India
India was a major centre for Ivory carving since ancient times. Murshidabad in State of West Bengal, India was a famed centre for ivory carving. A set of ivory table and chairs, displayed at Victoria Memorial, Kolkata is an exquisite example of carving done by Murshidabad Carvers. This chair is a five legged arm chair, where three legs culminate into Tiger's claw while remaining two culminate into open mouthed tiger's head. The table as well as chair has excellent perforated floral motif (jaali work) with traces of gold plating. This table and chair was presented to the museum by Maharaja of Darbhanga. The carvers of Murshidabad called solid end of the elephant tusk as Nakshidant, middle portion as Khondidant and thick hollow end as Galhardant. They preferred using the solid end of elephant tusk for their work.
Ivory carving was also prevalent in South India, especially in Mysore and Tamil Nadu, and also in Uttar Pradesh and Rajasthan.
Read more about this topic: Ivory Carving
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