Purchased on the antique market as a work by Luca Giordano, this painting can, as Andrea Spiriti noted in his description, be compared with the canvas on the same subject in the North Carolina Museum of Art, Raleigh [1].

While some stylistic weaknesses, partially accentuated by a less than perfect state of preservation, would suggest that it may be a copy, as Spiriti points out, the painting does display elements of marked quality, above all in the handling of colour and the definition of the faces. This evidence supports the view that the Cariplo Foundation canvas is not simply a copy by an unknown hand but rather the work of someone in the entourage of Luca Giordano. As the recent studies by Oreste Ferrari and Giuseppe Scavizzi have established, replicas of the Neapolitan master’s works were frequently produced by some of his assistants, especially Nicola Malinconico and Giuseppe Simonelli.

The latter worked in such close contact with Luca Giordano that he was assigned the task of completing the jobs left unfinished on the master’s departure for Spain. This talent for replication to the point where it sometimes proved difficult to distinguish between the original and the copy was widely recognised by contemporaries, as documented in the sources. At the same time, it also constituted the limitation of an artist who never moved beyond the master’s style and especially his “dark manner”.

The Cariplo Foundation painting can be compared with the Prodigal Son series from the H. Meade-Fetherstonhaugh Collection at Uppark, now owned by the National Trust. The themes of Giordanesque painting are developed with less fluidity and spontaneity, and this is a significant characteristic of Simonelli’s production in general.

As regards dating, the work was probably produced in much the same period as the American prototype, which was painted around 1675–80.