# The Garden of Delights \(Hortus Deliciarum\) [View the canonical artwork record]() ## Artwork - Artist: [MINIATURIST, German]() - Date: 1151-1200 - Technique: Manuscript \(facsimile\) ## Commentary The Garden of Delights \(Hortus Deliciarum\) c. 1180 Manuscript \(facsimile\) Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris Herrad of Hohenberg \(d. 1195\) was one of the most learned women of the twelfth century, and abbess of the women's monastery of St. Odile at Hohenberg in Alsace. \(Formerly historians believed her to be from a powerful family of Landsberg, but that is now questioned.\) She is chiefly remembered for her encyclopedia, compiled between 1170 and 1195, and entitled The Garden of Delights \(Hortus Deliciarum\). It was intended for the personal education of the nuns under her care, and was conceived as a history of the world, told against a Biblical background. The manuscript consisted of over 300 parchment leaves of folio size. In addition to the Latin texts, over 344 illustrations were used: at least 130 of these were brightly coloured full-page illuminations, while smaller ones were put on the same pages as text; there were also drawings and tables. Many of the illustrations were given explanatory rubrics and in some cases detailed captions placed around the figures. In case the Latin terms were not clear to the younger readers, German was frequently added. The effect was to allow text and image to gloss each other. The manuscript \(and one complete copy\) survived fires and suppression of monasteries, only to be destroyed in an 1870 bombardment during a siege of the city of Strasbourg. All that exists now are copies of part of the text and some tracings and engravings that were made before 1870. The picture shows an illustration \(facsimile\) of the Last Judgment from The Garden of Delights. This vivid image anticipates the Last Judgment scenes of Hieronymus Bosch. In the bottom level of the illustration a monk clutching a money bag is condemned to hell, while to his right Satan is enthroned with the Anti-Christ on his lap. Above this, group of Jews and knights are thrown into burning cauldrons. At the top various other punishments are depicted. ## Related artworks - [Aachen Gospels]() - [Aachen Gospels]() - [Ada Gospels]() - [Allegory of the Sacraments]() - [Antoninus Florentinus: Chronicon]() - [Aratea]() - [Astronomical-computist collection]() - [Astronomicum caesareum]() - [Astronomicum caesareum]() - [Bamberg Apocalypse]() - [Bamberg Apocalypse]() - [Bamberg Apocalypse]() ## Attribution [Web Gallery of Art]()