Single Leaf from a Book of Hours: Pieta (c. 1475–85): Art, History and Details

Single Leaf from a Book of Hours: Pieta (c. 1475–85) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection. The museum's creator attribution is Francesco dai Libri (Italian, 1452–1506); Andrea Mantegna (Italian, about 1431–1506).

The work and its context

The museum's open-access catalogue describes the work:

One section of a book of hours is known as the Prayers to the Virgin. Dedicated to the Virgin Mary, this group of prayers is written in the first person singular, which allowed readers to insert themselves into the prayer. A reader would begin by calling upon the Virgin Mary and Saint John, with whom they would plead, as saints were considered intercessors who could emphasize a supplicant’s faithfulness. Plaintive or urgent in tone, these prayers are considered some of the most moving texts in books of hours. To accompany them, illuminations often show the Virgin and Child or the Pietà, the Virgin cradling the dead body of Jesus after its removal from the cross.

Object facts

• Title: Single Leaf from a Book of Hours: Pieta
• Date: c. 1475–85
• Creator attribution: Francesco dai Libri (Italian, 1452–1506); Andrea Mantegna (Italian, about 1431–1506)
• Culture: Italy, Verona(?), 15th century
• Type: Manuscript
• Technique: tempera and gold on vellum
• Dimensions: Sheet: 14 x 9.3 cm (5 1/2 x 3 11/16 in.)
• Collection: MED - Manuscript Illuminations
• Department: Medieval Art
• Accession number: 1951.394

A detail from the museum

All books of hours contain the same basic sections, the order of which can shift, and individual prayers can vary, sometimes significantly, from region to region.

Collection credit

Purchase from the J. H. Wade Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• Collection M.P. Botkine. Saint-Pétersbourg: [éditeur non identifié], 1911.
• Milliken, William M. “The ‘Pietà’ by Andrea Mantegna.” The Bulletin of the Cleveland Museum of Art 39, no. 7 (September 1952): 172–174.
• Metzler, Paul B. "Museum Puts Mantegna Work, Newly Acquired, on Exhibition," The Cleveland Plain Dealer (September 7, 1952).

View the collection record

See the museum's photographs and full catalogue entry. Catalogue text is reproduced from the Cleveland Museum of Art's open-access data, with HTML formatting removed. This object and its supplied image are designated CC0.