Only the opening piece with thirteen figures has survived of Tallinn’s Danse Macabre. It is not known how many figures there were originally, how long it was, or who commissioned the painting. Since the work is not mentioned in the medieval account book of St Nicholas’ Church (1465–1520), it can be assumed that it was donated by a wealthy person (most probably a merchant), a guild or a fraternity. It has also been hypothesised that the original location of the work may have been the church at the Dominican friary of St Catherine rather than St Nicholas’ Church, but there is no evidence of this, either.

Bernt Notke’s Danse Macabre is undoubtedly the most famous medieval work of art in Estonia. The painting is of an exceptionally high artistic level, the faces of the Pope and the Emperor being particularly suggestive.