Spanish school, XVIII century.

Spanish School, XVIII century.
"St. Martin splitting the cloak with the poor".
Relief in polychrome wood.
Measurements: 44 x 90 cm.
The relief offers us one of the most popular stories and with greater fortune in the art of the life of Saint Martin of Tours: the moment in which, finding at the gates of the city of Amiens a poor man almost naked, he decided to split his cloak with his sword and give him half of it as a coat. At that time, the later bishop of Tours was a soldier in the Roman army, but that same night Christ would appear to him in a dream, dressed in the half cloak he had given, to thank him for the charitable gesture, a dream that would cause his conversion to Christianity. The narrative scene is flanked by fluted pilasters, in a classicist style, and by scrolls decorated with acanthus leaves. This type of frame suggests that the relief was part of a larger ensemble, probably a sculptural altarpiece, and, taking into account the format, it is possible that it was one of the upper or finishing compartments.