# Hidden Devil in painting in the Basilica of St. Francis of Assisi **URL:** \ **Category:** Factual Questions\ **Created:** [November 5, 2011, 4:12pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hidden-devil-in-painting-in-the-basilica-of-st-francis-of-assisi/601962 "2011-11-05T16:12:24Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 4\ **Page:** 3
**Author:** ![capybara](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/capybara/32/202_2.png) [@capybara](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/capybara)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2011, 2:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hidden-devil-in-painting-in-the-basilica-of-st-francis-of-assisi/601962/41 "2011-11-06T14:03:47Z")
> [@Acid\_Lamp](#): > > It is almost certainly on purpose. It was not unusual for artists of the time to place little faces and other “easter eggs”, to use a modern term, into large works like this. Other examples from early 14th-century Tuscany? Preferably religious works in Franciscan orbit? ---
**Author:** ![Acid\_Lamp](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/d6d6ee/32.png) [@Acid\_Lamp](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Acid_Lamp)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2011, 2:49pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hidden-devil-in-painting-in-the-basilica-of-st-francis-of-assisi/601962/42 "2011-11-06T14:49:36Z")
> [@capybara](#): > > Other examples from early 14th-century Tuscany? Preferably religious works in Franciscan orbit? Outside my pay grade. I had a lot of art history in the course of pursuing two fine art degrees but I don’t remember specific examples. I was a studio major, not a historian. We had a whole week on this subject though. I believe the practice spanned most of the renaissance though until artistic restrictions on content were relaxed. Michelangelo has his face on the flayed skin of St. Bartholomew, and there are a few other examples in his work (rude gestures, a dissected brain) that are fairly well known. Pieter Bruegel the Elder inserted all sorts of strange sexual miniatures into his work, and Da Vinci is suspected of hiding everything from musical scores to rude gestures in his paintings. In addition, most work was not censored until a later date and when viewed in context often become rather explicit. There are also hidden self portraits used to sign work. ---
**Author:** ![APB](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/8e8cbc/32.png) [@APB](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/APB)\ **Post date:** [November 6, 2011, 4:33pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hidden-devil-in-painting-in-the-basilica-of-st-francis-of-assisi/601962/43 "2011-11-06T16:33:37Z")
> [@Acid\_Lamp](#): > > It was not unusual for artists of the time to place little faces and other “easter eggs”, to use a modern term, into large works like this. Er, the question as to whether there are other comparable examples from this period is one that Frugoni specifically addresses and she admits that there aren’t any. The best she can come up with is the horseman visible in the clouds in Mantegna’s Vienna [_St Sebastian_](http://www.artmagazine.cc/data/content/2008-10/37951/mantegna_sebastian.jpg) painted a century and a half later. The word she uses for the _Death of St Francis_ is therefore ‘pioneering’. ---
**Author:** ![mac\_bolan00](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/b3f665/32.png) [@mac\_bolan00](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/mac_bolan00)\ **Post date:** [November 7, 2011, 11:03pm UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hidden-devil-in-painting-in-the-basilica-of-st-francis-of-assisi/601962/44 "2011-11-07T23:03:42Z")
an image is not enjoyable when it’s not obvious. the ghost faces on the belmez kitchen floor still give me the hibee-jeebees. [Previous page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/hidden-devil-in-painting-in-the-basilica-of-st-francis-of-assisi/601962.md?page=2)