SACRED TREASURES

Greymouth Evening Star, 15 August 1933, Page 6

SACRED TREASURES

REMARKABLE EXHIBITION. FLORENCE, June 20. A remarkable exhibition of treasures of Florentine sacred art has been opened here at the Museum of San Marco. It has brought, to light many objects of the greatest value which in ordinary times it would take at least a year to see even if armed with the necessary special permits.

Some belong to private chapels and have been lent for the first- time, while others, such as the reliquaries given by Pope Clement VII. to the basi-

lica of San Lorenzo, could only be seen by permission of the Pope. The pictures, which are chiefly of the thirteenth and fourteenth centuries, and have been taken from their dark churches for the first time, can now be studied in a. good light.

It has not been an easy matter to arrange the collection. Many of the pictures and statues are held in great veneration by the parishioners of the churches to which they belong, and it needed great tact to bring the objects to San Marco.

Ono Cross had, indeed, to be returned after it had already arrived here. ‘A deputation was sent, to say that there were already signs that things wore not going well in the village, and that tho directors of the exhibition would be held responsible if lire, earthquake or flood descended on the village whilst, the Cross was absent.

The exhibition will probably remain open until the end of August.