Ex Voto: An Account of the Sacro Monte or New Jerusalem at Varallo-Sesia: With Some Notice of Tabachetti's Remaining Work at the Sanctuary of CreaButler, Samuel
Religion
Ex Voto: An Account of the Sacro Monte or New Jerusalem at Varallo-Sesia: With Some Notice of Tabachetti's Remaining Work at the Sanctuary of Crea
Butler, Samuel
Art -- Italy -- Varallo-Sesia; Sacro Monte di Varallo (Sanctuary); Tabaguet, Jean Baptiste, 1568 -1615
Tabachetti was summoned to Crea in 1591, and was buying land and other
property in 1600, 1602, 1604, 1605, 1606, and 1608, at Serralunga, close
to Crea, where deeds which still exist say that he resided. There are
many families named Tabachetti still living in the immediate
neighbourhood of Serralunga, who are doubtless descended from the
sculptor. After 1608 nothing more is known of him. At Varallo, over and
above his work on the Sacro Monte, there is an exceedingly beautiful
Madonna by him, in the parish church of S. Gaudenzio, and one head of a
man with a ruff—a mere fragment—which Cav. Prof. Antonini showed me in
the Museum, and assured me was by Tabachetti. I know of no other work by
him except what remains at Crea, about which I will presently write more
fully. I am not, however, without hope that search about Liege and
Dinant may lead to the discovery of some work at present overlooked, and,
as I have said, will thankfully receive information.
I will conclude with a note taken from p. 47 of Part I. of Cav.
Alessandro Godio’s admirable “Cronaca di Crea.” {104}
The note runs:—
“The present writer found himself involved in a long dispute, through
having entered the lists against the Valsesian writers, who reckon
Tabachetti among the distinguished sons of the Val Sesia, and for
having said that he was born in Flanders. After a more successful
search in the above-named [Vercelli?] archive, under the letter B No.
6, over and above the deeds of 1600 and 1606, already referred to in
the ‘Vesillo della libertà,’ No. 39, Sept. 5, 1863, I found, under
numbers 308, 417, 498, 622, of the unarranged papers of Notary
Teodoro Caligaris, four more deeds dated 1602, 1604, 1605, 1608, in
which the Sculptor Gio. Battista Tabachetti is not only described as
a Fleming, but his birthplace is given as follows: “_Vendidit_,
_tradidit nobili Joanni Tabacheta filio quondam nobili Gulielmi de
Dinante de Liesa_ [_Liège_] _nunc incola Serralungæ_.” Since, then,
he was buying considerable property at Serralunga during the
above-named year, it is plain that he did not work continuously at
Varallo from 1590 to 1606, as contended by the Valsesian writers
quoted by An. Cav. Carlo Dionisotti, the distinguished author of the
Valle Sesia. Moreover, from the year 1590 and onward the chapels of
Crea were begun, and of these, by advice of Monsignor Tullio del
Carretto, Bishop of Casale, at the bidding of Michel Angelo da
Liverno, who was Vicar of Crea, Tabachetti designed not fifteen but
forty, and found himself at the head of the direction of the great
work that was then engaging the attention of the foremost Italian
artists of the day.”
GIOVANNI D’ENRICO.
Public-domain text, read in full here on John Shaqi.
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