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Shepherd and Shepherdess Making Music

ca. 1500–1530
On view at The Met Fifth Avenue in Gallery 199
This tapestry fragment depicts a shepherd couple entertaining themselves with music, while three sheep from their flock graze behind them in the flower-covered background. The shepherdess, seen at the left, holds up a sheet of music as she sings:

Chantons sur lerbette Let's sing, on the grass,
Avec ta musette with your bagpipe,
Quelque note double a tune for two.

The shepherd plays a bagpipe, responding with a verse of his own:

Cuant est de georgette When she sings
Elle a lavoix nette her voice is fair:
Mes ie faiz le trouble but I do the work.

It is one of three surviving fragments woven after the same series of cartoons, the other pieces of which are in the Detroit Institute of Arts and in Mobilier National in Paris. The shield that hangs between two branches of the orange tree has not yet been identified.

Artwork Details

Object Information
  • Title: Shepherd and Shepherdess Making Music
  • Date: ca. 1500–1530
  • Culture: South Netherlandish
  • Medium: Wool warp; wool and silk wefts
  • Dimensions: Overall: 92 1/2 x 115in. (234.9 x 292.1cm)
  • Classification: Textiles-Tapestries
  • Credit Line: Bequest of Susan Vanderpoel Clark, 1967
  • Object Number: 67.155.8
  • Curatorial Department: Medieval Art and The Cloisters

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