The first southern span is devoted to St. Ambrogio.
The patron saint of Milan is carved on the keystone
St. Ambrogio and Mary Immaculate are the central figures in the carved and painted stone polyptych.
It was carved by anonymous sculptors working for the Fabbrica del Duomo in 1482 for the donor Giacomo Vitudono, the canon portrayed kneeling and in red clothes in the first panel at the top left.
Above the entrance door the Gothic window has a stained-glass window painted by Pompeo Bertini (1854-1855) with the saints Lucia, Apollonia, Pietro Martire, Andrea Avellino.
Above the altar the blind window is walled from the beginning, as it was impossible to enlarge the opening because the internal and the external arches of the span did not coincide.
At human height on the pillars connecting the main nave there are two little bronze statues depicting St. Rita of Cascia and St. Antonio of Padova, made in the last century (1934).
Leaning on the second counter pillar there is the monumental and rhetorical marble sculptural group depicting cardinal Tomeo Gallio (who died in 1607), the founder of the Collegio Gallio (1583) and of the Opera Pia Gallio, by Luigi Agliati (1861)
Giorgio Scotti is the documented painter and gilder of the relief of St. Ambrogio in the keystone (1468).
The chapel is devoted both to St. Ambrogio and to Mary Immaculate, who is depicted above, in adoration of the Child, in the center of the polyptych, according to the vision of St. Brigida. Giacomo Vitudono, in red clothes, kneeling and holding his cap, turns to Her, under the protection of St. Lucia, recognizable by the torch she holds.
St. Lucia was very important for Como, because on the day of her feast, on 13th December 1439, peace was sanctioned between the Como factions that had been fighting for centuries.
St. James of Compostella, the donor’s onomastic saint, is represented in pilgrim’s clothing on the opposite panel.
On the lower tier St. Ambrogio is flanked by the martyrs Proto and Giacinto, worshipped in the Cathedral, where their relics are kept in the high altar.
In the predella, from left to right, there are the saints Stefano, Lorenzo, Rocco, Antonio da Padova, Leonardo, Caterina d’Alessandria.
These half-lenght saints are described by the inscriptions, but they are recognizable by the iconographic attributes: the first two, the protomartyrs Stefano and Lorenzo are characterized respectively by the stones on the bloody head and by the gridiron on which Lorenzo was burned.
Rocco, protector against the plague, was a pilgrim as we see from his clothes.
Antonio of Padova, a Franciscan friar, who performed miracles, is identified by the tunic and the lilies.
St. Leonardo, the protector of smiths and prisoners, holds the handcuffs.
St. Caterina of Alessandria holds the cogwheel, with which the torturers tried to torture her: the wheel is horizontally placed so we can see its rays.
The overlooking figure of St. Ambrogio, wearing green paraments, is raising his arm: the scourge he held against the heretic, the little figure defending himself, has been lost. We can see the scourge depicted in the keystone where the relief of St. Ambrogio has been painted by Giorgio Scotti with the red cross on white background, that is the coat of arms of Milan. The donor of the altarpiece was from Vimercate, near Milan. He was a lawyer, whose name IA(COBVS) DE VITVDONO we can read in the inscription after the year 1482. The attribute “CUMANUS CANONICUS” means that he was a canon of the Cathedral of Como.
The polyptych he had done is of carved, painted and gilded Musso marble and sandstone.
The artists should be identified among the masters working at the completion of the façade under the leadership of Luchino Scarabota from Milan.
Christ Almighty is represented in the semicircular cymatium, he is dressed in purple, among red painted cherubs on a starry sky background, showing the inscription “EGO SUM LUX MONDI” (I am the light of the world): it is still a medieval image, closed in the semicircular cymatium inspired by the Renaissance altarpieces in use from Toscana to Veneto.
A few years later, in 1489, the stained glass window was made, then replaced by this nineteenth-century one by Pompeo Bertini.
In 1492 Bartolomeo Maggi founded a chaplaincy devoted to the Immaculate Virgin. The Maggi family remained the owner of that chaplaincy for a long time.
An empty compartment appears under the altar table: behind the grate specially designed by the architect Federico Frigerio and made by the sculptor Pietro Tavani in 1935 the relic of the body of Blessed Maddalena Albricci was exhibited, which was then moved to the church of Brunate (1992).