The Canonisation of Five Saints

The pope's reign was a brief one, from October 6 to1689-February 1 1691. The main religious event of the brief pontificate of Alexander VIII occurred when five saints were canonised on 16th October 1690. It was an important event. After the closing of the Council of Trent, only two saints were canonised in the remainder of the sixteenth century. In the seventeenth century, there were only 24 canonisations of which this event created more than 20% of that total. The saints raised that day to the altars were: Saint Lorenzo Giustiniani, Patriarch of Venice; Saint Giovanni of Capistrano, the Franciscan monk who distinguished himself in the victory of the Hungarians against the Turks; Saint John of God, founder of the Hospital Order; St. Pasquale Baylon, the so-called Mad Saint and founder of the Fatebenefratelli; and Saint Giovanni da San Facondo. The Pope`s nephew Cardinal Pietro Ottoboni commisioned his tomb and it was designed by Count Arrigo di San Martino. But it was the Genovese sculptor Angelo de' Rossi (1671 – June 12, 1715) who executed the famous bas relief at the base of the tomb which commemorates the great canonisations that day in 1690, which is the relief here.