Stylistically similar to Crivelli's Massa Fermana Altarpiece, the work was a fundamental step in his evolution away from the Paduan Renaissance towards a more delicate and realist style.

A transcribed document in the Fermo archives (the original is now lost) states that the altarpiece was commissioned in 1470 by a man named Giorgio Salvadori, an Albanian immigrant to Italy fleeing the Ottoman advance after Skanderbeg's death in 1468.

The work's dating is based not only on its style but also on 18th-century documents which state that a signature by Crivelli was once visible at the bottom of the frame, reading "CAROLUS CRIVELLUS VENETUS PINXIT ANNO 1470" - this is now illegible.

An 1805 document in the Salvadori family archives refers to a Last Supper, compatible with the measurements of the paintings of "some saints" (a palm) and which may have formed the centre of the predella.

The prior of the monastic community of Porto San Giorgio claimed ownership of the altarpiece, however, and tried to contest the work's sale by the Salvadori family.