Gothic Ivories Project | Diptych, 1 register, 4 arches across (plaquettes; frise d'arcatures) (Front)

Wing, left
Death of the Virgin (Dormition); Christ holding the soul of the Virgin and making a blessing gesture with his right hand; apostle holding a censer; bishop with mitre and crozier; tonsured figure blowing on the coals of the censer; apostles; queens (female saints?).
Wing, right
Coronation of the Virgin; Christ crowning the Virgin; Christ holding a book in his left hand; bench decorated with tracery and blind arches; singing angel; musician angels (psaltery; portable organ; viol; pipe).
Scalloped arches; quatrefoils and cinquefoils.
Medallions enclosing quatrefoils (only right wing).

Longhurst 1929: Italy, end of the 14th century or beginning of the 15th century.
Williamson and Davies 2014: Italian (Venice), about 1360-70.

Attribution
Unknown

Hinges
Two hinges (later).

Polychromy - Gilding
Traces of gilding and polychromy: blue (architectural details; throne; crowns; robes of the angels; quatrefoils), gold (borders; architectural details; crowns).

Reverse
Flat and smooth.

Comments
The compositions are closely linked to the works of Paolo and Lorenzo Veneziano (see Williamson and Davies 2014 for recent discussion).

Provenance
Collection of George Salting, London, by 1909; his bequest to the museum in 1910 (no. 2545).

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. 94.
M. Longhurst, Catalogue of Carvings in Ivory, Victoria and Albert Museum, 2 vols (London, 1927 and 1929), II (1929), p. 61, pl. LIII.
H. Schnitzler, F. Volbach, P. Bloch, Skulpturen, Elfenbein, Perlmutter, Stein, Holz Europäisches Mittelalter, Sammlung E. und M. Kofler-Truniger, 2 vols (Lucerne, 1964), p. 30.
Mittelalterliche Elfenbein- und Emailkunst aus der Sammlung E. und M. Kofler-Truniger, Luzern, ed. by H. Schnitzler et al. (Düsseldorf, 1965), p. 29.
Medioevo e produzione artistica di serie. Smalti di Limoges e avori gotici in Campania, ed. by P. Giusti, P. Leone de Castris, exhibition catalogue, Naples, Museo Duca di Martina, 1981, p. 35, ill. p. 36.
P. Williamson, 'Ivory carvings in English treasuries before the Reformation', in Studies in Medieval Art and Architecture presented to Peter Lasko, ed. by D. Brekton and T. A. Heslop (Stroud, 1994), pp. 293, 298, note 13.
M. Tomasi, 'Contributi allo studio della scultura eburnea trecentesca in Italia', in Annali della Scuola Normale Superiore di Pisa. Classe di Lettere e Filosofia, IV serie, IV-1, 1999 [2001], pp. 230-231.
J. Cherry and J. Lowden, Medieval Ivories and Works of Art: The Thomson Collection at the Art Gallery of Ontario (Toronto, 2008), p. 106.
P. Williamson and G. Davies, Medieval Ivory Carvings 1200-1550 (London, 2014), no. 106 and in relation to no. 64.

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