October — Sowing Before the Louvre

The story

A peasant broadcasts seed by hand across a freshly harrowed field while another drives a horse-drawn harrow behind him — and in the field's corner, a bow-armed scarecrow figure stands guard against the crows, a small human touch amid the labor. Beyond the Seine, the old medieval Louvre — a turreted royal fortress that would later be entirely rebuilt, making this one of its few surviving detailed images — anchors the scene in real, dateable Paris. The zodiac lunette carries Virgo into Libra. October's combination of unglamorous labor and precise urban record-keeping makes it one of the calendar's most historically valuable folios, independent of its beauty.