, and from them we descend by a flight of stone steps to the level of the piazza. Immediately on reaching this we come upon the Pieta. We have seen that this chapel originally contained Gaudenzio's Journey to Calvary, and that the fresco background still, in so far as it is not destroyed, treats this subject, while the modelled figures represent the Pieta. Of Gaudenzio's original work Caccia says:-

"Come fu Christo de' panni spogliato, Montando il Monte poi Calvario detto, Nel mezzo a manigoldi mal trattato, Contemplar possi con pietoso affetto,

Seguito da Maria e da l'amato Discepolo di lui, et e l'effetto Sculto si bene e doitamente fatto Che sembra vero e non del ver ritratto."

"Per una scala asceso al Sacro Monte Si entra nel piu d'ogn' altro sacro tempio," &c.

The words "montando il monte poi," &c., must refer to a supposed ascent on the part of Christ Himself, for Gaudenzio's work was on a level with Tabachetti's present Journey to Calvary which Caccia has just described, and Caccia goes on to say that from Gaudenzio's chapel (the present Pieta) one "ascends by a staircase to" the most sacred chapel of all--the Crucifixion--as one does at present. That the present Pieta and the adjacent Entombment chapels were once one chapel, may be seen by any one who examines the vaulting inside the first-named chapel. Signor Arienta pointed this out to me, and at the same time called my attention to the fact that Gaudenzio's fresco on the wall facing the spectator does not turn the corner and join on with the subject that fills the left-hand wall. A flag and a horse are cut off, and the rest of them is not seen. I sometimes question whether the original wooden-figured entombment was in the chapel in which the present modern figures are seen, but it probably was so.

There was also a fainting Madonna mentioned in the prose part of Caccia as a work by itself and described as follows:-

"Come la Madonna e tramortita vedendo N.S. condotto a morte."

This is not referred to in the poetical part, and must have been a mere cell occupied by a single figure. No doubt it was seen through the window that is still approached by two steps on the south side of the present Pieta, and the space it occupied has been thrown into the present work.

I do not know when Gaudenzio's Journey to Calvary was dispersed, but it was some time, doubtless, between 1600 and 1644. It is puzzling to note that the Pieta appears in the plan of 1671 as situated rather in the part of the building now occupied by the Entombment than by the Pieta, while the 39 that should mark the site