Picturing institutional wet-nursing in Medicean Siena

This chapter examines how the two added frescoes, particularly the Assignment and Payment of Wet Nurses, articulated an ideology of abundance in late sixteenth-century Siena, both by engaging with the imagery of the earlier cycle and by associating the care of abandoned children with the provision of sustenance to the local community. In the 1440s, when the first decorative program in the Pellegrinaio was being executed, Siena was still an independent republic. The frescoes added in the 1570s thus communicate the plentiful resources of the Scala hospital under the control of Grand Duke Francesco and his proxy Rector Saracini. Brick was the traditional building material of Siena, while pietra serena was associated with Florentine architecture. In the context of Medicean Siena, however, the visual valence of lactation carried with it less desirable ties to the imagery of the Sienese commune. The structure of the composition also participates in this pictorial juggling act.