In the 1620s, while in Rome, the French artist Simon Vou- et (1590-1649) painted Saint Jerome and the Angel (National Gallery of Art, Washington, DC). A reconsideration of the iconography and meaning of the work as well as of the evolution of the composition suggests that the artist was indebted to the legacy of his Italian predecessor, Michelangelo Merisi da Cara- vaggio. Their affiliation, however, was not so much - or only - expressed in terms of Caravaggio's style; rather, the artists may be connected in their erudite readings of the Evangelist Matthew and, in Vouet's case, also with respect to the Church Father, Augustine. For both saints, the fictitious and historical Jerome had abiding spiritual affinities. [ABSTRACT FROM AUTHOR]