Register 1: Crucifixion; Virgin swooning supported by the holy women; saint John the Evangelist with onlookers holding scrolls; angels holding the sun and the moon; rugged cross; titulus.
Register 2: Saint Martin and the beggar; trees.
Rounded trefoils in the spandrels.
Koechlin 1924: France, 2nd half of the 14th century.
Gaborit-Chopin 2003 and Museum's opinion 2010: Mosan, mid-14th century.
Attribution
Unknown
Reverse
Small slot and evidence (small holes) of attachment to a handle (lost), which allowed the panel to be used as a pax (baiser de paix).
Longer sides chamfered (original).
Object Condition
Vertical cracks and major open crack, with pieces missing and traces of burning, from the top of the object to the Virgin.
Modern holes, filled in with plaster (4 in upper part, 3 in lower).
Comments
The presence of the episode of Saint Martin and the beggar in this panel is extremely unusual. This panel was transformed into a pax (see slot on the reverse), but its original function remains obscure: there are no traces of hinges, and it may have been used as part of the decoration of a binding.
Provenance
Collection of Édouard Corroyer, Paris (d. 1904)(in 1900); gift of Mrs Édouard Corroyer to the Museum in 1905.
Bibliography
Exposition Universelle de 1900, Catalogue illustré Officiel de l'Exposition Rétrospective de l'Art Français (Paris, 1900), no. 148 (Corroyer collection).
R. Koechlin, Les Ivoires gothiques français (Paris, 1924), I, pp. 198, 220, note 6, II, no. 590, III, pl. CII.
R. H. Randall, Masterpieces of Ivory from the Walters Art Gallery (New York, 1985), no. 306 (cited).
D. Gaborit-Chopin, Ivoires médiévaux, Ve-XVe siècle (Paris: Musée du Louvre, 2003), no. 187.
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