Gothic Ivories Project | Diptych, 1 register, 1 arch across (plaquettes) (Wing, left, back)

Wing, left
Standing Virgin and Child (Vierge Glorieuse); two standing angels holding navettes and swinging censers; angel crowning the Virgin.
Wing, right
Crucifixion with the Virgin and saint John the Evangelist; angels holding the sun and moon; titulus.
Dragons in the cusps of the arches. Angels holding crowns in the spandrels.

Longhurst 1929: French, 14th century (?). Doubts the authenticity of the piece.
Williamson and Davies 2014: French (Paris), c. 1300. Radiocarbon dating (2011): 95.4% probability that the elephant died between 1226 and 1295.

Attribution
Unknown

Hinges
Traces of two missing hinges.

Reverse
Flat and smooth.
Label with inscription '906' (Salting Bequest).

Object Condition
Missing: censers.
Two diagonally drilled holes towards the top of each wing (only visible from the back).

Provenance
Collection of George Salting, London, by 1909: his bequest to the Museum in 1910.

Bibliography
'Salting Bequest (A. 70 to A. 1029-1910)/Murray Bequest (A. 1030 to A. 1096-1910)', in List of Works of Art Acquired by the Victoria and Albert Museum (Department of Architecture and Sculpture) (London, 1910), p. 91.
M. Longhurst, Catalogue of Carvings in Ivory, Victoria and Albert Museum, 2 vols (London, 1927 and 1929), II (1929), p. 27.
D. Gaborit-Chopin, 'Aristote et les roses: sur un manche de couteau du musée du Louvre', in In Italiam nos fata trahunt, sequamur. Mélanges en l'honneur d'Olga Pujmanova (Prague, 2003), p. 347, note 3.
P. Williamson and G. Davies, Medieval Ivory Carvings 1200-1550 (London, 2014), no. 74.

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