Gothic Ivories Project | Gabled polyptych, with arches (tabernacle; colonnettes) (Front)

Wings, left
Register 1: Annunciation; vase of lilies.
Register 2: Herod ordering the Massacre of the Innocents.
Register 3: Adoring Magi (part of the Adoration of the Magi).
Centre panel
Standing Virgin and Child; belt.
Wings, right
Register 1: Annunciation to the Shepherds; sheep.
Register 2: Nativity; Joseph holding Christ Child.
Register 3: Presentation in the Temple; Virgin holding Christ Child.

Koechlin 1924: France, 1st half of 14th century.
Museum's opinion 2012: France (Paris?), c. 1300- 1325.

Attribution
Unknown

Hinges
Two sets of two missing ring hinges on either side.

Polychromy - Gilding
Traces of gilding and polychromy: red (Virgin's veil; trefoils; wings), green (book; trefoils), gold (hair; architectural details; belt; along the hems; background; halo; colonnettes; crowns, etc.).

Reverse
Flat and smooth, with some added strips of ivory along the sides of the centre panel.

Object Condition
Holes under a number of arches.

Comments
In 1924, the polyptych was inserted into a metal frame (see Koechlin 1924).

Provenance
Collection of George and Florence Blumenthal (at least from 1919), New York: given by him to the Metropolitan Museum of Art in 1941.

Bibliography
U. Gnoli, 'Avori francesi nella Galleria Nazionale di Perugia', in Bolletino d'arte 13 (1919).
R. Koechlin, Les Ivoires gothiques français (Paris, 1924), I, p. 126, 129; II, no. 141bis.
J. Warren, Medieval and Renaissance Sculpture in the Ashmolean Museum, 3 vols (Oxford, 2014), Vol. 2: Sculptures in Stone, Clay, Ivory, Bone and Wood, p. 552, in relation to no. 157.

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