The Entry into Jerusalem (folio 156 recto), from a Mirror of Holiness (Mir’at al-quds) of Father Jerome Xavier (1602–4): Art, History and Details

The Entry into Jerusalem (folio 156 recto), from a Mirror of Holiness (Mir’at al-quds) of Father Jerome Xavier (1602–4) is in the Cleveland Museum of Art collection.

The work and its context

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

Jesus rides astride a female donkey, as specified in the text, and he greets a group of four men, two of whom seem to welcome him with hands extended. He follows the road to the gates of Jerusalem, which appear in the upper left corner. Father Jerome devoted only three short lines to this episode, so perhaps its selection for illustration is connected to an old and popular Islamic saying: “If Jesus’s donkey is taken to Mecca, when it comes back it will still be a donkey.”

Object facts

• Title: The Entry into Jerusalem (folio 156 recto), from a Mirror of Holiness (Mir’at al-quds) of Father Jerome Xavier
• Date: 1602–4
• Culture: Mughal India, Allahabad, made for Prince Salim (1569–1627)
• Type: Manuscript
• Technique: Gum tempera, ink, color, and gold on paper
• Dimensions: Sheet: 26.2 x 15.6 cm (10 5/16 x 6 1/8 in.); Image: 19.6 x 9.8 cm (7 11/16 x 3 7/8 in.)
• Collection: Indian Art
• Department: Indian and Southeast Asian Art
• Accession number: 2005.145.156.a

A detail from the museum

All the figures are shown in seventeenth-century, rather than biblical, dress.

Collection credit

John L. Severance Fund

Further reading listed by the museum

• O’Malley, John W., Gauvin A. Bailey, and Giovanni Sale. The Jesuits and the Arts, 1540-1773. 1st English ed. Philadelphia: Saint Joseph’s University Press, 2005.
• Carvalho, Pedro de Moura, and W. M. Thackston. Mirʼāt al-quds (Mirror of holiness): a life of Christ for Emperor Akbar: a commentary on Father Jerome Xavier's text and the miniatures of Cleveland Museum of Art, Acc. no. 2005.145. Leiden: Brill, 2012.

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.