(38) chronology: 1520

The main reason El Jardín de las Delicias/The Garden of Delights has remained mostly undeciphered since the late nineteenth century is probably that its iconography is both European and Mexican. Its chronology includes events that are well known on different sides of the Atlantic, and not always remembered as having been simultaneous. But Martin Luther was warned by the Pope to recant or face excommunication on June 15, 1520, and in Mexico the “Noche Triste” took place two weeks later. It is logical to find the glyph for 1520 in a dark hell scene.