Spanish school of the 16th century.

Spanish school of the 16th century.
"Saint Paul".
Carved, gilded and polychromed wood.
It presents faults in the polychromy.
Measurements: 34 cm. high.
In this late Renaissance carving, the figure of Saint Paul appears without attributes (the sword of martyrdom being his best known emblem), but with a prototypical characterisation: as a mature man, with a long greyish beard. His cloak undulates to accompany the harmonious movement of the body, with which the carver takes up the Praxitelian study of the contrapposto, a device that was widely used in the Renaissance period.
Saint Paul was a Hellenised Jew from the Diaspora, born in Tarsus. He was therefore Jewish by ethnicity, Greek by culture and Roman by nationality. He received the name Saul, which he changed to Paul after his conversion. Born at the beginning of the first century, he studied in Jerusalem under the rabbi Gamaliel, who would have been noted for his hatred of Christians. One day, when he was on his way from Jerusalem to Damascus around the year 35, he was dazzled by lightning and fell from his horse. Then he heard the voice of Jesus saying to him: "Saul, Saul, why are you persecuting me? As a result of this experience, the saint went from persecutor to zealot of Christianity.