Room 9_ ROOM OF MAJOLICA

The tatoo set is composed by 63 box wooden boards, on which devotional symbols, images of the Virgin or of the Crucifix, illustrations of certain Saints and secular images were printed. Pilgrims often required them in order to certify their participation to some rituals. Tatoos were exclusively made by 4-5 local families by injecting under the skin a blueturquoise permanent ink, thanks to a rude instrument called “picchetta”, formed by 3 needles linked together on their top. It disappeared only in 1940-1950, even if it was prohibited by local authorities since 1860 for sanitary matters.

The collection, one of the most glamorous in its kind, is bound to the Holy House spicery, active since 1630 in two halls of the ground floor, in the west wing of the Apostolic Palace. Three main collections are part of it. The first is formed by 350 pieces coming from the Urbino workshop of Orazio Fontana (+1571), all painted with biblical and mythological facts. They were donated by the cardinal Giulio Feltrio Della Rovere, protector of the Holy House from 1564 to 1578. The second, set up by 111 pieces, came to Loreto in 1631, purchased in Urbino from the workshop of Patanazzi. The pottery is decorated with figures assumed from the Raphael’s figurative repertoire, mixed by the executions of well-known painters and engravers. The scenes are drawn from the Bible, from the Metamorphosis of Ovid, and from Greek, Sicilian and Roman antique History. Many ceramic pieces coming from different places are rather part of the third collection; they were gifted or purchased, time after time, by the administrators of the Holy House.

Simon Vouet

Paris 1590-1649

1629-1630, Oil on canvas, 328 x 210 cm

Last Supper