The Martyrdom of Saint Matthew

Matthew's attributes, and how he is told apart

Saint Matthew is identified in Western art by two conventions that work together. As one of the four evangelists he is given a winged man or angel, the symbol assigned to him in a scheme that also gives Mark a lion, Luke an ox and John an eagle; as a martyr he is given the weapon of his death, a sword or a halberd. The title of this work names the martyrdom, and so points to the second of the two. The angel identifies the writer; the blade identifies the death.

What the record holds

The catalogue gives 1600 as the date of creation and San Luigi dei Francesi in Rome as the location — a church rather than a museum, which is worth noting, since it means the painting is recorded where a congregation meets rather than where a ticket is sold. The dimensions are 323 x 343 cm, close to square and larger than most rooms would take. The record files it under group portraiture, religious cultural heritage and Religion, with Baroque and Tenebrism as styles, and the measured colour family is brown.

Scale and darkness

At that size, tenebrism stops being a matter of taste. A picture of more than three metres a side, built out of shadow with light admitted narrowly, is designed to be legible from a distance in a room with uncertain lighting.