Leo XIV Joins the Panoply of Popes

Mosaic Portrait of Pope Leo XIV

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Yesterday, on the Feast of the Conversion of St Paul, a portrait in mosaic of Pope Leo XIV was unveiled in the Basilica di San Paolo fuori le Mura.  

The tradition of placing portraits of all the popes in the ancient Basilica of St Paul's Outside the Walls dates back to the 5th century, to the time of Pope Leo the Great (r. 440-461). However, most of the portraits were destroyed in the fire of 1823.

In 1847, Pope Pius IX instructed the Vatican's mosaic workshop to recreate all of the the portraits, first in paint and then in mosaic.  The portrait of Pope Leo XIV was initially painted by the aptly named Rodolfo Papa. It then took three craftsmen 150 days to produce the copy in mosaic, which is made up of 15,000 tesserae.

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