Death of the Virgin

The Death of the Virgin is an oil-on-oak-panel painting by the Flemish artist Hugo van der Goes. It was completed c. 1472–1480 and shows the Virgin Mary on her deathbed surrounded by the Twelve Apostles. The scene is based on Jacobus de Voragine's thirteenth-century "Legenda aurea" which relates how the apostles were brought, at Mary's request, on clouds by angels to a house near Mount Zion to be with her in her final three days. On the third day Jesus appeared above her bed in a halo of light surrounded by angels to accept her soul at the point when his name was finally mentioned. Three days later he reappeared to accept her body.