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[[quoteright:321:https://static.tvtropes.org/pmwiki/pub/images/Hieronymus-Bosch-Hell_1546.jpg]]
[[caption-width-right:321: It sure is Hell around here...! ]]

Hieronymus Bosch (born Jheronimus van Aken, circa 1450 – 9 August 1516) was a Dutch [[TheMiddleAges medieval]] / [[UsefulNotes/TheRenaissance Renaissance]] {{painter|s}}, best known for his colorful and grotesque depictions of {{Hell}}.

He made several {{paintings}} about the subject and nobody has ever come close to his vivid and creepy visions of the place: Ugly [[OurDemonsAreDifferent demons]] torturing people in complete agony and scenes which predate {{Surrealism}} by five centuries. Most of these strange NightmareFuel scenes are the product of symbolism that might be clear and understandable to a (noble or monied, and certainly educated) viewer in Bosch's age, but now, centuries later, can be difficult to decipher. Bosch's paintings show mankind in all of his corruptness and meanspiritness, doomed to end up in Hell, while only a few chosen ones will be allowed in {{Heaven}}. Even the Church is not spared in his fatal vision. He was able to depict north-west European society during {{the Late Middle Ages}} in a scathingly satirical and memorable light, one that continues to inspire artists to this day.

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!!The art of Hieronymus Bosch provides examples of:
* AfterTheEnd: "[[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Last_Judgment_(Bosch_triptych,_Bruges) The Last Judgment]]" depicts people being shipped off to the Paradise or Hell after the Apocalypse.
* AlwaysNight: All of Bosch's paintings depicting Hell take place at night.
* AnachronismStew: Like many painters of that time Bosch also depicted events from Literature/TheBible in his own lifetime.
* AndKnowingIsHalfTheBattle: Bosch's paintings have one fundamental message: repent or you will definitely go to Hell.
* AnimatedAdaptation: ''[[https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=mKdcQK2v3JQ The Midnight Parasites]]'' is a 1972 anime short inspired by Bosch's work.
* ApocalypseWow: Bosch's hellish visions may be the most sensational visions of the after life and Last Ordeal.
* {{Bizarrchitecture}}: In "The Garden of Earthly Delights" many buildings have all kinds of weird shapes.
* BodyHorror: Certain demons are half animal or half tree.
* ColdBloodedTorture: Demons show no mercy when torturing their victims.
* CoolAndUnusualPunishment: Many of them show up in Bosch's visions of Hell. One of the most bizarre is a bird like creature on the "Hell panel" of the Garden of Earthly Delights who sits on a toilet and swallows people whole, only to shit them out again.
* CorruptChurch: A common subject in his paintings:
** [[http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Haywain_Triptych "The Haywain Triptych"]] shows numerous people fighting to grab some hay from a large wagon. On the lower right side of the painting, several nuns are collecting hay for a fat monk.
** In the painting "The Garden of Earthly Delights" a pig is seen with a nun's habit on its head.
* CrapsaccharineWorld: The middle panel of "The Garden Of Earthly Delights". It appears to show people having a great time, but it's really a corruption of Eden where the descendants of Adam and Eve are committing empty debaucheries.
* CreatorCameo: The Tree Man in the trope image is reputed to be a self-portrait, but this has never been confirmed. The same goes for the Peddler in the eponymous triptych and one of the men helping Saint Anthony on the triptych of the leftmost panel of "the Temptation of St. Anthony".
* DarkWorld: Bosch's vision of the world and Hell is not a pretty one. Hell in particular is a dark underworld.
* EasterEgg: In 2014, it was discovered that the musical notation tattooed on the buttocks of one of the damned musicians in "The Garden Of Earthly Delights" is actually a genuine performable melody.
* FemmeFatale: They are often painted as well dressed women, [[RedRightHand with reptile tails]].
* {{Gorn}}: Lust and death are more or less intertwined in his work.
%%* TheGrimReaper: Featured in his painting ''"Death And The Miser"''.
* GrotesqueGallery: Consider [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Christ_Carrying_the_Cross_(Bosch,_Ghent) his painting of Christ Carrying The Cross]], though it's disputed whether the creator was Bosch himself or an imitator.
%%* {{Hellgate}}: Present in some of Hell paintings.
* HumansAreBastards: In Bosch's art the entire world seems to be evil or at least morally fallible, destined to suffer from eternal damnation in Hell.
* IronicHell: Many victims of Hellish torture on his paintings hold small objects that allow us to identify their sins on Earth.
** If a woman and a candle are seen together, she was an adulteress, because candles symbolized lust.
** People being forced fed were gluttons.
** On the third panel of ''The Garden of Earthly Delights'' musicians are being impaled on the strings of their instruments, while others are performing music written on buttocks.
* LostInACrowd: Several of his most famous paintings show lots of people crowding together.
* MoodWhiplash: The first two panels of ''The Garden of Earthly Delights'' seem cheerful enough, with bright colors and depictions of people enjoying themselves in their natural states. The third panel, however, uses darker colors and more nightmarish imagery to illustrate what a life of excess and sin will lead to.
* NakedPeopleAreFunny: This seems to be most audiences' reaction when they view the middle panel of the "Garden of Earthly Delights", where several nude men and women are frolicking around in an erotic paradise. Yet Bosch never meant this image to be funny, only as a warning that people should watch out not ending up in Hell in the afterlife, as the right panel of the painting seems to indicate.
%%* NightmareFace: Many! "Christ Carrying the Cross" being just the most famous example.
* OminousOwl: In medieval society owls were seen as evil and foolish, thus explaining why they are often seen on Bosch's paintings in the presence of morally fallible human beings. In the Hell panel of "Garden of Earthly Delights", one appears as Satan himself.
* OurDemonsAreDifferent: Compared to demons on earlier medieval paintings Bosch's devils look far more realistic and thus scary.
%%* OurMonstersAreDifferent: The same goes for his monsters.
* APartyAlsoKnownAsAnOrgy: The middle panel of "The Garden of Earthly Delights" shows numerous nude men and women enjoying a paradise full of erotic intercourse and symbolism.
* PhallicWeapon: On the Hell panel of "The Garden Of Earthly Delights" a huge knife can been seen with two ears on the side.
* ReligiousHorror: The horrors of the afterlife are more prominent than the good parts.
* RiddleForTheAges: Some scenes are still a mystery for art historians. Part of the problem is that in a few cases, we know that his images are literal depictions of contemporary metaphors (or cultural in-jokes), which means that some of the things we haven't figured out are just sayings that are otherwise unattributed.
* RollInTheHay: In the painting "The Hay Wain" a couple can be seen on top of the hay wain. The man is playing his instrument to seduce her.
* RuleOfSymbolism: Bosch's paintings were allegorical, as most paintings were at the time, so many of the more bizzare images are meant symbolically.
* {{Satan}}: The devil with the oven in his belly on "[[http://www.flickr.com/photos/profzucker/7473590936/ The Last Judgement]]"
%%* SceneryGorn and SceneryPorn: You will probably never get tired of watching for all of those gruesome details on Bosch's paintings.
* SelfInflictedHell: ''The Garden of Earthly Delights'' depicts sinners getting punished in {{Ironic Hell}}s. A greedy man is made to excrete gold coins, musicians (secular music was considered sinful in the Middle Ages) are tortured by musical instruments, a vain woman is forced to see her reflection in a demon's backside, and so on.
* SevenDeadlySins: Depicted in his painting [[https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/The_Seven_Deadly_Sins_and_the_Four_Last_Things "The Seven Deadly Sins and the Four Last Things"]]. Clockwise from the top of the circle is Gluttony, Sloth, Lust, Pride, Wrath, Envy, and Greed.
* ShroudedInMyth: Historians know almost nothing about Bosch, except that he lived in 's-Hertogenbosch (nowadays in UsefulNotes/TheNetherlands). The real meanings and messages of his paintings are still a matter of dispute. Some claim he was mad or a hallucinogenic substance user. Others call him a moralist, a satirist, a non-believer, a religious fanatic, a member of some secret cult, etc. Bosch is probably [[EveryoneIsJesusInPurgatory one of the most overanalyzed artists in history]].
%%* SingleTear: Christ appears to be shedding one of these in "Christ Carrying the Cross".
%%* SpookyPainting: Probably one of the best examples.
* StoryWithinAStory: His paintings are so full of detail that you can view dozens of little anecdotal scenes taking place.
* SurrealHorror: Some images are very bizarre, especially considering they were not part of the Surrealist Movement, which only occured in the 20th century.
* WorldOfSymbolism: A lot of scenes that we might call surreal are, in fact, symbolical allegories.

!!Hieronymus Bosch in popular culture:
* In Animation/TheMysteryOfTheThirdPlanet formations from the garden of earthly delights can be seen on the Third Planet.
* Thomas Burnett Swann's early short story "The Painter" suggests an unlikely source of inspiration: Bosch is [[AlienAbduction abducted]] by [[EldritchAbomination hideous alien creatures]] who force him to paint them.
* Nancy Willard's children's book ''Pish, Posh, Said Heironymus Bosch'' depicts Bosch as a LighterAndSofter eccentric and the creatures from his paintings as real-life companions.
* A lot of songs by Dutch singer Music/BoudewijnDeGroot reference Bosch's art, including ''"Het Land van Maas en Waal", "Eva", "De Tuin Der Lusten"'' en ''"Megaton"''.
* Characters in Thea Beckman's novel ''"Hasse Simonsdochter"'' visit him for one chapter.
* Scenes from Bosch's ''"Ecce Homo"'' and ''"Garden Of Earthly Delights"'' can be seen in Music/{{Metallica}}'s MusicVideo for "Until It Sleeps".
* Scenes from Bosch's paintings can be seen in the music video "Spokes For The Wheel Of Torment" by Music/{{Buckethead}}.
* Creator/RobertCrumb once drew a parody of Bosch's ''"Christ Carrying The Cross"''.
* In WesternAnimation/TheSimpsons episode ''[[Recap/TheSimpsonsS2E10BartGetsHitByACar Bart Gets Hit By A Car]]"'' Bart travels to Hell and sees the Hell panel of Bosch's ''"Garden Of Earthly Delights"''.
* The painting in the ComicStrip/{{Nero}} album ''"De Totentrekkers"'' is actually a small detail of Bosch's ''"Christ Carrying The Cross"''.
* The protagonist detective [[Literature/HarryBosch Hieronymus "Harry" Bosch]] in Creator/MichaelConnelly's crime stories is a direct reference. In his novel ''Literature/ADarknessMoreThanNight'' Bosch's work even plays an important role in the story.
* ''Literature/{{Hollow}}'' is heavily based on the works of Bosch. ''The Triumph of Death'' is an eternal battle fought between the damned that is important to the plot, one character modeled for him years ago, the monsters from his various works are coming to life as "Woebegots", and deep analysis of one of his paitings (''Temptation of Saint Anthony'') gives a character an epiphany that proves vital to resolving the core conflict.
* ''Music/{{Dangerous|Album}}'' by Music/MichaelJackson shows a nude couple in a bubble on the album cover, near the right. This is a shout-out to the middle panel of ''The Garden of Earthly Delights''.
* In the film ''Film/GoyasGhosts (2004)'' one of Napoleon's deputy's decides to leave Bosch's work behind in Madrid, because he feels it's ''"ugly"''.
* Synonamess Botch, the villain in ''WesternAnimation/TwiceUponATime'', is named after him. He runs the Murkworks, which produces nightmares.
* The cover of Music/JohnZorn's "Chimeras" (2003) is a detail of the Creator/HieronymusBosch painting "The Last Judgment", a tryptich where only a fragment has survived.
* Music/SunRa's album "It's After the End Of The World" features a scene from "The Garden Of Earthly Delights" on the cover, more specifically the couple inside the bubble.
* The Music/TheyMightBeGiants song "Celebration" includes the line "The unlikely crowd assembled here's like Hieronymus Bosch, Hieronymus".
* ''Manga/{{Berserk}}'' features a two-page spread in Volume 34 that serves as a massive shout-out to "The Garden of Earthly Delights," featuring an assortment of the tryptich's GrotesqueGallery, with the Tree Man pictured above being the central figure. [[spoiler:It signifies how Ubik and the rest of the [[BigBadEnsemble God Hand]] are coming to the physical world and bringing HellOnEarth.]]
* The land of The Boiling Isles in the Disney animated series ''WesternAnimation/TheOwlHouse'' was inspired by Bosch's work. In fact, some of the show's background characters are derived directly from The Garden of Earthly Delights, and recurring characters Hieronymus Bump and Boscha were named in tribute to Bosch.
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