Italian, 'The Head of Saint John the Baptist', 1511

The head of Saint John the Baptist rests in a white ceramic footed dish on a narrow stone ledge. Salome’s mother Herodias persuaded her to ask King Herod for the head of John the Baptist as a reward for her dancing (Matthew 14: 1–12). Herodias held a grudge against the Baptist for saying that her marriage to Herod was unlawful. The saint was beheaded, and his head was then presented to Salome on a charger.

The grisly head stands out starkly against the plain black background. The Baptist’s expression is peaceful despite his violent end, his lips slightly parted, revealing his teeth, and his lashes resting softly against his cheek. His curls spread over the rim of the dish, which is marked with smudges and spots of his blood. The highlights on his curls and facial hair have been picked out in fine gold lines that echo the delicate gold designs on his halo.

There is some evidence that Leonardo painted a ‘Head of Saint John the Baptist on a Charger’ during his years in Milan, and there are many early sixteenth-century Milanese pictures of this subject which, like this one, may have been closely derived from Leonardo. Andrea Solario painted a version of the design in 1507, probably for the Cardinal d‘Amboise (1460–1510), which is now in the Louvre in Paris. The cardinal was the prime minister of the French king Louis XII, and responsible for increasing French power in Italy, including the conquest of the Milanese territories. In a demonstration of his virtuosity, Solario depicts the reflection of John the Baptist’s ear in the polished surface of the dish, something barely attempted by the artist of the National Gallery’s painting.

The increase in the demand for such images in Milan at the beginning of the sixteenth century seems to relate to the transfer of the headquarters of the Order of the Knights of Saint John in Lombardy to Milan in 1496. It also relates to the presence in Milan of Cardinal d’Amboise and his nephew Charles II d‘Amboise, governor of the city from 1500 and 1511, who had a particular devotion to Saint John the Baptist. Charles II d’Amboise became a friend of Leonardo da Vinci, who lived the last years of his life close to the royal castle of Amboise in France

The painting is inscribed in gold letters: MDXI / II.K[A]L.FEB. This translates as ‘1511, two days before the Kalends of February’ – meaning 31 January 1511. The date on the painting is the day of the death of Charles II d'Amboise, and the painting may have been commissioned to commemorate that event.