PREFAC E.


HE object of this volume is twofold : firftly, to
give defcriptions of the collection of fictile ivories,
numbering nearly a thoufand, in the South Ken-
fington Mufeum ; and, fecondly, to give an account

of the Continental collections of claffical and mediaeval ivories,
in order to direct attention to the fpecimens of which it would
be defirable to obtain fictile copies for the Mufeum.
Firft. The value of a collection of fictile mediaeval ivories
can hardly be over ftated, as affording examples of art work
during many centuries in which we are deftitute of fculptured
and to a great extent alfo of analogous pictorial reprefentations :
efpecially is this the cafe with the very numerous examples,
ranging from the claffical period to the eleventh and twelfth
centuries. The admirable memoir by Sir Digby Wyatt on
iyory carvings delivered at the annual meeting of the Arundel
Society on the 29th June 1855, publiihed by that Society, and
the equally excellent introduction by Mr. Maikell to the Cata-
logue of Original Ivories in the South Kenfington Mufeum,
publiihed in 1872, to which the prefent volume may be con-
fidered as a fupplement, renders it unneceffary in the prefent
work to enter at any great length on the hiftory and appliances
of ivory carvings during the Middle Ages.
The exhibition of the fplendid Fejervary Collection of carved
ivories by C0unt Pulfzky, at the Rooms of the Archaeological
Inftitute of London in 1853, may be faid to have given the firft
impulfe to the ftudy of fuch objects in this country. This
collection (of many of the moft interefting fpecimens of which
facfimiles are contained in the South Kenfington Mufeum)