Botticelli, renowned for masterpieces like “The Birth of Venus” and “Primavera,” left this previously unknown artwork. Massimiliano Croce, commander of the Italian Carabinieri Cultural ...

Botticelli died in 1510, a decade after he created the painting, and both the work and the artist faded into obscurity despite his prominence and high regard during the Italian Renaissance.

For centuries, parishioners at a church in a small French town thought that a painting in their collection was a 19th-century copy of a 15th-century artwork by Sandro Botticelli. Now, a new ...