Saint Jerome in His Study

Workshop of Pieter Coecke van Aelst, the elder
St. Jerome (ca. 341-420 CE), the greatest Christian scholar of the classics, is revered for his translation of the Bible from the original Greek and Hebrew into Latin. He completed it in a monastery in Palestine, which the artist has suggested in the view through the window by adding camels to an otherwise Flemish landscape. The admonition that Jerome has fixed to the wall, "Cogita Mori" (Think upon death), is made explicit by the skull. His Bible is open to an image of the Last Judgment, while the hourglass and candle, objects commonly found on a desk, are further reminders of the passage of time and the imminence of death. Pieter Coecke van Aelst's large studio in Antwerp produced many variations on this subject.