Predella with Annunciation and Scenes from the Lives of Four
Saints This predella depicts defining events in the lives of the
Madonna and Saints John the Baptist, Lawrence, Stephen, and
Anthony of Padua, all represented on the main panel of an
altarpiece now in a Roman private collection. Decorated
pilasters capped with Corinthian capitals divide the predella
into clearly defined scenes of martyrdom and wonder, while a
verdant, mountainous landscape in the distance provides a
rhythmic continuity of peaks and valleys that draws the eye
across the panel’s individual narratives. Traditionally the
devotional focus of an altarpiece, the Virgin receives the
widest section at the center of the predella with a depiction of
the Annunciation, the moment when Mary’s destiny to bear the
Christ Child is revealed to her by the Archangel Gabriel. Nicola
places the four remaining scenes on either side of the
Annunciation—just as the saints would appear on either side of
the Madonna in the main panel. Significantly larger in