CARVES: The long journey from tusk to museum

At the heart of the CARVES project is an ivory object that has lived several lives. It started, simply enough, as an elephant tusk, or actually rather several tusks. After the hunt, the ivory was carved into Roman consular diptychs, ceremonial writing tablets reserved for people of high status. Centuries later, around 800 AD, when ivory grew scarce due to overhunting and disrupted trade routes, several diptychs were cut and recombined: their fragments were reused to form both the front and back cover of a book, almost certainly a bible.

Recent research revealed that the book was restored in the 15th century in Maastricht. Eventually the book itself was discarded, but the ivory panels found a new place in the decoration of an altar in a small village church in Genoelselderen, Belgium. To pay for the renovation of the church, the ivories were sold, and began a new life at the Art & History Museums of Brussels. For the last hundred and fifty years, as a museum object, they have told and illustrated the history of our regions. Tusk, diptych, book cover, altarpiece, museum piece: five lives in one small piece of ivory.