America Infernalis: Printmaking Practices, Devilish Imagery, and Moral Discourse in Theodore De Bry’s India Occidentalis (1590-1597)

This dissertation examines the engraved illustrations produced by the first generation of the De Bry family workshop for the initial seven volumes of the India Occidentalis (1590-1597) series, published under the name of Theodore de Bry. Although this series has consistently been a central focus in scholarship on early modern representations of the Americas, its images have not undergone a comprehensive visual analysis. Moreover, Theodore de Bry’s contributions and significance have not been reassessed prior to the publication of his workshop’s works. This study attempts to address that gap by arguing that Theodore de Bry can be recognised as an art publisher who was connected to art- printing networks throughout his life. The project uses a systematic examination of nearly 200 copperplate engravings from the selected volumes, segmenting figures, motifs, and compositional structures to reconstruct patterns of repetition, borrowing, and transformation. Considered a collaborative production involving his sons and associates, the analysis integrates close visual comparisons and network reconstruction. The dissertation advances three main claims. First, it indicates that the visual strategies of the India Occidentalis cannot be understood without reconstructing Theodore de Bry’s earlier career as a goldsmith and printmaker. Through a close study of his signed works prior to the American series and the artistic and intellectual networks connected to them, his mobility across Strasbourg, Antwerp, London, and Frankfurt facilitated engagement with transregional craft traditions, print cultures and erudite networks. This background explains that the workshop’s dependence on established European visual conventions and the refinement of the copperplate engravings emerged as the logical outcome of De Bry’s artistic trajectory, not simply as a market strategy. Secondly, it reveals a workshop practice rooted not only in travel literature but also in the strategic recombination of models and motives from other print collections and illustrated books, drawn from unrelated thematic contexts, including devotional, allegorical, and xviii moralising imagery. By identifying and comparing these models, the study reconstructs what may be termed De Bry’s “visual library”: a structured repertory of models and motifs that were selectively adapted to represent the Americas. This study also reexamines the ideological and iconographic aspects of the series, paying particular attention to infernal imagery, idolatry, and moral discourse. It shows how representations of the Americas formed by infernal iconography and motifs associated with evil and vice reflect Europeans’ own confessional anxieties projected onto non-European subjects. It is precisely the semantic openness characteristic of the Calvinists, much like that of Theodore de Bry while in charge, that enabled the workshop to appeal across confessional boundaries, reaching an educated European audience without committing to a single doctrinal view. The volumes examined in the India Occidentalis series represent a dynamic platform for image-making. They draw upon European visual traditions to frame and interpret the Americas through their own pluralistic perspectives and moral frameworks. By integrating erudite networks, workshop practices, and iconographic analysis, this thesis shows that illustrated books have historically served — and continue to serve — as powerful tools for forming perceptions of cultural and religious differences.