The main register depicts, from left to right, St. Christopher with the Christ Child, St. Clare, St. John the Baptist, the Madonna and Child in the centre with two small saints devoid of attributions and the Poor Clare nun who commissioned the polyptych, St. Catherine, St. Francis and St. Louis of Toulouse. The pinnacles depict Stories of the Passion with, from left to right, the Agony in the Garden, the Arrest of Jesus, the Crucifixion, the Deposition in the Tomb and, in the final pinnacle, St. Lawrence and St. Anthony the Abbot. Six medallions around the edge of the frame hold portraits of the apostles St. Andrew, St. John the Evangelist, St. Peter, St. Thomas (?), St. Bartholomew and St. James the Greater, while the splays on either side of the central part have depictions of the Archangel Gabriel on the left and the Annunciation on the right.
The polyptych still appears to be in its original frame, although Carlo Volpe (1965) suggested, in view of the painting’s reasonable condition, that it might be missing certain pinnacles. Anna Tambini (1982, p. 81; 2007, p. 88) also argued that two pinnacles are probably missing from the upper part of the polyptych, depicting the Resurrection and a further two saints mirroring St. Lawrence and St. Anthony the Abbot.
The polyptych is remarkable for its extremely rich decoration, consisting of squaring with a burin on the gold ground, numerous free-hand inscriptions and a substantial number of haloes with pseudo-Cufic lettering and engraved leaves. This taste for decoration also extends to the precious fabric covering the Virgin’s throne, embroidered with Ghibelline eagles, and to St. Catherine’s costume, which has been described as “thoroughly Riminese in its elegance” (Tambini 2007, p. 88; see, for example, the similar motifs in Pietro da Rimini’s Madonna and Child, Fondazione Longhi, Florence).
There are two main schools of thought concerning the artist who painted the polyptych. On the one hand, it was already being suggested as long ago as in Argnani’s first catalogue (1881) that the artist was a local man named Pace di Faenza (an attribution subscribed to by Servolini, 1944, yet without ruling out the influence of the school of Rimini). This attribution was first questioned by Van Marle (1924), and Anna Tambini (1995, p. 216) subsequently put forward the name of an early 14th century painter from Faenza called Masio dei Conti, whose work is currently dispersed. The other school of thought comprises the various critics who have stressed the strong influence of the school of Rimini in the anonymous artist’s style (Cavalcaselle, Crowe 1883; Servolini 1944; Archi 1957; Bonicatti 1963).
Anna Tambini (2007) has highlighted a number of details paralleled in the Giottesque school of Rimini: the Agony in the Garden is set in a rocky landscape similar to that found in Pietro da Rimini’s frescoes in the refectory of the Abbey of Pomposa and in the Basilica of San Nicola da Tolentino; the choral composition, of considerable emotional intensity, in the Crucifixion also reflects a pattern typical of the school of Rimini (see, for example, Pietro da Rimini’s diptych inv. PiRi2411 in the Alte Pinakothek in Munich); and lastly, the motif of St. Mary Magdalen with her arms raised in the Deposition is found in numerous panels by artists from the school of Rimini (see, for instance, Pietro da Rimini inv. 1116 in the Gemäldegalerie in Berlin).
Tambini also draws attention to the fact that the emphatic expressionism of the Bolognese school, in particular that of Vitale da Bologna, is reflected in the immediacy of the gestures in the Arrest of Jesus with St. Peter pinning his adversary’s head to the ground, and in the liveliness of the narrative with the executioner placing a rope around Christ’s neck in the Crucifixion.
Thus whoever the polyptych’s anonymous painter may be, he is aware of the latest styles in vogue in the schools of both Rimini and Bologna. Despite the absence of any certainty regarding his identity, Tambini (2007, p. 92) nevertheless dates the polyptych to the 1340s and suggests (1995) attributing a panel now in Denver depicting St. Ursula and Her Companions received by Jesus (Denver Art Museum, inv.1958.98) to the same artist.
Given the presence in the polyptych of the most important Franciscan saints and the fact that the person who commissioned the work is the nun shown at the foot of the throne, Lanzoni (1939) suggested that it must have come from the demolished Convent of San Martino in Faenza, identifying the church’s titular saint as the figure in red at the Virgin’s feet. The other saint has been identified, albeit cautiously, as St. Agnes of Assisi, despite the absence of any recognisable attributes (Tambini 2007, p. 87).
