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Quid est secretum? Visual Representation of Secrets in Early Modern Europe, 1500–1700 is the companion volume to Intersections 65.1, Quid est sacramentum? Visual Representation of Sacred Mysteries in Early Modern Europe, 1400–1700. Whereas the latter volume focused on sacramental mysteries, the current one examines a wider range of secret subjects. The book examines how secret knowledge was represented visually in ways that both revealed and concealed the true nature of that knowledge, giving and yet impeding access to it. In the early modern period, the discursive and symbolical sites for the representation of secrets were closely related to epistemic changes that transformed conceptions of the transmissibility of knowledge.

Since the time of the Fathers of the Church a wide range of metaphors and typological readings have been employed to explain, emphasize and disseminate the unique prerogatives of the Virgin Mary. In Early Modern Europe theologians and ecclesiastical authors not only took over this tradition, but actively revitalized it, as one might expect from a period that was predisposed both to make extensive use of images and to transform reality into symbol and thus provided the perfect breeding ground for the development of emblems and other related symbolic forms. As a result, visual and verbal constructions intended for the elucidation and easier understanding of Marian mysteries paradoxically became enigmas in need of decoding, an intellectual task which in turn could lead the reader or beholder to apprehend better and reflect deeper on the beliefs or truths hidden in such conundrums. In a nutshell, a mystery proved suitable to represent another mystery. In 1636 the Jesuit Petrus Stoergler published in Linz (Austria) a work entitled Asma Poeticum Litaniarum Lauretanarum, the first recorded Litany of Loreto illustrated with emblematic compositions. Mythological figures and accounts, historical characters and events, biblical episodes, allegories, and a large assortment of corpora naturalia and artificialia were brought together to depict the (at that time) fifty-six canonical invocations of the litany, which actually are no other than corollaries to the main mysteries of Mary. In this chapter I discuss a selection of these ‘mysterious’ illustrations in light of Stoergler’s accompanying carmina, whose hints are crucial to unveil the Marian mysteries signified by them. In addition, thanks to the reuse of this set of images in two subsequent works, I show how the lack of awareness of the initial meanings led the authors of the 1732 edition to misunderstand some of the compositions, reducing their original contents and even creating some iconographic oddities—not a riddle this

Ephesians 6:10–17 employs clothing and armour imagery to the spiritual struggle of the faith communities. A growing field of interpretation looks to the systematic interpretation of such imagery in relation to and dialogue with the socio-political visual landscape. For my part I wish to engage the iconographic panorama of the cities in which the biblical texts are written, heard and read to further illuminate the meaning of the text. In this paper, using an adapted socio-rhetorical method I engage a visual exegesis of the clothing and armour images in Eph 6:10–17 in light of a gladiator graveyard in Ephesus and the context of Pax Romana in Asia Minor. Through this visual exegesis I examine the schema of visual images and investigate how the spectacle of gladiatorial combat and the sculpted panorama or imperial iconography informs, critiques and interacts with the metaphorical images in the biblical text

Ephesians 6:10–17 employs clothing and armour imagery to the spiritual struggle of the faith communities. A growing field of interpretation looks to the systematic interpretation of such imagery in relation to and dialogue with the socio-political visual landscape. For my part I wish to engage the iconographic panorama of the cities in which the biblical texts are written, heard and read to further illuminate the meaning of the text. In this paper, using an adapted socio-rhetorical method I engage a visual exegesis of the clothing and armour images in Eph 6:10–17 in light of a gladiator graveyard in Ephesus and the context of Pax Romana in Asia Minor. Through this visual exegesis I examine the schema of visual images and investigate how the spectacle of gladiatorial combat and the sculpted panorama or imperial iconography informs, critiques and interacts with the metaphorical images in the biblical text

Ephesians 6:10–17 employs clothing and armour imagery to the spiritual struggle of the faith communities. A growing field of interpretation looks to the systematic interpretation of such imagery in relation to and dialogue with the socio-political visual landscape. For my part I wish to engage the iconographic panorama of the cities in which the biblical texts are written, heard and read to further illuminate the meaning of the text. In this paper, using an adapted socio-rhetorical method I engage a visual exegesis of the clothing and armour images in Eph 6:10–17 in light of a gladiator graveyard in Ephesus and the context of Pax Romana in Asia Minor. Through this visual exegesis I examine the schema of visual images and investigate how the spectacle of gladiatorial combat and the sculpted panorama or imperial iconography informs, critiques and interacts with the metaphorical images in the biblical text