Shop Art Holiday Cards Inspired by an Illuminated Masterpiece

We're delighted to unveil our annual Holiday Preview Online Catalog, brimming with new and beloved holiday cards, ornaments, and more. Send “Glad Tidings!” with our latest Christmas cards featuring a splendid detail from The Belles Heures, an outstanding devotional book on view at The Met Cloisters.

The Museum’s Upper Manhattan location devoted to the art and architecture of the Middle Ages houses a must-see collection of illuminated manuscripts: richly ornamented books often accented with shimmering paints derived from gold and silver. None are more lavish than The Belles Heures, or The Beautiful Hours, of Jean de France, duc de Berry, which was likely crafted in Paris between 1405 and 1408 or 1409.

The Belles Heures is a private prayer book commissioned by Jean de France, duc de Berry; the son, brother, and uncle to three successive kings of France, and an active patron of the arts. Though he funded many fabulous creations, from castles to chalices, Jean de France is best remembered for his patronage of manuscripts. He granted the monumental opportunity to design The Belles Heures to a trio of teenage siblings collectively known as the Limbourg brothers (Franco-Netherlandish, active France, by 1399–1416), and even allowed them unusual creative license. What they produced is considered the largest and best-preserved collection of early 15th-century paintings to come out of Northern Europe.

Across a staggering 172 illuminations, the brothers united Italianate details with an intimate Northern European vision of nature. Borders teeming with exquisite penwork frame divine scenes boasting remarkable color and detail. 

All the customary components of a Book of Hours are accounted for in this manuscript—including readings from the Gospels and prayers to the Virgin—but the Limbourgs elevated their masterpiece with astounding “picture book” inserts portraying both sacred and secular subjects.

While all medieval books were handcrafted before printing technologies fell into place around the turn of the 15th century, The Belles Heures exhibits incomparable artisanship. Jean de France was so pleased with the finished work that he commissioned another, even larger book from the Limbourgs, but neither the duke nor the brothers lived to see it finished. The Belles Heures would be the only manuscript that they completed in its entirety.

The Belles Heures is on view at The Met Cloisters, though the featured page is periodically changed to minimize wear through exposure.

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