Martyrdom of Saint Januarius

Scope of Fracanzano Francesco

(Monopoli 1612 - Napoli 1656 circa)

Once believed to represent the Martyrdom of Ignatius of Antioch, the painting is generally held to depict the more common subject of the Martyrdom of Saint Januarius, the bishop who was thrown to the wild beasts before being beheaded. The work recalls the style of Francesco Fracanzano and can probably be ascribed to his circle. It in fact has elements in common with the canvases depicting episodes from the life of Gregory the Illuminator in the Neapolitan church of San Gregorio Armeno, named after this saint, which the artist from Apulia painted in 1635. This Saint Januarius can therefore be dated to sometime after that year.

Object details

Commentary

This painting forms part of the set of five works purchased by Camillo Borghese from Ignazio Grossi in 1818. The payment receipt for the transaction describes the canvas in question as ‘Bishop Ignatius attacked by two lions’, with an attribution to Spagnoletto (Jusepe de Ribera; document cited in Della Pergola 1959, p. 226, n. 100). Several years later, the Inventario Fidecommissario (1833) listed it with this description: ‘Martyrdom of Saint Ignatius, by Luca Giordani, 5 spans 5 inches wide, 4 spans 5 inches high’. The attribution to Giordano was maintained by Piancastelli (1891, p. 375) and Venturi (1893, p. 171), while Longhi (1928, p. 211) noted similarities with the production of Agostino Beltrano and the Apulian artist Cesare Fracanzano. The latter name was accepted by De Rinaldis (1939, p. 37) and Della Pergola (1955, pp. 88-89, n. 158); the canvas in fact appears with this attribution in the most recent catalogue of the Galleria Borghese, edited by Herrmann Fiore (2006, p. 115).

The thesis that the painting represents the martyrdom of Saint Ignatius was called into question by Ferdinando Bologna (1955, pp. 55-56, note 1, and 1958, pp. 126-127, note 19), who more convincingly argued that it portrayed that of Saint Januarius, the bishop who was thrown to the wild beasts before being beheaded; this theme was in fact more common than the former one. Bologna argued that the canvas formed part of the group of paintings dating to the 1640s that took their lead from the Christ in the Olive Grove of the Pozzuoli cathedral, a painting that the scholar ascribed to an anonymous artist from the circle of Francesco Fracanzano. Francesco was in fact the brother of the above-mentioned Cesare; like him, he moved from Apulia to Naples, where he frequented Ribera’s workshop (Schiattarella 1984, I, pp. 143-146). Bologna, then, proposed to set apart this group of works, including the Borghese Saint Januarius, from those traditionally ascribed to Francesco – such as the Pozzuoli Christ – and to attribute them to another painter. His thesis was welcomed by Stefano Causa (1972, p. 934), who nonetheless did not venture to suggest a specific identity for the anonymous master. While at first Bologna entertained the possibility that the painter in question was Francesco’s son Michelangelo Fracanzano, who also painted, he later rejected this idea, given chronological inconsistencies (Bologna 1958, p. 127; Causa, 1972).

Subsequently, Novelli Radice (1980, p. 193) ascribed the Borghese canvas to the Neapolitan painter Nunzio Rossi (see also Brejon de Lavergnée 1983, p. 272, n. 75); yet documents show that this artist’s year of birth – 1626 – is too late to sustain this thesis, as the work was executed sometime in the 1630s or 40s. As we have seen, the painting has been connected to the Pozzuoli Christ, which can be dated to the mid 1640s (Bologna 1955, pp. 55-56, note 1, and 1958, pp. 126-127, note 19). It also shares traits with the canvases depicting episodes of the life of Gregory the Illuminator in the Neapolitan church of San Gregorio Armeno, named after this saint, which Francesco Fracanzano painted in 1635 and which are considered his masterpieces. This Saint Januarius can therefore be dated to the period in between the execution of these two projects (Bologna 1958, pp. 126-127, note 19; Schiattarella, 1984; Guarino 1992, p. 41).

Pier Ludovico Puddu