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Set of writing tablets, 1 register, 1 ogee arch across (tablettes à écrire; plaquettes; colonnettes) (Front)

Set of writing tablets, 1 register, 1 ogee arch across (tablettes à écrire; plaquettes; colonnettes) (Front)
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Panel 1

Panel 2

Subject
Religious.


Unknown location

S/n

Ivory

Height: 81mm
Width: 48mm (each)

Panel 1 Annunciation to Zacharias of the birth of saint John the Baptist (Randall 1993) or Annunciation to Joachim of the birth of the Virgin by an angel (?).
Panel 2 Annunciation; vase of lilies; dove of the Holy Spirit.
Rosettes in the spandrels. Border of dentils.

Swarzenski 1929: Northern France, 2nd half of the 14th century.
Randall 1993: Tuscan, 3rd quarter of the 14th century (?).


Attribution
Unknown

Reverse
Panel 1: recessed to receive the wax, with a raised border.
Panel 2: circular recess on the reverse.

Object Condition
The Zacharias panel was broken in half and repaired.

Provenance
Passavant-Gontard collection, Frankfurt am Main (said to have been purchased in 1864): sale, Berlin, 5 December 1929. Collection of Robert von Hirsch: sale, Sotheby's, London, 22 June 1978, lot 292. Private collection, New York (in 1993).

Bibliography
G. Swarzenski, Sammlung R. von Passavant-Gontard (Frankfurt, 1929), no. 74 and 75, pl. 15.
R. H. Randall, The Golden Age of Ivory: Gothic Ivory Carvings in North American Collections (New York, 1993), no. 211.


Image

Conway Library © Courtauld Institute of Art.

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