The Auricola icon
The panel is very interesting for its iconography, but it is in a poor state of conservation and is waiting to be restored. In the late 70s of last century the panel was moved to Rome, where some of the damage and the repainting, which had altered a fair chunk of the panel, were only partially cleared away. This work has many lacunas: in the upper section, you can  see the wooden support; in the lower section, the dark gray stucco, made in a previous intervention remains visible. The first restoration was carried out in 1841; an inscription on the back marks both the date and name of the restorer: «G. Pileri p(i)nse p(roprio) p(ennello) / R(estauravit) A(nno) D(omini) 1841». It is possible that he is Giovanni Pileri, best know for his restorations between Rome and Marche a few years later²⁶. The “commissioner” of this intervention was Paolo Roccasecca, who was financed by Francesco Trojani in his work. The Virgin’s head was retouched, while the garments of the figures and the Madonna of the Annunciation scene, found in upper left, were repainted. Although they no longer exist, it is possible that during this restoration Christ’s left eye and the Virgin’s breast were reconstructed. As a result of the restoration, legitimacy was given to this work, but at the cost of a general distortion of the painted surface. However, any documentation of this restoration, as well as of the one completed in the 60s of the 20th century, during which the pictorial material was  consolidated, is missing. . In the late 70s a restoration was again made on the panel, but it has not yet been completed.
The area of the painting is divided into three parts: in the middle of the panel there is the Virgin enthroned, breast-feeding Christ while almost rocking him. On both sides there are two saints who seem to hold two holy pyxes. Above them, there are two Marian scenes: the Annunciation in the upper left and the Nativity in the upper right. Simple red frames divide the surface of the panel. The measurement of the panel is 1.33 x 1.035 m.
A poor bibliography exists on the Auricola icon. G. Tomassetti introduced it in 1899 as a work of the thirteenth century and focused on the two saints, identified as the «due Marie del Vangelo, che curarono la sepoltura di Gesù»²⁷. This hypothesis is grounded on an inventory of the church’s property of 1731, in which the writer had described the panel as «quadro della Madonna con in braccio il Figlio che sta poppando dalla zinna della gloriosa Madre e con ai piedi due Marie»²⁸. All subsequent scholars have accepted Tomassetti’s opinion²⁹. A date for the painting was also proposed a few times as being in the early fifteenth century, because local tradition says this icon was a gift to Giovanna II, queen of the Kingdom of Naples (1414–1435)³⁰. Recently, G. Leone has confirmed the possibility that the two female saints are two holy Mirofore (Mary of Cleopas and Mary Salome or Mary Magdalene) and that the panel is a work of the first quarter of the fourteenth century, with influences from Puglia and Campania, and contains elements of modern interventions³¹.
The identification of the two anonymous saints is not easy to sort out, because the inventory of the eighteenth century defines them as «due Marie», a term that also refers to the description of other frescoes of our Sanctuary («un dipinto antico nel muro raffigurante Gesù Cristo legato alla colonna e due Marie ai lati»³²). «Maria» may also simply indicate a female and not necessarily one of the women who went to Christ’s tomb. The Virgin with the suckling Christ is instead more particular because it presents unusual features, found not only in her elongated body, which is almost almond-shaped, but also for the iconographic solution: she rocks Christ and she holds him with both hands. The Galaktotrophousa image is more widespread in Lazio and in its neighboring regions where the Mother usually holds the Child in one hand, while offering him her breast with the other  . In pious icons of Lazio, Abruzzo and Southern Italy, Christ is put on her right or left knee, but is never suspended or held in both hands. The Virgin who nurses the Child while rocking him is a rare variant of Galaktotrophusa, best known in several examples of the fourteenth century; however, the Virgin is always painted half-length, in a very tender gesture. In the Amaseno icon the Mother is sitting on throne. Her solemn representation appears to be due to the almond-shape of the Virgin’s body, which prevents her from keeping the Child on her knee. The space was indeed very restricted and there was no other way to portray the breastfeeding.
In view of its poor state of conservation, this panel must be investigated with great care from a stylistic point of view. There are, however, many formal differences: high pictorial quality and some archaic elements that distinguish the female saints, especially the refined faces, with their absent and melancholy expressions. The Virgin is rather solemn, almost “gothic” with the almond-shape of her head and body. Narrative scenes are lively, as in the Nativity of Christ, even if it is possible that there could be further additions.
The icon could be dated back to the early decades of the fourteenth century, not for stylistic reasons which, as we have seen, are shaky, but on the basis of historical observation. In 1315, Count Riccardo da Ceccano had control over the whole valley of Amaseno flume and ordered in his last will and testament that upon his tomb, «in ecclesia sanctae Mariae Castri Sancti Laurentii», was erected «(…) unum altare ubi quotidie divina officia celebrentur pro anima sua (…), quod sit et vocetur altare sanctae Mariae de Auricula ad reverentiam Virginis (…)»³³. The Count chose to be buried in the Amaseno Collegiate, below an altar dedicated to Madonna dell’Auricola, which at that time brought fame to the deceased. It seems plausible that our icon, the emblem of the Sanctuary, already exists and that it is precisely referring to Riccardo’s intervention in favor of this monastery³⁴.