Description
The Annunciation to Zacharias opens the cycle devoted to Saint John the Baptist on the left wall of the Peruzzi Chapel in Santa Croce. It depicts the moment when the priest Zacharias, while serving in the Temple, is told by an angel that his wife Elizabeth will bear a son destined to play a decisive role in salvation history.
Giotto transforms this visionary episode into a spatially clear and psychologically intelligible narrative. Zacharias occupies the center of the action before the angel who delivers the prophecy. His bodily response is essential: he recoils slightly, conveying surprise and doubt through posture and establishing a direct relationship with the angelic figure. The episode therefore depends less on abstract symbolism than on physical interaction between two figures.
