Morganmobile: It's About Time

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This coat-of-arms depicts three ages of man. Each figure—the young lover, the knight, and the old man—is accompanied by a Latin proverb concerning death. This unsigned armorial belongs to no individual or family. Its maker’s preoccupation with the passage of time and mortality is further evidenced by the inclusion, above and on the reverse of the drawing, of several passages related to death, drawn from Saint Augustine, Robert Holcot, and the Bible.

Imitatio Christi, Augsburg, Günther Zainer, [not after 1472]. Purchased by Pierpont Morgan, 1907. PML 17074.1, front endleaf recto.