"Piero della Francesca Code" Reveals 15th-Century Murder?

ROME—Piero della Francesca's masterpiece The Flagellation, at the National Gallery of the Marches in Urbino, holds clues to a high-profile 15th-century murder, one historian is claiming, the London Times reports. In Piero della Francesca and the Assassin, Bernd Roeck, a professor of early modern history at Zurich University, claimed that the work, which appears to represent the flagellation of Jesus Christ before the Crucifixion, actually depicts the murdered Oddantonio da Montefeltro, the Duke of Urbino, and indicts his half brother, Federico da Montefeltro, of the crime. The Jesus figure tied to the pillar is the murdered duke and the figure seated on the far left of the painting "like Pontius Pilate," is Federico da Montefeltro, according to Roeck. One clue is the column to which Christ/Oddantonio is tied, Roeck said, given that Oddantonio's mother was Caterina Colonna ("column" in Italian), and the painting could have been commissioned by the Colonna family to offer clues to future generations. However, other scholars take a different view. "This is Dan Brown territory, a kind of 'Piero della Francesca Code,'" said Silvia Ronchey, a Byzantine scholar, who intends to confront Roeck at a debate in Venice in June. She believes the painting represents the fall of Byzantium to the Turks in 1453.