Stories of Saint Nicholas

The great altar step, also called “predella”, was purchased by Michelangelo The Younger in 1620. It was originally placed under the Annunciation of Donatello, in the Cavalcanti Chapel in Santa Croce.

Michelangelo The Younger was a sensitive patron, so he made the predella part of the XVII century set up of Casa Buonarroti, by providing it with a golden frame decorated with the family coat of arms.

A masterpiece of the fourteenth Florentine art, the painting ties in neatly with the so-called "Pittura di luce", a figurative tradition initiated by Domenico Veneziano in 1439.

Thanks to the restoration of the Giovanni di Francesco painting, this figurative tradition gained public attention with an exhibition held in 1990 in Casa Buonarroti and curated by Luciano Bellosi.

The main features of the "Pittura di luce" were the use of a crystal-clear, sharp and transparent light and the adoption of Brunelleschi's perspective.

The predella shows three episodes from the life of Saint Nicholas of Bari, bishop of Mira, and patron saint of the probable client, Niccolò Cavalcanti.

The first episode concerns the Saint's youth: he is depicted in the act of donating three golden balls to a father fallen on hard times and forced to prostitute his own daughters.

A clear hint to the family's poverty is the only bed, in which the father and his daughters are forced to sleep, with pillows on both ends.

In the second episode, Saint Nicholas, former bishop, resuscitates three young men who had been torn to pieces and pickled by an evil host, to serve them to the patrons in times of famine.

On the sign of the tavern there is a crescent in a red field, a reminder of Turkey, considered a constant threat of Christianity at the time.

In the third episode, Saint Nicholas flies over a crowded battlefield to stop the sword of an executioner, who was about to behead three young men unjustly sentenced to death.

This scene, to which the larger portion of the predella is dedicated, is linked to the Battle between Heraclius and Cosroe frescoed by Piero della Francesca in San Francesco in Arezzo.

The metallic, zenithal painting by Giovanni di Francesco had a short life in Florence but, thanks to Piero della Francesca, it found fertile ground in Ferrara, with artists such as Tura, Cossa and De’ Roberti.