Gonzaga Cycle: The Investiture of Gianfrancesco Gonzaga as Marquis of Mantua

In the spring of 1433 Sigismund of Luxembourg was crowned emperor in Rome, and on his way back north he stopped in Mantua. The city's ruler, Gianfrancesco Gonzaga, governed it as a lord without a title, and he meant to change that. The price was 12,000 gold florins, together with a marriage between his son Ludovico and Barbara of Brandenburg, a bride from a German princely house close to the emperor. In September 1433 Gianfrancesco became the first Marquis of Mantua. This canvas shows the grant itself, the princely hat handed over to him on Sigismund's orders, and it is the first scene of the Gonzaga cycle. Tintoretto painted it around 1578/79, nearly 150 years after the event, for Gianfrancesco's descendant Duke Guglielmo.