Lot Essay
These two groups must originally have belonged to a Crucifixion, and represent figures in the crowd attendant upon the scene. The man riding on an ass is one of the High Priests, while the man with the long beard and half-armour pointing upwards is Longinus, the centurion whose conversion took place at Calvary. According to Christian theology, Jesus came to convert the Jews and the Gentiles, and it is no coincidence if the personification of Synagogue is traditionally represented riding on an ass. The identical iconography is found in Pordenone's fresco of the Crucifixion in Cremona Cathedral.