The number of magi, their ethnicity and their names — and for that matter, what "magi" are — is mentioned nowhere. Yet this is the scene we see ... gravely. The "Nativity" story is what ...

Fabriano’s work portrays the kings dressed in fine linens and makes reference to camels and other exotic animals commonly ...

In A.D. 614, the Persians, who razed many other churches during wars with Byzantium, spared the Church of the Nativity, supposedly out of respect for a mosaic of the Magi shown wearing Persian attire.

The Magi remain a familiar and enduringly enigmatic presence in stories about the first Christmas and their visit is celebrated in countless school Nativity plays and again at Epiphany.