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Ch. 11: Elephant Tusks

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402 IVORY AND THE ELEPHANT
Fossil ivory appears to have been known as early as the third century B. C, as Theophrastus writes that the colour of ivory that had been dug up was a mixture of white and black.* In their ignorance of the true nature of these de­posits the ancients took refuge in the explanation that ele­phants sometimes buried the tusks they had lost through old age, accident, or violence·!
When Firmus of Seleucia, the friend and associate of Queen Zenobia of Palmyra (fl. 270 A. D.), was overcome by Aurelian (c. 212-275 A. D.), the latter secured among other valuables two enormous elephant tusks, each 10 ft. in length. Of these, with the addition of two others, Aurelian proposed to have executed a seat or throne upon which should be placed a golden and jewelled image of Jupiter. This design was probably frustrated by the emperor's death, and we are told that the tusks were eventually given to "a certain lady," who had them worked up into a couch for herself 4
One of the ninth-century relics in the treasury of the Cathe­dral of Aachen is an entire elephant tusk, rounded off at either end and having a series of longitudinally cut and smoothed surfaces. These are in part adorned with designs of animal forms in low relief. During the Middle Ages it was provided with a gold mounting and ornamented with gems cut en cabochon. Possibly in its original state, before carving, the tusk may have been among the gifts sent by Khalif Haroun-al-Rashid to Emperor Charlemagne. As has been noted, a live elephant was one of the most important and interesting of these gifts. There is also, however, a possibility that the tusk in question may have come from
*Theophrastus, "De lapidibus," cap. 37.
fPauly's "Real Encyclopädie des class. Altertumswissenschaft," Vol. V, Stuttgart, 1905, p. 2358; art. Elfenbein.
JFlavii Vopisci, "Firmus," in Scriptores Historiœ Romanse, Heidelbergiœ, 1743, Vol. IT, p. 421.
Ch. 11: Elephant Tusks Page of 681 Ch. 11: Elephant Tusks
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