16th-18th centuries

• 
  Erhard Altdorfer, from a book on Reynard the Fox (1539)
• 
  From Kleinste oder Kinder Postill (Author: Jakob Feucht) (1579)
• 
  From an alphabet book (Author/artist: Karion Istomin) (1694)
• 
  (unknown), from Divine Songs (Author: Isaac Watts) (1715)
• 
  "J.T." (John Tilly?), from Three Hundred Animals (Author: Thomas Boreman) (1730)
• 
  John Newbery (1744), from A Little Pretty Pocket-Book
• 
  (unknown) (1783), from The Life and Perambulation of a Mouse (Author: Dorothy Kilner)
• 
  (unknown), from The Adventures of a Pincushion (Author: Mary Ann Kilner) (1783/4)
• 
  Sarah Trimmer, from Fabulous Histories (1786)
• 
  William Blake (1791), from Original Stories from Real Life (Author: Mary Wollstonecraft) (1788)
• 
  (unknown), from A Token For Children (Author: James Janeway) (1795)

19th century

• 
  Jessie Willcox Smith (ca 1861-1897)
• 
  Mythological creatures, from Bilderbuch für Kinder (1806)
• 
  Walter Crane (1834), from a version of Princess Belle-Etoile
• 
  (unknown), from Struwwelpeter (Author: Heinrich Hoffmann) (1845)
• 
  Sinterklaas (variant of Santa Claus) (1854), from Tante Keetje's prentenboek
• 
  Illustration from De Nieuwe Rijschool ('the new riding school'), a picture book from the Netherlands from 1856
• 
  Kate Greenaway (1864), from Walk Me Through My Dreams (Author: Joe Lindsay)
• 
  Cinderella (1865)
• 
  Robinson Crusoe and Friday (unknown artist, 1870s), from Aunt Louisa's Oft Told Tales (Original author: Daniel Defoe ) (1719)
• 
  John Tenniel (1872), from Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There (Author: Lewis Carroll) (1871)
• 
  Elizabeth and Mary Kirby, from The Hummingbirds (1874)
• 
  Randolph Caldecott, from The House that Jack built (1878)
• 
  (unknown), from The Prince and the Pauper (Author: Mark Twain) (1881)
• 
  Richard Doyle, from Princess Nobody : a tale of fairy land (Author: Andrew Lang) (ca 1884)
• 
  Randolph Caldecott, from The Diverting History of John Gilpin (1887)
• 
  Edward Lear), from A Book of Nonsense (1888)
• 
  Henry Justice Ford, from The Red Fairy Book (Author: Andrew Lang) (1890)
• 
  Alfons Mucha (1894), from Mémoires d'un éléphant blanc (Author: Judith Gautier)
• 
  W.H. Drake (1895), from The Jungle Book (Author: Rudyard Kipling) (1894)
• 
  Heinrich Lefler (1897), from Die Prinzessin und der Schweinehirt (Author: Hans Christian Andersen)
• 
  Heinrich Schlitt, from The Children's Encyclopædia (Author: Arthur Mee) (1899)
• 
  Helen Stratton (1899), from The Fairy Tales of Hans Christian Andersen
• 
  Lewis Baumer, from The Story of the Treasure Seekers (Author: Edith Nesbit) (1899)

Early 20th century

• 
  Anne Anderson (20th c.), from a version of The Little Mermaid
• 
  Alfred Schmidt (1900), from Flugten til Amerika (Author: Christian Winther)
• 
  William Wallace Denslow (1900), from The Wonderful Wizard of Oz (Author: L. Frank Baum)
• 
• 
  Clara E. Atwood (1901), from A Book of Nursery Rhymes (Author: Charles Welsh)
• 
  Peter Newell (1902), from Through the Looking-Glass and What Alice Found There (Author: Lewis Carroll) (1871)
• 
  "The Journey", Elizabeth Shippen Green (1903), illustration for poems by Josephine Preston Peabody
• 
  Beatrix Potter (1904), from The Tale of Benjamin Bunny
• 
  Arthur Rackham (1907), from Alice's Adventures in Wonderland (Author: Lewis Carroll) (1865)
• 
  Cyril F. Austin (1908), from Edward Buttoneye and his adventures
• 
  J. R. Skelton (1908), from Stories of Beowulf by H. E. Marshall
• 
  John R. Neill (1908), from Little Black Sambo
• 
  Lothar Meggendorfer (1910), from Schneewittchen (Snow White)
• 
  Franz Jüttner (1910), from Schneewittchen
• 
  N.C. Wyeth (1911), from Treasure Island (Author: Robert Louis Stevenson) (1883)
• 
  Rudyard Kipling (1912), from Just So Stories
• 
  Joseph M. Gleeson (1912), from Just So Stories (Author: Rudyard Kipling)
• 
  Lancelot Speed (1912), from The Legends of King Arthur and His Knights (Author: Sir James Knowles)
• 
  William Heath Robinson (1913), from Hans Andersen's Fairy Tales
• 
  John Liston Byam Shaw (1913), from The Adventures of Akbar (Author: Flora Annie Steel)
• 
  Blanche Fisher Wright (1913), from The Goody-Naughty Book (Author: Sarah Cory Rippey)
• 
  Abanindranath Tagore (1914), from Myths of the Hindus & Buddhists
• 
  William Heath Robinson (1915), from The Water Babies (Author: Charles Kingsley)
• 
  William Heath Robinson (1915), from The Water Babies (Author: Charles Kingsley)
• 
  Maud and Miska Petersham (1917), from Fil and Filippa: Story of Child Life in the Philippines (Author: John Stuart Thomson)
• 
  John R. Neill (1917), from The Lost Princess of Oz (Author: L. Frank Baum)
• 
  Willy Pogany (1917), from The Children of Odin (Author: Padraic Colum)
• 
  Hilaire Belloc (1918), from The Bad Child's Book of Beasts
• 
  Florence White Williams (1918), from The Little Red Hen
• 
  Louis Agassiz Fuertes (1919), from The Burgess Bird Book for Children
• 
  Johnny Gruelle (1919), from Friendly Fairies
• 
  Virginia Frances Sterrett (1920), from Old French Fairy Tales
• 
  Hugh Lofting (1920), from The Story of Doctor Dolittle
• 
  Hendrik Willem van Loon (1921), from The Story of Mankind
• 
  Paul Bransom (1921), from An Argosy of Fables (Author: Frederic Taber Cooper)
• 
  Margery Williams (1922), from The Velveteen Rabbit
• 
  Boris Artzybasheff (1922), from Verotchka's Tales (Author: Dmitry Mamin-Sibiryak)
• 
  Edward Julius Detmold (1924), from The Arabian Nights (Author: Charles Maurice Detmold)
• 
  Tom Seidmann-Freud (1927), from Das Wunderhaus. Ein Bilderbuch zum Drehen, Bewegen und Verwandeln
• 
  Nicolae Tonitza (1932), from Fram (Author: Cezar Petrescu)

Modern works

• Note: Few children's book illustrations after 1923 are free of copyright restriction, thus this section, with some exceptions, does not represent the best in the field from the modern period.

• 
  Roger Vernam (1945), from Jungle Animals (Author: Frank Buck)
• 
  Clara Elsene Peck (1946), from Treasure Chest, Vol. 2, No. 9
• 
  (unknown) (1953), from Garfield Goose Memory Book
• 
  Hanna-Barbera (ca 1959-1961), from Quickdraw McGraw Coloring Book
• 
  Peggy Adler (1969), from Sets and Numbers for the Very Young
• 
  Felicia Bond (1989), from Big Red Barn (Author: Margaret Wise Brown) (1954)
• 
  Reidar Kjelsen (21st century), from Jon Demon
• 
  "MCM" (2006), The Pig and the Box
• 
  Alejandra Oviedo (2007), from La noche que nos regalaron el fuego (Author: Carmen Munoz Hurtado)
• 
  Wikijunior Wikibooks (2008), from Alphabet des animaux (photo courtesy NASA)
• 
  Katalin Szegedi (2009), from Rapunzel
• 
  Lisa Aisato N'jie Solberg (2012), from Fugl
• 
  Ryan Jude Novelline (2010), "The Golden Book Gown" constructed of illustrations from recycled and discarded Little Golden Books

Children's book illustrators

• 
  Loren Long
• 
  Robert Bright
• 
  Jerry Pinkney.jpg
• 
  Isobel Harrop
• 
  Felicia Bond
• 
  Bruce Degen
• 
  W. W. Denslow
• 
  Tove Jansson
• 
  William Joyce
• 
  Rudyard Kipling
• 
  Svein Nyhus
• 
  Howard Pyle
• 
  Abanindranath Tagore
• 
  John Tenniel