Presentation of Christ in the Temple

The Later Years

Presentation of Christ in the Temple, 1552-1556

oil on canvas
Delegazione Pontificia per Il Santuario della Santa Casa, Loreto

The Virgin tenderly presents the infant Christ to the elderly priest Simeon, in fulfillment of the Lord's promise that he would live to behold his Savior. The curious detail of the four human feet supporting the altar may be Lotto's imaginative response to a religious text such as the passage from the biblical book of Isaiah in which the Lord says: "Heaven is my throne and the earth my footstool. What is this house you will build to me?" The passage is interpreted as a prophecy of the coming of Christ and the establishment of the Christian church.