Tommaso Campanella and Andrea Sacchi's Fresco ofDivina Sapienzain the Palazzo Barberini

Abstract

Under the patronage of Cardinal Antonio Barberini, Andrea Sacchi received in 1629 the first great artistic commission of his career, the vault decoration for a reception room of Urban VIII's papal residence, the Palazzo Barberini.1 Information about the fresco, which takes as its subject the theme of Divine Wisdom, is provided by five contemporary sources. The first, Libra mastro A (1623–1630), Taddeo Barberini's incomplete financial ledger, establishes approximate dating for the work.2 This ledger, which contains only entries for December 1629 through December 1630, speaks in general terms of the “lavori” of Andrea Sacchi without being specific about the project.3 We remain uncertain about the exact date of its completion. A codex from the Barberini Library (Bibl. vat., Barb. lat. 6529, misc. v, fol. 52), first published by Giovanni Incisa della Rochetta, is the earliest, most detailed, and reliable account of the iconography of Sacchi's fresco.4 The other seventeenth-century sources, Tetius's Aedes barb...