Carved Ivory Box

This cylindrical casket - also known as a pyxis (the ecclesiastical term for vessels used to store the consecrated bread of the Eucharist) - is made from hollowing out a large cross-section of an elephant tusk. Presented with a flattened ivory lid, copper gilt mounts, a lock-plate and feet, these metal additions (along with the linen lining) are all original to the casket. The casket’s exterior was once ornamented with painted and gilded decoration, which has since worn almost entirely; however, faint outlines reveal an arabesque tree motif which compares to other surviving Norman caskets, today kept in church treasuries in Europe. In medieval Sicily, raw ivory was imported from West Africa via commercial routes controlled by the Fatimid rulers of Egypt. These ivories were probably produced for members of the Norman nobility who could afford the luxury material from which they were manufactured, and who mixed in circles where an Islamic aesthetic was de rigueur, as it was under Roger II (r.524-548 AH/1130-54 CE) and his successors. It would not have been unusual for such nobles to present their precious possessions to churches, where the caskets became reliquaries, which is how they have survived to the present day.