The Art of Illumination

Belles Heures of Jean de France, duc de Berry, 1405–1408/9. Herman, Paul, and Jean de Limbourg (Franco-Netherlandish, active in France by 1399–1416). French; Made in Paris. Ink, tempera, and gold leaf on vellum; 9 3/8 x 6 5/8 in. (23.8 x 16.8 cm). The Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York, The Cloisters Collection, 1954 (54.1.1).

Suffrages of the Saints
Saint Eustace Loses His Sons, Folio 164v

Eustace, traveling with his two young sons, came to a river too deep for them to cross; he carried one and was going back to get the other when a lion seized one and a wolf the other. As he stands and laments in mid-stream, the golden radiance above reassures him of their eventual reunion. The stream is painted in rippling lines of gold with green glazes, and the landscape is unusually deep.