Maffeo Barberini (later Urban VIII) in October of 1618 wrote to his brother Carlo saying that, if the price were right, he would buy a Pietà started by Michelangelo and owned by the artist’s homonymous nephew, because the son of Bernini would bring it to perfection. This note follows the documentation of Barberini and Bernini involvement with a large Pietà through the centuries until Mussolini sent it to the Accademia in Florence, after having it shipped from Palestrina to Rome for his exhibition of Fascist masculinity.