Book of Flower Studies

Master of Claude de France

An item at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Book of Flower Studies belongs to what is often dubbed "the last flowering" of northern European manuscript illumination in the medieval tradition. Illuminators working at Tours brought the garden inside to enrich the pages of princely manuscripts. The pages of this book unquestionably provided the models for renderings in several celebrated commissions linked to Claude, Queen of France and to Antoine de la Barre, a prominent ecclesiastic who became Archbishop of Tours. These flowers were painted in witness to their inherent beauty, not gathered merely for their symbolism, nor for their perceived medicinal value. Each of them can be found in the gardens of The Met Cloisters. See Catalogue Entry for a codicological description of the manuscript.

Medieval Art and The Cloisters

An exhibit at Metropolitan Museum of Art

The Museum's collection of medieval and Byzantine art is among the most comprehensive in the world. Displayed in both The Met Fifth Avenue and in the Museum's branch in northern Manhattan, The Met Cloisters, the collection encompasses the art of the Mediterranean and Europe from the fall of Rome in the fourth century to the beginning of the Renaissance in the early sixteenth century. It also includes pre-medieval European works of art created during the Bronze Age and early Iron Age.

Metropolitan Museum of Art