Jesus wriggles on a parapet offering cherries to his mother, a reference to the doctrine of the Original sin and to the red color of the blood of the Passion of Christ, while, on the right side, Saint John the Baptist leans out.

The infant John offering a cherry, a symbol of virginity, is holding a scroll with the inscription "ECCE AGNVS DEI."

This is similar to the infant John holding a lily of the valley in Albrecht Dürer's Madonna del Lucherino [it] (Berlin Gesellschaft), executed in Venice, in 1506.

This is a traditional composition in the Venetian style, referable to Giovanni Bellini, but also to the mentioned work of Dürer, also seen in the unusually detailed realism of Zacharias.

Titian however updated the theme with a greater sense of movement that animates the characters, who are seen sometimes facing downwards or upwards, and with the use of bright and full-bodied colors, in the name of overcoming tonality.