The Virgin whose image is inspired by the work of Filippo Lippi and Beato Angelico is depicted in the centre of a composition, the foreground of which is occupied by the figures of the Magi dressed in bright raiments. "All the gestures, all the expressions… have nothing ascetic or monastic about them. They are all pampered, elegant courtiers who know how to remain silent in the presence of their lords. It is the court of Lorenzo Medici," Alexander Benois writes in his Guide to the Hermitage Picture Gallery of 1910. "But if one looks into the painting," the outstanding art-historian continues, if one penetrates into the profound conviction in the faces, all fixed upon the Saviour of the World, then… one enters into a genuinely religious mood." The painting vividly manifests the emotionality that was a feature of the artist's work as well as a profound knowledge of ancient architecture and the problems of perspective.

The painting was acquired in 1808, on the orders of Alexander I, through the agency of Baron Dominique Vivant Denon, director general of the French museums under Napoleon.