Saint Mary Magdalene and the Apostles Peter and John discover the empty tomb of Christ
Cathedral of Notre-Dame de Chartres, 1194-1240
Stained glass with lead came; colourless glass; red, blue, green, ochre and yellow pot-metal glass; grisaille.
Diameter: 78.5 cm (in light), 83 cm (with frame)
Loan of the Historisches Museum Basel and Freiwilliger Museumsverein Basel, VMR 486
The round window shows a woman and two men standing and dressed in antique style. The blue background holds a plant with several foliage patterns on the left, and on the right, an empty, uncovered tomb, from which a white shroud is protruding. This is the story of the visit of Mary Magdalene and the apostles Peter and John to the tomb of Christ, which they found open and empty. The corresponding New Testament account is given in the Gospel of John (John 20:1-10). At this moment, the protagonists grasp the prophecy of Christ, who had announced his Resurrection three days after his Crucifixion. The scene is bounded by an ornamental frieze composed of colourful geometric motifs.
This stained glass window, on long-term loan from the Basel Historical Museum, shares its fate with its counterpart depicting Christ in Glory, which is now kept at the Historical Museum Basel (inv. 1978.222). Both come from the cathedral of Notre-Dame de Chartres, in the Eure-et-Loir region of France, about 90 kilometres south-east of Paris, where they are believed to have been made between 1194 and 1240 during the cathedral's prestigious first stained-glass decoration.
Based on archival documents found in the 1880s in Chartres, we know that our stained glass window was restored between 1415 and 1416: it was at this time that the head of Mary Magdalene and several of the glasses making up the sarcophagus were replaced, while the head of St. John was replaced at an undetermined date by a fragment dating from around 1200. Having retained its old lead came, the panel seems to have escaped the major restoration of the cathedral that took place between 1868 and 1918: it is probably at this time that the stained glass was substituted in Chartres, perhaps by one of the many Parisian restorers then active at the site. It was also at this time or at the very beginning of the 20th century that a restorer and/or antique dealer gave the panel its present medallion shape.
After the removal, the two Basel panels found their way onto the art market – a rare occurrence for stained glass from Chartres. They were acquired in 1910 by the American A. M. Vail (1864-1946) from the Bacri Frères antique dealers in Paris in 1910, and later inherited by the Sarasin-Dearth family from Basel in 1947. In 1978, the Christ in Glory was purchased by the Canton of Basel-Stadt and the Empty Tomb was purchased by the Freiwilliger Museumverein Basel and given to the Basel Historical Museum.