Cardinal Camillo Massimo

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Camillo Massimo or Cardinal Camillo II Massimo was a cardinal in Rome, best remembered as a major patron of Baroque artists such as Pouissin, Lorrain, Velazquez, Duquesnoy, Algardi, Francesco Fontana and Cosimo Fancelli.

Born as Carlo in 1620 into the prominent Massimo family, he was educated at the Sapienza. He succeeded at age 20 to the estate of his cousin Camillo, from whom he derived his name. The elder Camillo had been the executor of the will of another great Roman collector, Marchese Vicenzo Giustiniani. In 1653, he was made patriarch of Jerusalem and an year later Nunzio to Spain. However, Phillip IV refused his appointmen, complaining he was too friendly with the French. He was forced to stop for a year in a small town between Valencia and Madrid. In 1670, Pope Clement X made him Cardinal and Maestro di Camera. His portraits were painted by both Velazquez and Carlo Maratta. He reoganized the Roman academy, the Umoristi. He had copies made by Pietro Santo Bartoli of the illustratration on of an antique edition of Virgil and drawings based on the ancient paintings found in the Tomb of the Nasonii in Rome.

• Haskell, Francis (1993). “Chapter 6”, Patrons and Painters: Art and Society in Baroque Italy, 1980, Yale University Press, p 114-119.