Within an open spherical shape (probably suggesting a terrestrial globe) seven genre scenes, each of them referring to one of the Seven Deadly Sins, are placed in the foreground of a broad landscape. Atop the sphere we see a Passion scene (the crucified Christ), and underneath the sphere there is a hell scene. The panel is signed ‘Jheronimû bosch’.
Nothing is known about the origin, original function, or patron of this panel. The recent pedigree looks as follows:
LITERATURE
Bax [1948: 159, 1979: 210] interprets the owl in the Superbia scene as a symbol of folly and wonders whether the owl and the mirror are intended to represent the name of Uilenspiegel (Owlglass), a literary figure associated with folly. According to Bax, the panel is ‘attributed to Bosch’. In 1983 [Bax 1983: 227], the same author attributes the panel to an ‘imitator of Bosch’ and refers to the mirror in the Superbia scene as a symbol of vanity.
Tolnay [1965: 426 / 444 (ill. 105)] publishes a small black-and-white photograph of the painting and considers it a ‘copy after Bosch’. He calls the spherical shape ‘the Earthly Globe’.
Friedländer [1969: 91 (Supp. 137, ill. 116)] mentions the panel without further comment and publishes a black-and-white photograph.
Van Puyvelde [1977: 28 (ill. 5)] publishes a black-and-white photograph without further comment. The caption accompanying the photograph seems to imply that the panel is an authentic Bosch. Strange: in the photograph published here, the signature reads ‘Jheronimûs bosch’, which makes the abbreviation mark above the ‘u’ pointless. Apparently, at some moment before 1977 someone added an ‘s’ to ‘Jheronimû’ (on closer inspection, the ‘s’ does look a bit weird), and this ‘s’ was removed later on.
Gerlach [1978d: 239-240, 1988: 151] writes about the Seven Deadly Sins scenes in the Prado Tabletop with the Seven Deadly Sins and sometimes compares them to the similar scenes in the Geneva panel (see below, under ‘Iconographical analysis’), of which he publishes a black-and-white photograph (here again, the signature shows a final ‘s’ in the first name ‘Jheronimûs’). The sphere is the terrestrial globe. Gerlach believes that this may be the Seven Deadly Sins panel that was part of the legacy of Margaretha Boge in Antwerp in 1574.
Unverfehrt [1980: 223 / 266 (cat. nr. 62, ill. 227) dates the panel in or around the third decade of the sixteenth century. He calls the signature ‘the constant one’, by which he means that it has the same outlook as the signatures we can see on Bosch paintings which are generally accepted as authentic. Nevertheless, the letters ‘h’ and ‘r’ seem unusual for Bosch, and the ‘u’ has a dash on top signalling an abbreviation: indeed, the final ‘s’ has been dropped). According to Unverfehrt, the Ira and Luxuria scenes were inspired by the similar scenes in the Prado Tabletop with the Seven Deadly Sins, and the jewel case in the Superbia scene was also taken from the same painting.
De Bruyn [1991] analyses the Seven Deadly Sins scenes in the Prado Tabletop and compares them to the similar scenes in the Geneva panel.
Larsen [1998: 49-50 / 114 (cat. nr. 6)] publishes colour photographs of the complete panel and of one detail (the Luxuria scene). He attributes the panel to Bosch and considers it a preliminary version of the Prado Tabletop. The sphere signifies the earth. This panel may be the panel representing the Seven Deadly Sins that was owned by Margaretha Boge in Antwerp in 1574. Based on a style-critical analysis, Larsen dates the panel ‘around 1470-75’. According to this author ‘several pigment, dendrochronological, and radiocarbon examinations have been performed, which confirm grosso modo a date of execution corresponding to the years of Bosch’s career’. Unfortunately, no further references regarding these examinations are given.
De Bruyn [1999: 83 / 86] publishes a black-and-white photograph. The naked behind of the phallus-like monster and the owl, both reflected in the mirror of an ugly woman in the Superbia scene, remind the woman of her folly and sins. When inventing this detail, the painter (a follower of Bosch) may have been inspired by the early-sixteenth-century editions of Uilenspiegel (Owlglass).
Vandenbroeck [2001: 137 / 184 (ill. 154), and Cat. Rotterdam 2001: 223 (cat. nr. 10.1)] publishes a colour photograph, calls the painting ‘a copy (?) after Bosch’ and identifies the man in the Avaritia scene as a pawnbroker. The same author [Vandenbroeck 2002: 330 (cat. nr. 54B)] reports that according to a dendrochronological examination by Dr. Molly Alexander the panel can have been painted around 1500 or later. According to a similar research by Dr. Peter Klein the panel can have been painted around 1530. These datings do not contradict the dating suggested by Unverfehrt in 1980.
Falkenburg [2011: 63] publishes a colour photograph and calls the panel a ‘pastiche of modest artistic value’ and ‘a far echo of Bosch’s own inventions’. The sphere is a globe. The central rock formation with the dark cave is an allegorical world within the world. It is a cipher for the world at large, as it balances on the cavernous grounds of Hell.
Pitts Rembert [2012: 191] publishes a colour photograph of the panel. The sphere is the terrestrial globe. No further comment,
De Vrij [2012: 587 (E.54)] attributes the panel to a Bosch follower without further comment.
Martens [in Cat. Lille 2012: 132-133 (cat. nr. 4)] publishes a colour photograph, describes the panel (the sphere is ‘some sort of globe’), and interprets the Seven Deadly Sins scenes (often in a very unconvincing way, see below). The dendrochronological examination places the panel within Bosch’s life-time, the signature is the original one (which is absolutely untrue, see above), and infrared reflectography has revealed the underdrawing and the use of a squared grid (suggesting that the painting is a copy). Martens dates the panel around 1500/1515 and suggests that it was produced in Bosch’s workshop under Bosch’s supervision.
Pinson [2016: 245 / 250] publishes a colour photograph and attributes the panel to Bosch’s workshop (with a question mark). She sees the sphere as a terrestrial globe made of transparent glass in which the corrupted world (see the genre scenes) is reflected as in a mirror. The fact that the mirror-world globe is cracked at the top denotes fragility, ephemerality, and vanity. The iconic cross atop the globe is replaced by a Calvary scene. The globe-mirror is precariously balancing atop a rocky foundation, which is part of a Hell scene.
Conclusion: today, the Geneva panel is generally considered the work of a Bosch follower and dates from around 1520-1530.
ICONOGRAPHICAL ANALYSIS
The iconography of the Geneva panel does not cause too many problems. The various deadly sins, for example, are fairly easy to identify (which probably explains why little attention has been paid to this aspect of the painting up to now). In the lower right half of the sphere, Acedia (Sloth) is simply represented by a sleeping man with a pillow underneath his head. In the Prado Tabletop Sloth is also represented by a sleeping man with a pillow underneath his head, but there a number of additional details make the scene more complex. Although father Gerlach [1978d: 240, 1988: 151] speaks against it, it is impossible not to think of the Dutch proverb ‘ledigheid is des duivels oorkussen’ (idleness is the devil’s cushion). In Symon Andriessoon’s collection of Dutch proverbs, printed in Antwerp in 1550, we read: Een leech mens is eens duyvels oorcussen (an idle person is a devil’s cushion) [Duytsche Adagia ofte Spreecwoorden ed. 2003: 230 (nr. 66.5)]. Andriessoon explains that a person who has nothing to do is easily tempted into committing sins by the devil. It is true that in the Geneva panel a devil is not an immediate part of the Acedia scene, but is it coincidence that of all the deadly sins Acedia is situated closest to the devil accompanying a damned soul in the lower right corner of the panel?
Father Gerlach [1979c: 248, 1988: 162] claimed that ‘probably the two men to the right of the cave opening are “envious” of each other. This is confirmed by their gaze and attitude’ (my translation). Maximiliaan Martens [Cat. Lille 2012: 132] was of the same opinion. But in the Geneva panel this scene represents Gula (Gluttony, see below)). Invidia (Envy) is represented by the scene next to the sleeping man: a man with a bone in his right hand and a grim expression on his face is leaning close to a dog. Between the man and the dog another bone is lying on the ground. In the Middle Ages a dog with a bone was a traditional attribute of Envy, and in the Invidia scene of the Prado Tabletop two dogs are envious of each other because they are both eager for the bone held by a man standing in a doorway. Again, the Tabletop scene is far more complex than the corresponding scene in the Geneva panel. Both Invidia scenes remind the viewer of a Dutch proverb. In a collection of proverbs published in Kampen (in present-day Holland) in 1550 we read: Daer twee honden knaegen an een been, die draegen sich selden overeen (where two dogs are gnawing at one bone, they rarely agree) [Gemeene Duytsche Spreckwoorden ed. 1959: 65 (lines 20-21)]. Peter Bruegel the Elder represented this proverb in his Flemish Proverbs panel (Berlin) and in the foreground of his Invidia drawing. Although it may seem a bit awkward that a man would envy a dog because of a bone, the painter probably wanted to express the improper, dog-like behaviour of the envious man, which is why he painted only one dog: the man is the second ‘dog’. Maximiliaan Martens [Cat. Lille 2012: 132] interprets this scene as representing another facet of Acedia, because the man with the bone has a melancholic look on his face. This interpretation must be rejected.
The scene in the lower left half of the sphere represents Avaritia (Greed). About this scene father Gerlach [1979b: 199, 1988: 150] wrote: ‘There we see a monk behind a table with some coins on it, and a crying woman with a child who is walking toward him. Does she need money and does she want to hand over a rosary by way of pawn?’ (my translation). Maximiliaan Martens [Cat. Lille 2012: 132] called the man a Dominican friar. Father Gerlach (who probably never saw the real panel and did not have access to a good and clear photograph) misinterpreted the man behind the table and the object in the hand of the woman. The man behind the table with coins on it and with a dagger, a hat, and a robe lying next to him is in fact a pawnbroker (as Paul Vandenbroeck correctly observed in 2001, see Vandenbroeck 2001: 137), and the object is not a rosary but a belt. Apparently, the crying old woman and the child are paupers wanting to obtain some money by bringing a belt to a pawnbroker. It stands to reason that here the pawnbroker is the one who is guilty of Greed. In De hel vant brouwersgilde (The Hell of the Brewers’ Guild), a play written by an anonymous rederijker around 1561, Lucifer’s secretary sums up all the professions and social classes that will end up in hell. About pawnbrokers he says: Lombaerden, wouckenaers, daer den duijvel off vervaert is, / sullen hem noch aen duijvels aersgadt veegen, / wiens groote wouckerije in de hel vermaert is, / so datse steden verderft, wadt baetet versweegen (Pawnbrokers, usurers, of whom the devil is afraid, will be used to wipe the devil’s arsehole. Their big usury is well-known in hell, corrupting complete cities, why should the truth be hidden?) [Hel vant brouwersgilde ed. 1934: 15 (verses 489-492)].
Superbia (Vanity) is represented by an old and ugly woman sitting next to a jewelry case and looking at her face in a mirror. In the Middle Ages, a woman looking into a mirror was a traditional way of representing Vanity (compare the Superbia scene in the Prado Tabletop, where there is also an open jewelry case). Behind the woman a little monster is bending over and showing his naked behind with an owl sitting on it. Undoubtedly, the viewer of the panel is supposed to understand that the mirror not only reflects the woman’s face but also the monster’s behind. In the present-day regions of Brabant and Flanders many people still know the proverbial warning directed at vain girls: as ge in de spiegel kèkt, ziede ’t gat van den duvel (when you look into the mirror, you see the devil’s arse) [H. Mandos and M. Mandos-van de Pol, De Brabantse Spreekwoorden – uitdrukkingen in Brabant gebruikt en opgetekend, Waalre, 1988, p. 486]. Although I cannot refer to a late medieval source for this proverb, it seems highly plausible that the painter of the Geneva panel was familiar with it. As was suggested by Dirk Bax [1948: 159, 1979: 210], the owl is probably a symbol of folly. The upper part of the monster’s body is hidden inside a hat, which gives the whole figure the appearance of a phallus-on-legs, not unlike late medieval insignia representing the same thing (see, for example, the numbers 7.40-7.46 in Jos Koldeweij, Geloof & Geluk – Sieraad & devotie in middeleeuws Vlaanderen, exhibition catalogue, Bruges, 2006, pp.115-116). Within this context, it may be relevant to be aware of the fact that an owl could also have a phallic meaning in late medieval art and literature. According to late medieval moralists, Vanity could easily lead to Unchastity. In Der Sotten Schip, the Middle Dutch adaptation of Sebastian Brant’s Das Narrenschyff published in 1548, vain women are rebuked as follows: Ende en draecht v lichaem niet te coope / Want sulcke die viant met grooten hoope / Ter hellen treckt ende maecktse strecken / Om ander sielen daer me te trecken (And do not show off your body, for women who do this are drawn into hell by the devil in great numbers and he uses them as traps to draw along other souls as well) [Der Sotten Schip ed. 1981: Z4r (chapter 87)].
In the Geneva panel the deadly sins Gula (Gluttony) and Ira (Wrath) are distinct parts of one scene, which has led to some misunderstandings in the past. The Gula scene focuses on excessive drinking: outside a cave which is at the same time an inn (see the signboard to the left of the entrance) and underneath a shabby side shelter two men are playing dice and drinking. The upset bench functions as a hyphen between this scene and the scene further to the left. Apparently, the excessive drinking ang gambling have led to a quarrel between two other men. This has resulted in a fight, which represents Ira, in total agreement with the Ira scene in the Prado Tabletop where Wrath is also represented by means of a fight outside an inn. In the Geneva panel the man to the left has raised a sword whereas a woman (probably the landlady or a maid of the inn) is trying to calm him down. Somewhat more to the front, an unarmed chubby man, who has probably been hit by the sword, is helped by a (Franciscan?) friar. Maximiliaan Martens’ interpretation [Cat. Lille 2012: 132] that this friar is biting the man’s neck, thus representing Gula, must be strongly rejected.
From the roof of the inn rises a strangely shaped, narrow rock formation. Its top is covered with grass, and there Luxuria (Unchastity) is represented by means of an amorous couple in front of a tent and of a small table with food and drink. Amourous couples near a similar tent can also be seen in the Luxuria scene of the Prado Tabletop and in the New Haven fragment that was once the lower part of Bosch’s Ship of Fools (Louvre). We know this motif from late medieval depictions of love gardens, for example by the German Master E.S. (circa 1460) and by the Hausbuch Master (late fifteenth century) and also from sixteenth-century Middle Dutch plays written by rederijkers, where the tents are called Venustenten (Venus tents) [De Bruyn 1991: 38-39]. In the Geneva panel the tent is completely surrounded by a bush that seems to grow atop the rock in a very unnatural way. This seems to have a special, ambiguous meaning, especially if one realises that in late medieval Middle Dutch the word ‘bush’ (struik) could refer to the female pubic hair. In a love song from the Antwerp Songbook, published in 1544, a girl is described as follows: Van leden is si wel ghemaect / Het schijnt een albasteren beelde / Moecht icse noch aenschouwen moedernaect / dat waer mijn herteken een weelde / Gondese mi dan haer ghebruyck / Het mochte haer luttel deeren / Want op haren witten buyc / Eenen swaerten struyc / Dat waer al mijn begheeren (Her body is well-shaped, she looks like an alabaster statue. If I could see her stark-naked, my heart would be rejoiced. If she would then give herself to me, it would do her little harm, for on her white belly a black bush, that would be all my desire). In another song from the same literary source old prostitutes complain about their physical decline and say: Ghewreven is onsen struyck / die mammen zijn plat, als een scotel doec nat / Si hangen op onsen buyck (our bush has been grinded, our breasts are flat, they hang on our belly like a wet dishcloth) [Antwerps Liedboek I ed. 1983: 121 / 198]. Is it far-fetched to interpret the open, red-coloured tent and the bush in the Geneva Luxuria scene as symbolic references to a vagina and to pubic hair? The (likewise unnatural) rock formation could then suggest a phallus.
All earlier authors seem to agree that the sphere is meant to be a terrestrial globe, thus suggesting that sins have spread all over the world. It is plausible that we should interpret the background landscape as a world landscape, defined by Falkenburg [1985: 91-92] as a (painted or drawn) landscape which offers a panoramic view of the complete visible world. In the Geneva landscape we see (from left to right) a couple walking toward a farm, a castle on a hill, a distant town, a man on horseback crossing a river, a woman washing linen in a pool, and a naked bather in a river. The woman washing linen reminds the viewer of similar details that can be seen in the background of Bosch’s Ghent St Hieronymus and in the central panel of his Lisbon St Anthony triptych.
Yona Pinson [2016: 250] has correctly pointed out that where we would normally expect a cross atop the terrestrial globe we now see a Christ at the Cross in the middle of a nightly wood, which turns brighter toward the left (but toward the heraldic right from Christ’s point of view) where an angel is pointing at what seems to be a morning sky (thus suggesting the way to Heaven) and darker toward the right, where a devil is taking possession of Judas’s soul after he has hanged himself. The meaning of all this is crystal clear: sinful man can still reach Heaven if he believes in and trusts upon Christ, whose death ‘has taken away the sins of the world’. If you do not repent, you will end up in Hell, like Judas did.
Underneath the globe, we see a Hell scene with a rock on which the globe is resting, fires burning in the dark, and two naked souls both of them accompanied by a devil. The devil to the left is winged and wears a pinned disc on his head. The devil to the left seems to refer to prostitution: he is holding a long candle, wears a fancy woman’s headgear, and has a long tail where his genitals should be. Pinson [2016: 250] has correctly observed that the globe is precariously balancing atop the infernal rock. At any moment, it can topple over and fall to pieces, which suggests the fragility of the sinful world shown inside the globe. This reminds the viewer of the Haywain tapestry (El Escorial, Patrimonio Nacional) where the sinful hunt for hay is represented within a terrestrial globe floating on a sea and ready to topple. Falkenburg’s suggestion [Falkenburg 2011: 63] that there is a link between the infernal rock and the central rock with a dark cave may make sense as well. The central rock cave could well be an emanation of the ‘under-world’ in the ‘upper-world’ through which the devil’s influence is felt on earth. And finally, it may be of interest to point out that in the late Middle Ages a dead tree that is beginning to blossom again could refer to Christ’s resurrection (see the tree to the right of the Gula scene). Together with the Calvary scene atop the globe, this detail could thus represent a comforting token of hope for the Christian viewer of the panel.
AFFINITY WITH BOSCH
First of all, there is nothing in the Geneva panel that does not agree with Bosch’s painted world: sinful mankind, the imitation of Christ, Heaven as a reward for the good, and Hell as a punishment for the bad, these are all standard motifs of Bosch’s Christian message. Furthermore, the painter of the Geneva panel seems to have been familiar with a number of works by Bosch or by his workshop (in particular the Prado Tabletop, but also see the woman washing linen, the morphology of the devils, and the erotic symbolism in the Superbia and Luxuria scenes). The fact that the sins are not represented in an allegorical way but by means of genre scenes does not necessarily point at Bosch: in an anonymous, Antwerp panel from the late fifteenth century we see a similar iconography [Antwerp, Koninklijk Museum voor Schone Kunsten, inv. nr. 680 – see Paul Vandenbroeck, Catalogus schilderijen 14e en 15e eeuw – KMSK Antwerpen, Antwerp, 1985, pp. 3-8]. But the similar details of the Acedia, Invidia, Superbia, Ira, and Luxuria scenes in both the Geneva panel and the Prado Tabletop are convincing enough: even if one argues that the Prado Tabletop is not an authentic Bosch, it is obvious that the Geneva panel radiates a truly Boschian atmosphere all over.
Is the Geneva panel a copy of an original Bosch painting produced within Bosch’s workshop? The deviant signature speaks against this. On the other hand, the use of a squared grid in the underdrawing [Cat. Lille 2012: 132] seems to point at a copy. But was the Geneva panel copied after an authentic Bosch? In my opinion, Reindert Falkenburg [2011: 63] was a bit too harsh when he called the Geneva panel a ‘pastiche of modest artistic value’. The pictorial execution is not of the highest calibre, but the panel does have its charms, and the open sphere surrounding the genre scenes and suggesting the omnipresence of evil on earth really seems a happy find, not unworthy of Bosch’s genius. Unfortunately, with the current state of accessible data, it is impossible to confirm that Jheronimus Bosch was the original inventor of the Geneva panel. Neither can we know for sure whether this panel was owned by the Antwerp lady Margaretha Boge before 1574.
[explicit 16th June 2020 – Eric De Bruyn]
