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Caravaggio has avoided the melodrama and goriness of his earlier works and packed drama into this chiaroscuro work (1601). The naturalistic figures quietly go about their business, the tired workers hauling the cross into place, Peter looking sad and contemplative.

Again, Caravaggio leaves all drama to the effects of light, depicting an awe-struck Paul transfixed by blinding light (1601).

Raphael designed this exquisite chapel for papal banker Agostini Chigi, including the frescoes and niche statues (1519–23).

Cardinal Fabio Chigi hired Bernini to finish the job begun by Raphael 130 years earlier. The artist only deviated from the original plan in two Biblical niche statues.

Raphael’s elder contemporary retained more of their teacher Perugino’s limpid Umbrian style in this 1490 work in the della Rovere chapel. Also in the chapel is Cardinal Cristoforo’s tomb sculpted by Francesco da Sangallo (1478), while Domenico’s tomb (1477) features a Madonna with Child by Mino da Fiesole.

Under triumphal arch tombs, Tuscan Andrea Sansovino gave a Renaissance/Etruscan twist to the traditional lying-in-state look (1505–07). These effigies of Cardinal Girolamo Basso della Rovere and Cardinal Asciano Sforza recline on cushions as if merely asleep.

The only Roman work by Guillaume de Marcillat (1509), the undisputed French master of stained glass, depicts the Infancy of Christ and Life of the Virgin.

The Renaissance architect’s first work in Rome, commissioned by Julius II around 1500, was this beautiful light-filled choir and scallop shell-shaped apse.

Carlo Fontana managed to make this Baroque confection of multicoloured marbles and a Carlo Maratta Immaculate Conception altarpiece blend together in his 1682–7 design.

This altarpiece in the Chigi Chapel (1530–34) is in contrast to the dome’s Neo-pagan themes, the Eternal Father blessing Chigi’s horoscope of planets symbolized by pagan gods.