Iconology of the Wayfarer Triptych – Detail

Die Baumgabelung auf dem Bild mit dem Hausierer findit sich beim Verlorenen Sohn” wieder. Schreitet ersterer auf eine Brücke zu, so stößt der Weg des letzteren auf ein Gatter… Nach Fraenger ist dieses Gatter die Grenzscheide des guten und bösen Weges; die sechs Felder des Gatters sinnbilden des Sechstagewerk; im sechsten Feld, dem Geviert der Erschaffung des Menschen, sitzt eine Elster; derschwarzweiße Vogel ist bereits in Wolfram von Eschenbachs Parzival [von Eschenbach, ca. 1200-1210] ein Symbol des zwîfel, das heißt des Menschen, der vor die Entscheidung zwischen Schwarz und Weiß, zwischen dem Bösen und dem Guten, zwischen dem Weg zur Hölle und dem Weg zum Himmelsteht [Fraenger, 1950, 109] (p. 108)

From the tree of life in The Prodigal Son it twitters at the beggarman, ruffling its feathers in indignation. (p. 44)

…the tree of life, is developed just as richly and appealingly as the magpie symbol. A neighborly tree stands beside the homecomer, linked with him by the basic color of its trunk. It is a beech tree. The language of the late Middle Ages liked to treat this tree, like the elder and the hazel, as a woman, especially since it is one of the trees that possesses the power of the tree oracle. The casting. sticks used for divining one’s lot in life were made from its wood. Its maternal, destiny-divining qualities make the beech an obvious choice for the tree of life… According to popular belief in sympathetic influences, the tree of life to which a child is dedicated shares his fate, be it to grow and thrive or to fall sick and die. The beech in our picture has fallen sick as a result of the vagaries of its protege: exactly level with his heart it has developed a cancerous growth. But now that the Prodigal has repented, the excrescences recede. Rejuvenated, the tree rises to a fork. One branch, in danger of withering, forks toward the evil side, a sound one toward the good. From the withered branch the owl scolds. Its warning is not directed to the reprobate alone but to another happy-go-lucky bird too: the daring titmouse feeding on the beechmast – upside down like the Prodigal’s way of life. (p. 260)

Above the peddler’s head hovers an owl, a consistent harbinger of evil in Bosch, though it is accompanied in the same tree by a second bird, probably a titmouse or chickadee [Silver, 2006, 411:note 31; de Jongh, 2000, 43]. (p. 259)