Carved from a single tusk of elephant ivory, a material reserved for objects of great value, these female figures once adorned a lavish wood chest or other piece of luxury furniture. The intricate patterns incised on one of the garments represent an elaborately woven textile. Similar ivories were also painted or gilded. Here, scientific analysis has identified traces of red ocher, blue azurite, and cinnabar, a rare and expensive mineral used to create a brilliant red pigment.
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Artwork Details
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Title:Ivory decorative plaque
Period:Archaic
Date:2nd half of 7th century BCE
Culture:Greek
Medium:Ivory
Dimensions:Overall: 5 3/8 x 2 3/4 x 5/8 in. (13.6 x 7 x 1.6 cm)
Classifications:Miscellaneous-Bone, Ivory
Credit Line:Gift of J. Pierpont Morgan, 1917
Accession Number:17.190.73
Until 1913, collection of J.P. Morgan, New York; 1913-1917, estate of J.P. Morgan; acquired in December 1917, gift of J.P. Morgan.
Picard, Charles. 1941. Epitymvion Chrēstou Tsounta. pp. 446–51, Athens: Archeion tou Thrakikou Laographikou kai Glōssikou Thēsaurou.
Richter, Gisela Marie Augusta. 1945. "An Ivory Relief in the Metropolitan Museum of Art." American Journal of Archaeology, 49(3): pp. 261–69, figs. 1–4, 6–8.
Picard, Charles. 1946. "Les deux déesses: Ivoire archaïque de la collection J. Pierpont Morgan au Metropolitan Museum, New-York." Revue Archéologique, 6th ser., 26: pp. 93–6, fig. 1.
Schefold, Karl. 1949. Orient, Hellas und Rom in der archäologischen Forschung seit 1939. p. 108, pl. 1, Bern: A. Francke.
Homann-Wedeking, Ernst. 1950. Die Anfänge der griechischen Grossplastik. p. 7, Berlin: Gebr. Mann.
Richter, Gisela M. A. 1953. Handbook of the Greek Collection. pp. 31, 180, pl. 20a, Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press.
Picard, Charles. 1956. "L'ivoire archaïque des deux-déesses au Metropolitan Museum, New York." Monuments et Mémoires de la Fondation Eugène Piot, 48: pp. 9–23, figs. 1-3, pls. I, II.
Metropolitan Museum of Art. 1970. Masterpieces of Fifty Centuries. New York: Dutton.
Robertson, Martin and Cambridge University Press. 1975. A History of Greek Art, Vols. 1 and 2. p. 141, pl. 8e, Cambridge, England.
Böhm, Stephanie. 1990. Die "nackte Göttin": zur Ikonographie und Deutung unbekleideter weiblicher Figuren in der frühgriechischen Kunst. pg. 89f, Tafel 34c, Mainz am Rhein: Verlag Philipp von Zabern.
Lexicon Iconographicum Mythologiae Classicae (LIMC). 1994. Vol. 7: Oidipous-Theseus. "Peitho," p. 247, no. 45; "Proitides," p. 523, no. 3, pl. 413, Zürich: Artemis Verlag.
Strouse, Jean and Joan R. Mertens. 2000. "J. Pierpont Morgan: Financier and Collector." Bulletin of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, 57(3): pp. 42–43, fig. 47.
Picón, Carlos A. 2007. Art of the Classical World in the Metropolitan Museum of Art: Greece, Cyprus, Etruria, Rome no. 43, pp. 57, 416, New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Aruz, Joan, Sarah B. Graff, and Yelena Rakic. 2014. Assyria to Iberia at the Dawn of the Classical Age no. 161, p. 293, New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Lapatin, Kenneth. 2015. Luxus: The Sumptuous Arts of Greece and Rome. no. 147, pp. 12, 194, 262, pl. 149, Los Angeles, CA: J. Paul Getty Museum.
Metropolitan Museum of Art. 2020. ART = Discovering Infinite Connections in Art History. pp. 028, 266, New York: Phaidon Press.
Hemingway, Seán. 2021. How to Read Greek Sculpture. no. 3, pp. 52–53, New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art.
Williams, Dyfri, Kenneth Lapatin, Nicholaus Dietrich, Judith M. Barringer, Francois Lissarrague, and Edinburgh University Press. 2022. Images at the Crossroads : Media and Meaning in Greek Art, Judith M. Barringer and Francois Lissarrague, eds. pp. 411–12, fig. 18.12, Edinburgh.
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The Museum's collection of Greek and Roman art comprises more than 30,000 works ranging in date from the Neolithic period to the time of the Roman emperor Constantine's conversion to Christianity in A.D. 312.
