
Casket
Italian · 12th century
- Medium
- Ivory, brass, tempera, and gold leaf
- Original size
- 9.5 × 15.9 × 9.7 cm (3 3/4 × 6 1/4 × 3 13/16 in.)
- Currently held
- Art Institute of Chicago
- Movement
- Medieval
This small but richly worked casket offers a vivid window into the luxury craft traditions of medieval Italy, where ivory, gilding, and painted ornament came together in objects made to be both used and treasured. Produced in twelfth-century Italy — likely in a workshop influenced by the cultural crossroads of Norman Sicily, where Byzantine, Islamic, and Latin traditions met — the casket combines carved ivory panels with brass fittings and delicate tempera painting highlighted with gold leaf. This layering of materials was deliberate: each element signalled wealth and refinement, and the painted and gilded surfaces would have glimmered by candlelight in a way no single medium alone could achieve. Such caskets were made to hold small valuables, relics, or keepsakes, and their intimate scale only intensifies the care given to every surface. Ivory of this quality was a rare commodity in medieval Europe, sourced through long-distance trade networks stretching back to sub-Saharan Africa and the Islamic world, making the raw material itself a statement of status before a single tool touched it. The hand-painted oil reproduction translates the warmth of aged ivory and the quiet luminosity of the original gilding into a form that rewards close looking, preserving the intricate ornamental spirit of a centuries-old craft tradition.
Hand-painted oil reproduction
Painted in real oil on stretched canvas by master copyists. Delivered unframed — ready to frame at home.
Choose a size
In Italian's style.
Send us a photograph of your family, pet, or home — we'll paint it as a custom oil on stretched canvas in any style you like. From £220.

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