[kris-el-uh-fan-tin, -tahyn] 
| made of or overlaid with gold and ivory, as certain objects made in ancient Greece. |
| chrys·el·e·phan·tine (krĭ-sěl'ə-fān'tēn', -tīn') adj. Made of gold and ivory, as certain pieces of sculpture or artwork in ancient Greece. [Greek khrūselephantinos : khrūs-, khrūso-, chryso- + elephās, elephant-, ivory; see elephant.] |
chryselephantine
(from Greek chrysos, "gold," and elephantinos, "ivory"), type of figural sculpture in which the flesh was made of ivory and the drapery of gold. Statuettes of ivory and gold were produced in ancient Egypt, Mesopotamia, and Crete. Chryselephantine statues were made in Greece from the 6th century BC. Frequently they were colossal cult figures adorning the interiors of major temples; Classical writers record, for example, that the Greek sculptor Phidias made a 40-foot (12-metre) chryselephantine statue of Athena for the Parthenon at Athens and another large figure of Zeus for the temple at Olympia
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