The Right Aisle and the South Transept

 The Right Aisle and the South Transept of the Cremona Cathedral

The altars of the right aisle were also adorned in the 17th century by new ancons designed by the Natali. Thus in the first altar one of their monumental marble ancon (1680) frames the tablet by "il Pordenone" representing Our Lady with Child and the Saints Philip and James together with the offerer the canon Giacomo Schizzi. Even the following altar has an ancon made by the Natalis, but in this case it contains a complex wooden structure designed in 1692, imitating the opposite ancon of St. Joseph, by Alessandro Arrighi who signed and dated it (1691) on a pilaster. The structure of this altar is actually made of two distinct parts: the fresco in the Bembos style of Our Lady with Child called Madonna of the Peace, formerly located above on the first right altar, and the scene of the Miracle of St. Eusebius resuscitating the dead, that takes the rest of the scene. Finally, the third and last altar of this aisle is adorned, as the symmetrical altar of the left aisle, by an altar- piece of 1593 made by Luca Cattapane representing the Crucifixion with the Saints Fermo and Gerolamo and Pope Innocent the 1st.

Turning on the right in the wing of the south transept we immediately find the entrance door of the Sagrestia dei Canonici (Sacristy of the Canons), a pleasant environment that is the outcome of a eighteenth century omogeneous work that scenographically transformed it (perspective decoration of the ceiling by Antonio Galli known as "il Bibiena" (1763) and an elegant complex of walnut furniture by Angelo and Antonio Tiraboschi); in this place we find the foundation stone of the cathedral.

The following altar of the Visitation contains a beautiful altarpiece painted by Gervasio Gatti in 1583 and framed by a neoclassical ancon designed by Giovanni Manfredini in 1789. The beautiful eighteenth-century sculpture full of pathos, located on the near altar dedicated to the Crucifix, is a work of Giacomo Bertesi.

Before visiting the altars of the opposite side, there are some mobile works that deserve our attention and are located here: in the counterfagade the two tempera paintings representing the Archangel Gabriel and the Annunciation, attributed to Tomasi Aleni (beginning of the 16th century) and above, on the separation wall from the nave, the big curtain painted by Giulio Campi (1567) with the Triumph of Mordecai, formerly the curtain of the organ, but moved here in 1776.

The works located on the two left altars of this wing of the transept are also interesting, as the first altar shows the altarpiece with the Annunciation by G.B.Trotti known as “il Malosso" (1594), the same author of the Christ at the Column of the near pilaster; while in the second one we have a noteworthy painting by G.A. Borroni with St. Benedict in the Glory (1747); this altar was once followed by the altar of St. Anthony suppressed in 1844 in order to create the actual entrance to the Sacristy of the Masses.