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Casket lid with huntsmen and animals
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Description
The art of ivory carving in Spain was at its height when this lid was made at the end of the 10th century. It was once part of a cylindrical box made of ivory and fitted with silver hinges. The box and lid were carefully carved out of an elephant tusk, most likely imported from East Africa.
The carved decoration depicts a lively hunting scene with four huntsmen on horseback in the dramatic act of spearing their prey: deer and leopards. The inscription carved around its base mentions the year in which the piece was made (389 in the Islamic calendar, corresponding to 998-999 AD), as well as the name of its patron Abu’l-Mutarrif, son of the grand vizier to the Umayyad Caliph of Spain Hisham II (r. 976-1009 AD).
This type of cylindrical container would probably have held perfumes and other precious substances used at the royal court, such as ambergris, camphor, and musk.
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Details
- Associated place
- Date
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AD 998 - 999 (AH 389)
Umayyad of Spain Period (AD 756 - 1031)
- Associated people
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Abu’l Mutarrif ibn al-Mansur Abi Amir Muhammad ibn Abi Amir (AD 983 - 1009) (named on object)
- Material and technique
- elephant ivory, with carved decoration
- Dimensions
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4 cm (height)
10.5 cm (diameter)
- Material index
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organic › animal › tooth › mammal tooth › elephant tooth › elephant tusk,organic › animal › tooth › mammal tooth › tusk › elephant tusk
- Technique index
- Object type index
- No. of items
- 1
- Credit line
- Purchased with the assistance of the MLA/V&A Purchase Grant Fund, the Art Fund, and the Friends of the Ashmolean Museum, 1987.
- Accession no.
- EA1987.3
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Further reading
J. B., ‘A Dated Ivory Box of Hispano-Arabic Origin’, Bulletin of the Metropolitan Museum of Art, 18/1, (1923), passim, illus. p. 6
Gómez-Moreno, Manuel, ‘Los marfiles cordobeses y sus derivaciones’, Archivo español de arte y arqueología, 3/9, (1927)
Rosser-Owen, Mariam, ‘A Córdoban Ivory Pyxis Lid in the Ashmolean Museum’, Murqanas: An Annual of the Visual Culture of the Islamic World, 16, (1999), passim, figs 1-10
Rosser-Owen, Mariam, ‘Questions of Authenticity: The Imitation Ivories of Francisco Pallas y Puig (1859 - 1926)’, Journal of the David Collection, 2, (2005), pp. 257-258, fig. 161
Piper, David, and Christopher White, Treasures of the Ashmolean Museum: An Illustrated Souvenir of the Collections, revised edn (Oxford: Ashmolean Museum, 1995), no. 121 on p. 116, illus. p. 116 fig. 121
Oxford: Ashmolean Museum, 24 May 2006-23 December 2008, Treasures: Antiquities, Eastern Art, Coins, and Casts: Exhibition Guide, Rune Frederiksen, ed. (Oxford: Ashmolean Museum, 2006), no. 139 on p. 50, illus. p. 50
Blair, Sheila S., ‘What the Inscriptions Tell Us: Text and Message on the Ivories from al-Andalus’, Journal of the David Collection, 2/1, (2005), pp. 81, 87, & 95
Location
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First floor | Room 31 | Islamic Middle East
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First floor | Room 31 | Islamic Middle East
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