Annunciation, the tidings brought by the angel Gabriel to the Virgin Mary of the incarnation of Christ. Also the festival kept by the church, in commemoration of this event, on the 25th of March. The festival was instituted about the beginning of the 7th century, those sermons of Athanasius and Gregory Thaumaturgus in which it is mentioned being now rejected as spurious; and the earliest certain references to it occurring in the acts of the Tenth Council of Toledo (656), and of the Trullan Council (692). In England, the festival is commonly called Lady Day (q.v.). Among the Jews, this title is given to a part of the ceremony of the Passover.
The Order of the Annunciation, now the highest Italian order, was instituted in 1360 by Amadeus VI., Duke of Savoy, and in 1725 was made the first order of the kingdom of Sardinia. The king is always grand-master. The knights, who are not limited in number, must be of high rank, and already in the orders of St Mauritius and St Lazarus.