| Cain and Abel | |
| Height Metric: | 298 |
| Width Metric: | 282 |
| Metric Unit: | cm |
| Imperial Unit: | in |
| Museum: | Santa Maria della Salute |
| City: | Venice |
Cain and Abel (Italian: Caino e Abele) is an oil painting by the Venetian painter Titian. It was made in about 1543–1545 for the church of Santo Spirito, but is now in the basilica of Santa Maria della Salute.
The scene in question is the first murder recounted in the Genesis narrative. Cain and Abel were two brothers, the first sons of Adam and Eve. Cain, the firstborn, was a farmer, and Abel was a shepherd. The brothers made sacrifices to God, but God accepted the firstlings offered by Abel rather than the first fruits offered by Cain. Cain, full of jealousy, called out Abel into the fields, and slew him.[1]
It was about the beginning of the 1540s that Titian received commissions for a great number of pictures from the brothers of the church of Santo Spirito, who already possessed the work of his early career, the San Marco Enthroned. One altarpiece represented the Descent of the Holy Spirit, but having been damaged had to be restored later by Titian. The picture on the same subject, which is now in the Church of the Salute, belongs to another period in Titian's activity. The whole collection of art treasures from Santo Spirito was transported to the Church of the Salute in the seventeenth century, where they remain today.[2]
In the ceiling of the sacristy of the Salute, above the altar, are three creations of this period : Cain and Abel, Abraham and Isaac, and David and Goliath.[3]
Georg Gronau writes of these three pictures collectively: