Medieval and Byzantine art

The Metropolitan Museum of Art holds one of the most comprehensive collections of medieval and Byzantine art in the world, spanning works from the fall of Rome in the fourth century through the dawn of the Renaissance in the early sixteenth century, with some pre-medieval Bronze and Iron Age pieces included as well. The Museum acquired its first medieval object back in 1873, but the collection's core wasn't established until 1917, when J. Pierpont Morgan's son donated roughly two thousand medieval objects that had belonged to his father. Today the holdings are split across two locations: the main Fifth Avenue building in Manhattan, and The Met Cloisters, a dedicated branch built from architectural elements of five actual medieval cloisters and set on four acres overlooking the Hudson River in Fort Tryon Park. Highlights of the collection include the famed Unicorn Tapestries, a set of South Netherlandish tapestries woven around 1500; the Merode Triptych by the Netherlandish master Robert Campin; and illuminated manuscripts such as the Belles Heures made for Jean, Duc de Berry, and the Hours of Jeanne d'Évreux. The Fifth Avenue galleries also include dedicated spaces for Byzantine Art and for Medieval Art up to 1300, funded by Mary and Michael Jaharis, while The Cloisters continues to add works — recent acquisitions since 1999 include a Carolingian ivory known as the Jaharis Lectionary and a Limoges plaque with angels.