Sistine Chapel historical timeline

Last updated on October 5, 2026

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A chapel rebuilt by one della Rovere pope and repainted twice for another, losing a starry sky and three frescoes along the way.

Chronology

1477–1480 — Sixtus IV della Rovere, pontiff from 1471 to 1484, has the ancient Cappella Magna restructured. Structural impact: the box you stand in. What you see today: the chapel's shape, and its name.
1481–1482 — the walls are frescoed by a team of Perugino, Botticelli, Ghirlandaio and Rosselli with their workshops and collaborators including Biagio di Antonio, Bartolomeo della Gatta and Luca Signorelli: the feigned draperies, the Stories of Moses and of Christ and the portraits of the Pontiffs. Pier Matteo d'Amelia paints a starry sky on the vault. The marble transenna, cantoria and the papal arms over the door are made in the same period. Structural impact: the chapel is finished and furnished. What you see today: the walls — and not the sky.
15 August 1483 — Sixtus IV consecrates and dedicates the new chapel to the Assumption. Structural impact: none. What you see today: the dedication that Michelangelo's altar wall would later paint over.
1508 — Julius II della Rovere, Sixtus's nephew, decides to change the decoration and entrusts it to Michelangelo Buonarroti. Structural impact: the starry vault is lost. What you see today: the beginning of the ceiling.
October 1512 — Michelangelo completes the vault and the lunettes, the nine central panels carrying the Stories of Genesis, from the Creation to the Fall of man, the Flood and the subsequent rebirth of humanity with the family of Noah. The pope inaugurates the Chapel on All Saints' Day with a solemn Mass. Structural impact: none. What you see today: the ceiling.
1522 — the door collapses, gravely damaging the frescoes of the entrance wall. Structural impact: physical damage to two fifteenth-century paintings. What you see today: the reason that wall is not original.
Late 1533 — Clement VII de' Medici charges Buonarroti with painting the Last Judgment on the altar wall. Structural impact: the altar wall is to be cleared. What you see today: the commission that cost the chapel three paintings.
1536–1541 — Michelangelo begins under Paul III in 1536 and finishes in the autumn of 1541. The work destroys Perugino's altarpiece of the Virgin Assumed among the Apostles and the first two episodes of the stories of Moses and of Christ. Structural impact: one wall becomes a single picture. What you see today: the Last Judgment, and two cycles that start late.
Second half of the 16th century — Ghirlandaio's Resurrection of Christ is re-executed by Hendrik van den Broeck and Signorelli's Dispute over the body of Moses by Matteo da Lecce, after the 1522 collapse. Structural impact: none. What you see today: the entrance wall, at one remove.
1979–1999 — the chapel is completely restored. Structural impact: twenty years of cleaning. What you see today: the colour.
Today — the Sistine Chapel is still the seat of the Conclave for the election of the Supreme Pontiff. Structural impact: none. What you see today: a working room, open when it is not in use.

Verified against Turismo Roma, October 2026.

Sources & verification Covers the sourced claims on this page.

Checked against Turismo Roma — Turismo Roma records that the Sistine Chapel takes its name from Pope Sixtus IV della Rovere, pontiff from 1471 to 1484, who had the ancient Cappella Magna restructured between 1477 and 1480, Turismo Roma records that the fifteenth-century decoration of the Sistine Chapel's walls, including the feigned draperies, the Stories of Moses and of Christ and the portraits of the Pontiffs, was executed by a team of painters initially made up of Pietro Perugino, Sandro Botticelli, Domenico Ghirlandaio and Cosimo Rosselli, assisted by their workshops and by closer collaborators among whom stand out Biagio di Antonio, Bartolomeo della Gatta and Luca Signorelli, Turismo Roma records that on the vault of the Sistine Chapel Pier Matteo d'Amelia painted a starry sky, that the execution of the frescoes began in 1481 and ended in 1482, the same period as the marble works including the transenna, the cantoria and the papal coat of arms above the entrance door, and that on 15 August 1483 Sixtus IV consecrated and dedicated the new chapel to the Assumption, Turismo Roma records that Julius II della Rovere, pontiff from 1503 to 1513, decided to change the chapel's decoration and entrusted the task to Michelangelo Buonarroti in 1508; the artist painted the vault and the lunettes, completing the work in October 1512, with the nine central panels depicting the Stories of Genesis from the Creation to the Fall of man, the Flood and the subsequent rebirth of humanity with the family of Noah, and the Pontiff inaugurated the Chapel on All Saints' Day with a solemn Mass, Turismo Roma records that towards the end of 1533 Pope Clement VII de' Medici charged Buonarroti with modifying the decoration further by painting the Last Judgment on the altar wall, that Michelangelo began the work in 1536 under the pontificate of Paul III and brought it to completion in the autumn of 1541, and that its execution led to the loss of the fifteenth-century frescoes of the altarpiece with the Virgin Assumed among the Apostles and of the first two episodes of the stories of Moses and of Christ, painted by Perugino, Turismo Roma records that in the second half of the sixteenth century Ghirlandaio's Resurrection of Christ was re-executed by Hendrik van den Broeck and Signorelli's Dispute over the body of Moses by Matteo da Lecce, both frescoes of the entrance wall having been gravely damaged by the collapse of the door in 1522, Turismo Roma records that the first nucleus of the Vatican Museums, a collection of ancient sculpture, was formed by Julius II, though the idea of the museum was born with Clement XIII, who with Winckelmann's assistance had the Museo Profano set up, and that the Museo Pio Clementino, gathering the best known examples of ancient sculpture such as the Apollo Belvedere, the Laocoön group and the Belvedere Torso, came into being under Clement XIV and Pius VI, Turismo Roma records that the Vatican Pinacoteca holds works datable from the 12th to the 18th century by artists including Lorenzetti, Martini, Giotto, Beato Angelico, Filippo Lippi, Perugino, Pinturicchio, Titian, Carracci, Caravaggio, Poussin, Guido Reni and Guercino, and that in 1973 Paul VI inaugurated the Historical Museum and the Collection of Modern Religious Art, set up in part in the rooms of the Borgia Apartment decorated by Pinturicchio, showing works by Rosai, Boccioni, Balla, De Chirico, Guttuso and Manzù, Turismo Roma records that the Sistine Chapel, completely restored between 1979 and 1999, is still today the seat of the Conclave for the election of the Supreme Pontiff (October 2026).

Sistine Chapel historical timeline

Chronology

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