Description
The workshop of the Embriachi family in Venice produced a variety of luxury objects decorated with carved plaques of bone and inlays of stained wood, bone, and horn. The scenes are taken from classical literature. Depicted here are incidents from the life of the Trojan prince Paris: his childhood is combined with the more familiar stories of Paris' judgment of the goddesses Juno, Venus, and Minerva and his abduction of Helen, Queen of Sparta, the incident which caused the Trojan war.
Such caskets were often given to a lady upon marriage to hold her bridal jewels. The empty shields on the lid would have been painted with the coats of arms of the woman and her husband. They may have worn off over time.
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