St. Jerome (342-420) appears in numerous guises as one of the most popular Saints in Western European Art in the sixteenth and seventeenth centuries.  He is shown in the Wilderness of Chalcis learning Hebrew by the workshop of Ambrosius Benson, Pietro Faccini, and Palma Vecchio and as one of the four Latin Doctors of the Church by Claude Vignon.  Here he is in his study contemplating death with a skull, an extinguished candle and an illuminated manuscript open at the page depicting The Last Judgement.  As is the case with most of Reymerswaele’s compositions there is an earlier source. In 1521 Albrecht Dürer (1471-1528) visited Antwerp, where he met Jan Gossaert and painted his St. Jerome (Lisbon, Museu Nacional de Arte Antiga), which was to be widely influential on a number of Netherlandish artists, including Reymerswaele.   This composition is one of several versions, each one with minor variations in the facial expression, furniture, and details of the still life.  There are, however, many levels of artistic quality between these versions, some of which may well be later than the artist’s lifetime.

‍