拍品专文
A related comb is in the Cloisters Collection of the Metropolitan Museum, New York (inv.no.1982.357) and illustrated by Wixom.
The tradition of using boxwood for combs is an ancient one and indeed the latin word for boxwood, buxum, also signifies comb. Wixom records how textual sources from the late Middle Ages show that a comb was a traditional marriage gift from a husband to a wife.
Pinto illustrates a late fifteenth century or early sixteenth century comb which can be closely compared to the present example.
Related literature:
E.H. Pinto, Treen and other Wooden Bygones, London, 1969, fig. 381.
W. Wixom, Mirror of the Medieval World, New York, 1999, p. 211, no. 259.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Secular Spirit: Life and Art at the end of the Middle Ages, New York, 1975, p. 94, ill. no. 107a-b.
The tradition of using boxwood for combs is an ancient one and indeed the latin word for boxwood, buxum, also signifies comb. Wixom records how textual sources from the late Middle Ages show that a comb was a traditional marriage gift from a husband to a wife.
Pinto illustrates a late fifteenth century or early sixteenth century comb which can be closely compared to the present example.
Related literature:
E.H. Pinto, Treen and other Wooden Bygones, London, 1969, fig. 381.
W. Wixom, Mirror of the Medieval World, New York, 1999, p. 211, no. 259.
The Metropolitan Museum of Art, The Secular Spirit: Life and Art at the end of the Middle Ages, New York, 1975, p. 94, ill. no. 107a-b.