Ivory is a hard, white material from the tusks and teeth of animals, that consists mainly of dentine, one of the physical structures of teeth and tusks. The chemical structure of the teeth and tusks of mammals is the same, regardless of the species of origin. The trade in certain teeth and tusks other than elephant is well established and widespread; therefore, "ivory" can correctly be used to describe any mammalian teeth or tusks of commercial interest which are large enough to be carved or scrimshawed. It has been valued since ancient times in art or manufacturing for making a range of items from ivory carvings to false teeth, piano keys, fans, dominoes and joint tubes. Elephant ivory is the most important source, but ivory from mammoth, walrus, hippopotamus, sperm whale, killer whale, narwhal and warthog are used as well. Elk also have two ivory teeth, which are believed to be the remnants of tusks from their ancestors.
A pyxis is a shape of vessel from the classical world, usually a cylindrical box with a separate lid. Originally mostly used by women to hold cosmetics, trinkets or jewellery, surviving pyxides are mostly Greek pottery, but especially in later periods may be in wood, metal, ivory, or other materials. The name derived from Corinthian boxes made of wood from the tree puksos (boxwood), that also came with covers. The shape of the vessel can be traced in pottery back to the Protogeometric period in Athens, however the Athenian pyxis has various shapes itself. At first, the two varieties of pyxis included the pointed and the flat-bottomed. The pointed pyxis didn't last much longer than the ninth century BCE, while the flat-bottomed continued into the late Geometric. It also continued to grow larger and more squat in proportions. The cover often depicts elaborately sculpted handles and the walls tend to be somewhat convex. During the sixth century BCE, however, Athens began producing boxes with concave walls that enabled them to be grasped easily when ranged close together on a shelf. Compare the waisted shape of the medieval and Early Modern albarello. Images on the pyxis usually depict the marriage procession from a young girl's house to that of her new husband.
Chiusi is a town and comune in province of Siena, Tuscany, Italy.
The work is one of the most important examples of Etruscan ivory work - there are only two other examples, one from Chiusi and one from Cerveteri. It is composed of a hollow cylinder (22cm high) and decorated with horizontal friezes, separated by small bands carved with plant motifs (interweaved palmettes and lotus flowers). Two medium-sized bands at the top and bottom are decorated with more lotus flowers.
Etruscan art was produced by the Etruscan civilization in central Italy between the 9th and 2nd centuries BC. From around 600 BC it was heavily influenced by Greek art, which was imported by the Etruscans, but always retained distinct characteristics. Particularly strong in this tradition were figurative sculpture in terracotta, wall-painting and metalworking especially in bronze. Jewellery and engraved gems of high quality were produced.
Cerveteri is a town and comune of northern Lazio in the region of the Metropolitan City of Rome. Known by the ancient Romans as Caere, and previously by the Etruscans as Caisra or Cisra, and as Agylla by the Greeks, its modern name derives from Caere Vetus used in the 13th century to distinguish it from Caere Novum.
The upper frieze shows two myths from the Odyssey, split by a sphinx: the encounter with Scylla (who looks a lot like a hydra) and the escape from the cyclopsPolyphemus. The second frieze shows common motifs of departure for war, followed by hoplites performing a salute and weeping women (with long braids and their arms over their chests). After that there is a warrior without his shield performing a funerary dance and a horseman. The third band is decorated with beasts and monsters, employing eastern motifs. On the final band there are further imaginary animals.
The Odyssey is one of two major ancient Greek epic poems attributed to Homer. It is, in part, a sequel to the Iliad, the other Homeric epic. The Odyssey is fundamental to the modern Western canon; it is the second-oldest extant work of Western literature, while the Iliad is the oldest. Scholars believe the Odyssey was composed near the end of the 8th century BC, somewhere in Ionia, the Greek coastal region of Anatolia.
A sphinx is a mythical creature with the head of a human and the body of a lion.
In Greek mythology, Scylla was a legendary monster that lived on one side of a narrow channel of water, opposite her counterpart Charybdis. The two sides of the strait were within an arrow's range of each other—so close that sailors attempting to avoid Charybdis would pass dangerously close to Scylla and vice versa.
The style of the situla is less monumental than ivories of the previous period, but more lively.
Bibliography
Ranuccio Bianchi Bandinelli & Mario Torelli, L'arte dell'antichità classica, Etruria-Roma, Utet, Torino 1976.
Ranuccio Bianchi Bandinelli was an Italian archaeologist and art historian.
The Ionic order forms one of the three classical orders of classical architecture, the other two canonic orders being the Doric and the Corinthian. There are two lesser orders: the Tuscan, and the rich variant of Corinthian called the composite order, both added by 16th-century Italian architectural writers, based on Roman practice. Of the three canonic orders, the Ionic order has the narrowest columns.
In architecture, the frieze is the wide central section part of an entablature and may be plain in the Ionic or Doric order, or decorated with bas-reliefs. Paterae are also usually used to decorate friezes. Even when neither columns nor pilasters are expressed, on an astylar wall it lies upon the architrave and is capped by the moldings of the cornice. A frieze can be found on many Greek and Roman buildings, the Parthenon Frieze being the most famous, and perhaps the most elaborate. This style is typical for the Persians.
In architecture the capital or chapiter forms the topmost member of a column. It mediates between the column and the load thrusting down upon it, broadening the area of the column's supporting surface. The capital, projecting on each side as it rises to support the abacus, joins the usually square abacus and the usually circular shaft of the column. The capital may be convex, as in the Doric order; concave, as in the inverted bell of the Corinthian order; or scrolling out, as in the Ionic order. These form the three principal types on which all capitals in the classical tradition are based. The Composite order, established in the 16th century on a hint from the Arch of Titus, adds Ionic volutes to Corinthian acanthus leaves.
Black-figure pottery painting, also known as the black-figure style or black-figure ceramic is one of the styles of painting on antique Greek vases. It was especially common between the 7th and 5th centuries BC, although there are specimens dating as late as the 2nd century BC. Stylistically it can be distinguished from the preceding orientalizing period and the subsequent red-figure pottery style.
The Chennakesava Temple, also referred to as Chennakeshava Temple, Keshava Temple or Kesava Temple, is a Vaishnava Hindu temple on the banks of River Kaveri at Somanathapura, Karnataka, India. The temple was consecrated in 1258 CE by Somanatha Dandanayaka, a general of the Hoysala King Narasimha III. It is located 38 kilometres (24 mi) east of Mysuru city.
The palmette is a motif in decorative art which, in its most characteristic expression, resembles the fan-shaped leaves of a palm tree. It has a far-reaching history, originating in ancient Egypt with a subsequent development through the art of most of Eurasia, often in forms that bear relatively little resemblance to the original. In ancient Greek and ancient Roman uses it is also known as the anthemion. It is found in most artistic media, but especially as an architectural ornament, whether carved or painted, and painted on ceramics. It is very often a component of the design of a frieze or border. The complex evolution of the palmette was first traced by Alois Riegl in his Stilfragen of 1893. The half-palmette, bisected vertically, is also a very common motif, found in many mutated and vestigial forms, and especially important in the development of plant-based scroll ornament.
Ottonian art is a style in pre-romanesque German art, covering also some works from the Low Countries, northern Italy and eastern France. It was named by the art historian Hubert Janitschek after the Ottonian dynasty which ruled Germany and northern Italy between 919 and 1024 under the kings Henry I, Otto I, Otto II, Otto III and Henry II. With Ottonian architecture, it is a key component of the Ottonian Renaissance. However, the style neither began nor ended to neatly coincide with the rule of the dynasty. It emerged some decades into their rule and persisted past the Ottonian emperors into the reigns of the early Salian dynasty, which lacks an artistic "style label" of its own. In the traditional scheme of art history, Ottonian art follows Carolingian art and precedes Romanesque art, though the transitions at both ends of the period are gradual rather than sudden. Like the former and unlike the latter, it was very largely a style restricted to a few of the small cities of the period, and important monasteries, as well as the court circles of the emperor and his leading vassals.
A festoon is a wreath or garland hanging from two points, and in architecture typically a carved ornament depicting conventional arrangement of flowers, foliage or fruit bound together and suspended by ribbons. The motif is sometimes known as a swag when depicting fabric or linen.
Romanesque art is the art of Europe from approximately 1000 AD to the rise of the Gothic style in the 12th century, or later, depending on region. The preceding period is known as the Pre-Romanesque period. The term was invented by 19th-century art historians, especially for Romanesque architecture, which retained many basic features of Roman architectural style – most notably round-headed arches, but also barrel vaults, apses, and acanthus-leaf decoration – but had also developed many very different characteristics. In Southern France, Spain and Italy there was an architectural continuity with the Late Antique, but the Romanesque style was the first style to spread across the whole of Catholic Europe, from Sicily to Scandinavia. Romanesque art was also greatly influenced by Byzantine art, especially in painting, and by the anti-classical energy of the decoration of the Insular art of the British Isles. From these elements was forged a highly innovative and coherent style.
The acanthus is one of the most common plant forms to make foliage ornament and decoration.
The scroll in art is an element of ornament and graphic design featuring spirals and rolling incomplete circle motifs, some of which resemble the edge-on view of a book or document in scroll form, though many types are plant-scrolls, which loosely represent plant forms such as vines, with leaves or flowers attached. Scrollwork is a term for some forms of decoration dominated by spiralling scrolls, today used in popular language for two-dimensional decorative flourishes and arabesques of all kinds, especially those with circular or spiralling shapes.
Situla, from the Latin word for bucket or pail, is the term in archaeology and art history for a variety of elaborate bucket-shaped vessels from the Iron Age to the Middle Ages, usually with a handle at the top. All types may be highly decorated, most characteristically with reliefs in bands or friezes running round the vessel.
The François Vase is a large Attic volute krater decorated in the black-figure style. It stands at 66 cm in height and was inspired by earlier bronze vases. It was used for wine. A milestone in the development of ancient Greek pottery due to the drawing style used as well as the combination of related stories depicted in the numerous friezes, it is dated to circa 570/560 BCE. The Francois Vase was discovered in 1844 in Chiusi where an Etruscan tomb in the necropolis of Fonte Rotella was found located in central Italy. It was named after its discoverer Alessandro François, it is now in the Museo Archeologico at Florence. It remains uncertain whether the krater was used in Greece or in Etruria, and whether the handles were broken and repaired in Greece or in Etruria. Perhaps the François Vase was made for a symposium given by a member of an aristocratic family in Solonian Athens, then broken and, after being carefully repaired, was sent to Etruria, perhaps as an instance of elite-gift exchange. It bears the inscriptions "Ergotimos mepoiesen" and "Kleitias megraphsen", meaning "Ergotimos made me" and "Kleitias painted me". It depicts 270 figures, 121 of which have accompanying inscriptions which is highly unusual for so many to be identified; the scenes depicted represent a number of mythological themes. In 1900 the vase was smashed into 638 pieces by a museum guard by hurling a wooden stool against the protective glass. It was later restored by Pietro Zei in 1902, followed by a second reconstruction in 1973 incorporating previously missing pieces.
The Nimrud ivories are a large group of small carved ivory plaques and figures dating from the 9th to the 7th centuries BC that were excavated from the Assyrian city of Nimrud during the 19th and 20th centuries. Most are fragments of the original forms; there are over 1,000 significant pieces, and many more very small fragments.
Tyrrhenian amphorae are a specific shape of Attic black-figure neck amphorae. Tyrrhenian amphorae were only produced during a short period, about 565 to 550 BC. They are ovoid in shape and bear striking decorations. The handle is usually decorated with a lotus-palmette cross or vegetal tendrils. It always terminates in a red-painted ridge. The vase body is painted with several friezes. The uppermost of these, on the shoulder, is usually especially notable. It often contains mythological scenes, but the first erotic motifs in Attic vase painting also occur here. Unique motifs include the sacrifice of Polyxene. Often, the figures are explained by added inscriptions. The other friezes, usually two to three in number, are often decorated with animals. At times, a frieze is replaced with a vegetal band.
The Leagros Group was a group of Attic black-figure vase painters active during the last two decades of the 6th century BC. The name given to the group by modern scholars is a conventional one, derived from a series of name vases.
Etruscan vase painting was produced from the 7th through the 4th centuries BC, and is a major element in Etruscan art. It was strongly influenced by Greek vase painting, and followed the main trends in style over the period. Besides being producers in their own right, the Etruscans were the main export market for Greek pottery outside Greece, and some Greek painters probably moved to Etruria, where richly decorated vases were a standard element of grave inventories.
The Dinos of the Gorgon Painter is an important example of ancient Greek pottery, produced at Athens around 580 BC. It entered the Louvre's collection in 1861, with the purchase of Giampietro Campana's collection.
The Hüseyindede vases are Early Hittite vases decorated with reliefs, which were found in excavations at Hüseyindede Tepe near Yörüklü in the Turkish province of Çorum. There are fragments of four vases in total. Two of them were nearly complete and were able to be restored. They are on display in the Çorum Archaeological Museum.
Kranok pattern is one of the most important Thai motif patterns, because it appears in many Thai artworks such as Tripiṭaka cabinets, the doors of Thai temple, and coffins. According to the Royal Institute Dictionary in 1982, the definition of Kranok refers to a pattern of lines. However, when it is written as Kanok, it means gold. The pattern basically shows the repetition of right triangles. Sometimes, it is shown in same sizes or in different sizes. Oftentimes, the pointy part of the triangle goes right with each other in the same direction.
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