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, Italian, 1625-1713
Title
Portrait of Luke Wadding
Date1650s
MediumOil on canvas
Dimensions
56 x 46 cm
Credit LinePurchased, 2006
Object numberNGI.2006.24
ProvenancePurchased, Canesso Gallery, Paris, 2006Label TextWadding was a Franciscan scholar who contributed hugely to the establishment of seminaries abroad to train the Catholic clerical elite in the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries. In the 1620s he founded Saint Isidore’s friary and church and a college for diocesan clergy in Rome. Wadding’s acclaimed writing included his studies on the medieval philosopher Duns Scotus, and his monumental history of the Franciscan order. He promoted Irish causes, persuading many Irish soldiers serving with European armies, among them Owen Roe O’Neill, to return to Ireland. Carlo Maratti got to know Wadding well while decorating a chapel in Saint Isidore’s.