Seated on the ground in an open Italian landscape, the Virgin watches as the infant John the Baptist offers a slender cross to the Christ Child, who grasps it, accepting his future Passion. Raphael fits the pyramid of figures into a round panel with ease. The Soviet government secretly sold it from the Hermitage to Andrew Mellon in 1931.
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The flowers at the Virgin's feet carry meaning: violets for humility, cyclamen for love and sorrow, and red-centred anemones for the Passion.
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