Maarten van Heemskerck
Isaiah

1559-60
Oil on oak
Musées Royaux des Beaux-Arts, Brussels

As usual the prophet is depicted as an old man with white hair and beard. The bucksaw he holds refers to the assertion in The Ascension of Isaiah that the prophet was sawed in half at the command of King Mannaseh. In the book at his feet the page on the left begins with Isaiah's name in Latin and continues with some text that is not legible in the photograph.

This is the left panel of the closed state of van Heemskerck's Triptych of the Entombment. The right panel depicts the prophet Jeremiah and also includes text from the book of his prophecies.

Read more about images of Isaiah.

• Home Page
• Iconography of Isaiah
• This Picture

Source: Web Gallery of Art via this page at Wikimedia Commons.