Gentile da Fabriano's Strozzi Altarpiece.: Liturgical, Patristic, and Apocryphal Sources

This book examines the iconographical sources for Gentile da Fabriano's famous altarpiece originally destined for the mausoleum sacristy of S. Trinita, Florence. Many motifs in this work have been cited as mere decorative conflations of the most secular theme in Christian art. The author finds explanations for them in popular legends, sermons of the Fathers of the Church, and in the liturgy of Advent and Epiphany. The reader will find this study an important prototype to the iconography of the great Journey of the Magi painted by Benozzo Gozzoli for the Medici family in their palace chapel thirty-six years later. Both monuments are key to understanding what "Renaissance" really means.