Story of Saint Thomas the Apostle – Saint Thomas Baptises Gundaphorus, and other Episodes (one of two panels, artist previously identified as the Master of Lucchese Immaculate Conception)

Vincenzo Frediani worked in Lucca in the 1490s–1500s and this panel depicting episodes from the life of Saint Thomas the Apostle — including his baptism of King Gundaphorus of India — is part of a cycle drawing from the Acts of Thomas, an apocryphal text describing Thomas's missionary journey to India. The legend of Thomas in India had particular significance in the late fifteenth century because Portuguese explorers were actively seeking the Christian communities in South Asia (the so-called Thomas Christians of Kerala) that tradition attributed to the apostle. This intersection of devotional and geographical curiosity gave the Thomas legend renewed contemporary resonance.

The multi-episode narrative format places sequential scenes within a continuous architectural landscape, with architectural frames separating individual moments. Frediani's figures are somewhat stiff — a characteristic of provincial Tuscan workshop painting outside the main centers — but the narrative sequence is clearly organized and legible. The Indian king's court is rendered with generic contemporary court dress rather than any attempt at ethnographic accuracy, which was standard practice for exotic locations in this period.