Abstract
While almost any late medieval religious image could have been contemplated and thus memorized some of them clearly employed mnemonic procedures in their very own design. This is not just the case of manuscript illuminations but also of panel paintings and wall-paintings.
A notable example is the image type of "Defensorium virginitatis beatae Mariae", a scheme consisting of multiple layers of meaning arranged in the geometrical scheme ruled by repetition of same quantities. I shall observe how this unique design changed in the pictorial tradition and what can we say about its reception as well as about similar image schemes based on the same principles.