The family of Jesus meets the family of the Baptist (The Holy Kinship)

Nicola Filotesio, knwon as Cola dell’Amatrice (Amatrice 1470 ca. – before 1553)

The painting depicts the moment of the Holy Family’s meeting with the young John and his parents.
In the foreground on the left, the Madonna holds the baby Jesus in her arms, while on the right Elisabeth embraces her Baptist, who supports himself on her knee. At the feet of John lies his scroll bearing the inscription ‘Ecce Agnus Dei Ecce Qui (TollitPec)cata (Mundi)’ (Lamb of God, who takes away the sins of the world, have mercy on us).
At the centre of the panel, the outstretched arms of the two infants – almost touching their fingers – seal the sacredness of the encounter.
Behind the group in the foreground, three figures are standing: on the left, John’s father, Zacharias, is facing Joseph, who participates at the event with vigorous gestures, while on the right side, the domestic, with two doves in one hand and a flask in the other, witnesses the meeting of the two families.
The meeting takes place in an interior characterised by classical-style architectural elements: an arch decorated with fluted half-columns opens the scene to a landscape in the distance.
The episode, absent from both the New Testament and the Apocryphal Gospels, is narrated for the first time in the compilation handed down under the title Meditationes vitae Christi, attributed in its final draft to Giovanni de’ Cauli (who lived in the fourteenth century).