This half-length figure can be dentified as St Paul through the sword in his hand (the instrument of his martyrdom) and the passage from his Epistle to the Ephesians he points to in an open book that rests on a parapet. He is wearing a red robe and a green coat, and has black hair and a long black beard.

In addition to depicting St Paul, this may also be a disguised portrait. The cartellino in the upper left of the canvas was overpainted in black and was only revealed in 1973. It is inscribed with an apparently incomplete text: ‘M.D.XXX-IIII/ Bernardinj Lycinij/Opus:-‘ The cartellino is a folded piece of paper with its corners curled, and is identical to one found in the top right corner of a male portrait now in the Cini Collection, suggesting that the two pictures might be pendants. The text in the book is two passages from Ephesians iv; the sitter places his finger on Ephesians iv. 5, ‘Wherefore putting away lying, speak every man truth with his neighbour.’ It is possible that the name Paolo and this text may refer in some way to the sitter in the Cini portrait, if it is a pendant.