The Dormition of Mary

I just went through Brian E. Daley's On the Dormition of Mary: Early Patristic Homilies looking for passages in these early works that would be relevant to later images of the Dormition and the Assumption. There is a lot of variety in how these events are portrayed, both in eastern and in western Christian art. Here are some gleanings:

1. John of Thessalonika (7th century) says Christ "took her [Mary's] soul and placed it in the hands of Michael [the archangel], after wrapping it in veils of some kind, whose splendor it is impossible to describe." We see Christ doing this (although the angel is not identified as Michael) in a Byzantine icon of 950-1000 in the Metropolitan Museum.
2. According to this John, when the Apostles bore Mary's bier from her deathbed they sang from Ps. 113 (114), "When Israel came out from the land of Egypt." Daley suggests that this reflects burial practices of the early 6th century. The same psalm is mentioned in St. Andrew of Crete's 3rd homily on the Dormition.
3. Several of the homilists make comments consistent with a belief in the Immaculate Conception. Theoteknas of Livias: "She was begotten like the cherubim, from pure and spotless [Daley supplies 'clay']" (p. 72). Also St. Andrew of Crete (Homily I, p. 113), "she entered and left this life in a wonderful way" (though that might refer to her mother's long barrenness).
4. In Homily II, Andrew seems to be referring to an icon that is present while he speaks and says, "what a great multitude are gathered here" as Mary's life ends (p. 129). Then he speaks of the procession to Gethsemane also as if they could see an image of it. He also says (p. 131), "Dionysius speaks of 'many of our holy brethren,' so it seems clear that the seventy, those appointed disciples of Christ in second place, were also present in that divinely chosen gathering."
5. A palm branch is mentioned several times. John of Thessalonica says "the great angel" brought her a palm branch and said, " Rise, Mary, take this branch of palm, which he who planted Paradise gave to me, and give it to the Apostles, so that they may carry it as they sing before you, for after three days you will lay aside your body" (p. 49). It is also in Germanus of Constantinople Homily II (p. 173)
6. Germanus presents the deathbed scene liturgically. Peter urges Paul to say "the customary prayer over the Virgin's remains" (p. 175). Similarly, John of Damascus' 2nd Homily says, of her death, "Then there must have been inspired speech, words that spoke of God! Then there must have been heavenly singing, celebrating her departure from this world!" (211). Later, speaking of the aftermath of her death, he postulates the following: "Her body would have been wrapped in fresh cloths, and the Queen placed again on her couch. Then lamps would have been brought, ointments applied, funeral hymns sung; the angels would have chanted, in their own tongue, a song most fitting for them, while the Apostles and holy ancestors would have sung sacred canticles, inspired by the Spirit" (215).
   
7. In Germanus the Virgin's shroud is important to the events. The apostles use it to lift her, so they won't have to touch her body, into the tomb. Then she is taken from them (3 days do not intervene in this account): "Who took it, no one could see -- for God is invisible! But the shroud was then gently taken up into the air from the Apostles' hands in a light cloud" (p. 177).