Book of Hours

Masters of Dirc van Delf; Johannes de Malborch

about 1405–1410

Tempera colors, gold leaf, and ink, Tempera Colors, Ink

J. Paul Getty Museum

An illuminated manuscript page features a central initial 'D' containing an image of the Virgin Mary holding the Christ Child. The page is surrounded by an ornate gold border with floral motifs and small figures. In the early 1400s in the northern Netherlands, a new dynamic cultural circle developed under the patronage of Albrecht of Bavaria, Count of Holland. In a workshop closely associated with the count, the anonymous artists known as the Masters of Dirc van Delf illuminated this book of hours, perhaps for a member of Albrecht's family or one of his courtiers. These artists, who worked in the International style that so appealed to aristocratic taste across Europe, formed one of the first important illuminators' workshops of fifteenth-century Holland. While the Hours of the Virgin were most often illustrated with miniatures showing the L