Francesco Maria del Monte

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Portrait of Cardinal Francesco Maria del Monte by Ottavio Leoni

Francesco Maria del Monte, full name Francesco Maria Bourbon del Monte Santa Maria, (5 July 1549 – 27 August 1627) was an

Caravaggio
, and on his art collection (the del Monte collection) which provides provenance for many important works of the period.

Career

Palazzo Madama, Cardinal del Monte's palace in Rome.

Born in

Ferdinando de' Medici
.

He was created cardinal deacon in the

Ferdinando de' Medici
, in Rome, and was firmly but discreetly pro-French in the ongoing struggle between the French and Spanish for influence over the papacy.

He served as Prefect of the

Tridentine Council (1606 to 1616) and as Bishop of Palestrina from 1615 to 1621. He participated in the Papal Conclave of 1621 and had ambitions of being elected Pope but his pro-French sympathies ensured his veto by the Spanish.[3]

Academics such as Posner, Frommel, and Hibbard have drawn upon extant documents (principally the correspondence of Dirk van Ameyden) that suggest the strong likelihood that he was

papacy. Van Ameyden mischievously painted a portrait in words of a man that seemed to display more than a paternal care for the boys in his charge. But Graham-Dixon argues that such accusations seem deliberately to have been cast by the pro-Spanish Ameyden against the pro-French Del Monte in order to discredit him, and bear little real scrutiny. Besides which, there is better evidence that Del Monte had courted women in his youth.[5][6]
In short, the most honest and impartial scholarly conclusion about Del Monte's sexuality is that just as we currently do not have grounds to prove his homosexuality, we likewise do not have grounds to absolutely exclude that possibility.

He died in his Rome palace, the (

Italian Senate) and was buried in the church of Sant'Urbano, Rome.[7]

Patron of science and art

The Portland Vase.

The epitaph on Del Monte's tomb describes him as an "excellent patron of the good arts".[7] Del Monte was a perceptive supporter of the arts and sciences – he was the first recorded owner of the Portland Vase, and his Palazzo Madama household was one of the most important intellectual salons in Rome. At his death his art collection contained more than six hundred paintings, and his support of the young Caravaggio has given provenance to several of that artist's early works.

Together with his brother, he helped

Cosimo II recommended him to the Cardinal's council so that he could be helped during his sojourn at the Vatican.[9]

Del Monte was a patron of German painter Adam Elsheimer[8] and Andrea Sacchi.[7]

Selected art from his collection

  • Caravaggio, The Lute Player, oil on canvas, 94 × 119 cm, Hermitage Museum, Saint Petersburg[10]
    Caravaggio, The Lute Player, oil on canvas, 94 × 119 cm, Hermitage Museum, Saint Petersburg[10]
  • Caravaggio, The Musicians, oil on canvas, 92 × 118.5 cm, The Metropolitan Museum of Art
    Caravaggio, The Musicians, oil on canvas, 92 × 118.5 cm,
    The Metropolitan Museum of Art
  • Caravaggio, Saint Catherine of Alexandria, oil on canvas, 173 x 133 cm, Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza, Madrid
    Caravaggio, Saint Catherine of Alexandria, oil on canvas, 173 x 133 cm,
    Museo Thyssen-Bornemisza
    , Madrid
  • Caravaggio, Bacchus, oil on canvas, 85 × 95 cm, Uffizi Gallery, Florence
    Caravaggio, Bacchus, oil on canvas, 85 × 95 cm,
    Uffizi Gallery
    , Florence
  • Caravaggio, The Fortune Teller, oil on canvas, 93 × 131 cm, Louvre, Paris
    Caravaggio, The Fortune Teller, oil on canvas, 93 × 131 cm, Louvre, Paris
  • Caravaggio, The Cardsharps, oil on canvas, 94 × 131 cm, Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth
    Caravaggio, The Cardsharps, oil on canvas, 94 × 131 cm, Kimbell Art Museum, Fort Worth

References

  1. OCLC 53276621
    .
  2. [self-published]
  3. ^ Clovis Whitfield "The Camerino of Cardinal del Monte" Paragone, LIX, n.77, 2008, pp. 3–38
  4. ^ Encyclopaedia of Gay, Lesbian, Bisexual, Transgender and Queer Culture: Archived 2 April 2015 at the Wayback Machine Patronage I: The Western World from Ancient Greece until 1900
  5. ISBN 978-0-06-433322-1
  6. ISBN 9780241954645
    .
  7. ^
    S2CID 191619204
    .
  8. ^
    JSTOR 1482611
    .
  9. ^ 'Galileo, Courtier: RRThe Practice of Science in the Culture of Absolutism', Mario Biagioli, University of Chicago Press, 1993.
  10. JSTOR 884128
    .
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