applied prints and emblems

In 1639 the Galician sculptor Mateo de Prado agreed to execute the choir stalls of the Benedictine Monastery of San Martín Pinario. The themes that were meant to be carved on the dust guard and on the back of both the upper and lower row were soon stipulated: the life and miracles of Saint Benedict, a series of portraits of saints and the life of the Virgin Mary, respectively.

Unlike what has traditionally been said, twenty-four out of the thirty-five reliefs with scenes of Our Lady can be explained thanks to an only source: the series of engravings included in the Officium Beatae Mariae Virginis published by the Officina Plantiniana in Antwerp in 1609 and reissued with the same plates in 1622 and 1652.

At the same time, as Lois Fernández found out, the panels dedicated to the founder saint follow to the letter the Vita aefigiata issued in Rome in 1579 under the title of Vita et Miracula Sanctisimi Patris Benedicti. Ex Libro II Dialogorum Beati Gregorii Papae et Monachi collecta.