Crucifix

This crucifix was made to be carried. Painted around 1265 to 1270, it most likely went out in processions, and it once had the same image on both faces, so it read the same from either side. At some point it was cut in half, probably because constant use had damaged it. The gold circles set into the ends of the arms were very likely covered with discs of glass, and one round setting almost certainly held a relic, perhaps a fragment of the True Cross. Beside the dead Christ stand the mourners, the Virgin supported by Mary Magdalene, then Saint John and a Roman soldier, all against a ground of ultramarine, the costliest blue a painter could buy. The Gallery bought it in 1965 with help from the Art Fund, a charity that supports museum purchases, and from an anonymous donor.