Bernardo Daddi | Christ Enthroned with Saints | The Metropolitan Museum of Art

Title: Christ Enthroned with Saints

Artist: Bernardo Daddi (Italian, Florence (?) ca. 1290–1348 Florence)

Date: ca. 1325

Medium: Tempera on wood, gold ground

Dimensions: Irregular, 7 1/2 x 9 in. (19.1 x 22.9 cm)

Classification: Paintings

Credit Line: Bequest of Harriet H. Jonas, 1974

Accession Number: 1974.217

Inscription: Inscribed (bottom): hec su[n]t no[m]i[n]a. s[an]c[t]or[um] [et] s[an]c[t]ar[um] quor[um] reliq[ui]e su[n]t hic. S[cilicet].bo[ni]fatii. / leonis. alexa[n]dri. peregrin[i] philypy. Rufi [Iu]ste co[n]cordie [et] dece[n]tie: / [et] alior[um] s[an]c[t]or[um] de monasterno s[an]c[t]i sebastian[i] deroma. quas frater / Simon abbas d[i]c[t]i monasterii dedit (Here are the names of the saints, male and female, whose relics are here: That is Boniface, Leo, Alexander, Peregrine, Philip, Rufinianus, Justa, Concordius, Decentius, and other saints of the monastery of Saint Sebastian of Rome which Brother Simon, the abbot of said monastery, gave)

monastery of San Sebastiano, Rome; Jerome de Salis, 4th Count de Salis-Soglio, Rokeby Hall, county Louth, Ireland [A piece of paper affixed to back of panel is inscribed "No. 67 / Small figures of Saints by Giotto / on gold A.D. 1300 / very curious" and in another hand "Jerome Count de Salis" and has a red wax seal of the Count de Salis (1771–1836).]; [Giuseppe Volterra, Florence, until 1931; sold to Jonas]; [Édouard Jonas, New York, from 1931]; Mrs. Édouard (Harriet H.) Jonas, New York (by 1933–d. 1974)

Detroit Institute of Arts. "The Sixteenth Loan Exhibition of Old Masters: Italian Paintings of the XIV to XVI Century," March 8–30, 1933, no. 5 (as "Christ as Judge," by a follower of Bernardo Daddi, lent by Mrs. Edouard Jonas, New York).

Los Angeles. J. Paul Getty Museum. "Florence at the Dawn of the Renaissance: Painting and Illumination, 1300–1350," November 13, 2012–February 10, 2013, no. 29.

Toronto. Art Gallery of Ontario. "Florence at the Dawn of the Renaissance: Painting and Illumination, 1300–1350," March 16–June 16, 2013, no. 29.

W. R. Valentiner in The Sixteenth Loan Exhibition of Old Masters: Italian Paintings of the XIV to XVI Century. Exh. cat., Detroit Institute of Arts. Detroit, 1933, unpaginated, no. 5, as "Christ as Judge" by a follower of Bernardo Daddi; dates it about 1340.

W. R. Valentiner. "Detroit Holds Fine Loan Show of Italian Art: Exhibition of Italian Painting from Giotto to Raphael." Art News 31 (March 18, 1933), p. 9, no. 5, ill. p. 10, attributes it to a follower of Daddi and identifies it as a reliquary; illustrates it with the filigree tondo in place.

Wilhelm R. Valentiner. "Die Leihausstellung frühitalienischer Malerei in Detroit." Pantheon 12 (1933), p. 238, mentions it as a reliquary in the style of Daddi.

Richard Offner. A Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting. Vol. 4, section 3, New York, 1934, pp. XIII, 189–90, 212, add. pl. VIII, attributes it to a close follower of Daddi and says that the painting is in its original form; compares it to an Annunciation in the Musée du Louvre, Paris, placing it roughly in the same period or slightly later; illustrates it without the silver filigree tondo.

George Kaftal. Iconography of the Saints in Tuscan Painting. Florence, 1952, col. 796.

Miklós Boskovits in Richard Offner et al. A Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting. Vol. 3, section 3, The Fourteenth Century: The Works of Bernardo Daddi. new ed. Florence, 1989, p. 43 n. 42, pp. 84, 386, considers it an early work of Daddi; tentatively suggests that it was originally the top of a crucifix.

Miklós Boskovits in Richard Offner et al. A Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting. Vol. 4, section 3, The Fourteenth Century: Bernardo Daddi, His Shop and Following. new ed. Florence, 1991, pp. 22, 333–36, 510–11, pl. XLIIIa.

Katharine Baetjer. European Paintings in The Metropolitan Museum of Art by Artists Born Before 1865: A Summary Catalogue. New York, 1995, p. 5, ill.

Christopher W. Platts in Florence at the Dawn of the Renaissance: Painting and Illumination, 1300–1350. Ed. Christine Sciacca. Exh. cat., J. Paul Getty Museum. Los Angeles, 2012, pp. 129–31, no. 29, ill. (color, overall and detail).

Bryan C. Keene in Florence at the Dawn of the Renaissance: Painting and Illumination, 1300–1350. Ed. Christine Sciacca. Exh. cat., J. Paul Getty Museum. Los Angeles, 2012, p. 6.

This reliquary originally contained the relics of a number of saints, as stated in the inscription. The recess that enclosed these relics is now filled with a filigree tondo which is Spanish and dates from about 1500. The reliquary is reproduced with this tondo in place in Valentiner 1933, but without it in Offner 1934.