Saint Jerome Penitent [right panel]

Jan Gossaert

National Gallery of Art

A man kneels, holding a rock to his bare chest, in a rocky landscape in this tall, vertical painting. The scene is painted entirely in white and gray. The man, Saint Jerome, takes up the bottom half of the narrow panel. He faces our left almost in profile and looks up and off in that direction. He is clean-shaven with rounded, sagging cheeks, deep-set eyes, and wispy, curly hair. A robe with deep, angular folds is open across his chest and puddles on the ground around his feet. He holds a rock to his chest with one muscular arm, and the other hangs by his side holding another rock. A flat-topped, wide-brimmed hat is on the ground in front of his knees, and a lion lies next to him, to our left. The lion’s features are flattened and rounded, with almost human eyes, mouth, and ears. A ridge of craggy boulders separates Saint Jerome and the lion from the landscape beyond. A man rides a camel next to a walking man on the far side of the ridge. The camel rider holds a whip up high, and the other man carries a basket on a long stick slung across one shoulder. A stony hill rises steeply in the near distance behind this pair. A church is cut from the rock there. On a rocky path leading to the church, the lion rests his front paws up on Saint Jerome like a dog expecting a treat. Here, Saint Jerome wears his hat and long robes. He appears again just to our left, approaching an arched door of the church. Spires and flying buttresses surround the church like lace. A river winds to another town in the deep distance to our left under a cloudy sky.