POLYPTYCH. - Term generally adopted to indicate a complex of more than three painted panels, joined together by a frame of an architectural character.
Indeed, a diptych is a complex of two paintings joined together, whose compositions complete each other or do not, and a triptych is a complex of three paintings whose lateral ones are called wings or shutters. To the terms tetraptych, pentaptych, etc., that of polyptych is generally preferred, also because in most cases, between the 14th and 15th centuries, when polyptychs were most widespread, besides the compositions of greater importance, panels of smaller dimensions but equally painted found space within the complex frames, especially in the cymatium, in the pilasters, in the predella. Characteristic examples are found in Sienese painting, in Umbrian painting, in Venetian painting, etc., especially in the regions where the taste for Gothic architecture was most widespread.
In a polyptych, at the base, the predella is generally distinguished, divided into several compartments; upon it rest pilasters that culminate in pinnacles or spires and frame panels that are almost always arched. Above these there is often a second order of painted panels of smaller dimensions than the previous ones and in turn surmounted by small panels that are almost always polylobed. Typical is the polyptych by Nicola Alunno, which is in the Pinacoteca of Gualdo Tadino, and those with various figured elements in polychrome sculpture by the masters of the Murano school.
Emilio Lavagnino