Artibus et Historiae no. 48 (XXIV)

2003, ISSN 0391-9064

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DIANE COLE AHL - Camposanto, Terra Santa: Picturing the Holy Land in Pisa

Inspired by scholarship on historic memory and sacred topography, the article proposes a new interpretation of the decorative program of the Camposanto in Pisa. Enclosing earth brought from Mount Calvary during the crusades, the Camposanto was conceived not only as a cemetery but as a reliquary church and place of pilgrimage. Its frescoes recreated the experience of pilgrimage by evoking the sacred sites of the Holy Land, inaccessible from Pisa due to naval losses and the crusades. A coda to the article publishes a drawing for Benozzo Gozzoli's Punishment of Korah, Dathan, and Abiron, tentatively ascribing it to Andrea Boscoli and reconstructing the lost fresco.