This drawing of the Adoration of the Magi presents the Virgin and the infant Jesus at the center of the composition. Standing at the right, Joseph presents a woman with a child while, at the left, various shepherds kneel. This work’s technique and models suggest that it was made by Carlo Maratti around 1656, and it can be compared to three drawings that Maratti made that same year for the fresco of Saint Joseph Recognized by his Brothers, which he was supposed to paint on one of the walls of the gallery at the Palazzo Quirinale in Rome the following year. In fact, it was painted by Pier Francesco Mola, although Maratti did paint an Adoration of the Shepherds for that same gallery. And, while it differs from the drawing presented here, there are numerous similarities in the overall layout of the scene and in the figures’ postures. These, and their relation to the groups in drawings for the fresco of Saint Joseph Recognized by his Brothers might possibly allow us to consider the present drawing an initial idea for the Quirinale fresco, which the artist would have abandoned in favor of a richer and more complex composition (Text drawn from Mena Marqués, M.: Catálogo de dibujos. VI. Dibujos italianos del siglo XVII, Museo del Prado, 1983, p.117).