Art Gallery

Berruguete, Pedro (1450/1455 - 1504?), was born in Paredes de Nava (Palencia). No evidence exists about his preparation as a painter, where it took place and who was his master. Most probably he was trained within the Spanish-Flemish style prevailing in Castile, where he spent his young years.

Nowadays it is widely admitted that he was the same Pietro Spagnuolo who, according to the notarial files of the Court of Urbino, was working there for the Duke Federigo da Montefeltro, since 1477. During Berruguete's sojourn in Italy his pictorial grounding was most likely improved with the quattrocento contributions.

Berruguete's activity in Spain is documented from 1483 on: in Toledo first and in the provinces of Palencia, Burgos and Segovia later. His last years he was working in three large altar-pieces for the convent of Saint Thomas in Avila, which he left unfinished when he died in 1504.

The Dominican convent of Saint Thomas had been completed in 1493. Shortly after, Berruguete was entrusted with the task of painting the retable for the high altar devoted to the saint of Aquinos under whose patronage the convent had been established (which is still in situ), and two other secondary altarpieces depicting scenes from Saint Dominic de Guzmán's and Saint Peter the Martyr of Verona's lives. The panel we are commenting here was part of the second one.

Peter the Martyr of Verona was a Dominican friar who lived in the 13th. century. He was appointed Inquisitor General of Milan by the Pope and his preaching was so perturbing for heretics that he ended his days on a road at the hands of a hired assassin, who sank a knife into his cranium and thrusted a sword into his chest. Before dying, the saint managed to write on the ground, with his own blood, Credo in Deum.

The painter has depicted the saint before a brocade baldachin and wearing the attributes common to him. He is standing, dressed with the Dominican habit and showing a wide tonsure, the knife in the cranium and the sword in the chest. In the left hand he holds a book where the Credo can be read and in the right one the palm surrounded by the three crowns that symbolize martyrdom, preaching and chastity.

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