The GDELT Project

Gemini For Museums: Using Gemini To Identify & Describe Woodcuts In The Profusely Illustrated 1657 Van Sichem Bible

Kalev Leetaru

One of the most profusely illustrated Bibles ever created, the 1657 Biblia Sacra published in Amsterdam by Pieter Jacobsz Paets and known as the "Van Sichem Bible" features more than 1,200 woodcuts by Christoffel van Sichem II in addition to copious historiated and decorated initials, headers, footers and other decorative elements throughout its 1,600 pages. While it is known that Christoffel van Sichem II created the woodcuts, the exact source of each individual woodcut is less well documented. One on particular page, both van Sichem's "CVS" monogram and a second monogram (alternately "MHem" and "MK") is seen. Can Gemini help us discern this second monogram and tell us more about the images?

Here we test two scenarios. The first is a scholar in a rare books archive snapping a quick photo with their cellphone and asking Gemini specifically to identify the monograms seen on the page. The second is an at-scale production workflow in which an entire scanned book is processed page-by-page by Gemini to identify all imagery and decorative elements, describe each in detail, identify its artist, engraver and publisher, attempt to estimate its original source work and additional details. While not quite perfect, the results here are extremely promising.

First we'll assume we are a researcher encountering this Bible in an archive and wanting to learn who the monograms belong to, so we take a photograph with our cellphone and pass to Gemini 3.1 Pro with the following prompt:

Who cut these woodcut images?
Who is the original artist they are based on?
Tell me the meaning of the "CVS" mark and "MK In" and "MHem In" marks in the images.
The top right images both have "MK In" whereas several others have "MHem In" - they appear to be different.

This yields the following:

Based on the style of the illustrations, the specific monograms, and the layout of the text, these are pages from a 17th-century Dutch Bible (very likely the Biblia Sacra published by Pieter Jacobsz Paets in Amsterdam around 1657).

Here is the breakdown of the artists, the woodcutter, and the meaning of the marks:

1. Who cut these woodcut images? (The "CVS" Mark)

The "CVS" mark—visible as an interlaced monogram of the letters C, V, and S in the bottom left image—stands for Christoffel van Sichem (specifically Christoffel van Sichem II, also known as the Younger, 1581–1658).

Van Sichem was a highly prolific and master woodcutter in Amsterdam. During this era, publishers wanted heavily illustrated Bibles, but commissioning entirely new artwork was expensive. Instead, Van Sichem's job was to take older, famous copperplate engravings (which were delicate and wore out quickly) and painstakingly carve exact copies of them into woodblocks. Woodblocks were much more durable and could be printed simultaneously with letterpress text, making them ideal for mass-producing illustrated Bibles.

2. Who is the original artist? (The "MHem" Mark)

The "MHem" mark stands for Maarten van Heemskerck (1498–1574), one of the most important Dutch artists of the Northern Renaissance.

Heemskerck was famous for introducing the dramatic, muscular, and crowded "Mannerist" style from Italy to the Netherlands. The heavily muscled figures, contorted poses, and classical Roman architectural backgrounds in these woodcuts are classic hallmarks of his style.

Heemskerck rarely engraved his own works. He was a "designer." He would create detailed drawings specifically meant to be turned into prints by professional engravers. Decades after Heemskerck died, Christoffel van Sichem copied those older engravings to create these woodblocks.

3. What does "In." mean?

The letters "In." or "Inv." appear after the artist's name (e.g., "MHem In."). This is an abbreviation for the Latin word Invenit, which translates to "invented it" or "designed it."

In the printmaking world from the Renaissance onward, prints usually carried two names to give proper credit:

So, "MHem In." coupled with "CVS" translates to: "Maarten van Heemskerck designed this image, and Christoffel van Sichem carved the woodblock."

4. The difference between "MHem In" and "MK In"

You have a very sharp eye to catch that discrepancy!

While most of the panels clearly say "MHem In." (Maarten van Heemskerck), the "MK In." mark on the top right images is a bit of an anomaly, but there are two possible explanations for it:

Most Likely Explanation: It is an alternative monogram for Heemskerck.
Stylistically, the "MK" images (like Christ carrying the cross) are identical to the "MHem" images. They feature the exact same anatomy, shading techniques, and facial profiles. It is highly probable that "MK" is simply an abbreviation for Maarten van HeemsKerck. When Christoffel van Sichem was copying the original 16th-century engravings to make these woodblocks, he may have copied a variant monogram used by the original engraver, or he simply abbreviated the name differently on certain blocks to save space.

Less Likely (but possible) Explanation: A different artist.
Publishers of these 17th-century Bibles often mixed and matched print series to get enough images to fill the book. Van Sichem copied works by several artists (including Dürer, Goltzius, and Maarten de Vos). It is theoretically possible that "MK" refers to a lesser-known contemporary of Heemskerck, but given the seamless stylistic unity across all six panels on these pages, it is overwhelmingly likely they were all designed by Maarten van Heemskerck.

Now let's replicate an actual at-scale production digitization workflow and hand this image to Gemini as if it just arrived from scanning and ask it to search for any imagery or other decorative elements on the page and describe each in detail, along with searching for artist and other identifying marks. One could imagine such a workflow being applied at scale to every single page of a digitized book like this:

Attached is a scanned historical book page from 1657 Biblia Sacra published in Amsterdam by Pieter Jacobsz Paets.
Does the page contain engravings, woodcuts, historiated or decorated initials or other decorations?
If so, list each below in a bulleted list.
For each, give its location on the page, describe it in detail such that someone who can't see the image can picture it,
tell what it depicts and its importance, search carefully for any artist/engraver/publisher/etc marks and list them and
who they represent.
If the image is a copy of a known artwork, list it and its original artist.

While not quite perfect, the results are extremely impressive, suggesting considerable potential, especially if the quality of the scan was improved beyond a quick blurry cellphone image under room lighting and with no attempt to flatten or otherwise make the gutter more visible:

Based on the provided scan of the 1657 Biblia Sacra published by Pieter Jacobsz. Paets, the pages do not contain any decorated or historiated initials. However, they are highly decorated with eight detailed woodcut illustrations arranged in a grid across the two pages (four per page).

These woodcuts are copies of earlier 16th-century designs by the renowned Dutch artist Maarten van Heemskerck, which were transformed into woodblocks by the 17th-century Dutch master woodcutter Christoffel van Sichem II.

Here is a detailed list of each woodcut:

Page 164 (Left Page)

Page 165 (Right Page)