Four Fathers of the Church: Saint Jerome (c.342-420)
British (English) School
Category
Art / Oil paintings
Date
1575 - 1599
Materials
Oil on panel
Measurements
900 x 760 mm
Place of origin
England
Order this imageCollection
Chastleton House, Oxfordshire
NT 1430445
Summary
Oil painting on panel, Four Fathers of the Church: Saint Jerome (c.342-420) (after Maarten de Vos), British (English) School, late 16th century. One of three remaining panels (Saint Ambose missing) in the series of fathers of the church, after prints by Pieter Cool (ac. Antwerp 1590) after Maarten de Vos. A half-length portrait of an elderly man, turned to the left in profile, seated at his writing-stand, bearded and bald, in a red, hooded cloak. In an interior, a shelf of books on the back wall, a lantern clock hanging behind him, his lion in lower right that he had befriended when living in penance in the desert. He writes with a quill in an open book. He is shown writing his translation of the Bible into Latin, which became canonical for the Catholic Church, under the later name of the Vulgate. Note how the books on the shelf are ranged in the old way, with the fore-edges (which would have been inscribed or decorated) facing outwards, the inkpot under his left hand, and the 'pen-knife' taken out of its case, ready to sharpen the quill pen with which he is writing. Inscribed upper left; St Hierome a famous docteur / lived in the yere 300. The garbled word 'doctor' in the inscription refers, not to any medical qualification, but to the fact that Saint Jerome was a learned (Lat.: doctus) teacher.
Provenance
Purchased by National Trust in 1992
Makers and roles
British (English) School, artist after Maerten de Vos (Antwerp 1532 – Antwerp 1603), artist after Joan Baptista Vrints (Antwerp 1575 - Antwerp 1611/12), engraver and publisher after Pieter Cool (fl.1575 - 1599), printmaker