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Source Description
This "tondo" (round painting) depicts the "Virgo lactans," the Latin term for the nursing Virgin Mary. The image testifies to the humanity of Christ as it shows that he consumed food like all other humans. Mary is seated on the ground--in this pose, she is known as the Madonna of Humility. The young Saint John the Baptist, Jesus' second cousin, gazes reverently at Christ. John the Baptist was the patron saint of Florence, and the painting comes from the Florentine artist Sandro Botticelli's workshop, suggesting the tondo was painted for a patron from that city. A "tondo" was not used as an altarpiece and could be hung in a private home.
Scholar Source Context
Document identity
localId
15551
label
Madonna and Child with the Young Saint John the Baptist
core
obj
dtoType
drawing
citationUrl
pageCount
2
Source metadata
id
15551
sourceUrl
contentType
drawing
stage
normalized
title
Madonna and Child with the Young Saint John the Baptist
description
This "tondo" (round painting) depicts the "Virgo lactans," the Latin term for the nursing Virgin Mary. The image testifies to the humanity of Christ as it shows that he consumed food like all other humans. Mary is seated on the ground--in this pose, she is known as the Madonna of Humility. The young Saint John the Baptist, Jesus' second cousin, gazes reverently at Christ. John the Baptist was the patron saint of Florence, and the painting comes from the Florentine artist Sandro Botticelli's workshop, suggesting the tondo was painted for a patron from that city. A "tondo" was not used as an altarpiece and could be hung in a private home.
provenance
Don Marcello Massarenti Collection, Rome [date and mode of acquisition unknown] [1897 catalogue: no. 31, as Botticelli]; Henry Walters, Baltimore, 1902, by purchase; Walters Art Museum, 1931, by bequest.
date
1495-1499 (Renaissance)
citationUrl
rightsUri
CC0
language
en
genreSpecific
Painting & Drawing
tondi
imageCount
2
pageCount
2
source
import
dimensions
units
cm
width
93.5
height
3.7
dimensionsRaw
Painted surface Diam: 36 13/16 x D: 1 7/16 in. (93.5 x 3.7 cm)
Source extras
med
tempera and oil on wood panel
creator_ids
15774
collection_ids
REN
exhibition_ids
none
Page inventory
seq
1
type
photo
mediaId
54014d2876006c92
hasOcr
no
hasDescription
no
seq
2
type
photo
mediaId
e02799aff85bd4d4
hasOcr
no
hasDescription
no