Andrée Hayum argues that the commissioning of the tondo by the Doni family helped to emphasize the ""secular and domestic ideals"" of the painting rather than seeing it as a ""devotional object."" In choosing a tondo as the format for the picture, Michelangelo is referencing the form's long association with depicting the ""Adoration of the Magi, the Nativity, the Madonna and Child."" Hayum also finds many allusions to Noah throughout the work. She posits a referencing of the Madonna to Noah's daughter-in-law, a sibyl, which thus makes Joseph an embodiment of Noah himself. Hayum further supports this by acknowledging the direct link between Joseph and Noah as depicted in Michelangelo's Sistine Ceiling paintings. This link to Noah also gives an explanation to the nudes in the background, whose forms may have inspired the sons in the "Drunkenness of Noah". The allusion to the Noah story also brings up themes of baptismal water, thus giving rise to an interpretation of the nudes similar to D’Ancona's: ""catechumens awaiting baptism"" from John the Baptist, whose ""isolation within a pit-like space"" indicates his special role as baptizer.