Description in Icons, Nationalmuseum, Stockholm, 2004, cat. no. 50:
From Festival tier of an iconostasis
First quarter of 16th century, Novgorod or Moscow
The Dormition of the Mother of God
NMI 248

Wood: Linden (Tilia sp.), egg tempera,
gilded silver cover on background and
borders (16th century). Panel made
of two boards with two splines inlaid
from opposite sides (both lost).

Inscriptions a t.: A) Paper label with
printed and hand-written text in
brown ink in Cyrillic letters: GOSUDARSTVENNAYA
/ TRETYAKOVSKAYA
/ GALEREYA / Nº 144;
B) Hand-written on panel: 1.in red
pencil: 3265; 2.in white paint in Cyrillic
letters: P 5683/36 GTG; 3.in red
paint: 14731; C) 16 inscribed horizon-
tal lines (about 8 cm long)

PROVENANCE: State Historic Museum,
Moscow; Tretyakov Gallery, 1448;
Antiquariat, c/9317 (”Novgoroder Schule,
Anfang 16. Jahrh.”); Olof Aschberg 1935;
Gift of O. Aschberg 1952
EXHIBITIONS: Gothenburg 1970, no 17; Helsinki
1970, no 17; Stockholm 1988, no 10
BIBLIOGRAPHY: Kjellin 1956, pp 219, 237;
Abel 1971, pp 22–23, 67; Abel 1978:1, fig. 1;
Abel 1978:2, p 93; Taylor 1979, pp 78–79;
Abel 1981, p 255; Bjurström 1984, p 197;
Quenot 1987, p 70; Abel 1989:2, p 12;
Havice 1992, pp 39, 40, 45; Abel 1995,
pp 111, 113; Moberg 1999, p 90
CONSERVATION: Restored prior to entering
NM: painting cleaned and retouched
mainly on lower part of face of Christ, the
Soul of Mother of God and in corners;
halos reduced by holes left by metal covers
on the outer edges; NM 1956: paint flakes
and blisters consolidated; 1962: cleansed of
wax and old retouches; 1964: joints glued,
flaking paint consolidated,cleaned, re touch -
ed, varnished. Gold on halos and paint
layer in lower half of picture abraded; losses
of silver from background and borders;
panel warped

Because of its high artistic quality and
good state of preservation this icon
must be considered to be at the core of
the collection. Iconographically it can
be said to agree with the standard current
in 16th century Russia. Geograph -
ically, it is less easy to place, in spite of
the painterly style being so clearly profiled.
C. Havice has written a study of
this motif, based on a 16th century
icon in the Menil Collection, Houston
(85–57.57DJ). In it she has collated “a
distinctive cluster of Dormition icons
from the Novgorod region,” four icons
from the mid-15th century onwards,
and in connection with these, “a
second group of icons related to these
but less strictly”.1 It is to this latter
group she is inclined to place the
Nationalmuseum icon, dating it to the
first half of the 16th century and attributing
it to the Novgorod region.
There is however some discussion concerning
the origins of the icon. On a
visit to the Museum in 1981, E.S. Smirnova
suggested that it could be from
Novgorod, whilst not fully prepared to
rule out the alternative possibility of
Moscow. On a visit in 1997, E. Gordienko
of the Novgorod Museum stated
that the icon was probably rooted
in Novgorod, referring among other
things to the icon with this motif from
the Feast tier in the Church of the
Dormition of the Virgin at the Volotovo
Field in Novgorod Museum (inv.
no 3770).2 There are also certain re -
semblances – architectural, for example
– to the icon with the same motif in
the museum at Kirill-Belozersk (inv.
no 1958).3 I. Shalina is most inclined
to suggest a Moscow origin for this
work.4
The lines scribed on the reverse side
show that this icon occupied the
sixteenth place in the Feast tier of the
iconostasis, i.e. was one of the last or
possibly the very last.

1 Havice 1992, p 40.
2 Smirnova 1982, p 249 ff.
3 ibid., p 322 ff.
4 Shalina, Russian Museum, St Petersburg, on a
visit to the Museum in June 2000.
[slut]