San Pier Maggiore was a church and monastery in Florence, Tuscany, central Italy that existed from the eleventh to the eighteenth century, and hosted ceremonies for the reception of newly appointed Bishops of Florence.
A church was already present at the site when a Benedictine convent was established there in 1067 by the Florentine noblewoman Gisla and the then-Bishop Peter Mezzabarba, [1] and a Gothic church was built here in the early fourteenth century. [2] The Florentine government almost entirely removed this church in 1784 and replaced it with a marketplace, [2] although three arches of the portico have been preserved into the twenty-first century. [3]
The church of San Pier Maggiore played a role in a ritual that was performed every time a new bishop of Florence was appointed. Traditionally, from the late thirteenth century until the late sixteenth century, the newly appointed bishop would ride in a procession with his attendants to the plaza outside San Pier Maggiore. [4] There, the bishop and abbess of San Pier Maggiore gave gifts to each other, with the bishop usually giving his horse to the abbess. [5] In return, the nuns of the convent gifted the bishop a bed which they had paid for and furnished. [6] Next, the bishop entered the church and attended a banquet provided by the nuns of San Pier Maggiore. [7] After the banquet came a ceremony where the newly appointed bishop gave a special ring to the abbess of the convent; Strocchia cites contemporary accounts that view this act as the bishop being married to the church of Florence. [8] [9] Last, in this ceremony, the bishop would spend his first night in the city in the church – he would sleep in the bed that the nuns had gifted to him, before proceeding the next day to lead prayers at different churches. [10] [8]
The abbess of San Pier Maggiore – who, as Miller notes, usually belonged to one of the most socially prominent families in Florence [11] – had considerable freedom to direct the flow of this ceremony from its inception until the late fifteenth century, when her powers were limited by subsequent bishops. [12] She could negotiate with the bishop to reaffirm the taxation privileges of the convent, limit the number of people who could accompany the bishop during the lunch, and otherwise defend the social standing of S. Pier Maggiore in the city. [10] [13] Although verbal negotiations were the norm, sometimes physical conflict erupted over access to the bishop, such as in the 1380s when the bishop's attendants and the church staff of San Pier Maggiore fought over who could help seat the bishop in the church. [14] Strocchia and Miller have interpreted the entire marriage ritual as the process by which the bishop made himself known to and established clear relations with wealthy Florentine families – through the giving of gifts, the banquet, and the bishop's sleeping overnight in the nunnery-provided bed. [15] [16]
The multi-paneled altarpiece by Jacopo di Cione and Niccolò di Pietro Gerini or Niccolò di Tommaso [17] was completed in 1371 (12 of its frames are now held by London's National Gallery). [17]
Other artworks in the church included likely Botticini's Assumption of the Virgin (also in the National Gallery), [18] as well as Francesco Granacci's Assumption of the Virgin (now in the Ringling Museum) [19] and The Visitation by Maso da San Friano (now owned by the Fitzwilliam Museum, though currently loaned to Trinity Hall, Cambridge). [20]
Raffaellino del Garbo (1466–1527) was a Florentine painter of the early Renaissance.
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Jacopo di Cione was an Italian Gothic period painter in the Republic of Florence.
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Lorenzo di Bicci was an Italian painter of the Florentine School considered to be one of the most important painters in Florence during the second half of the 14th century. He is believed to have learned his trade from his father, about whom little is known. Lorenzo’s style, as well as that of his contemporaries Jacopo di Cione and Niccolò di Pietro Gerini, was influenced by the artist Andrea di Cione. Lorenzo's paintings made use of bright colors and his compositions avoided complexity. The figures he painted tended to have round faces and were often expressionless. Another one of Lorenzo's distinctive characteristics was his precision of execution. He was known for exceptional talent in drawing, an ability that he put to use at the initial stages of his painting. Unlike many celebrated Florentine artists of this period, Lorenzo mostly received commissions from the country clergy and from the lower-middle-class Florentine guilds. His successors, Bicci di Lorenzo and Neri di Bicci, continued to serve these groups.
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The Fiesole Altarpiece is a painting by the Italian early Renaissance master Fra Angelico, executed around 1424–1425. It is housed in the Convent of San Domenico, Fiesole, central Italy. The background was repainted by Lorenzo di Credi in 1501.
Mariotto di Nardo di Cione was a Florentine painter in the Florentine Gothic style. He worked at the Duomo of Florence, the church of Santa Maria Maggiore, and the Orsanmichele. He created both frescoes and panel paintings, and was also active as a manuscript illuminator.
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The Liberation of St Peter from Prison is a small tempera on wood panel or predella from a large polyptych or multipanel altarpiece painted in 1370-1371 by Jacopo di Cione for the no-longer extant church of San Pier Maggiore in Florence, Italy. It is now part of the collection of the Philadelphia Museum of Art.
