Nicolò di Pietro
St. Benedict Exorcises a Possessed Monk
1415-20
Tempera on wood
Uffizi Gallery, Florence, Italy
Provenance: Palazzo Portalungi, Verona, Italy
This appears to be an illustration of the exorcism in Gregory the Great's life of St. Benedict.1 A monk would continually leave the oratory at prayer time and go wandering outside. The abbot would remonstrate with him and he might behave for a day or two, but then off he would go when it was time for prayer. So the abbot and St. Maurus called on St. Benedict. The saint saw, and the others did not, that during prayers a black demon was dragging the monk out by the hem of his habit. So Benedict went outside, took a rod, and beat the monk to drive the demon out. Fearful of another beating, the demon never again dared to disturb the monk in his thoughts.
The painting appears to picture the aftermath of the beating. It is set just outside the oratory. In the background the demon flees the scene while holding the broken pieces of a rod. On the right, St. Benedict blesses the monk. The bearded man on the left is probably the abbot; the younger one should be St. Maurus, although he has no halo.
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Photographed at the Uffizi by Richard Stracke, shared under Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license.