Pair of Handcarved Wood Architectural Elements

Description

Pair of Handcarved Wood Architectural Elements
Two handcarved pieces of ebonized wood, one 8" high, 4" wide, 7" deep, one 8" high, 4" wide, 6 3/4" deep, the matched pair differing in numerous details, each showing evidence on both its upper side and underside (where there is a hole in which a hollow metal rod is visible) of having been removed from a larger whole (perhaps an architectural element, perhaps a piece of furniture); four 1/8"-diameter screw / nail holes at the top of each flat (uncarved) back. Note, on the deeper of the two pieces, its upper left edge, where the carving on the smaller of the two leaves (matching the number on its mate) trails away, leaving an incised (or chiseled) void of wood; this may be a defect, but we believe it to be endemic to the carving (there is a similar, smaller area to this piece's opposite side). A shallow, 1/4"-square piece is missing from the shallower work's right rear corner. Numerous minute chips and indentations are visible across the surface of the pair, primarily at the high points of the many carved lines, which time and handling have largely smoothed away. Undated; nineteenth-century, perhaps earlier.