Image Credits

What the Hell?

Every artwork on the course page, with its source, license, and the reason it was chosen. All of it is public-domain art from Wikimedia Commons: Renaissance and medieval visions of hell, the ferryman of the classical underworld, and the biblical manuscripts at the heart of the course.

Image Work & Attribution License Where it appears Why it’s included
The Damned Cast into Hell (San Brizio fresco cycle, Orvieto) damned.jpg The Damned Cast into Hell (San Brizio fresco cycle, Orvieto) Luca Signorelli c. 1500 Source ↗ Public domain Hero background · instructor-section backdrop Signorelli’s crowd of the damned dragged down by demons: the vision of eternal torment the course puts to the test.
The Last Judgment (triptych) last-judgment.jpg The Last Judgment (triptych) Hans Memling c. 1471 Source ↗ Public domain Section I origin figure (“Plate I”) Memling’s souls weighed and sorted at the end of time: the medieval picture of judgment the course traces back to its roots.
Codex Sinaiticus, the Lord’s Prayer (Gospel of Matthew) sinaiticus.jpg Codex Sinaiticus, the Lord’s Prayer (Gospel of Matthew) Unknown (Greek scribes) 4th century Source ↗ Public domain Lecture 1 medallion · At-a-Glance backdrop The oldest surviving complete New Testament, open to the Lord’s Prayer: the words of Jesus at the center of the question.
Landscape with Charon Crossing the Styx charon.jpg Landscape with Charon Crossing the Styx Joachim Patinir c. 1520 Source ↗ Public domain Lecture 2 medallion · highlights image card Patinir’s ferryman rowing a soul between paradise and a burning hell: the pagan afterlife that Christianity absorbed.
Charon Herds the Sinners onto His Boat (Dante’s Inferno, Canto III) dore-charon.jpg Charon Herds the Sinners onto His Boat (Dante’s Inferno, Canto III) Gustave Doré 1861 Source ↗ Public domain Hero ornament · section backdrops Doré’s damned crowding Charon’s boat: the vivid hell the West inherited from Dante rather than from scripture.
Christ in Limbo (the Harrowing of Hell) harrowing.jpg Christ in Limbo (the Harrowing of Hell) Follower of Hieronymus Bosch c. 1575 Source ↗ Public domain Highlights image card A Bosch-school inferno of fire and torment: the popular imagination of damnation the course takes apart.
Map of Hell (Chart of Dante’s Inferno) map-of-hell.jpg Map of Hell (Chart of Dante’s Inferno) Sandro Botticelli c. 1485 Source ↗ Public domain Bento image (“Hell, after Dante”) · section backdrops Botticelli’s funnel of nine descending circles: how the West mapped and populated a hell the Bible never describes.
Masoretic Hebrew Bible, a page of Genesis hebrew-bible.jpg Masoretic Hebrew Bible, a page of Genesis Jewish scribes (Masoretic tradition) Medieval Source ↗ Public domain Rethink-section backdrop A page of the Hebrew scriptures, where, the course argues, no place of eternal torment is ever taught.

Public-domain works are reproduced freely. CC BY / CC BY-SA images are credited to their photographers as required; follow each Source link for the full license text.