News on Prester John in the Rome of Gregory XIII: Echoes of the Ethiopian Question in the Contarelli Chapel from Muziano to Caravaggio

The essay examines the contents of the Relatione della Religione, & Stato del Re d’Ethiopia, detto «Prete Gianni» addressed to Pope Gregory XIII, dwelling on some news related to the relationship of Ethiopian Christians with sacred images and on the echoes of Ethiopian religiosity and the problematic dialogue between Catholicism and Abyssini an Christianity traceable in some artistic commissions of the second Roman 16th century. The article intends to open to new possible interpretations of the iconographic program of the Contarelli Chapel in S. Luigi dei Francesi, whose decoration, planned as early as 1565 by the apostolic referendario Mathieu Cointrel, made cardinal by Pope Boncom pagni in 1583, was only completed between 1599 and 1602 by Caravaggio