Images that tell the story of salvation illustrate saints in various scenes. They are often depicted by an emblem or icon. It used to be that we knew enough about the saints to recognize them in images or artworks without much trouble, but it is becoming a struggle.

This book is a solution. It is a guide for recognizing and understanding the saints. This text explains such things as why so many of the saints appear in images with Jesus and the Virgin Mary, yet remain unnamed, which symbols are associated with each saint, and what their roles were in Christian salvation. With full-color images and biographical information about the saints, it is a work of popular religious culture and anthropology.

Fernando Lanzi and Gioia M.G. Lanzi are founders and directors of the Centro Studi Per La Cultura Popolare, a cultural association that studies and researches the expression of the sacred and the Christian faith. Fernando is a member of the Commission on Sacred Art and the Institute for the History of the Church of the Diocese of Bologna and Gioia is a professor of Sacred Art at the Phylosophical Dominican Stadium in Bologna.