visible in some areas due to the paint having become more transparent. A number of details were added at a late stage, over areas previously painted, including the two figures at the window to the left; the ox and the ass; the two shepherds behind the ass and the shepherds in the distance; Joseph's stick; Caspar's sceptre and the lid of Caspar's goblet. Gossaert's composition draws from several sources. It takes its main inspiration from the Monforte altarpiece by Hugo van der Goes (Gemäldegalerie, Staatliche Museen, Berlin), which has a similar grouping of richly dressed Mary and Magi among ruined architecture, with their attendants and bystanders, and glimpses of the landscape behind and angels above. The two dogs in the foreground, on a floor with many broken tiles, are copied from other engravings: one taken from the lower right corner of Dürer's engraving of Saint Eustace and the second is a reflection of the dog in an engraving of the "Adoration of the Kings" by Martin Schongauer. Other elements are drawn from other prints by Schongauer and Dürer. History The origins of the painting are unclear. It may have been commissioned by David of Burgundy, Bishop of Utrecht from 1456 to 1496, or his half-brother, Philip of Burgundy, who was Bishop from 1517 to 1524. Lorne Campbell argues that the painting was commissioned by Daniel van Boechout, Lord of Boerlare and Beverweerd, as the altarpiece of the Lady Chapel of the Benedictine Abbey of St Adrian in Geraardsbergen, in East Flanders, south of Ghent and west of Brussels, where it first enters the historical record in 1600. It was bought by the rulers of the Habsburg Netherlands, Albert and Isabella, in 1601, who had seen it at the abbey the previous year. They paid £2,100 to the abbot, and moved the painting to become the altar of the chapel of their palace in Brussels. The palace was destroyed by a fire in February 1731, but the chapel and its contents survived. The chapel was demolished in the 1770s, but the painting had already been removed by the Governor of the Austrian Netherlands, Charles of Lorraine. It was sold after Charles' death in 1781 to Emmanuel-Marie de Cock, Pensionary of Brussels and Greffier-Pensionary of the States of Brabant. A painting matching its description came to London in 1787 and was sold at an auction held in London by John Greenwood the