The disappearance of the «Nativity with Saints Lawrence and Francis of Assisi», painted by Caravaggio is still considered one of the most sensational thefts of works of art in history.

The disappearance of the Mona Lisa, stolen by an Italian painter who wanted to return Leonardo Da Vinci’s masterpiece to Italy ( read here ), is not the only theft left in history. There is another painting, stolen on a rainy night in October from a church in Palermo, which has been making people talk for more than fifty years with its load of mysteries, more or less credible theories, confessions and stories in which it is no longer possible to distinguish reality from fantasy. This is the Nativity with Saints Lorenzo and Francis of Assisi , an oil on canvas by Caravaggio, a precious work (the market value is around 20 million dollars according to the FBI) ​​never found again.

Half a century was not enough to solve the mystery of one of Michelangelo Merisi ‘s most beautiful paintings which inspired Leonardo Sciascia, providing him with the inspiration for his latest novel, a simple story.

The theft of Caravaggio’s Nativity

October 18, 1969 . That stormy night a small street in the historic center of Palermo became the scene of one of the most famous thefts of works of art in history. Set on the main altar of the Oratory of San Lorenzo for over three hundred years, there was the «Nativity with Saints Lawrence and Francis of Assisi», a canvas by the Italian painter preserved in that place of worship in baroque style, among small squares, shops, huts and historic buildings in disrepair, where it was easy for thieves to enter. It is said that they began planning the coup after an episode of “Hidden Masterpieces”, the famous Rai program which every week revealed one of the many wonders of the Italian artistic heritage hidden in the cities.

With an ease that today seems unthinkable, the strangers, hooded – according to the story of some witnesses – snuck into the Church in the heart of Palermo, detached the cloth from the altar, cut it with millimetric precision and took it away, rolled up like a carpet, on a pickup truck. Nobody noticed anything. When the custodian discovered the theft it was almost evening: the painting had disappeared into thin air. From that moment on, he will only appear in the stories of repentants and mafiosi, in imaginative reconstructions. But let’s go in order.

At first, it was thought that the thieves, common criminals, were unaware of the inestimable value of the stolen work. The intent was to cut it into pieces and sell it on the black market, but the plan would have failed due to the fame of the work that went beyond the borders of Sicily and the attention that the theft had raised. So what happened to the Nativity? Among the many hypotheses, never discarded and never confirmed, there is also the one that Cosa Nostra commissioned the theft.

A ‘brag’ of the mafia: the legend of the Cosa Nostra meetings and other theories

According to a repentant, the canvas of the Nativity was a “regular guest” during the meetings of the Dome : it was displayed as a symbol of power and prestige. According to another, Totò Riina used Caravaggio’s jewel as a bedside rug. There are many theories on the fate of the work linked to the Sicilian mafia, but all the paths indicated by picciotti who decided to open their mouths found no results or, worse, ended in a dead end.

Buried in the countryside of Palermo by the boss Gerlando Alberti (the iron chest with the canvas was never found in the place indicated by his nephew), destroyed forever as told by Francesco Marino Mannoia (the collaborator confided to judge Giovanni Falcone that he was one of the authors materials of the theft and that, in detaching the canvas and rolling it up, it would have been irreparably damaged). It was still used as a bargaining chip by Giovanni Brusca who offered to return the painting in exchange for a reduction in the 41 bis. Burnt after being gnawed by mice and pigs according to Gaspare Spatuzza (the repentant said that the Nativity had been entrusted to the Pullarà family and hidden in a stable where, without protection, it was gnawed by mice and pigs. The remains of the canvas were then burned .

Destroyed, lost forever, but in the Irpinia earthquake a British journalist Peter Watson came down who declared that he had been on the verge of buying Caravaggio’s jewel from an art dealer, but that at the meeting in Laviano, in the province of Salerno , scheduled for the evening of November 23, never showed up due to the disaster that devastated the region.

What is now on the altar of the Oratory of San Lorenzo alla Kalsa, surrounded by Serpotta’s elegant stuccoes, is only a perfect reproduction of the work, created in 2015.