_Lorenzo di San Severino_ (Umbrian: painted 1483-1496).
This picture is signed by the artist "Laurentius _the second_
of Severino"--to distinguish himself from the earlier Lorenzo,
who was born in 1374, and who painted some frescoes at Urbino
in 1416. The date of this picture is approximately fixed by
the fact that Catherine is described on her nimbus as "saint,"
and she was not canonised till 1461; and perhaps also by the
influence on Lorenzo of Crivelli (painted 1468-1493), which has
been traced in the execution of the details: see for instance
the cucumber and apple on the step of the throne (_cf._ 724,
etc).
St. Catherine of Siena (1347-1380) is one of the most remarkable
figures of the Middle Ages. She was the daughter of a dyer, brought
up in the humblest of surroundings, and wholly uneducated. When only
thirteen she entered the monastic life as a nun of the Dominican
order (St. Dominic is here present on the right), and at once became
famous in the city for her good works. She tended the sick and
plague-stricken, and was a minister of mercy to the worst and meanest
of her fellow-creatures. On one occasion a hardened murderer, whom
priests had visited in vain, was so subdued by her tenderness that he
confessed his sins, begged her to wait for him by the scaffold, and
died with the names of Jesus and Catherine on his lips. In addition to
her piety and zeal she succeeded as a mediator between Florence and
her native city, and between Florence and the Pope; she travelled to
Avignon, and there induced Gregory XI. to return to Rome; she narrowly
escaped political martyrdom during one of her embassies from Gregory
to the Florentine republic; she preached a crusade against the Turks,
and she aided, by her dying words, to keep Pope Urban on the throne.
But "when she died she left behind her a memory of love more than of
power, the fragrance of an unselfish and gentle life. Her place is in
the heart of the humble. Her prayer is still whispered by poor children
on their mother's knee, and her relics are kissed daily by the simple
and devout."
The mystical marriage which forms the subject of this picture, where
the infant Christ is placing the ring on her finger, suggests the
secret of her power. Once when she was fasting and praying, Christ
himself appeared to her, she said, and gave her his heart. For love
was the keynote of her religion, and the mainspring of her life.
In no merely figurative sense did she regard herself as the spouse
of Christ; she dwelt upon the bliss, beyond all mortal happiness,
which she enjoyed in supersensual communion with her Lord. The world
has not lost its ladies of the race of St. Catherine, beautiful and
pure and holy, who live lives of saintly mercy in the power of human
and heavenly love. (See further, for St. Catherine of Siena, J. A.
Symonds, _Sketches in Italy_ (Siena), from which the above account is
principally taken.)