Adoration of the Magi (Ospedale degli Innocenti)

The Adoration of the Magi is a painting by the Italian Renaissance master Domenico Ghirlandaio, executed around 1485–1488 and housed in the Ospedale degli Innocenti gallery in Florence, Italy.

A third Magus stands on the left, wearing a yellow and red cloak, gifting a richly decorated chalice.

On the right, in the Magi procession, are three richly donned men, which have been identified as major members of the Arte della Seta (Guild of the Silk Workers), the main financial backer of the Hospital.

Above them, the procession continues in the far background, passing under an arch (with the date, MCCCCLXXXVIII, or 1488) another possible symbol of the fall of the transition between paganism and Christianity.

Finally, painted above a lake landscape with ships among hills and mountains, a layman and a clerk observe the scene: they symbolize the main institutions backing the orphanage.

The city in the left background is a symbolic representation of Rome: edifices include the Colosseum, Trajan's Column, the Torre delle Milizie and the Pyramid of Cestius.

Detail of one of the innocenti .
Detail of the portraits on the right.
Deposition from the Cross (tempera on wood, 1488): one of the predella's scenes by Bartolomeo di Giovanni