UNKNOWN MASTER, Spanish
(active mid-16th century in Aragon)

St Jerome (detail)

around 1550
Alabaster, painted and gilt
Metropolitan Museum of Art, New York

St Jerome is shown, pen in hand, writing a book, presumably his Latin translation of the Bible, known as the Vulgate. His robe has the ermine-fringed collar of a cardinal. Jerome's torso, bursting from the garland's confines, reflects trends of Mannerist art in Spain in the middle of the sixteenth century.