Piero himself in scarlet kneels in the middle; Giuliano, his second son, doomed to an early death by assassination, is kneeling on his right.

The picture is not only a sacred painting but (like the Gozzoli fresco at the Riccardi palace) an exaltation of the Medici family.

The dead Cosimo is at the Child's feet; the dead Giovanni, Piero's brother, stands close to the kneeling Giuliano.

Among the other persons represented are collateral Medici and certain of their friends.
It is by some accepted that the figure in yellow, on the extreme right, looking out of this picture, is Botticelli himself.

But for a portrait of the painter of more authenticity we must go to the Carmine, where, in the Brancacci chapel, we shall see a fresco by Botticelli's friend Filippino Lippi representing the Crucifixion of S.Peter, in which our painter is depicted on the right, looking on at the scene--a rather coarse heavy face, with a large mouth and long hair.