IVORY CARVINGS 55 



production of an Italian carver of the fourteenth century; 

 this is a fragment of a triptych. In the middle of the cen- 

 tral panel are the Virgin and Child; on either side are two 

 female saints; and still farther to the right and left, respec- 

 tively, are figures of St. Peter, with his massive key, and 

 of another male saint, bearing a drawn sword; all the saints 

 carry books in their left hands. While undoubtedly the 

 addition of colour serves to make the figures more lifelike, 

 a finer artistic effect is attained by trusting to the fair- 

 toned ivory alone. 



The ivory carving of the Early Renaissance period, and 

 indeed some specimens of an even earlier date, show that the 

 same religious inspiration that developed Gothic architecture 

 was working in this branch of art also. Out of the great 

 wealth of examples of this, which might well be termed the 

 Golden Age of ivory carving, one of the very finest specimens 

 is a carving on a piece of ivory that appears to have formed 

 part of a pastoral staff. The subject is a Pieta, or represen- 

 tation of the Virgin Mary holding the dead Christ in her 

 arms, and the overpowering love and pity of the Virgin 

 Mother have never found truer and more touching treatment 

 than here.* 



The elaborately carved pastoral staffs in ivory produced in 

 the Middle Ages often bore on one side of the volute the 

 Crucifixion, and on the other side the Virgin and angels. A 

 symbolic meaning was attributed to the different parts of 

 the staff, namely, the crook, the rod and the point, thus 

 expressed in a medieval Latin verse: "I draw in sinners, 

 exhort the just, and prick the erring." 



In the "Liber Regalis" containing a coronation ritual 

 prepared in 1373 by Nicolas Littlington, Abbot of West- 

 minster, it is provided that in case the king's hair should fail 



*William Maskell, "Ivories Ancient and Modern," pp. 103, 104, South Kensington 

 Museum Art Handbooks, No. 2. 



