St. Martin and the Beggar

Description The hat badge depicts St. Martin and the beggar, represented according to the usual iconographic type: the youthful saint, riding a horse, turns in his saddle towards the beggar and cuts his cloak in two to share it with him. Very often the beggar was represented as a cripple in rags with a wooden leg. Here he is naked, except for a loin-cloth. The border is studded with "jewels" in raised enamels over foil spangles, with gilt scrolls between, and an outer line of drops of white enamel. Inscribed in faded gilding in the blue ground between the legs of the horse: SM (Sanctus Martinus).

Conservation

Date	Description	Narrative
10/14/1940	Treatment	coated; cleaned
4/26/1961	Treatment	cleaned; loss compensation
1/07/1963	Treatment	cleaned; loss compensation; coated
1/22/1980	Examination	examined for condition
4/21/2003	Examination	examined for condition

Provenance Sale, Galleria Sangiorgi, Rome, April 21, 1902, lot 340; Henry Walters, Baltimore, 1902, by purchase; Walters Art Museum, 1931, by bequest.

Inscriptions [Transcription] SM; [Transliteration] S(aint) M(artin)

Credit Acquired by Henry Walters, 1902