Interior
The walls of the church are decorated with numerous frescoes, including those of Niccolò Circignani (Niccolò Pomarancio) and Antonio Tempesta portraying 34 scenes of martyrdom, commissioned by Gregory XIII in the 16th century. Each painting has a titulus or inscription explaining the scene and giving the name of the emperor who ordered the execution, as well as a quotation from the Bible. The paintings, naturalistic depictions of torture and execution, are somewhat morbid, if not gruesome.
Read more about this topic: Santo Stefano Rotondo
Famous quotes containing the word interior:
“It cannot but affect our philosophy favorably to be reminded of these shoals of migratory fishes, of salmon, shad, alewives, marsh-bankers, and others, which penetrate up the innumerable rivers of our coast in the spring, even to the interior lakes, their scales gleaming in the sun; and again, of the fry which in still greater numbers wend their way downward to the sea.”
—Henry David Thoreau (1817–1862)
“Fish have water, the bushmen of the Kalahari have sand, and Houstonians have interior décor.”
—Simon Hoggart (b. 1946)
“The exterior must be joined to the interior to obtain anything from God, that is to say, we must kneel, pray with the lips, and so on, in order that proud man, who would not submit himself to God, may be now subject to the creature.”
—Blaise Pascal (1623–1662)