From its original location behind the altar of the Trinity at Florence cathedral, this image would have been visible across the entire length of the church. Mary, holding her breast, says to Jesus, "Dearest son, because of the milk that I gave you, have mercy on them." Jesus, touching the wound in his side, gazes up and asks, "My father, let those be saved for whom you wished me to suffer the Passion" as God the Father sends the Dove of the Holy Spirit down from Heaven.
Due to rights restrictions, this image cannot be enlarged, viewed at full screen, or downloaded.
Open Access
As part of the Met's Open Access policy, you can freely copy, modify and distribute this image, even for commercial purposes.
API
Public domain data for this object can also be accessed using the Met's Open Access API.
This artwork is meant to be viewed from right to left. Scroll left to view more.
Detail - the Virgin Mary
Detail - Figures
Artwork Details
Use your arrow keys to navigate the tabs below, and your tab key to choose an item
Title:The Intercession of Christ and the Virgin
Artist:Attributed to Lorenzo Monaco (Piero di Giovanni) (Italian, Florence (?) ca. 1370–1425 Florence (?))
Date:before 1402
Geography:Made in Florence, Tuscany, Italy
Culture:Italian
Medium:Tempera on canvas
Dimensions:Overall: 94 1/4 x 60 1/4 x 1 in. (239.4 x 153 x 2.5 cm)
Classification:Paintings-Canvas
Credit Line:The Cloisters Collection, 1953
Accession Number:53.37
Inscription: [on black band against background] PADRE MIO SIENO SALVI CHOSTORO PEQUALI TU / VOLESTI CHIO PATISSI PASSIONE (My Father, let those be saved for whom you wished me to suffer the Passion); DOLCIXIMO FIGLIUOLO PELLAC: / TE CHIO TIDIE ABBI MIA DI CHOSTORO (Dearest Son, because of the milk that I gave you, have mercy on them).
From the Lady Chapel of the Cathedral of Santa Maria del Fiore, Florence, Italy (removed sometime after 1846); [ William Blundell Spence 1814–1900, Florence (after 1846–sold 1856)] ; Alexander William Crawford Lindsay, 25th Earl of Crawford, 8th Earl of Balcarres 1812–1880, Haigh Hall, Wigan, Lancashire (1856–d.1880) ; by descent to his great-grandson, David Alexander Robert Lindsay, 28th Earl of Crawford and 11th Earl of Balcarres, Haigh Hall, Wigan, Lancashire (sold 1946) ; his sale, Christie's, London (October 11, 1946, no. 18) ; [ Arthur Kauffman, London (1946–sold 1953)]
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Florentine Paintings in the Metropolitan Museum," June 15–August 15, 1971, no catalogue.
Galleria dell'Accademia. "Lorenzo Monaco (1370-1425)," May 8, 2006–September 24, 2006.
New York. The Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Choirs of Angels: Painting in Italian Choir Books, 1300-1500," November 25, 2008–April 12, 2009.
Richa, Giuseppe. Notizie istoriche delle chiese fiorentine. Vol. 6. Florence: Pietro Gaetano Viviani, 1757. pp. 115–16.
Cambiagi, Gaetano. Guida al forestiero per osservare con metodo le rarità e bellezze della città di Firenze. 5th ed. Florence: Stamp. Granducale, 1790. p. 28.
Follini, Vincenzo, and Modesto Rastrelli. Firenze antica e moderna illustrata. Vol. 2. Florence: Pietro Allegrini, 1790. pp. 195–96.
Fantozzi, Federico. Nuova guida ovvero descrizione storico, artistico, critica della città e contorni di Firenze. Florence: Gius. e Fratelli Ducci, 1842. p. 352.
Cavallucci, Camillo Jacopo. S. Maria del Fiore e la sua facciata. Florence: Giovanni Cirri, 1887. pt. 1: p. 241, pt. 2: p. 151.
Poggi, Giovanni. Il Duomo di Firenze: Documenti sulla decorazione della chiesa e del campanile tratti dall'archivio dell'opera. Berlin: Bruno Cassirer, 1909. pp. CIX–CXII, 68–69, 202–5, 208, 212–13, document nos. 371–72, 1006–16, 1019, 1036, 1056, 1061.
Borenius, Tancred. "A Florentine Mystical Picture." Burlington Magazine 41, no. 235 (October 1922). pp. 156–58, ill. opp. p. 155.
Marle, Raimond van. The Development of the Italian Schools of Painting: Volume 3, The Florentine School of the 14th Century. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 1924. p. 625 n. 1.
Marle, Raimond van. The Development of the Italian Schools of Painting: Volume 5, The Local Schools of Central and Southern Italy in the 14th Century. The Hague: Martinus Nijhoff Publishers, 1925. p. 480.
Offner, Richard. Studies in Florentine Painting: The Fourteenth Century. New York: Frederic Fairchild Sherman, 1927. p. 94.
Panofsky, Erwin. "'Imago Pietatis': Ein Beitrag zur Typengeschichte des 'Schmerzensmanns' und der 'Maria Mediatrix'." In Festschrift für Max J. Friedländer zum 60. Geburtstage. Leipzig: E. A. Seemann, 1927. pp. 293–94, 305–6 n. 106, fig. 38.
Scharf, Alfred. Filippino Lippi. Vienna: Anton Schroll, 1935. pp. 46 n. 95, 47.
Berenson, Bernard. Pitture italiane del Rinascimento: catalogo dei principali artisti e delle loro opere con un indice dei luoghi. Valori plastici. Milan: Ulrich Hoepli, 1936. p. 295.
Antal, Frederick. Florentine Painting And Its Social Background: The Bourgeois Republic Before Cosimo De Medicis Advent To Power, XIV And Early XV Centuries. London: Kegan Paul, Trench Trubner & Co. Ltd., 1948. p. 329, pl. 121.
Paatz, Walter, and Elisabeth Paatz. Die Kirchen von Florenz: ein kunstgeschichtliches Handbuch. Volume 3, SS. Maccabei-S. Maria Novella. Frankfurt am Main: Vittorio Klostermann, 1952. p. 401.
Meiss, Millard. "An Early Altarpiece from the Cathedral of Florence." The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin 12, no. 10 (June 1954). pp. 302–17.
Metropolitan Museum of Art. "Eighty-Fourth Annual Report of the Trustees for the Fiscal Year 1953." The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, n.s., 13, no. 1 (Summer 1954). p. 21.
Klesse, Brigitte. "Literatur zur Trecentomalerei in Florenz." Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte 25, no. 3/4 (1962). pp. 271–72.
Berenson, Bernard. Italian Pictures of the Renaissance: Florentine School. Vol. 1. London: Phaidon Press, 1963. p. 132.
Rorimer, James J. The Cloisters: The Building and the Collection of Medieval Art in Fort Tryon Park. 3rd revised ed. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1963. pp. 91–92, fig. 41.
Gore, St. John. The Art of Painting in Florence & Siena from 1250 to 1500. London: Wildenstein & Co., Inc., 1965. no. 32, pp. 18–19, fig. 33.
Bellosi, Luciano. "La Mostra di affreschi staccati, al Forte Belvedere." Paragone 17 (November 1966). p. 78.
de Montebello, Philippe. "Four Prophets by Lorenzo Monaco." The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, n.s., 25, no. 4 (December 1966). pp. 155–56.
Meiss, Millard. French Painting in the Time of Jean de Berry: The Late Fourteenth Century and the Patronage of the Duke. Volume 1, Text. London: Phaidon Press, 1967. p. 383 n. 103.
Bologna, Ferdinando. I pittori alla corte angioina di Napoli, 1266-1414, e un riesame dell'arte nell'età fridericiana. Saggi e studi di storia dell'arte, Vol. 2. Rome: Ugo Bozzi, 1969. pp. 240, 282 n. 10.
Zeri, Federico. Italian Paintings: A Catalogue of the Collection of The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Florentine School. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1971. pp. 56–60.
Fredericksen, Burton B., and Federico Zeri. Census of Pre-Nineteenth-Century Italian Paintings in North American Public Collections. Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1972. pp. 219, 354, 609.
Boskovits, Miklós. Pittura fiorentina alla vigilia del Rinascimento. Florence: Edam, 1975. pp. 105, 229 nn. 91–94, pp. 386, 412, fig. 355, pl. 110.
Rosenfeld, Myra Nan. "A Florentine Quattrocento Altarpiece: Witness to Artistic, Religious Trends." M: A Quarterly Review of the Montreal Museum of Fine Arts 7, no. 2 (1975). pp. 5, 8, 16, fig. 2.
Rosenfeld, Myra Nan. "Problems of Iconography in Italian Painting." Apollo 103 (May 1976). p. 386.
Warner, Marina. Alone of All Her Sex: The Myth and the Cult of the Virgin Mary. New York: Alfred A. Knopf, 1976. pp. xi, 200, 322, fig. 26.
Fahy, Everett. "On Lorenzo di Niccolò." Apollo 108 (December 1978). pp. 380–81, fig. 11.
Pope-Hennessy, John. "Thoughts on Andrea della Robbia." Apollo 109 (March 1979). pp. 191–92, 197 n. 31.
Baetjer, Katharine. European Paintings in The Metropolitan Museum of Art by Artists Born before 1865: A Summary Catalogue. Vol. 1. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1980. p. 92.
Baetjer, Katharine. European Paintings in The Metropolitan Museum of Art by Artists Born before 1865: A Summary Catalogue. Vol. 2. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1980. p. 12.
La Favia, Louis M. The Man of Sorrows: Its Origin and Development in Trecento Florentine Painting. Rome: Sanguis, 1980. p. 96, n. 27, fig. 54.
Végh, Janos. "The Particular Judgment of a Courtier: A Hungarian Fresco of a Rare Iconographical Type." Arte cristiana 74 (September–October 1986). p. 308, fig. 9.
Freuler, Gaudenz. "Die Malavolti-Kapelle des Bartolo di Fredi und Paolo di Giovanni Fei in S. Domenico in Siena." Pantheon 45 (1987). p. 49, fig. 19.
Eisenberg, Marvin. Lorenzo Monaco. Princeton, N.J.: Princeton University Press, 1989. pp. 174, 177, 185–86, 194, 198, fig. 234.
Neri Lusanna, Enrica. "Aspetti della cultura tardogotica a Firenze: il 'Maestro del giudizio di Paride'." Arte Cristiana 77 (November–December 1989). pp. 415, 426 n. 38.
Freuler, Gaudenz. Bartolo di Fredi Cini: Ein Beitrag zur sienesischen Malerei des 14. Jahrhunderts. Disentis, Switzerland: Desertina, 1994. pp. 353, 367, fig. 317.
Baetjer, Katharine. European Paintings in The Metropolitan Museum of Art by Artists Born before 1865: A Summary Catalogue. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1995. p. 13, ill. p. 14.
Villers, Caroline. "Paintings on Canvas in Fourteenth Century Italy." Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte 58, no. 3 (1995). p. 349, fig. 12.
Ahl, Diane Cole. Benozzo Gozzoli. New Haven: Yale University Press, 1996. pp. 145, 303 n. 71, pl. 176.
Hale, Charlotte. "The Technique and Materials of the 'Intercession of Christ and the Virgin' Attributed to Lorenzo Monaco." In The Fabric of Images: European Paintings on Textile Supports in the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries, edited by Caroline Villers. London: Archetype Publications, 2000. pp. 31–41, fig. 1–4, pls. opp. p. 54.
Meilman, Patricia. Titian and the Altarpiece in Renaissance Venice. Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 2000. pp. 43, 213 n. 66, fig. 21.
Pasquinucci, Simona, and Barbara Deimling. Tradition and Innovation in Florentine Trecento Painting: Giovanni Bonsi, Tommaso del Mazza, edited by Miklós Boskovits. A Critical and Historical Corpus of Florentine Painting, Section 4, Vol. 8. Florence: Giunti, 2000. pp. 352, 357–63, pls. LXVII, LXVII.1–3.
Verdon, Timothy. "The 'Intercession of Christ and the Virgin' from Florence Cathedral: Iconographic and Ecclesiological Significance." In The Fabric of Images: European Paintings on Textile Supports in the Fourteenth and Fifteenth Centuries, edited by Caroline Villers. London: Archetype Publications, 2000. pp. 43–54, fig. 1, pls. opp. p. 54.
Williamson, Beth. "The Cloisters Double Intercession: The Virgin as Co-Redemptrix." Apollo CLII (2000). pp. 48—54, fig. 1.
Dehmer, Andreas. Italienische Bruderschaftsbanner des Mittelalters und der Renaissance. Munich: Deutscher Kunstverlag, 2004. no. 61, p. 323.
Strehlke, Carl Brandon. Italian Paintings, 1250–1450, in the John G. Johnson Collection and the Philadelphia Museum of Art. Philadelphia: Philadelphia Museum of Art, 2004. pp. 142–43 n. 42.
Barnet, Peter, and Nancy Y. Wu. The Cloisters: Medieval Art and Architecture. New York and New Haven: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2005. no. 84, pp. 120, 197.
Kanter, Laurence B., and Pia Palladino, ed. Fra Angelico. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2005. pp. 298–99, fig. 184.
Verdon, Timothy. L'arte cristiana in italia: Volume 1, Origini e medioevo. Cinisello Balsamo (Milan): Edizioni San Paolo, 2005. pp. 390, 392, fig. 455.
Bernacchioni, Annamaria. "Firenze." In Gentile da Fabriano: studi e ricerche, edited by Andrea De Marchi, Laura Laureati, and Lorenza Mochi Onori. Milan: Electa, 2006. pp. 130, 132 n. 71, fig. 7.
Miller, Julia I. "The 'Man of Sorrows' at Santa Maria Nuova." In Watching Art: Writings in Honor of James Beck, edited by Lynn Catterson, and Mark Zucker. Todi: Ediart, 2006. p. 176, fig. 5.
Tartuferi, Angelo. "Lorenzo Monaco: Notes on an Exhibition." In Lorenzo Monaco: A Bridge from Giotto's Heritage to the Renaissance, edited by Angelo Tartuferi, and Daniela Parenti. Florence: Galleria dell'Accademia, 2006. no. 22, pp. 27–29.
Tartuferi, Angelo, and Daniela Parenti, ed. Lorenzo Monaco: A Bridge from Giotto's Heritage to the Renaissance. Florence: Galleria dell'Accademia, 2006. no. 22, pp. 115, 161–66.
Boehm, Barbara Drake. "Choirs of Angels: Painting in Italian Choir Books, 1300-1500." The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, n.s., 66, no. 3 (Winter 2009). p. 50, fig. 61.
Gertsman, Elina. "The Pilgrim's Progress: Devotional Journey Through the Holy Womb." In Push Me, Pull You: Physical and Spatial Interaction in Late Medieval and Early Renaissance Art, edited by Sarah Blick, and Laura D. Gelfand. Studies in Medieval and Reformation Traditions 156, Vol. 2. Leiden: Brill, 2011. p. 255 n. 39.
Gertsman, Elina. Worlds Within: Opening the Medieval Shrine Madonna. University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 2015. p. 87, fig. 75.
Stein, Wendy A. How to Read Medieval Art. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2016. no. 28, pp. 15, 103–5, ill. pp. 86–87.
Lorenzo Monaco (Piero di Giovanni) (Italian, Florence (?) ca. 1370–1425 Florence (?))
1408–11
Resources for Research
The Met's Libraries and Research Centers provide unparalleled resources for research and welcome an international community of students and scholars.
The Met Collection API is where all makers, creators, researchers, and dreamers can connect to the most up-to-date data and public domain images for The Met collection. Open Access data and public domain images are available for unrestricted commercial and noncommercial use without permission or fee.
Feedback
We continue to research and examine historical and cultural context for objects in The Met collection. If you have comments or questions about this object record, please complete and submit this form. The Museum looks forward to receiving your comments.
The Museum's collection of medieval and Byzantine art is among the most comprehensive in the world, encompassing the art of the Mediterranean and Europe from the fall of Rome to the beginning of the Renaissance.
