Spending free time in Gdańsk, you will sooner or later reach St Mary’s Basilica. Walking from Szewska Street you will see the gate to St Mary’s Church decorated with a semicircular tympanum with an extraordinary medieval figural group, modelled on the architectural details of the thirteenth-century French cathedrals. In contrast to the stone cathedrals made in France, the Gdańsk churches have little outside decorations due to the fact that they are built of brick, which is a relatively fragile and difficult to shape material, hence it is not very decorative. The figures placed above the Szewska Gate are therefore a quite unique exception to the rather ascetic exterior decoration of the building. The sculptures depict the scene of the Blessed Virgin Mary falling asleep. The Mother of God kneels gently supported by St John surrounded by the Apostles. The artwork was made around the year 1420 and has decorated the gate lintel for over half a thousand years. According to the Old Gdańsk tradition, at this gate, in the shadow of the Madonna and the Apostles, Gdańsk’s harlots were gathered every year during Easter in order to participate in the Mass in the role of penitents. In 1926, to protect the monument against progressive erosion due to atmospheric factors, the sculptures were moved to the museum, where they are located today (currently in the Gdańsk branch of the National Museum), while in the tympanum of the gate there is an exact copy of the monument, which we can still admire.