Joseph pardons his Brothers

This long, low panel, about 36 centimetres high and well over a metre wide, was probably set into a piece of furniture in a Florentine bedroom made for a wedding in 1515. Bacchiacca uses the strip to tell the climax of Joseph's story in stages. Far back on the hillside, guards catch up with the brothers, the youngest, Benjamin, carried along on horseback. In front they are marched back to Egypt, some of them struggling with the soldiers. Then, beside a grand doorway, they learn that the powerful man they have come to beg from is the brother they once sold. One lies flat on the ground, another clutches his head, others kneel in disbelief. Joseph forgives them. Its companion panel in the National Gallery shows the earlier moment, when he received them still unrecognised.