The last place we visited on our one day, very hectic, trip to Sicily was a small lovely village named Scicli. We were again taken for a tour of several interesting places. One of them was the church of St John the Evangelist which was reconstructed in the 18th century. This collage shows two shots I took in this church:
1. on the left is a painting popularly known as the Christ in the skirt. We learnt that it is actually a painting copied from a sculpture ‘Christ of Burgos’ because the sculpture was done in Burgos, Spain and copied in a painting there. Nobody knows how it came to Scicli, though Scicli, like Malta, was part of the Spanish kingdom for quite a long time. Some say that if you turn the painting upside down it will represent a chalice with drops of blood dropping into it.
2. the other picture is a painting on the ceiling of the church.
At Scicli we also visited the mayor’s office which is a location in the TV serial ‘Il Commissario Montalbano’ which has been showing also (in English language) on one of the main UK tv networks. There I saw a manuscript showing the names of people from Scicli who died during WWI. Curiosity made me search through the pages and I found two persons surnamed Giorgio like myself. In Malta, the surname is very uncommon and all those with that surname are relatives to me. Who knows these Scicli persons could have been part of my family too. I should find some time to check this out.
Thank you so very much for looking and for your lovely comments on yesterday’s picture.
Nice collage. I can see the chalice- such an interesting history to that picture (and I just saw some sculptures replicating pictures!). The ceiling looks magnificent! Have fun searching your family tree- it sounds like they truly could be related to you.
Thank you for the fav.
I wonder why Christ is depicted wearing a skirt? I've Googled but can find no explanation.