The Apocalypse stems from the Revelations of St. John, the last book in the Bible. It refers to cataclysmic events that will precede the Last Judgment based on the saint's visions. The account includes the four horsemen who unleash their wrath on earthly vices, beasts who threaten humanity, the enthroned God flanked by crowned men in white garb witnessing the event, and a descending heavenly city. St. John's account of the Apocalypse provided plenty of inspiration to artists, including Albrecht Dürer who created a woodcut print of the Four Horsemen of the Apocalypse in 1498, the Limbourg brothers who included the enthroned God the Father flanked by the crowned men in Les Très Riches Heures du duc de Berry (1416; Chantilly, Musée Condé), and Hans Memlinc who painted the Vision of St. John on Patmos (1479; Bruges, Hospital of St. John) as one of the side panels to the Altarpiece of the Virgin and Angels. In this last work, St. John sits on a rock and experiences the strange visions that led him to write the Book of Revelations.
Historical dictionary of Renaissance art. Lilian H. Zirpolo. 2008.