Vatican City, Mar 30, 2005 / 22:00 pm
The Vatican has announced that next week, it will issue a set of four stamps featuring details of one of the most prominent paintings in the recent history of the Holy See. In addition, the Vatican plans to issue a special Euro coin honoring of the 27th year of the pontificate of Pope John Paul II.
On April 5th, The Philatelic and Numismatic Office of the Governorate of Vatican City plans to issue 300,000 sets of the stamps, which will feature details from the painting, "Resurrection of Christ" by Perugino.
120,000 copies of a leaflet featuring the Risen Christ, the central part of the painting, will also be released to accompany the stamps. The full series of four stamps costs 3.02 Euro and the leaflet will be 2.80 Euro.
According to the Vatican, Perugino, also known as Pietro Vannucci, painted the altarpiece of the Resurrection of Christ during a period of only two months in 1499 as a decoration for a noble family's chapel in the Church of San Francesco al Prato in Perugia.