"The Garden of Earthly Delights" by Hieronymus Bosch

Hieronymus Bosch was born in 1450 in Flanders. Though the meaning of his paintings is now largely incomprehensible, they were certainly constructed as allegories and social commentaries. In these Pre-Reformation times there was a great deal of public hysteria against heresy, sorcery, and magic. Public tortures and executions were common. Hieronymus Bosch's work might have easily been viewed with suspicion, but his marriage into wealth shielded him from such concerns—In 1478 he married Aleyt van de Meervenne, (Anna van Meer, in our musical) the daughter of a wealthy patrician. Hieronymus Bosch later joined the Brethren of the Swan, a charitable group for whom he did some work on their altarpiece. They also put on morality plays. One of them, "The Temptation of St. Anthony", which Hieronymus Bosch certainly had a hand in, was criticized by a young scholar, Erasmus of Rotterdam, for being licentious and heretical. That is how Erasmus became the villain of the musical "Hieronymus".

To learn more about the Hieronymus Bosch musical by T. E. Breitenbach, click here Hieronymus.