The Death of the Virgin
The original, as its museum records it
Every line above is reproduced from the holding institution’s own catalogue entry, which is linked. Where their title, date or attribution differs from ours, theirs is the one printed here.
The file this print is made from
Sizes
About this painting
No Gospel records Mary's death; the subject is apocryphal. Giotto paints no miracle here, only a funeral performed correctly.
Peter recites from the psalms, Andrew brings the aspergillum and its holy water, an angel blows into a censer to rouse the coals. Berlin identifies the twisted candles as those lit at the blessing of the dying.
Giotto made this gabled poplar panel c. 1310 for the Humiliati at Ognissanti, above a side altar kept for offices of the dead. Berlin reads it as matched to the rite performed before it: the apostles and the mourners were saying the same office.
Sources: Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, Gemäldegalerie, obj-865492 (Ident. Nr. 1884) · Staatliche Museen zu Berlin, catalogue text for obj-865492 · Smarthistory, 'Giotto, The Ognissanti Madonna and Child Enthroned' · Metropolitan Museum of Art, 'Art and Death in Medieval Byzantium'
Printed on demand. Public-domain masterwork, reproduced from a 9,554 px master of the original. The whole image is printed — never cropped to fit the sheet — so every sheet carries an archival margin, and the dimensions and resolution listed above are the ones you receive.