(18) comparanda: a haywain triptych

(17) another version

(16) another version with columns

(15) reversing the tapestry cartoons

When the tapestry copy of El Jardín de las Delicias was made, each panel was reversed left to right, but a painted copy of a painted panel is not likely to be in the opposite direction from the original. Perhaps it makes more sense to reconstruct a hypothetical triptych as shown here, with the haywain going in the opposite direction.

(14) another vanitas triptych?

I've explained on the el bosco updates page that El Jardín de las Delicias resembles later vanitas paintings, and that Ecclesiastes 1:2, Vanitas vanitatum, dixit Ecclesiastes; vanitas vanitatum, et omnia vanitas, is a rare if not unique subject for a triptych. But it may not necessarily be the only old triptych where Ecclesiastes 1:2 is a major theme. Most art historians are persuaded that the Ship of Fools (Paris), a fragment with swimmers (New Haven), and the so-called Death of the Miser (Rotterdam) were once all part of the same triptych, since dendrochronological analysis has shown that all are painted on wood from the same tree. There have been no reasonable explanations of the hypothetical triptych's subject, and I am not persuaded that there ever was a triptych. The reason I am not persuaded is that the so-called Death of the Miser looks to me like a real scene from the life of St. Francis, and the scene that supposedly would go on the other side of a square center panel, the people drinking and swimming, seems to be more allegorical. But if the overall subject was Ecclesiastes 1:2, then maybe it would make sense to have a historical scene showing Saint Francis falling ill and then taking up a life of poverty, and an allegorical scene illustrating omnia vanitas where the concept of vanitas applies to Franciscans and laymen alike.
What would the triptych have looked like? There is a tapestry supposedly based on an original by Hieronymus Bosch that combines Franciscan and vanitas themes. If there was a triptych, it might have been somewhat like the reconstruction illustrated here. It might be that all of the images in this hypothetical reconstruction are copies of lost originals, and the date seems to have to be uncertain even though art historians know the approximate date the tree was cut down to make the panels. At least one additional version of the Haywain theme is lost, i.e. the version José de Sigüenza remembered as having dancers riding on the haywain, and there might have been others. The proportions of the tapestry shown here might have been changed to match the other tapestries in the set.

(13) la vanidad del mundo

Here is the phrase "la vanidad del mundo" in context in a book published in 1528. (The full text is online at Proyecto Filosofía en español.)
Antonio de Guevara,
Libro áureo de Marco Aurelio (1528)
Prólogo
Comiença el Prólogo dirigido a la Sacra, Cessárea, Cathólica Magestad del invictíssimo semper Augusto, el Emperador Nuestro Señor, don Carlos, Quinto de este nombre, por la graçia de Dios Rey de Castilla, de León, de Aragón, etcétera. Embiado por fray Antonio de Guevara, de la Orden de los Frailes Menores de Observançia, Predicador en la Capilla de su Imperial Maiestad, sobre la translaçión que hizo de griego en latín, de latín en romançe, al libro llamado Áureo, el qual habla de los tiempos de Marco Aurelio, decimoséptimo Emperador de Roma.
La mayor vanidad que hallo entre los hijos de vanidad es, no contentos ser vanos en la vida, procuran aya memoria de sus vanidades después de la muerte. Parésçeles que, pues estando en la carne al mundo sirvieron con obras, desde la sepultura le offrezcan a más no poder sus voluntades. Yo iuraré iuren los tales que, si el mundo les diera perpetua vida, para siempre ellos permanesçieran en su locura. Paresçe que esto sea verdad, porque todo el tiempo que naturaleza los tuvo en esta vida sin occuparse en otra cosa, en serviçio del mundo emplearon la vida. Los que son del mundo, biviendo en el mundo, no es mucho que sirvan al mundo; pero lo que nos escandaliza es por qué después que les atajó los passos la muerte, sin que tome gusto la carne quieren oler a la vanidad del mundo en la sepultura. No se suffre que vean todos el fin de nuestra vida y ninguno jamás vea el fin de nuestra locura.
Tranquillo cuenta que, estando Iulio César, último dictador y primero emperador, en la Ulterior España, en la çiudad de Gades (que agora llamamos Cáliz) mirando en el templo esculpida la imagen del Magno Alexandro y sus victorias, dio de lo íntimo del coraçón un sospiro, y preguntado por qué sospirava, respondió: «¡O, triste de mí, que en los treinta años de la edad que yo tengo agora, ya tenía Alexandro sojuzgada toda la tierra y estava descansando en Babilonia. Yo, siendo romano, ni he hecho cosa porque merezca gloria en la vida ni dexe fama después de mi muerte.» …

el bosco updates

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