Donation of Rome
Photogallery
Donation of Rome
The Emperor Constantine is depicted in the act of offering a golden statuette, symbolising the city of Rome, to Pope Sylvester, in front of whom he is kneeling: on this episode (which turned out to be legendary) rested the legal foundations of the Church State and the temporal nature of the power of the popes themselves. In the scene, Sylvester I has the mature features of Clement VII, in the second part of his pontificate (1523-1534), and the episode documents the interior of the medieval Saint Peter's Basilica, still standing at the time.