The Hospitality of Abraham
12th century
Mosaic
Palatine Chapel, Palermo, Sicily
The inscription on the left says abraham s angelos vidit et unum adoravit, "Abraham saw [three?] angels and worshipped one." This is probably based on some interpretation of Genesis 18:2, which neither calls the men angels nor specifies how many of them Abraham worshipped. As in Byzantine iconography, the angels carry tall sceptres. Only one of them has a red circle for a halo.
The other inscription says abraham tres angelos hospitio recepit, "Abraham received the three angels hospitably." On the table are the cakes and the bowls of butter and milk mentioned in Genesis, as well as some sort of green vegetables. Abraham stands "beneath the tree" as in 18:8 and proffers a covered jar. The jar should contain the calf that he had ordered cooked for his guests, though it is rather small for that purpose.
View this image in full resolution.
View other panels in the chapel's Genesis sequence.
Read more about Abraham.
Photographed at the chapel by Richard Stracke, shared under Attribution-NonCommercial-ShareAlike license.