The Limbourg brothers, or in Dutch Gebroeders van Limburg (Herman, Paul, and Johan; fl. 1385 – 1416), were famous Dutch miniature painters from the city of Nijmegen. They were active in the early 15th century in France and Burgundy, working in the style known as International Gothic. They created what is certainly the best known late medieval illuminated manuscript, the Très Riches Heures du Duc de Berry.

The brothers' grandfather, Johannes de Lymborgh probably came from Limbourg on the Vesdre to Nijmegen, then the capital of the duchy of Gelre. Johannes' son, Arnold, was a wood carver who worked for the ducal court. Around 1385 Arnold married Mechteld Maelwael or Maloeul, the daughter of a well-to-do family of heraldic painters. Herman (Hermant in French sources) was the eldest child (born about 1385), followed by Paul (Polleke; or Polequin in French sources: 1386 or 1387), and Johan (Johanneke; or Jacquemin, Gillequin, or Jehanequin in French sources: probably 1388). There were two younger brothers, Rutger and Arnold, and a sister, Greta.

Umberto Eco Knight Grand Cross (born 5 January 1932) is an Italian semiotician, essayist, philosopher, literary critic, and novelist. He is best known for his groundbreaking 1980 novel Il nome della rosa (The Name of the Rose), an intellectual mystery combining semiotics in fiction, biblical analysis, medieval studies and literary theory. He has since written further novels, including Il pendolo di Foucault (Foucault's Pendulum) and L'isola del giorno prima (The Island of the Day Before). His most recent novel Il cimitero di Praga (The Prague Cemetery), released in 2010, was a best-seller.

Eco has also written academic texts, children's books and many essays. He is founder of the Dipartimento di Comunicazione at the University of San Marino, President of the Scuola Superiore di Studi Umanistici, University of Bologna, member of the Accademia dei Lincei (since November 2010) and an Honorary Fellow of Kellogg College, University of Oxford.

Eco was born in the city of Alessandria in the region of Piedmont in northern Italy. His father, Giulio, was an accountant before the government called upon him to serve in three wars. During World War II, Umberto and his mother, Giovanna, moved to a small village in the Piedmontese mountainside. Eco received a Salesian education, and he has made references to the order and its founder in his works and interviews. His family name is supposedly an acronym of ex caelis oblatus (Latin: a gift from the heavens), which was given to his grandfather (a foundling) by a city official.