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This small panel, showing The Pietà of Christ, was originally a “pax,” or a liturgical object in use from the thirteenth through eighteenth centuries, which would be kissed by the priest during the celebration of Mass, then offered to the other ministrants, and finally to the members of the congregation. The work, purchased by Horne on the antiques market in the first years of the twentieth century, still presents on its rear side the signs of a support, which enabled it to be clasped, and held erect on the altar. At first believed to be a work by Masaccio, it was later associated with the activity of Fra Filippo Lippi, to whom it is now generally attributed. Its precise dating, however, remains debated: some scholars place it in the youthful phase of Filippo Lippi, for the evident influence of Masaccio in the sculptural modelling of the figure of Christ, while others assign it to a late phase, for the refinement of certain details.