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Mirror case (valve de miroir), frame of 8 lobes (Front)

Mirror case (valve de miroir), frame of 8 lobes (Front)
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Front

Subject
Secular. Courtly love.

Repository Institution
thewalters.org

To purchase an image
thewalters.org


Baltimore, Walters Art Museum

Inv. 71.167

Ivory

Width: 95mm

Castle of Love; meeting of lovers (courting couples); winged God of Love throwing arrows at lovers; lady crowning a youth with a wreath; couple embracing; man and woman on the battlements.
Foliated corner terminals.

Randall 1985 and Museum's opinion 2010: France, 2nd half of the 14th century.


Attribution
Unknown

Reverse
Text glued to the reverse recording a May 1858 description of the object by Viollet-le-Duc: 'Boëte de miroir du XIVeme siècle. Le dos manque ainsi que le miroir qui était ordinairement en acier poli. Ce sujet représente souvent sur les miroirs. Une dame couronne un jeune homme; celui-ci devient entreprennant et embrasse la Demoiselle. Le Dieu d'amour couronné et ailé lance un trait aux amoreux du haut de sa forteresse. Le jeune homme et la femme s'adorent ensuite a droite et a gauche'.

Provenance
Inscribed in 1858 by Viollet-le-Duc (see Back description field). Bought by Henry Walters in 1926; Walters Art Museum, 1931, by bequest.

Bibliography
R. H. Randall, Masterpieces of Ivory from the Walters Art Gallery (New York, 1985), no. 333.
K. A. Smith, Art, Identity and Devotion in Fourteenth-Century England: Three Women and their Books of Hours (Toronto, 2003), p. 68, fig. 17.


Image

© Laila Zamuelis Gross Archive of Secular Ivories, 1985.
Laila Zamuelis Gross Archive of Secular Ivories. 1985.

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