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Elephant and mammoth ivory comes from the two modified upper incisors. Tusks of some male African elephants can grow up to 2 meters (6 ½ feet) and weigh up to 45 kilograms (100 pounds). The tusks have a pulp cavity where the root and soft tissues attach to the jaw and that extends for approximately one-third of the tusk.
The Venus of Brassempouy, about 25,000 BP 11th-century Anglo-Saxon ivory cross reliquary of walrus ivory. Ivory carving is the carving of ivory, that is to say animal tooth or tusk, generally by using sharp cutting tools, either mechanically or manually. Objects carved in ivory are often called "ivories".
Elephant ivory, for example, will exhibit a pattern of intersecting arcs called schreger lines, that hatch across the surface at 115-degree angles. [4] Examples of ivory objects include: horns, handles and inlays for ceremonial weaponry, jewelry, and decorative arts; statuettes, regalia masks, and even triptychs.
Ivory is a fragile medium; many 19th-century pieces were preserved because they were kept in a barrel of oil on board ship. Gary Kiracofe, a scrimshander in Nantucket, Massachusetts, advises collectors that if a piece looks dry, one should fill the center of the tooth with unscented baby oil and allow it to remain until as much oil as possible is soaked into the microscopic pores of the ivory.
Ivory from Africa came from one of two types of elephant in Africa; the more desirable bush elephant with larger and heavier tusks or the forest elephant with smaller and straighter tusks. [2] Ivory tusks as well as ivory objects such as carved masks, salt cellars, oliphants and other emblems of importance have been traded and used as gifts and ...
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If you thought teeth were only worth a couple bucks from the tooth fairy, think again. On a brand-new episode of "Antiques Roadshow" Monday, a Fred Myrick scrimshaw tooth got a price tag that ...
Ivory is a hard, white material from the tusks (traditionally from elephants) and teeth of animals, that consists mainly of dentine, one of the physical structures of teeth and tusks. The chemical structure of the teeth and tusks of mammals is the same, regardless of the species of origin, but ivory contains structures of mineralised collagen ...