Madonna and Child in Glory with Saints Petronius, Dominic, Francis, Ignatius, Francis Xavier, Proculus, and Florian, protectors of Bologna (Plague Altarpiece or Great Votive Banner)

The work was commissioned to Guido Reni, the most renowned artist in Bologna, by the city's government at the time, as a pallione, that is to say a banner to be carried in procession every year from Palazzo Pubblico to the church of San Domenico, to give thanks for an end to the plague of 1630.

The epidemic, the same one that was described by Alessandro Manzoni in “The Betrothed”, and that had stricken all of Italy, had raged in the city, causing a good twenty thousand deaths out of seventy thousand inhabitants.

In light of its future use, Guido Reni decided to paint on silk, as was customary for the processional banners.

The large work is structured in a composition divided into three bands: in the central section is a crown to intercede for the cities, the traditional patron saints of Bologna, Petronius, Proculus, Francis of Assisi, Florian and Dominic, in addition to the founders of the Confraternity of Jesus, Ignatius of Loyola and Francis Xavier.

In the upper section is the Virgin seated on a throne of clouds within a glory of angels, her feet touching a rainbow, symbol of peace-making, which illuminates the grey of the sky with its light.

Portrayed in the lower section, shrouded in clouds, is the city of Bologna, with the carts of the monatti (those who removed corpses during the plague) exiting from the city walls.