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Tuesday 31 January 2023

16th Century Boxwood Carvings Are So Tiny That Researchers Need To Use CT-scanning For Their Research

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ecbaa1ecb298 23.png?resize=648,365 - 16th Century Boxwood Carvings Are So Tiny That Researchers Need To Use CT-scanning For Their Research

There are only 135 known miniature boxwood carvings and they have been puzzling art specialists all over the world.

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Recently, researchers have gathered some of these tiny religious pieces from museums and private collections to further study their secrets and have found a few very interesting answers.

It is thought that these wooden carvings were made during only a brief time frame, between 1500 and 1530 either in Flanders or the Netherlands. The rise of a new merchant social class in Europe created a market demand for high-quality portable religious carvings. However, soon the Reformation began and a lot of church-related accessories went out of fashion, including the miniature boxwood pieces.

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Using micro-CT scanning and Advanced 3D Analysis Software, researchers found out just how intricate these miniature altars really are. The inner layers are pieced together, hiding the joints so completely, that only a microscope or an X-ray can detect them. The pieces also incorporate pins, smaller than a grass seed. However, much of the production process remains unknown, because traces of gold and other decoration materials conceal the X-ray views.

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Researchers took these 500-year-old miniature boxwood carvings to the lab to find out their secrets

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They think these miniatures were made between 1500 and 1530 in Flanders or the Netherlands

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The human eye isn’t able to analyze details this tiny

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So researchers used micro-CT scanning and Advanced 3D Analysis Software

Photography by Ian Lefebvre

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To find out how intricate the pieces really are

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They found joints in the inner layers so tiny that only a microscope or an X-ray can detect them

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And pins, smaller than a grass seed

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But even the advanced technology couldn’t see everything

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Because traces of gold and other decoration materials conceal the X-ray views

miniature-boxwood-carvings-16th-century-13

 

The miniatures were a result of a rising new social class in Europe that created a demand for these high-quality portable religious carvings

Photography by Craig Boyko

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However, soon the Reformation began and a lot of church-related accessories went out of fashion

miniature-boxwood-carvings-16th-century-5

 

 

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