Ceccarelli Odoardo (1 results)

THE ONLY MONOGRAPH ON A STOLEN ICON? NO COPY IN US / UK LIBRARIES. 4to. (2), 3-15 pp, (1). Bound in early 20th century patterned boards. Very good. Extremely rare first edition (reprinted in 1708) of this treatise on a now-lost portrait of the Virgin Mary rediscovered in 1610 while renovating the Church of Santa Maria delle Grazie in Rome. Ceccarelli firmly contends that this icon (80 x 45 cm) "was one of the seven images painted by the Evangelist Saint Luke," giving a fulsome account of its early history. In 1876 the icon was transferred to the nearby Chiesa di Santa Maria della Consolazione; and in 1970 it was stolen; it seems little-discussed in modern literature (a replica was installed in 2003). "In the year of our Lord 328," writes Ceccarelli, "Saint Helenamother of Constantine the Greathaving discovered the Most Holy Wood of the Cross in Jerusalem, and having left a portion of it in that holy city (where she also erected a noble temple in which it was to be venerated by the faithful), established within that very same temple an altar upon which she placed this most holy Image painted by Saint Lukean Image which the Patriarch of Antioch had, shortly before, presented to her" (p. 7). Today, that particular legend is attached to a different icon: the famous 'Salus Populi Romani' housed in Santa Maria Maggiore. Ceccarelli then traces the painting's movement's through the millennia: in 637, it was transported by Emperor Heraclius from Jerusalem to Constantinople; in 658 Emperor Constans travelled to Rome, personally presenting the holy image as a gift to Pope Vitalian I, who swiftly erected a new church around it; but in the middle ages that church was merged with that of the nearby Consolazione, and fell into disrepair. Finally, in 1610, Abbot Pier Gio Francesco Florentia of Perugia undertook to raise the floor of the old church to meet the modern level, and rediscovered the painting. In 1647, coinciding with Ceccarelli's investigations, the image was canonically incoronated by Pope Innocent X a practice introduced only in 1631. According to the modern church's website, the original icon was stolen in 1970 and a copy stands in its place. OCLC shows a single copy worldwide, at the Casanata Library in Rome; ICCU adds five other Italian locations. * ICCU RMLE\048095; Rossetti, Rome: a bibliography from the invention of printing through 1899 Vol II (2000), #1785, p. 179.