The Crucifixion

This panel shows Christ on the cross between the two crucified thieves and is crowded with figures that are symbolically positioned. To his right, the good thief gazes directly up at him, the Virgin collapses into the arms of John the Evangelist, and the grieving Magdalene embraces the shaft of the cross. Longinus, the Roman spear bearer who converted at Christ's death holds his right hand up in blessing. Contemporary figures of a cardinal and a Turk have been included on the right-hand side of the composition under the cross of the bad thief – as it were, among the unenlightened.

[cda 2022]