Portrait of Cardinal Antonio Barberini the Younger

Cardinal Antonio Barberini had been dead for more than ten years when Carlo Maratta painted him, in 1682 or 1683. The commission came from his nephew, Cardinal Carlo Barberini, and the picture went up in the oval hall of the family palace at the Quattro Fontane, the building that now houses the gallery. Carlo's inventory describes it as a standing portrait of the late Cardinal Antonio in the cappa magna, the great ceremonial cape, in a gilded frame with bees and suns, by Carlo Maratta.

Antonio was a nephew of Pope Urban VIII. After his uncle's death the new pope, Innocent X, accused him and his brother Taddeo of financial abuses during the War of Castro, a costly papal war against the Farnese family. In 1645 Antonio fled to France and the protection of Cardinal Mazarin, the king's chief minister. At the French court he became Grand Almoner of France and a member of the Order of the Holy Spirit, the kingdom's highest order of chivalry, and in 1657 archbishop of Reims.

The star of that order is pinned to his chest in full view. The museum thinks Maratta had in mind Philippe de Champaigne's state portrait of Cardinal Richelieu, and it notes the Barberini sun, the family emblem, faded and barely visible in the background, behind the austere ivory crucifix before which the cardinal stands.