Gothic Ivories Project | Diptych, 1 register, 1 arch across (plaquettes; colonnettes) (Front)

Ivory;brass (later hinged frame);copper and silver (added 19th-century medallions)

Wing, left
Seated Virgin and Child; Christ standing on the Virgin's left knee.
Wing, right
Crucifixion; swooning Virgin supported by one of the Holy Women; saint John the Evangelist and onlookers holding scrolls; sun and moon. Medallions enclosing quatrefoils in the spandrels.
Later addition in the medallions of silvered brass or copper relief depictions of the four Symbols of the Evangelists: eagle of saint John the Evangelist and angel of saint Matthew; lion of saint Mark and ox of saint Luke.

Randall 1993: English, 2nd quarter of the 14th century.
Williamson and Davies 2014: France (Paris), c. 1320-1330.

Attribution
Unknown

Hinges
Traces of two missing hinges.

Reverse
The back of the ivory panels is flat and smooth. The back of each of the two brass mounts is open at the centre with triangular dagging, notched along the edges and engraved with lines. Inscription on the back of the left wing: '1549 G Pusso' (possibly the date of the frame, according to Randall).

Object Condition
Both panels have broken into at least two pieces which have been glued back together. This probably explains why they have been inserted into a frame.

Provenance
Collection of the Viscount and Viscountess Lee of Fareham, Buckinghamshire, England; given in trust by the Massey Foundation to the Royal Ontario Museum; transferred from Hart House of the University of Toronto in 1960 to the Royal Ontario Museum.

Bibliography
R. H. Randall, The Golden Age of Ivory: Gothic Ivory Carvings in North American Collections (New York, 1993), no. 61.
P. Williamson and G. Davies, Medieval Ivory Carvings 1200-1550 (London, 2014), in relation to no. 60.

Courtesy of the Royal Ontario Museum, © ROM.
Credit Line: From the Collection of Viscount and Viscountess Lee of Fareham, given in trust by the Massey Foundation to the Royal Ontario Museum.

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