According to Vasari, “Botticelli was a follower of Savonarola, and this was why he gave up painting and then fell into considerable distress as he had no other source of income…so finally, as an old man, he found himself so poor that if Lorenzo de’Medici…had not come to his assistance, he would have almost died of hunger.” While most art historians today dismiss Vasari’s claim, it is undeniable that Botticelli’s career was on the decline in the final years of his life and that his late works never again achieved the vitality and grace of the younger artist.