Altarpiece representing the Madonna delle Grazie (“Our Lady of Graces”), realized by Bernardo Daddi in 1347, from the Church of Orsanmichele, Florence. Originally this church had been built as marketplace for the grain commerce.
This representation of the Virgin is interpreted by the historian Franco Cardini as a “great Christian Ceres”. Enveloped in her night blue coat, she holds on her right shoulder a star, probably referring to the star Spica, in the Virgo constellation. In her womb she holds the Child Jesus, who has in his hand a goldfinch, a passerine bird which feeds on grains, a possible reference to the propitiating and protective function carried out by the Lady of Graces toward the crops. Indeed, the Virgin “was born at ht end of the harvest season and at the beginning of the vine ripening season. Christian tradition established the date of the birth of Mary, from Anne and Joachim, on September 8, exactly at the climax of the course of the sun in the portion of the sky dominated by the Virgo constellation” (Cardini 1995, p. 140-141).


[Image: http://italianrenaissanceresources.com/units/unit-1/essays/the-spectacle-of-devotion-civic-miracle-workers/]