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St. Anne, the mother of the Virgin Mary, is the elderly female saint kneeling on the floor in the interior of a temple and the heavenly apparition that takes place above her head foretells her conception of Mary, the child in the upper register of the composition in a flowing dress, standing on a crescent moon, symbol of the Immaculate Conception, who in her turn would be the mother of Jesus. Wing
In her 1983 catalogue, Mena Marques rightly brought attention to the very high quality of this drawing and suggested the style could be Sienese, from the end of the sixteenth century and the beginning of the seventeenth. Although some Tuscan elements do seem to be displayed here -for example the particular use of the red chalk- the handling has more in common with Emilian drawing of the period. A
