Crucifixion

The date is painted twice. It flies on a red pennant among the soldiers' lances, 1449 in Gothic numerals, and again on the blanket of the pale horse in the foreground, whose gilded border also carries the words ALS ICH CHUN. Jan van Eyck, the Netherlandish painter who had died in Bruges eight years earlier, wrote almost the same phrase, als ich can, as well as I can, on several of his frames. The Belvedere reads the letters CHUN as possibly the start of Chunrad, the old spelling of Laib's first name. Around the lettering the panel is packed with people, riders in plate armour, men in turbans and tall hats, the Virgin sinking to the ground in a dark mantle among the holy women, and Mary Magdalene kneeling at the foot of the cross. A skull and scattered bones lie on the ground below.