Contents
Hieronymus Bosch
Painting The Garden of Earthly Delights and extraordinary visions of temptation and judgment.
The Garden of Earthly Delights · The Temptation of Saint Anthony
- Born
- c. 1450
- Birthplace
- ’s-Hertogenbosch, Netherlands
- Died
- 1516
More people
Hieronymus Bosch
Early Netherlandish painter whose strange creatures and densely populated scenes explore human desire, sin and punishment. The surviving records of his life are sparse.
Early life
A family of painters
Born Jheronimus van Aken into a family with several generations of painters.
Local roots
Spent his life in ’s-Hertogenbosch, the town from which he took the name Bosch.
Career
- 1470s
First records
Appears in the surviving civic records of his home town.
- 1480s
An established household
Married Aleid van de Meervenne and became associated with the Brotherhood of Our Lady.
- Late 1400s–1516
Growing reputation
Produced religious paintings collected by patrons beyond his home town.
Selected work
The Garden of Earthly Delights
A triptych moving from paradise through earthly pleasure to a terrifying hell.
The Temptation of Saint Anthony
A saint endures a crowded world of monstrous temptations.
The Haywain Triptych
Humanity pursues worldly possessions on a journey toward judgment.
Beyond work
Religious community
He was a sworn member of the Brotherhood of Our Lady, a prominent local religious association.
An elusive biography
Many stories about his beliefs remain conjectural; even the dating and attribution of paintings are debated.
Sources & photo credit
Biography and references ↗Institutional biography and career ↗Featured work and significance ↗Photo: Attributed to Jacques Le Boucq. Public domain · Original image. Cropped and displayed in monochrome.
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