L'Adoration des mages

Jan Gossaert painted this large altarpiece around 1510, probably for a funerary chapel near Geraardsbergen, while he was in the service of Philip of Burgundy, bishop of Utrecht. It is packed. The three kings and their courtiers, peasants, dogs and angels overhead all crowd into a grand palace that is quietly falling into ruin, the old order making way for the new child. Mary sits with Christ on her lap and holds a golden cup of coins, the gift of the kneeling elderly king Caspar, whose hat and sceptre lie on the ground before her. Gossaert, a Netherlandish painter who had recently travelled to Rome, signed the work twice, hiding his name on the hat of the king Balthasar and again on the silver collar of Balthasar's attendant.