Aurora, goddess of the dawn, fell in love with Tithonus, son of Laomedon and brother of Priam. She gained immortality for him but not youthfulness; hence he is shown here lying on the ground as an old man. Aurora floats above him, half naked on clouds, wearing a crown of roses and holding a chaplet of flowers in her upraised right hand. The three winged putti surrounding her hold a flaring torch, a basket of flowers and an urn; symbolising the dawn's light, its generative power and the dew.

The slightly ponderous style of this work is suggestive of Ricci's work before his English visit, c. 1700-10. The subject of Aurora occurs in the main ceiling fresco by Ricci in the Palazzo Pitti, which is often wrongly identified as Venus and Adonis; that Aurora is the subject is shown by the attributes of the putti, which are the same as in this work.

The painting was cleaned in 1972.