The chapel of the Tau monastery, which has recently regained its splendor of old thanks to careful restoration, houses the greatest Gothic painting cycle in Pistoia. The frescos were carried out in the last three decades of the 1 300s by Niccolò di Tommaso and some of his talented assistants, among whom we presume there was the Pistoian artist Antonio Vite (vs36/40/41).
If the whole complex reveals the strong influence of Florentine culture, seen in the use of pietra forte (the only example oft his kind in the city), the paintings declare an even stronger link to the Florentine school of the Orcagna brothers: Andrea, Nardo and Jacopo who monopolized figurative art in the second half of the 1300s, developing the lively, descriptive style that characterizes the art of that period. Entering beyond the measured façade, the not very wide rectangular hall offers the extraordinary sight of three narrative bands A B that un fold along the walls, telling stories from The Old Testament, The New Testament and from the life of Saint Anthony Abbot (vi). Each one of the twelve sections forming the ceiling of the chapel is dedicated to an episode of the Genesis D, from the Creation of the Sky and Earth up to the Giants. The Old Testament cycle continues in fourteen panels in the upper register with episodes illustrating Scenes of Noah and of Job. The middle register illustrates fifteen scenes from The New Testament, from the Annunciation to Zachary to the Transfiguration, as well as fourteen stories from the Legend of Saint Anthony Abbot. The well-defined decorative plan, with Paradise C frescoed on the presbytery wall, ends in the bottom strip with a procession of angels and female figures who perhaps represent the Virtues. Rendered with great compositional clarity, the detailed iconographic program corresponded perfectly to the didactic needs of the Tau Order who wanted their charitable goals to be clearly legible to the faithful.

(n.) refers to the number of the file-card (s.i.) means see information inside

Saint Anthony Abbot and Domestic Animals

Saint Anthony Abbot, an old man with a white beard, dark monk's robes and a stick, is usually portrayed with a small pig at his feet. Although no episode in the Saint's life refers to this animal, the Tau monks chose it as their symbol because they used its fat to make cures for infirmities. The monks raised pigs and this strengthened the association between Saint Anthony and the domestic animals of which he would become the patron saint. On January 1 7, the saint's feast day, a crowd of farmers used to come to the church of the Tau for the blessing of the animals and, during the frequent masses, small blessed breads were distributed to the faithful who kept them afterwards. Traces of this tradition which Is rooted in the Pistoian countryside, can still be seen today in the custom of hanging an image of Saint Anthony in the stables in order to ward off bad luck.