A final shot of this series – hope you all enjoyed it.
This is the titular statue of the Church dedicated to St Paul Shipwrecked . It was carved in wood in 1657 by Melchiorre Cafà, the brother of Lorenzo Gafà who remodelled the church in 1680. The statue is paraded through the streets of Valletta on the feast day.
Melchiorre was born in Vittoriosa in 1636 and moved to Rome in 1658 where he was referred to as Melchior Maltese. He was already an accomplished sculptor when he went to Rome and entered the workshop of Ercole Ferrata. In 1662 he became a member of the Accademia di San Luca and was even elected its principal in 1667, but declined the honor. Cafà died on the 4 September 1667 after some material collapsed on him in the foundry of Saint Peter's while he was working on the altar decoration for St John's Co-Cathedral in Valletta.
The church boasts of several other treasures, the most important are a relic of part of St Paul’s wristbone and one of the four marble pillars (or legs) of the table on which the apostle was beheaded in Rome in 64 AD. The relic was donated to this church by Pope Pius VII in 1818.
Quite an amazing gilded statue. The whole place is amazing. So well documented Dione. And thank you for all of the historical information you shared with us each day. Very enlightening.
What a beautiful shot of this Statue of Paul. He was the apostle sent to the Gentiles and his words in the Bible are full of God's wisdom. I have very much enjoyed your series, Dione! I love church history and this certainly is a big part of it. Thank you for sharing this delightful and fascinating story!
Thanks for your series dione
so greatly captured