17th - 18th Century Saint Catherine And Saint Dominic

17th - 18th century
Saint Catherine and Saint Dominic

Pair of wooden sculptures, cm h 18 (without base cm h 17) and cm h 22 (without base cm h 21)

The present wooden sculptures depict Saint Catherine and Saint Dominic. The iconography of Saint Catherine sees her portrayed with the wheel of martyrdom to which she was submitted to Alexandria in 305 A.D. According to tradition, Catherine was an Egyptian girl, the Golden Legend specifies that she was a daughter of King Costa and that she grew up educated from childhood in liberal arts. Caterina is asked for as a bride by many men, but after she saw in her dream the Madonna with the Child who put the ring on her finger, she became a nun. The history of martyrdom began with the great celebrations that the emperor celebrated in his own honor in Alexandria, Catherine presented herself to the palace in the midst of pagan celebrations with animal sacrifices and which were forced to participate even many Christians, for fear of persecution. Catherine refused the sacrifices and asked the emperor to recognize Jesus Christ as the redeemer of humanity, arguing her thesis with philosophical depth. The emperor, impressed by both the beauty and the culture of the young noble, summoned a group of rhetoricians to convince her to honor the gods, even asking for marriage. However, thanks to the eloquence of the young woman, not only did they not convert her, but they themselves were readily impressed by Christianity. The emperor therefore ordered the death of all the rhetoricians and, after the umpteenth refusal of Catherine, she was also sentenced to death by means of a toothed wheel. However, the instrument of torture and condemnation was broken and the emperor was forced to have the saint beheaded, from whose head spilled milk, symbol of her purity. Saint Dominic is instead identified by the dog that accompanies him, in fact according to legend the Dominican dog was born from a vision that had the mother of the saint before he was born: the woman dreamed that a dog came out of her belly with a torch lit in her mouth. When he woke up, he interpreted that dream as a message addressed to her by God himself and decided to go on pilgrimage to the monastery of San Domenico di Silos to ask for his intercession.

Shortly afterwards she became pregnant and understood that the answer given to her by God was the creature which she now bore, and that the child would light a fire in the world through her preaching; as a sign of homage to the Holy One, therefore, she decided to give her son his own name. Saint Dominic founded the so-called Order of Preachers, which in the world are called Dominicans, in Latin, Dominicans is translated as Dominicanus, similar to Domini Canis, Dogs of the Lord, as the brothers are still called preachers.

These two small statues show the beauty of the carving, especially in the wide draperies that wrap the bodies of the two saints, both at waist height, where they open up, driven by an invisible breath of wind, and around their feet, where they curl harmoniously.

The object is in good condition