• Material: Ivory, Ebony Wood.
• Size: 8" by 7", cameos themselves are 5 1/8" by 4 3/8".
• Date and Origin: Circa 1850, Dieppe, France.
• Conditions: Ivory cameos are Immaculate, the wood frame of one has two fissurations, easy to restore if wanted.

This are two out of this world ivory giant cameos. Saying that they are a Museum Quality carving is reductive because these cameos are something that goes beyond our imagination. Everything is amazing in these pieces, the three-dimensional carving, the proportions, the intensity and real expressions of the subjects, their spendid clothes. This cameo comes from France where the ivory master carvers made wonderful artworks using that material. Dieppe in France wes the place where the best ivory carving were made from  1600's until the beginning of 1900's.
We can examine everything starting from the main character, Henry IV, here depicted crowned by a laurel garland. He was not handsome but, without any doubt, you can see royalty looking at his ivory portrait. His clothes are something of spectacular, a rich embroidery depicting foliage on his jacket. An amazing mask on his shoulder, the cross pending from a ribbon on his chest, the fringed cloak on his shoulder. His curly hair and beard are so well carved that appear to be real, everything is painstakingly and meticolously carved that I'm amazed that something of so delicate is arrived to us completely intact.  I remain breathless looking at this cameo, it is something of so incredible as the second one depicting the Duke of Sully, the counselor of Henry IV.
Even this ivory portrait is at the same carving level of the one of the King. The Duke of Sully has a fierce and royal posture and his face is masterly carved, look at his elaborated moustache, amazing.
His clothes are superbly carved with leaves embroideries and scallop. His collar, typical of that era, is outstanding, can you imagine someone able to carve a thing like that? Only great carvers of the past could do something of so complicated. The Duke wears a fringed cloak tied on one of his shoulders, it is so real that you could want to grab it away. These two cameos are carved three dimensionally and are really out of this world. Another great historical find, a must have for any collector.

A bit of History


Henry IV (French: Henri IV; 13 December 1553 – 14 May 1610), also known by the epithets Good King Henry or Henry the Great, was King of Navarre (as Henry III) from 1572 and King of France from 1589 to 1610. He was the first monarch of France from the House of Bourbon, a cadet branch of the Capetian dynasty. He was assassinated in 1610 by François Ravaillac, a Catholic zealot, and was succeeded by his son Louis XIII.
The son of Antoine de Bourbon, Duke of Vendôme and Jeanne d'Albret, the Queen of Navarre, Henry was baptised as a Catholic but raised in the Protestant faith by his mother. He inherited the throne of Navarre in 1572 on his mother's death. As a Huguenot, Henry was involved in the French Wars of Religion, barely escaping assassination in the St. Bartholomew's Day massacre. He later led Protestant forces against the royal army.
Henry and his predecessor Henry III of France were direct descendants of King Louis IX. Henry III belonged to the House of Valois, descended from Philip III of France, elder son of Saint Louis; Henry IV belonged to the House of Bourbon, descended from Robert, Count of Clermont, younger son of Saint Louis. As Head of the House of Bourbon, Henry was "first prince of the blood". Upon the death of his brother-in-law and distant cousin Henry III in 1589, Henry was called to the French succession by the Salic law.
He initially kept the Protestant faith (the only French king to do so) and had to fight against the Catholic League, which denied that he could wear France's crown as a Protestant. After four years of stalemate, he converted to Catholicism to obtain mastery over his kingdom (reportedly saying, "Paris is well worth a mass"). As a pragmatic politician (in the parlance of the time, a politique), he promulgated the Edict of Nantes (1598), which guaranteed religious liberties to Protestants, thereby effectively ending the French Wars of Religion.
An active ruler, Henry worked to regularise state finance, promote agriculture, eliminate corruption and encourage education. During his reign, the French colonization of the Americas truly began with the foundation of the colonies of Acadia and Canada at Port-Royal and Quebec, respectively. He is celebrated in the popular song "Vive le roi Henri" (which later became an anthem for the French monarchy during the reigns of his successors) and in Voltaire's Henriade.


Maximilien de Béthune, 1st Duke of Sully, Marquis of Rosny and Nogent, Count of Muret and Villebon, Viscount of Meaux (13 December 1560 – 22 December 1641) was a nobleman, soldier, statesman, and counselor of King Henry IV of France. Historians emphasize Sully's role in building a strong centralized administrative system in France using coercion and highly effective new administrative techniques. While not all of his policies were original, he used them well to revitalize France after the European Religious Wars. Most, however, were repealed by later monarchs who preferred absolute power. Historians have also studied his Neostoicism and his ideas about virtue, prudence, and discipline.
From 1596, when he was added to Henry's finance commission, Rosny introduced some order into France's economic affairs. Acting as sole Superintendent of Finances at the end of 1601, he authorized the free exportation of grain and wine, reduced legal interest, established a special court to try cases of speculation, forbade provincial governors to raise money on their own authority, and otherwise removed many abuses of tax-collecting. Rosny abolished several offices, and by his honest, rigorous conduct of the country's finances, he was able to save between 1600 and 1610 an average of a million livres a year.
His achievements were by no means solely financial. In 1599, he was appointed grand commissioner of highways and public works, superintendent of fortifications and grand master of artillery; in 1602, governor of Nantes and of Jargeau, captain-general of the Queen's gens d'armes and governor of the Bastille; in 1604, he was governor of Poitou; and in 1606, made first duke of Sully and a pair de France, ranking next to princes of the blood. He declined the office of constable of France because he would not become a Roman Catholic. Sully encouraged agriculture, urged the free circulation of produce, promoted stock-raising, forbade the destruction of the forests, drained swamps, built roads and bridges, planned a vast system of canals and actually began the Canal de Briare. He strengthened the French military establishment; under his direction, the construction of a great line of defences on the frontiers began. Abroad, Sully opposed the king's colonial policy as inconsistent with French interests, in opposition to men like Champlain who urged greater colonial efforts in Canada and elsewhere. Neither did Sully show much favor toward industrial pursuits but, on the urgent solicitation of the king, he established a few silk factories. He fought together with Henry IV in Savoy (1600–1601) and negotiated the treaty of peace in 1602; in 1603, he represented Henry at the court of James I of England; and throughout the reign, he helped the king to put down insurrections of the nobles, whether Roman Catholic or Protestant. It was Sully, too, who arranged the marriage between Henry IV and Marie de' Medici.