Rome's S. Pietro in Vincoli church houses precious relics and a Renaissance masterpiece which is one of the greatest expressions of Italian art of all time.
The chain that bound St. Peter in Jerusalem
The church is the 16th-century St. Peter in Chains in Rome's busy Monti district, not far from the Coliseum, and it was founded in the 5th century by the Empress Eudoxia. The aim being to guard a very precious relic: the chain with which St Peter, a prisoner in Jerusalem, had been bound. Today the chain is kept in a reliquary under the main altar of the church and is displayed to the faithful on 1 August each year.
Michelangelo’s marble Moses is eight feet tall
The great masterpiece to be found in the right transept of the church is the colossal, and arresting statue of Moses. It was sculpted in 1515 by Michelangelo Buonarotti for the funeral monument that had been commissioned by Pope Julius II. At eight feet tall, it was intended to be part of a grand two-story tomb for the pontiff. But due to disagreements between the pontiff and the great sculptor (no doubt part of the ongoing altercations that flared up constantly between them during the five years Michelangelo spent painting the Sistine Chapel) the statue of Moses intended for St. Peter's ended up in the church of San Pietro in Vincoli.
Vasari said the statue was perfection
The work, for which Michelangelo drew inspiration from Raphael and Donatello, shows a majestic, seated Moses with the Tablets of the Law under his right arm. With this same hand he is caressing his long beard, which according to Vasari was sculpted with such perfection that Michelangelo’s "iron chisel must have become a brush." The sculptor has depicted Moses who had just given the Commandments on Mount Sinai, when he sees the Israelites worshipping the golden calf. The statue expresses all Moses’ anger, which the artist expressed in the swollen veins and tense muscles that stand out on the smooth marble, and the sensation that Moses is about to rise to his feet. Apparently this was one of Michelangelo's favourites, and the one he considered the most lifelike of all his works. So much so, as chronicles of the time recount, that having finished the work the artist struck it with his hammer and ordered it to speak.
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