Maximilian and Trithemius

Just for the sake of context, the center panel of the Hieronymus Bosch triptych of Saint Anthony in Lisbon appears to come from the general direction of the Holy Roman Emperor Maximilian, a Yorkist, and the idea of demons conveying messages is likely based on the work of the abbot Johannes Trithemius who advised Maximilian on demonology and also devised secret codes. This is not without interest in terms of art history since a comparison to Trithemius’s Steganographia and Polygraphia helps to clarify that for instance the Nahuatl chronology in El Jardin de las Delicias can be seen as an example of a message that can be decoded by putting its elements in chronological order by means of an obscure system, in this case a language that was unknown to most observers. A less obscure example is the series of illustrations described by Laurinda Dixon of an alchemical process for making gold in a laboratory. Charles V had no more need for alchemists than Saint Anthony had for demons volunteering to send messages since he had access to gold from New Spain, and the alchemical stages are certainly partly allegory (with for example the Sack of Rome representing putrefactio), but also a cover text to illustrate Trithemius’s steganography, that is the use of codes that make messages appear to be plain text concerning some unlikely subject.