Gothic Ivories Project | Gabled diptych, 4 registers, 4 arches across (frise d'arcatures; colonnettes) (Front, left wing)

Wing, left
Register 1: temptation of Judas; Judas receiving the reward; Betrayal (Taking of Christ; Kiss of Judas); Christ restores Malchus' ear, cut by saint Peter.
Register 2: Flagellation; Carrying of the Cross.
Register 3: standing figure of the Church (Ecclesia); Deposition with the Virgin holding Christ's hand, and saint John the Evangelist; Joseph of Arimathea holding Christ's body; man with pincers removing the nail from Christ's feet; standing figure of Synagogue (Synagoga).
Register 4: Three Holy Women at the Tomb, with angel seated on the tomb and three soldiers asleep; saint John the Baptist standing (part of the Harrowing of Hell scene on the right wing).
Wing, right
Register 1: Death of Judas (Judas hanging); Christ before Pilate; Pilate washing his hands.
Register 2: Crucifixion with thieves, the Virgin and saint John the Evangelist; Longinus standing in prayer; Stephaton giving Christ vinegar.
Register 3: Entombment (Anointing of Christ's body); tomb decorated with quatrefoils.
Register 4: Harrowing of Hell with Adam and Eve coming out of the Mouth of Hell; souls burning in Hell; demons.
Tracery.

Darcel and Basilewski 1874: Italy (?), 13th century.
Westwood 1876: Italy or Southern France (?), early 14th century.
Koechlin 1924: France, later 13th century.
Kube 1925: France, early 14th century.
Leningrad 1973 [Kryzhanovskaya]: France, c. 1300.
Kryzhanovskaya 2014: Northern France, middle of the 13th century.

Attribution
Soissons group (Atelier du Diptyque de Soissons) (Koechlin 1924)

Hinges
Traces of three missing hinges.

Polychromy - Gilding
Traces of gilding and polychromy: gold (hair); red (architectural details).

Reverse
Flat and smooth.

Object Condition
Broken around the hinges (repaired).
Missing: pinnacles between the gables of the upper register (were made of separated pieces of ivory slotted into holes).
Two holes in the upper and lower part of each panel.

Provenance
Collection of Count James-Alexandre de Pourtalès (b. 1776, d. 1855), Switzerland: Pourtalès-Gorgier sale, Paris, 6 February 1865, lot 1515. Collection of Alexander Petrovich Basilewski (b. 1829, d. 1899), Paris; acquired by the Museum in 1885.

Bibliography
A. Darcel, 'Le Musée rétrospectif', in Gazette des Beaux-Arts (1865), II, p. 10.
Exposition de 1865 au Palais de l'industrie, Union centrale des beaux-arts appliqués à l'industrie (Paris, 1866), no. 315.
Exposition universelle, exhibition catalogue, Paris, 1867, no. 1750.
A. Darcel, A. P. Basilewski, Collection Basilewski. Catalogue raisonné (Paris, 1874), no. 644.
J. O. Westwood, Fictile Ivories in the South Kensington Museum (London, 1876), Appendix, p. 407.
A. Darcel, 'Le Moyen-Age et la Renaissance au Trocadéro', in Gazette des Beaux-Arts, (1878), II, p. 204.
Exposition universelle de 1878 à Paris: les Beaux-Arts et les arts décoratifs, exhibition catalogue, Paris, 1878.
N. Kondakov, Императорский Эрмитажъ. Указатель отделенія среднихъ вековъ и эпохи возрожденія [Guide to the Department of the Middle Ages and the Renaissance of the Imperial Hermitage] (Saint Petersburg, 1891), p .154, no. 40.
E. Molinier, 'La Descente de croix', in Monuments Piot (1896), p. 190, n. 1.
R. Koechlin, 'Quelques ateliers d'ivoiriers français aux XIII et XIVe siècles. I. L'atelier du diptyque du trésor de Soissons', in Gazette des Beaux-Arts, 34 (1905), pp. 362-379 (p. 364).
A. Rossi, 'Les Ivoires gothiques français du Vatican', in Gazette des Beaux-Arts, 1905, I, p. 395.
O. M. Dalton, Catalogue of the Ivory Carvings of the Christian Era in the British Museum (London, 1909), p. 99.
A. N. Kube, Gosudarstvennyi Ermitazh. Putevoditel' po otdeleniiu srednikh vekov i epokhi Vozrozhdeniia [State Hermitage Museum. Guide to the Medieval and Renaissance sections] (Saint Petersburg, 1921), p. 11.
O. Pelka, Elfenbein (Berlin, 1923), p. 71-78.
R. Koechlin, Les Ivoires gothiques français (Paris, 1924), I, pp. 60, 76, 78, 81, 88; II, no. 34; III, pl. XIII.
A. N. Kube, Reznaia kost'. Katalog [Ivory Carvings Catalogue Hermitage], (Leningrad [Saint-Petersburg], 1925), no. 70.
Gosudarstvennyi Ermitazh. Obshchii putevoditel' (Leningrad [Saint Petersburg], 1940), 2nd ed., p. 91.
L. Grodecki, Ivoires français (Paris, 1947), p. 17.
M. Kryzhanovskaya, Puteshestviia v proshloe po zalam Ermitazha. Iskusstvo zapadnogo srednekov'ia [Journey into the Past in the Hermitage Rooms. Medieval Art in Western Europe] (Leningrad [Saint Petersburg], 1963), p. 47.
J. Natanson, Gothic Ivories of the 13th and 14th Centuries (London, 1951), p. 17.
E. A. Lapkovskaia, Gosudarstvennyi Ermitazh. Prikladnoe iskusstvo Zapadnoi Evropy V-XV vv. (State Hermitage Museum. Applied Arts of Western Europe from the Vth to the 15th century) (Leningrad [Saint Petersburg], 1956), p. 27.
Gosudarsvenniy Ermitazh. Vystavka frantsuzskogo iskusstva XII-XX vv., exhibition catalogue, Moscow, 1956, p. 146.
L. I. Faenson, M. Y. Kryzhanovskaya, E. A. Lapkovskaya, Западноевропейская резная кость IX - XIX веков из собрания Эрмитажа: каталог выставки (Leningrad [Saint-Petersburg], 1973), no. 169, with ill. on p. 74.
L. Salmina-Haskell, Ivory Carvings from the Hermitage, in The Burlington Magazine (April 1974), p. 226.
Westeuropäische Elfenbeinarbeiten aus der Ermitage Leningrad XI-XIX, exhibition catalogue, Berlin, Kunstgewerbemuseum, Prague and Erbach, 1974-1975, no. 74.
H. W. Hegemann, Erbach, Elfenbein-museum. Westeuropäische Elfenbeinarbeiten aus der Eremitage, Leningrad, in Die Weltkunst 45 (1975), p. 1135.
G. M. Golubenkova, Frantsuzskaia reznaia kost' kontsa XIII v.: Diplomnaia rabota (Moscow, 1978), pp. 11-62.
D. Gaborit-Chopin, Ivoires du Moyen Age (Freiburg, 1978), p. 208.
S. M. Guérin, 'Tears of Compunction': French Gothic Ivories in Devotional Practice (New York, 2011), p. 100-110.
P. Williamson and G. Davies, Medieval Ivory Carvings 1200-1550 (London, 2014), pp. 167-169, in relation to no. 51.
M. Kryzhanovskaya, Western European Medieval Ivories. Catalogue of the Collection (Зaпaднoeврoпeйскaя рeзнaя кoстъ Срeдних вeкoв. Кataлoг кoллeкции), (Saint Peterburg, 2014), no. 61.

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