Plaque, walrus ivory, carved in high relief, The Nativity, Germany (Cologne), ca. 1150-60

Panel, The Nativity, walrus ivory, carved in high relief. The Virgin lies on a mattress within the towered walls of a city (Bethlehem) with the Child beside her in a manger, the ox and ass behind, and St. Joseph seated to the right; above are the star and a worshipping angel, gesturing towards Christ. Outside the walls four angels announce the Birth to three shepherds below. Surrounded by a border of a repeating anthemion ornament. Panel relief in walrus ivory made up of three slices of tusk plaques fastened together, with traces of purple colouring.

From the Webb collection; formerly in the Mertens Schaaffhausen collection, Cologne, purchased from Webb, £280.

Historical significance: One of the main features of the style is the use of rows of dots to emphasize curved lines, which has given the group its name: 'gestichelte' or 'pricked'. Another series of plaques, slightly smaller, less well preserved, and with a slightly less imaginitive expression of form, but stylistically and iconographically almost exactly the same as the larger series is now divided between Cologne, Berlin and the V&A (a second Ascension). Other works showing the same style confirm the Cologne provenance suggested by the expressionless oval faces shown in the three-quarter profile and the softly rounded forms, which can be seen in Romanesque sculpture in the Cologne area, and in two contemporary illuminated gospels, made in Cologne, now housed in the Hessisches Landesmuseum in Darmstadt (Exh.cat. 'Die Zeit der Stauffer',
Stuttgart, 1977, no. 620.)

This and the two other plaques in the V&A (Inv.nos: 145-1866, 378-1871) belong to the same ensemble, together with two other reliefs in the Metropolitan Museum in New York (showing the Three Maries at the Sepulchre and the Incredulity of St. Thomas);
They are the same size and are carved in an identical style and display the same border designs.
The size and number of the plaques suggest that they probably once formed a large altar frontal or decorated a pulpit, in an ensemble that probably consisted of nine panels.

This and the two other plaques in the V&A (Inv.nos: 145-1866, 378-1871) belong to the same ensemble, together with two other reliefs in the Metropolitan Museum in New York (showing the Three Maries at the Sepulchre and the Incredulity of St. Thomas);
They are the same size and are carved in an identical style and display the same border designs.
The size and number of the plaques suggest that they probably once formed a large altar frontal or decorated a pulpit, in an ensemble that probably consisted of nine panels.
Each is made up of several pieces of ivory, and there is evidence that they were once coloured. The expressionless oval faces in three-quarter profile and the rounded forms are features of Romanesque sculpture and manuscript painting in the Cologne area. Unusually the carver used rows of dots to emphasise curved lines.

144-1866