The Annunciation

This was the last of the rooms Pinturicchio decorated for Alexander VI, and he left most of it to his workshop. The Annunciation is one of the scenes his assistants carried out. The room is named after the Mysteries of the faith, seven episodes from the lives of Mary and Christ, and five of them, the first three and the last two, centre on Mary, to whom the Borgia pope was especially devoted. Gabriel kneels with a lily, Mary kneels opposite him, and the dove of the Holy Spirit descends from God the Father in the archway behind. Above, in the vault, the papal coat of arms carries the Borgia bull.

The walls around these scenes held a surprise. When the room was fitted out in 1973 for the Vatican's new collection of modern religious art, the decoration of the walls was thought to be 18th-century work and was covered with tapestries. Restoration finished in 2006 showed it was original, with painted false niches holding liturgical objects and grotesques in the antique manner.