Cappella del Tau

Frommer's Review

This remarkable chapel was built in 1360 by a branch of the Franciscan order that cared for the sick and those with disabilities and whose members wore a Greek Tau as their symbol. In the 1500s a private citizen bought it and whitewashed over the 1372 fresco cycle by Niccolò di Tommaso that covered every inch of the walls and ceiling. In the process of stripping the whitewash in 1968, many of the frescoes were seriously damaged, but what remains of the Life of St. Anthony Abbot and (on the ceiling) the stories of Creation and Original Sin is stupendous. The colors on the few in the upper corners of the back give some idea of how vivid the original effect must have been.

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