Fragmentary plaque, carved ivory, Egypt or Syria, 1st half of 8th century. H: 11.5; W: 8 cm, Inv. no. 20/1978. © The David Collection.

The ivory plaque was probably mounted with similar ones as a decoration on a piece of furniture.

The plaque’s vines, which grow from a little vase and enclose flowers and deer, are characteristic of the forms of decoration used by the Umayyads.

A closely related decoration was used on the facade of the Mshatta palace complex built in the Syrian Desert by the Umayyad caliph al-Walid II in the 740s. What remains of the facade is now found in Berlin.

Vegetal ornamentation of this kind is indebted to the decorations of Late Antiquity that were an important point of departure for Umayyad art.