Gothic Ivories Project | Gabled polyptych, 2 registers (tabernacle; frise d'arcatures; colonnettes) (Front)

Wings, left
Register 1: Annunciation; Visitation.
Register 2: Adoring magi (part of the Adoration of the Magi).
Centre panel
Register 1: Coronation of the Virgin; angel crowning the Virgin.
Register 2: Standing Virgin and Child (Vierge glorieuse); two standing angels holding candlesticks.
Wings, right
Register 1: Nativity with midwife.
Register 2: Presentation in the Temple; Joseph holding a candlestick and a basket of doves brought as offerings; Christ held over the altar by the Virgin and Simeon.
Pointed trefoils in the spandrels (later).

Griggs 1904-1907: England, 14th century.
Koechlin 1924: France, 1st third of the 14th century.
Longhurst 1929: French, 1st half of the 14th century.
Morey 1936: North Italian.
Williamson and Davies 2014: Northern French, c. 1300.

Attribution
Unknown

Hinges
Two sets of three wire ring hinges on either side.

Polychromy - Gilding
Faint traces of polychromy: painted trefoils in the gables.

Reverse
Flat and smooth.

Object Condition
Missing: colonnettes on both registers, cusped arch on the lower register, base of the pinnacle on the left (all replaced), crowning angel's forearm and crown he was holding; central pinnacle (crosshatched lines and hole where it once was attached), finial of the right pinnacle.
Cusped arch restored in Cologne before 1865 (already present in early photographs, unlike the colonnettes).
Upper part of the left inner wing has broken across the neck of the Virgin and been repaired.
Thin backgrounds on outer panels (lower registers) present vertical cracks.
Crosshatching and dowel hole on the underside to secure to a pedestal.

Provenance
Collection of Anton Josef Essingh (b. 1787, d. 1864), Cologne: his sale, J. M. Heberlé, Cologne, 18 September 1865, lot 861, pl. V. In the possession of John Webb (b. 1799, d. 1880), London: on loan to the Museum from 1867 and purchased from him by the Museum in 1872.

Bibliography
M. A. Siret, 'Collections Essingh à Cologne', in Revue de l'art chrétien 9 (October 1865), p. 516 (no. 861).
List of Objects in the Art Division, South Kensington, Acquired During the Year 1872, Arranged According to the Dates of Acquisition (London, 1872?), p. 1.
W. Maskell, Ivories Ancient and Mediaeval in the South Kensington Museum (London, 1872), pp. 144-145.
H. Semper, 'Über eine besondere Gruppe elfenbeinerner Klappaltärchen des XIV Jahrhunderts', in Zeitschrift für Christliche Kunst 11 (1898), cols. 136, 138, 188.
W. Griggs, Portfolio of Ivories [London, 1904-1907], pt. XXIX.
A. Michel, L'histoire de l'art depuis les premiers temps chrétiens jusqu'à nos jours, 8 vols, 17 parts (Paris, 1905-1929), II, p. 478.
R. Koechlin, Histoire de l'art depuis les premiers temps chrétiens jusqu'à nos jours, ed. by A. Michel, II (Paris, 1906), p. 478.
O. Pelka, Elfenbein (Berlin, 1920), p. 190.
O. Pelka, Elfenbein, 2nd edn., (Berlin, 1923), p. 180.
R. Koechlin, Les Ivoires gothiques français (Paris, 1924), I, pp. 130, 131; II, no. 171; III, pl. XLII.
M. Longhurst, Catalogue of Carvings in Ivory, Victoria and Albert Museum, 2 vols (London, 1927 and 1929), II (1929), p. 14, pl. IX.
O. Förster, Kölner Kunstsammler (Berlin, 1931), pp. 125-126. fig. 72.
C. R. Morey, Gli oggetti di avorio e di osso del Museo Vaticano (Vatican City, 1936), pp. 32, 33, 80.
C. R. Morey, 'Italian Gothic Ivories', in Medieval Studies in Memory of A. Kingsley Porter (Cambridge, Mss., 1939), pp. 193 (no. xi), 194, 196.
H. Westermann-Angerhausen, Schatz aus den Trümmern: der Silberschrein von Nivelles und die europäische Hochgotik, exhibition catalogue, Cologne, 1995-1996, no. 270 (R. Krischel).
P. Williamson and G. Davies, Medieval Ivory Carvings 1200-1550 (London, 2014), no. 47.

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