The precise subject of this intriguing Renaissance engraving remains a mystery. A number of the figures are surely Biblical: God or an angel expels Adam and Eve in the upper right hand corner; a lamb burns on a pyre at upper left (perhaps a reference to Abel’s sacrifice). The nudes in the foreground may refer to Adam and Eve and one of their sons, or an entirely allegorical figure symbolic of some greater message (humanity considering good and evil is a possibility); but these figures are also examples of the designer’s knowledge of Classical art, as are the architectural elements throughout the composition. The artist, too, has long been debated: Aspertini provided the design, but did he engrave it himself or was it engraved by one of his talented colleagues: Veneziano, Bonasone, or an anonymous member of the school of Raimondi? The work invites study and reflection, a key component of the Renaissance and Humanist inquiry in the Western tradition.

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