Full title | Saints Jerome and John the Baptist |
---|---|
Artist | Masaccio |
Artist dates | 1401 - 1428/9? |
Series | Santa Maria Maggiore Altarpiece |
Date made | about 1428-9 |
Medium and support | Egg tempera on poplar |
Dimensions | 125 x 58.9 cm |
Acquisition credit | Bought with a contribution from the Art Fund, 1950 |
Inventory number | NG5962 |
Location | Room 60 |
Art route(s) | A |
Collection | Main Collection |
Saint Jerome, wearing his red cardinal’s hat, and Saint John the Baptist stand side by side on a grassy hillock. Saint John’s sturdy toes interrupt a carpet of wild flowers, including yellow dandelions, violets and strawberries.
A lion sits at Saint Jerome’s feet – according to his legend, when living as a monk near Bethlehem Jerome pulled a thorn from a lion’s foot; it then became his companion. John the Baptist is shown in the camel-hair tunic that he wore when he was in the wilderness, preaching and baptising people in the river Jordan. His preached about Christ and his significance, and so he carries a cross and a scroll with the words he spoke about Christ: ‘Behold! The Lamb of God.’
The panel comes from a large double-sided altarpiece that Masolino and Masaccio collaborated on for the church of Santa Maria Maggiore. This panel is by Masaccio, but Masolino had to complete the altarpiece after the artist’s death in 1428/9.
Saint Jerome, wearing his red cardinal’s hat, and Saint John the Baptist stand side by side on a grassy hillock. Saint John’s sturdy toes interrupt a carpet of wild flowers, including yellow dandelions, violets and strawberries.
Saint Jerome who lived in the fourth century, was a cardinal and biblical scholar who translated the Bible from Greek to Latin. At his feet is a lion. It lifts its paw up to the saint and looks at him with an imploring expression. According to legend, when Jerome was living as a monk near Bethlehem he pulled a thorn from a lion’s foot; from that moment it was his companion and protector. In his left hand he holds a Bible, its weighty pages curling over at the top edge. It is open at the first page of the Old Testament which describes the creation of the world. In his right hand he holds a model of a church which may represent Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome.
This picture and A Pope (Saint Gregory?) and Saint Matthias formed part of an altarpiece made for the canon’s choir of Santa Maria Maggiore. Saint Jerome was an important saint for the church: he had been baptised by its founder, Saint Liberius, and his relics had been moved there in the thirteenth century. There was an altar dedicated to him, and he was also shown in a mosaic in the apse at the eastern end of the church.
John the Baptist wears a pink cloak over a camel-hair tunic which, according to the Bible, he wore when he was preaching in the wilderness about Christ’s ministry and baptising people in the river Jordan (Matthew 3: 4). He carries a scroll beginning with the words he spoke about Christ: Ecce Agnus Dei ('Behold the Lamb of God’). He referred to Christ as a lamb because he was sacrificed as lambs were, to atone for sin. He emphasises this by pointing at the cross he carries, a reference to the Crucifixion. John the Baptist is also represented in a mosaic in the apse. He too was an important figure for the church; the altar of the canon’s choir was dedicated to him.
Download a low-resolution copy of this image for personal use.
License and download a high-resolution image for reproductions up to A3 size from the National Gallery Picture Library.
License imageThis image is licensed for non-commercial use under a Creative Commons agreement.
Examples of non-commercial use are:
- Research, private study, or for internal circulation within an educational organisation (such as a school, college or university)
- Non-profit publications, personal websites, blogs, and social media
The image file is 800 pixels on the longest side.
As a charity, we depend upon the generosity of individuals to ensure the collection continues to engage and inspire. Help keep us free by making a donation today.
You must agree to the Creative Commons terms and conditions to download this image.
Santa Maria Maggiore Altarpiece
The Florentine painters Masaccio and Masolino often collaborated on large-scale projects. These panels come from a double-sided altarpiece made for the church of Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome. It was placed in the canon’s choir and probably commissioned by the wealthy and notable Colonna family.
One side would have been visible to only the canons – the clergymen connected specifically to the church and bound by its rules – who worshipped in this chapel and the other side to all who prayed in the church. The chapel was dedicated to Saint John the Baptist which explains his presence with Saint Jerome on the panel by Masaccio, Saints Jerome and John the Baptist. The painting by Masolino, A Pope (Saint Gregory?) and Saint Matthias, was once on the other side of the same panel. Masolino completed the altarpiece after Masaccio died in Rome of the plague in 1428/9.
Masaccio’s Saints Jerome and John the Baptist and Masolino’s A Pope, Saint Gregory (?) and Saint Matthias were painted on either side of the same piece of wood and formed the left-hand panel of a double-sided altarpiece made for the church of Santa Maria Maggiore in Rome.
Giorgio Vasari, the sixteenth-century writer and artist who wrote biographies of Italian artists from the thirteenth century onwards, visited the church with Michelangelo in 1568. He described the altarpiece in his account of the life of Masaccio, saying he saw ’several panels‘ painted with four saints and ’in the centre the "Miracle of the Snow"‘, which explained the church’s foundation in the fourth century. A Roman couple wished to donate their wealth in honour of the Virgin Mary and prayed for guidance on how to dispose of their riches. On the evening of 5 August, snow began to fall on the Esquiline hill; the couple built the church on that spot and dedicated it to the Virgin. The miracle and the church’s foundation are still celebrated on that date.
Vasari probably only saw one side of the altarpiece because he did not describe its reverse. In fact, although he says he saw four painted saints, he only mentions the Miracle of the Snow and the figure of Saint Martin (Pope Martin V) who was ’drawn as if from life'. A panel showing Saint Martin and Saint John the Evangelist (now in Philadelphia Museum of Art) is most likely the picture Vasari saw. The other two saints were probably Saints Jerome and John the Baptist, originally positioned to the left of the central panel.
The other side of the central panel was painted with the Assumption (the moment that the Virgin ascended to heaven after her death); the feast was also important to Santa Maria Maggiore and is still celebrated there on 15 August. This was flanked by A Pope (Saint Gregory?) and Saint Matthias (on the reverse of Saints Jerome and John the Baptist) and another panel showing Saints Peter and Paul (the reverse of Saint Martin and Saint John the Evangelist, now also in Philadelphia).
Vasari described the altarpiece’s location as a small chapel near the sacristy. It is likely that this was a chapel behind the church’s main altar, reserved for the worship of the church’s canons. This chapel belonged to the esteemed Roman Colonna family and was dedicated to Saint John the Baptist. One side of the altarpiece would have been visible by those within the chapel, while the other side – its public face – was that seen by Vasari.
The altarpiece may have been commissioned by Pope Martin V who was a member of the Colonna family. They had a long association with the church, dating to the thirteenth century when Cardinal Jacopo Colonna made additions and decorations to the building and founded two family chapels, including the one where this altarpiece was once displayed.
Masaccio and Masolino often worked together, collaborating most famously on the fresco cycle in the Brancacci chapel, Florence, in the early 1420s. They are distinguishable here by their technique. Masaccio has used a green base paint, known as green earth, beneath the flesh colours while Masolino used only vermilion (a red pigment) and white paint. Furthermore, Masaccio has used only egg to mix his paints whereas Masolino has also included oil.
Masolino painted both sides of the central panel and the image of Gregory and Matthias, while Masaccio painted Saint Jerome and John the Baptist. Masaccio died in Rome in 1428/9, probably in a plague epidemic. After his death, Masolino seems to have completed the side panel showing Saint John the Evangelist and Saint Martin, with Saints Paul and Peter on the reverse.


More paintings by Masaccio
