An Undescribed Early Christian Ivory Diptych

The Early Christian ivory diptych which, by the permission of the owner, Mr. Andrews, it is my privilege to bring before the Society is almost entirely unknown. I have called it ‘undescribed’, and I might almost have called it ‘unpublished’. But some twenty years ago a rather inadequate photographic reproduction of it did appear in the first volume of Professor Venturi's invaluable Storia dell' Arte Italiana. Since that date a number of archaeologists have tried to get a sight of the diptych, but in vain. And the few brief notices of it that have been published by Professor Goldschmidt, Dom Leclercq, and others, have been based entirely on the small and not very clear half-tone block given without comment by Professor Venturi.