The Holy Allegory is a painting by the Italian Renaissance master Giovanni Bellini, dating from c. 1490 to 1500. It is in the Uffizi gallery in Florence, Italy. There is no documentation about the commission and the original location of the work, which is known to have been part of the Austrian Imperial collections in Vienna in the 18th century. In 1793 the director of the Uffizi, Luigi Lanzi, exchanged it with another work in order to improve the Venetian Renaissance presence in the museum. At the time, it was attributed to Giorgione. The Italian art historian Giovanni Battista Cavalcaselle... was the first to identify it as a Bellini. Today his attribution is widely recognized, although another name sometimes mentioned is that of Marco Basaiti. The scene is set on a wide terrace with a polychrome marble pavement, in perspective, separated from a lake shore by a parapet. On the left Mary is enthroned, under a baldachin whose support is in cornucopia shape, a symbol of her fertility. The baldachin has four steps, and on its side is a frieze with scenes of the myth of Marsyas, interpreted as a parallel with Jesus' Passion.
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