Public data from the Cleveland Museum of Art. Learn more
Saint Jerome
Also known as: Heraclitus (or Saint Jerome); The Weeping Heraclitus
Provenance
Sir Watkin Williams-Wynn (Wynnstay, Denbighshire, Wales) (sold, Wyngetts Auction Galleries, Wrexem, Wales, May 12, 1971, lot 489, as "Anonymous: Man Reading with Human Skull at Side," to Trafalgar Galleries). Trafalgar Galleries (London, England), sold to the Cleveland Museum of Art, 1977.
About the Artwork
Not all subjects are easy to identify. This museum long thought that the subject was the Greek philosopher Heraclitus, largely because tears are part of the standard representation of this ancient thinker. However, ter Brugghen omits the other crucial key to identifying Heraclitus--a globe over which he weeps. Instead, the book and skull indicate that the figure is Saint Jerome, known for translating the Bible into Latin. The artist probably chose to show Jerome crying to intensify his penitence.
Inscriptions
Signed and dated upside down on open book: "H TBrugghen 1621"
Exhibition history
Year in Review: 1977. The Cleveland Museum of Art, Cleveland, OH (organizer) (December 28, 1977-January 22, 1978). Hot Dry Men, Cold Wet Women: The Theory of Humor and Depictions of Men and Women in Western European Art of the 1600s. Joslyn Art Museum, Omaha, NE (September 13-November 2, 1997); Arkansas Museum of Fine Arts, Little Rock, AR (November 20, 1997-February 6, 1998); John and Mable Ringling Museum of Art, Sarasota, FL (February 27-April 24, 1998).
Quick Overview
- Artist
- Hendrick ter Brugghen (Dutch, 1588–1629)
- Date
- c. 1621
- Medium
- oil on canvas
- Type
- Painting
- Classification
- Painting
- Department
- European Painting and Sculpture
- Credit line
- Mr. and Mrs. William H. Marlatt Fund
- Accession no.
- 1977.2
More by Hendrick ter Brugghen in museum collections
Data retrieved from the Cleveland Museum of Art on October 8, 2026. The museum may have updated its record since.
Open-access museum record · AT-00009926
Powered by Art Trackers