mirror-case;
forgery
- Museum number
- 1902,0423.4
- Description
-
Mirror-case; ivory; carved; fake; military subject in three zones; top: mounted horsemen; middle: eight knights in full armour with weaponry; bottom: sleeping knight with helmet to side; rosettes on border; also paw and tail fragments of lions.
- Production date
- 19thC(early)
- Dimensions
-
Diameter: 140 millimetres
-
Weight: 78 grammes
-
Depth: 18 millimetres
- Curator's comments
- Jones 1990
Ivory mirror-back, with soldiers
First recorded in 1851, this ivory is like an illustrated manual of helmet design of the twelfth to seventeenth centuries (information Mr Claude Blair). Indeed, such a book is probably precisely what this antiquarian forger used. With his exotic view of medieval warfare and his fascination with the details of armour, he was catering to a well-established mid-nineteenth-century collectors' market. Even the breakages to the ivory seem to have been contrived to create a medieval effect.
Literature: A. C. Kirkmann, Journal British Archaeological Association VI (1851), pp. 123-4; C. H. Read, Proceedings Society of Antiquaries, 2nd series, XIX (1902), p. 44.
Associated dates : 14thC.
- Location
- Not on display
- Exhibition history
-
Exhibited:
1997 21 Jun-31 Aug, USA, Baltimore, The Walters Art Gallery, Images in Ivory – Precious Objects of the Gothic Age
1997 7 Mar-25 May, USA, Detroit, Detroit Institute of Arts, Images in Ivory – Precious Objects of the Gothic Age
- Condition
- Third missing.
- Acquisition date
- 1902
- Department
- Britain, Europe and Prehistory
- Registration number
- 1902,0423.4
