Curiosities and rarities
· Vanalinn
Bernt Notke’s Dance of Death
In Bernt Notke’s Dance of Death, Death leads the pope, emperor and other ranks towards the same unavoidable end.
The Dance of Death in St Nicholas’ is a surviving fragment of a much larger late 15th-century painting. Figures of Death address representatives of different social ranks, warning that power, wealth and religious office exempt no one. The work emerged in a world where plague, war and early death were familiar experiences. Its message remains unsettlingly direct: social hierarchy loses its meaning before death.
Practical information
Address: Niguliste 3
The painting is displayed in a carefully lit room in St Nicholas’ Museum. Follow the figures in sequence and read the accompanying dialogue if available.