500th Anniversary of the Death of Pietro Perugino

The Virgin Mary with the Christ Child — a detail from Madonna with Child, Saint Sebastian and Saint John the Baptist by Pietro Vannucci, known as Perugino (1446–1523), held in the Uffizi in Florence. To the left: the commemorative inscription "PERUGINO", the dates "1523" and "2023" and the "R" of the Rome mint; to the right: the issuing state "SAN MARINO" and the initials "MAC" of designer Maria Angela Cassol.

Pietro Perugino — born Pietro Vannucci, around 1446 in Città della Pieve in Umbria — is one of the key figures of central Italian painting in the 15th and early 16th centuries. He owes his nickname "Perugino" to Perugia, the Umbrian capital where he worked for an extended period and established his reputation as one of the most sought-after masters of his time. His work is characterised by serene compositions, a distinctive softness of figures, and a harmonious sense of space marked by accurate perspective and clearly structured landscape backgrounds. Pope Sixtus IV commissioned him to paint murals in the Sistine Chapel, where Perugino's frescoes survive to this day alongside those of Michelangelo. Among his pupils was the young Raphael, who initially adopted Perugino's style before far surpassing it — a teacher-student relationship that decisively shaped the history of Renaissance painting.

San Marino, nestled in the central Italian landscape just a few kilometres from the Adriatic Sea, sees itself as culturally rooted in the heritage of this region. Its proximity to Umbria and the Marche — the core areas of Perugino's activity — makes the connection to the painter easy to understand. Among his late works is the panel "Madonna and Child with Saint Sebastian and John the Baptist", now held at the Uffizi Gallery in Florence, which served as the model for the coin's design. Perugino died in 1523, probably of the plague, in Fontignano near Perugia. San Marino marked the 500th anniversary of his death in 2023 by honouring the Umbrian master with its own coin issue.