La colomba di Giotto: forma e funzione della cappella degli Scrovegni

A commission of Enrico degli Scrovegni, the chapel dedicated to Santa Maria della Carità at the Roman Arena, Padua, was built after 6 February 1300 and decorated by Giotto, with the Stories of the Virgin Mary and Christ. The church, dedicated to the Virgin in 1303, was probably consecrated on 25 March 1305, when a procession from the Cathedral to the Arena was followed by the liturgical drama of the Annunciation which took place in the Arena itself. In 1306, the Paduan podestà established the civic status of the feast of the Annunciation, which was celebrated almost yearly until its prohibition in 1597, in the post-tridentine era. Since 1429, the pious brotherhood of Santa Maria della Carità dell’Arena gained an annual income to provide for the maintenance and the restoration of the chapel, as well as for the arrangement of the feast, including the drama. Some archival documents record that a dove was regularly purchased by the brothers on the occasion of the feast. A symbol of the Holy Spirit, the dove probably glided towards the interior of the chapel from the God’s image painted on a turning wooden panel inserted in the wall on the chancel arch, and it announced to the Virgin Mary the miraculous conception of Christ the Saviour. Thus, it seems that the shape of the chapel was integrated with the setting of the liturgical drama.