Count Saverio Marchese (1757-1833) : his picture-gallery and his bequest to the Cathedral Museum

Abstract

Picture collecting in Malta as elsewhere was the favourite pastime of the Knights, the nobility, wealthy people and a few scholars and art lovers centuries ago. Local and foreign artists commissioned to decorate our churches and palaces were also asked to decorate private houses and furnish them with portraits and other paintings. Inventories of the many art collections in private houses may have been compiled by their respective owners in their own lifetime but they were certainly compiled in the interests of heirs and claimants immediately after their death. An important art collection in the early 19th century was that of Count Saverio Marchese, fourth son of Cavaliere Giuseppe Isidoro and Serafina Marmier. Of all the old collectors Saverio Marchese was one of the earliest, to my knowledge, to have left his collection of paintings, drawings, prints and art books as a legacy to a public institution — the Cathedral Church.