Gothic Ivories Project | Double-sided panel (fragment of a triptych; centre panel), 1 register, 1 arch across (plaquette) (Top)

Side 1
Seated Virgin and Child (Virgo lactans); two angels crowning the Virgin; Virgin breast feeding the Child; female kneeling figure in donor position.
Side 2
Nativity and Annunciation to the Shepherds; swaddled Christ.
Foliated decoration on the edges. Pointed trefoils in the spandrels. Foliated scrolls on three sides; underside with a dragon or hybrid creature.

Dalton 1909: French, 14th century.
Koechlin 1924: French, end of 1st quarter of 14th century.
Museum's opinion 2011: French, 14th century.

Attribution
Unknown

Hinges
Traces of two missing hinges on either side on the front of the panel.

Reverse
Carved on all sides.

Object Condition
Missing (front): lower right side; crown and hands of angels above the Virgin and Child.

Provenance
Found in the 2nd half of the 18th century in Cannock Wood (Stafford). Greene Collection, Lichfields (in 1784). Collection of Felix Slade (b. 1788, d. 1868); donated by him to the British Museum in 1856.

Bibliography
The Gentleman's magazine LIV (1784), p. 671, fig. 1.
O. M. Dalton, Catalogue of the Ivory Carvings of the Christian Era in the British Museum (London, 1909), no. 258, pl. LXVII.
R. Koechlin, Les Ivoires gothiques français (Paris, 1924), I, pp. 195, 211; II, no. 449.

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