The death of Sapphira

The subject is taken from the Acts of the Apostles, recounting how the Apostles persuaded the wealthy Ananias and his wife Sapphira to sell their land and houses and donate the proceeds to the poor (chapter 5, verse 1). They both obeyed, but they kept back some of the gains. When Peter told Ananias he had lied not to men, but to God, he died and was buried. Sapphira, unaware of this, repeated the same lie and, when confronted, also died. This drawing shows the moment when she collapses into the arms of a servant who will bury her (verse 10). Saint Peter is shown gazing down at her and pointing to heaven as a reminder of the origin of the punishment. A group of drawings by Antonio Gionima is in the Royal Collection (O. Kurz, Bolognese Drawings of the XVII and XVIII Centuries in the Collection of Her Majesty The Queen at Windsor Castle, London, 1955, nos. 280-6).