Annunciation to Mary

Frueauf dated this panel himself. In the top corner, on the dark red wall, he painted the year 1490 and his initials, R F. Gabriel arrives with his wings still raised, his cope of red and green fastened at the chest with a jewelled clasp. His greeting from Luke's Gospel, Hail, full of grace, the Lord is with thee, unrolls in Latin along a long white scroll, lettered in black Gothic script and upside down from where we stand. Mary has turned from a book lying open on a lectern, draped with a cloth patterned in stars, and lifts one hand. Her red mantle spills across the chequered floor. Through the window behind her, the dove of the Holy Spirit flies in over a landscape of steep rocks and a single thin tree.