Hispano-Moresque box in the collection of the Hispanic Society of America

The minor arts of the Caliphate of Cordoba, famed by traveler and chronicler alike, are well exemplified in a series of carved ivory boxes which are eloquent of the perfection and refinement of workmanship of the Spanish Arabs. They appeared slightly after the middle of the tenth century and ceased within the next hundred years. In shape they are round with domed covers or rectangular with the cover either flat or more often with sloping sides. -- Preface.