Guariento di Arpo
Coronation of the Virgin Altarpiece: Detail, The Birth of Mary

Padua, 1344
Tempera and gold leaf on panel
Norton Simon Museum, Pasadena, California

Unlike many images of Mary's birth in this period, Arpo's panel does not include a midwife washing the baby. Dressed as they are in expensive garments, the secondary women in the picture may be not midwives / servants but relatives of the mother who figure in medieval images and accounts of the "Holy Kinship," Jesus' extended family.

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Photographed at the site by Richard Stracke, shared under Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license.