This is the central panel from an altarpiece for S. Maria della Scala, Verona. The altarpiece was a triptych with a central panel and a flanking panel on either side. The flanking panel of Saint Roch by Paolo Morando is also in the National Gallery’s collection, but the other flanking panel of Saint Sebastian by Francesco di Marco India Torbido is missing. It is quite unusual for each of the three panels of a triptych to be painted by a different artist. The commission for this work was connected with an outbreak of plague in Verona from 1510 to 1512. Roch and Sebastian are both saints invoked against plague. The panel of Saint Roch is dated 1518.

The Virgin Mary, Christ Child and Saint Anne are in an enclosed rose garden, or hortus conclusus, symbolic of the Virgin’s purity. They are sitting on each other’s laps beneath a lemon tree, emphasising that this is the generational family tree of Christ. The lemon tree features frequently in images of the Virgin and Child produced in Verona during this period, including in the National Gallery’s other painting by Morando, The Virgin and Child, Saint John the Baptist and an Angel, in which the Baptist presents Christ with the traditional offering of a lemon (or etrog), as mentioned in Leviticus 23: 40.

Here the lemon tree may refer to the Song of Solomon (2: 3), in which it becomes a symbol of the beloved or Christ: ‘As a citron among trees of the forest, So is my beloved among the sons, In his shade I delighted, and sat down, And his fruit is sweet to my palate.‘ Gerolamo dai Libri included a lemon tree behind the Virgin and Saint Anne in his similar altarpiece for S. Paolo in Campo Marzio, Verona, and another appears in his Madonna and Child with Saints Lorenzo Giustiniani and Zeno (1526) in San Giorgio in Braida, Verona. A single lemon is placed as an offering before the Virgin and Child’s throne in his Madonna dell’ombrello (Museo di Castelvecchio, Verona) dated 1530.

The dead dragon at the feet of the Virgin and the olive branch held by the Christ Child symbolise his defeat of the devil but may also refer to the ending of the 1516 siege of Verona. The city was under siege by the French and the Venetians, who were trying to reclaim it from the Emperor Maximilian I. After the Treaty of Brussels in December 1516, Emperor Maximilian I gave Verona to his grandson Charles I of Spain, who ceded it to France, who then returned it to Venice.

Gerolamo dai Libri was a specialist in manuscript illumination – hence his nickname ‘dai Libri’ (of the books) – and his larger paintings also reflect this training. Here it is evident in his skilful observation and recording of the details of the natural world, his rich palette of jewel-like colours, his decorative style and his precise, carefully blended brushwork. Working in Verona, at the crossroads of artistic influences, his work combines the emphasis on light and colour of Venetian art and the sculptural style of Paduan painting derived from works by Mantegna, with a focus on naturalistic detail inspired by northern European artists – especially prints by Albrecht Dürer, which directly influenced dai Libri’s landscape backgrounds.