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Writing tablet, 2 registers, 1 full and 2 half arches across (frise d'arcatures; plaquette; tablette à écrire) (Back)

Writing tablet, 2 registers, 1 full and 2 half arches across (frise d'arcatures; plaquette; tablette à écrire) (Back)
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Front

Subject
Religious. Infancy of Christ.

Repository Institution
www.ashmolean.org

To purchase an image
www.ashmolean.org


Oxford, Ashmolean Museum

Inv. AN1685 A.580

Ivory

Height: 100 mm
Width: 40mm
Depth: 3 mm

Register 1: Annunciation; vase of lilies; dove of the Holy Spirit.
Register 2: Visitation.
Pointed trefoils in the spandrels.


Koechlin Number: 0341

Koechlin 1924: France, 2nd half of the 14th century.
Warren 2014: France, mid-14th century.


Attribution
Unknown

Hinges
Trace of one later clasp on the right side.

Reverse
Circular recess on the reverse.
Handwritten ink inscription in the recess: ‘(catalogue of 1756) 532’. Handwritten ink inscription at the centre: ‘580 (Dr. Plot’s catalogue number Lib. Decani Aedis Christi. Date 1691)’. Label with inscription ‘68’.

Object Condition
Central hole in the upper part of the panel. Repairs in the hands of Elizabeth in the Visitation scene.

Provenance
Probably collection of John Tradescant by 1656; at the death of John Tradescant the Younger (b. 1608, d. 1662), bequeathed to Elias Ashmole (b. 1617, d. 1692); given by him to the Museum in 1683; Department of Western Art (WA1908.184); transferred to the Department of Antiquities in May 2008.

Bibliography
'Liber Domini Decani Aedis Christi', The Book of the Dean of Christ Church, c. 1684-90 (Ashmolean Manuscript 8, fol. 33r, no. 580).
Liber Domini Vice-Chancellari, fols. 1-137, 'Catalogus Numismatum tum Antiquorum tum modern. A.A.A. quae Cl: Vir. Dns Elias Ashmole Musaeo suo Oxonij prima vice donavit. Anno 1683', The Book of the Vice-Chancellor, 1695 (Ashmolean Manuscript 11, fol. 231, no. 580).
'Liber Domini Aedis Christi Decani', The Book of the Dean of Christ Church, compiled by William Huddesford in 1756 (Ashmolean Manuscript 12, fol. 38r, no. 532).
P. B. Duncan, A Catalogue of the Ashmolean Museum, descriptive of the Zoological Specimens, Antiquities, Coins, and Miscellaneous Curiosities (Oxford, 1836), no. 326.
W. Maskell, Ivories Ancient and Mediaeval in the South Kensington Museum (London, 1872), p. 163.
R. Koechlin, 'Quelques ivoires gothiques français connus antérieurement au XIXe siècle', in Revue de l'Art Chrétien 41 (1911), pp. 281-292, fig. 9.
R. Koechlin, Les Ivoires gothiques français (Paris, 1924), I, p. 177; II, no. 341.
D. A. Porter, Ivory Carvings in Later Medieval England 1200-1400, State University of New York at Binghamton, PhD 1974 (Ann Arbor, 1986: University Microfilms International), p. 142, fig. 69.
A. Macgregor (ed.), Tradescant’s Rarities: Essay’s on the foundation of the Ashmolean Museum, 1683, with a catalogue of the surviving early collections (Oxford, 1983), p. 284, no. 234, pl. 118.
A. MacGregor, Ashmolean Museum Oxford: Manuscript catalogues of the early museum collections 1683-1996, pt.I (Oxford, 2000), p. 55, no. 580 and p. 193, no. 532.
A. MacGregor and M. Hook, Ashmolean Museum Oxford: Manuscript Catalogues of the early Museum Collections, pt. II: The Vice-Chancellor’s consolidated catalogue 1695 (Oxford, 2006), p. 84, no. 580.
J. Warren, Medieval and Renaissance Sculpture in the Ashmolean Museum, 3 vols (Oxford, 2014), Vol. 2: Sculptures in Stone, Clay, Ivory, Bone and Wood, no. 169.


Image

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