The Miraculous Image of our Lady Sapieżyńska

Abstract

Sources that have not been printed yet were found in the archives and used, which brought to light facts that had been unknown and showed the untypical history of a medieval altar. It also allowed putting in order the most recent historical facts about the painting whose history was closed only in the last decade of the 20th century. It is most likely that it was painted at the break of the 15th century, and its iconographic-formal arrangement argues for the possibility that it had its origin in Cracow.

The analysis made in the article seems to exclude the former hypothesis that work on changing the groundwork was done after a fire in 1610, as well as the one saying that an unknown Lithuanian painter was the painter of the picture. It also seems very likely, albeit still hypothetical, that the painter who did the changes in the composition of the painting in the second half of the 17,h century could be Franciszek Lekszycki.