Cane, Italian, 1470-1500

Bamboo cane enrgaved with fifty-nine subjects, scriptural and ecclesiastical each with a Latin inscription.

Bought from the Museum of the Collegio Romano (records do not say for how much).

One current view of this type of staff (sometimes called pilgrim staffs, or staffs of dignity) is that examples were made in bamboo with inked decoration or ivory with engraved decoration, mainly in the 17th century, as souvenirs for visitors or as gifts for senior churchmen, particularly to mark papal jubilees.

Comparable objects
A number of comparable engraved bamboo staffs have been published, most recently in the exhibition catalogue ROMA 1300-1875, L'arte degli anni santi, eds., Marcello Fagiolo and Maria Luisa Madonna (exhib. cat. Roma, Palazzo Venezia, 20 Dec. 1984 - 5 April 1985), cat. nos. II.2.14-16 - as pilgrim staffs, made in Sicily in the early 17th century.

Bayerisches Nationalmuseum, Munich (bamboo and bone), 138cm long (missing the knob and base point), with 50 scenes with inscriptions in Latin and some Italian including at the top four scenes with the saints Francesco, Bonaventura, Antonio da Padova, and B.Giraldus (probably Giraldo Cagnoli d.1342); scenes from Genesis (14), the life of Jesus (33), prophets Isaiah and Zacariah. ROMA II.2.14

V&A, 2167-1855; Cerimonial staff (ivory with black mastic), 173cm, 1610-20, with biblical scenes and portraits of Pope Paolo V, and Cardinal Orazio Lancelotti. ROMA II.2.15

Vatican City (Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticano, Museo Sacro), bamboo, 122cm (missing the handle), with the arms of Pope Innocent X Pamphilj (1644-55), and scenes illustrating the exaltation of the Roman Catholic church, including St Peter's basilica and Biblical scenes. ROMA II.2.16

Three are held at the British Museum, one in bamboo (See ROMA, p.56) with 75 oval scenes from the old and new testaments.

See also:
Ancient and Modern Furniture & Woodwork in the South Kensington Museum, described with an introduction by John Hungerford Pollen (London, 1874), p. 279.
Clive Wainwright, edited for publication by Charlotte Gere, 'The Making of the South Kensington Museum III: Collecting Abroad', in Journal of the History of Collections 14, no. 1 (2002), pp. 45-61.
Paul A. Underwood, 'Drawings of St Peter's on a pilgrim's staff in the museo sacro', in Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institute (1939-40), pp. 147-153.

This cane came from the Museum of the Collegio Romano, the headquarters of the Jesuits. It is described as Italian and made of Bamboo, a plant not native to Italy. Judging from photographs it looks more like a reed, such as might be found in the Mediterranean. The style of the decoration is a mixture of fairly sophisticated ornament but rather crude figures. Given the active missionary work of the Jesuits, might this be Iberian colonial (Mexico or even Goa) and date from the 1550s?

This staff is decorated with religious themes and would probably have been used in church processions. In 1859 it was acquired from the Museum of the Collegio Romano, based in Rome and the head quarters of the Jesuits. The ornaments on this staff indicate it was made from about 1600; the style of the figures suggest that it was more likely to have been made in the Spanish or Portuguese colonies of the New World countries where the Jesuits were active missionaries, rather than Italy.

4723-1859