Magnificent Antique Hand Carved Alabaster Bust Bookends Dante & Beatrice Italy
When you click on links to various merchants on this site and make a purchase, this can result in this site earning a commission. Affiliate programs and affiliations include, but are not limited to, the eBay Partner Network.
Magnificent Antique Hand Carved Alabaster Bust Bookends Dante & Beatrice Italy:
$175.00
Magnificent Antique Hand Carved Alabaster Bust Bookends Dante & Beatrice Italy. Beatrice measures about 6 1/4\" tall, the base is 2 7/8\" x 5 5/8\". Dante is 5 3/4\" tall and the base is 3 3/16\" x 6 3/16\". Each is made of 3 separate pieces if hand carved alabaster with the center piece being colored. Hand made by a fine skilled artist, not signed that I could find but museum quality and genuine old Italian antiques. Fine condition with no damage noted, just some normal edge and surface wear - please check my 12 photos. Guaranteed genuine as described.
Alabaster carving has a long history in Volterra, going all the way back to the Etruscans, the ancient inhabitants of the region. Among the many artifacts we admired in the local Etruscan museum were hundreds of alabaster cinerary urns—rectangular stone boxes in which the ashes of the deceased were buried after cremation—dating from the fourth to the first century B.C.E. These stone boxes are richly adorned with carvings in relief, often including scenes of the deceased person’s supposed journey to the afterworld.
Of course, the Etruscans were not the only ones to use alabaster in ancient times. The Egyptians used a great deal of it. There is a difference in chemical composition, however, between such oriental alabaster—also referred to in the Bible—and the much softer Volterran chalky alabaster.
Marble too was used extensively in ancient Greek and Roman art, but compared with such “noble” materials, chalky alabaster was considered something of a poor relative. It is a softer, more fragile rock, easily scratched, and its role in architecture and art has thus always been subordinate to that of marble. Alabaster sculptures cannot endure exposure to the elements. In architecture alabaster is used primarily in interiors. The ductility of alabaster, on the other hand, makes it particularly suited to the sculpturing of minute details.
There is no evidence of alabaster production in Volterra for centuries after Etruscan and Roman times. However, historical records preserve references to the craft in the mid-16th century. At that time Francesco de’ Medici, grand duke of Tuscany, acquired a rare and beautiful lathe-turned vase from a Volterran craftsman and presented it to the Duke of Bavaria. In the 17th century, local craftsmen were busy producing artistic objects and minor decorative pieces. The craft enjoyed notable expansion during the 18th century, with quality reproduction of classical sculptures. By this time, the fame of Volterran alabaster had spread throughout Europe and beyond.
During this period Marcello Inghirami Fei, a local nobleman with a reputation for artistic talent and business acumen, gave impetus to the alabaster trade. He began to exploit newly discovered underground deposits of the mineral, and in 1791 he established a school where more than 100 apprentices could learn the art under the direction of master craftsmen called in from different regions of Italy and abroad. The industry flourished.
The eight or nine alabaster workshops that existed in 1786 multiplied to 60 by 1830. In those years some 50 adventurous Volterran merchants toured the world’s markets from Europe to the Americas, India, and the Far East to sell high-quality alabasters. Some amassed great fortunes. The boom lasted until 1870, but since then, there have been alternating periods of prosperity and slump. Even so, alabaster production remains one of the pillars of the local economy.