This dense carving depicts scenes associated with the Redemption of Man. The left section of the diptych contains images from the Life of Christ, including Christ’s Betrayal, Crucifixion, and Resurrection. In the upper register is shown, from left to right, God the Father receiving his son, Christ between Justice and Mercy, and Saint Michael weighing souls. On the right are images of the Virgin’s role in man’s redemption, including the Annunciation and Nativity, as well as her Death, Assumption, and Coronation by Christ.
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17.190.265 and .266
Artwork Details
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Title:Leaf from a Diptych with the life of the Virgin
Date:mid to late 14th century
Culture:British
Medium:Elephant ivory
Dimensions:Overall: 7 1/16 x 4 5/8 x 5/16 in. (18 x 11.8 x 0.8 cm)
Classification:Ivories-Elephant
Credit Line:Gift of J. Pierpont Morgan, 1917
Accession Number:17.190.266
This heavily-perforated ivory panel represents scenes from the life of the Virgin Mary. The narrative of her life proceeds from the Annunciation and represents the Annunciation to the Shepherds, the Adoration of the Magi, and the Presentation of Jesus at the Temple in Jerusalem. Superimposed over these scenes of her early motherhood are representations of her death (or Dormition), the Assumption, and her Coronation as the Queen of Heaven. The double depiction of the presentation of the soul and the bodily ascent, although based in The Golden Legend, are unusual for contemporary depictions of the life of Mary. Encapsulating all these scenes is a complex architectural frame composed of gothic arches adorned with cusps, crockets, foliage, window tracery, and miniaturized building elements like roofs, crenellations, brickwork, and towers.
The size, architectural framework, and religious themes of this panel match another in the collection (acc. no. 17.190.265). This matching panel follows the Passion, Last Judgement, and reign of Jesus in Heaven after the Apocalypse. Together, these two ivories functioned as the wings of a devotional diptych or two-winged religious image that represented the Joyful, Sorrowful, and Glorious Mysteries, scenes from the life of the Virgin Mary and Jesus that are central to the performance of the Rosary. In the fifteenth century, the Rosary became popular among members of the French and Netherlandish aristocracy and urban elite who sought a way to incorporate religious devotion into their daily lives. This set of prayers and meditations could be accomplished in the privacy of the home and outside the calendar of church ritual. This practice therefore allowed laypeople the ability to engage in Christian ritual practices without the mediation of church hierarchies and in turn led to the development of a set of devotional tools for popular use. During prayer, devotional panels and diptychs like the current example provided a devotee focus for meditations on the life and sufferings of Jesus and the Virgin Mary, and the devotee would count his or her prayers in groups of ten on a string of beads also called a rosary. Like the current panel, some of these rosary beads consist of tours-de-force of miniature carving (acc. no. 17.190.475).
Beyond their use as devotional aids, ivory diptychs were appreciated, gifted, and preserved as luxurious works of art, and the current panel demonstrates that their makers responded to shifts in taste in the years after 1400. Whereas diptychs of the fourteenth century are normally composed of two slabs of ivory cut into low relief and joined with pins or hinges, this panel and its mate were carved "à jour" or into openwork so that they could be layered over and framed within another material. Such composite artworks are occasionally encountered in the archives of French aristocrats in the fifteenth century. For example, upon her death in 1405, Margaret of Flanders (Duchess of Burgundy and sister-in-law of the King of France) owned "a panel of cypress wood with images in ivory" ("un tableau de cipres de ymages d’yvoire"). The scribes used language that was more ambiguous for objects in her collection. It mentions, for instance,"another image of Saint Lienard on a black panel" ("ung aulture ymage d’voire de st. Lienard sur un tableau noir") and "an image of Our Lady in ivory sat on a panel of gilt silver" ("ung ymage de Nostre dame d’ivoire, assisse sur entablement d’argent dore"). These latter two entries may refer to statuettes affixed to bases or to perforated relief carvings laid over materials of contrasting colors. Either way, these archival documents demonstrate that mixing ivory with precious metals, textiles, woods, and other luxury materials amplified the luxury of this already expensive and high-status art form in the eyes of royal patrons in the fifteenth century.
Charles T. Little, "The Art of Gothic Ivories: Studies at the Crossroads," Sculpture Journal 23 (2014), pp. 13-29.
Paul Williamson and Glyn Davies, Glyn. Medieval Ivory Carvings, 1200-1550, Part 2 (London: Victoria and Albert Museum Publishing, 2014), pp. 326-328.
Catalogue Entry by Scott Miller, Andrew W. Mellon Curatorial and Research Collections Specialist, Department of Medieval Art and The Cloisters, 2020–2022
[ Frédéric Spitzer (Austrian), Paris (sold1893)]; his posthumous sale, Chevallier and Mannheim, Paris (April 17–June 16, 1893, no. 148); [ Bourgeois Frères, Cologne (in 1893, for Oppenheim)]; Baron Albert Oppenheim, Cologne(by 1904–sold 1906); J. Pierpont Morgan (American), London and New York (1906–1917)
Museum Kunstpalast, Düsseldorf. "Kunsthistorische Ausstellung," May 1–October 20, 1902.
La Collection Spitzer: Antiquité, Moyen-Age, Renaissance. Vol. I. Mâcon: Imprimerie Protat Frères, 1890–1891. Ivoire 112, p. 64.
Spitzer, Frédéric, ed. La Collection Spitzer: Antiquité -- Moyen-Age -- Renaissance. Vol. 1. Paris: Maison Quantin, 1890–1893. Ivoire 112, pp. 61–62.
Schnütgen, Alexander. "Zwei durchbrochene Elfenbeintafeln aus dem Anfang des XV. Jahrh.." Zeitschrift für christliche Kunst 6, no. 4 (1893). cols. 97–98, pl. IV.
Catalogue des objets d'art et de haute curiosité: antiques, du moyen-âge & de la renaissance: composant l'importante et précieuse Collection Spitzer. Vol. 1. Paris: Chevallier and Mannheim, April 17–June 16, 1893. no. 147, p. 27, pl. III.
Catalogue officiel illustré de l'exposition retrospective de l'art français des origines à 1800. Exposition universelle de 1900. Paris: Lemercier & Cie., 1900. no. 126, 128, or 130 (?), p. 265.
Molinier, Emile. Collection du Baron Albert Oppenheim: Tableaux et objets d'art, catalogue précédé d'une introduction. Paris: Librairie Centrale des Beaux-Arts, 1904. no. 80, p. 35, pl. LVII.
Kehrer, Hugo. Die heiligen drei könige in literatur und kunst. Vol. 2. Leipzig: E. A. Seemann, 1909. pp. 218–19, fig. 260.
Burlington Fine Arts Club. Catalogue of an Exhibition of Carvings in Ivory. London, 1923. p. 89.
Koechlin, Raymond. Les Ivoires Gothiques Français: Volume I, Text. Paris: Editions Auguste Picard, 1924. no. 875, pp. 324, 484.
Koechlin, Raymond. Les Ivoires Gothiques Français: Volume II, Catalogue. Paris: Editions Auguste Picard, 1924. no. 875, pp. 327–29.
Koechlin, Raymond. Les Ivoires Gothiques Français: Volume III, Plates. Paris: Editions Auguste Picard, 1924. no. 875, pl. CLVII.
Breck, Joseph, and Meyric R. Rogers. The Pierpont Morgan Wing: A Handbook. 1st ed. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1925. pp. 117–18, fig. 66.
Longhurst, Margaret H. English Ivories. London: G. P. Putnam's Sons, 1926. no. LXXIII, pp. 55, 111–12, pls. 49 (misidentified as in the British Museum).
Breck, Joseph, and Meyric R. Rogers. The Pierpont Morgan Wing: A Handbook. 2nd ed. New York: The Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1929. pp. 117–18, fig. 66.
Egbert, D. D. "North Italian Gothic Ivories in the Museo Cristiano of the Vatican Library." Art Studies 7 (1929). pp. 196, 198–200, 201, fig. 56.
Rorimer, James J. "An English Woodcarving of the Late Fourteenth Century." The Metropolitan Museum of Art Bulletin, o.s., 25, no. 9 (September 1930). p. 188.
Natanson, Joseph. Gothic Ivories of the 13th and 14th Centuries. London: A. Tiranti, 1951. pp. 29–30, 39, fig. 63.
Warren, Jeremy. Medieval and Renaissance Sculpture in the Ashmolean Museum: Volume 2, Sculptures in Stone, Clay, Ivory, Bone and Wood. Oxford: Ashmolean Museum, 2014. pp. 594–95.
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