4 Carving in limestone. Coptic. Sixth century. This exuberant style, suggestive almost of Indian art, was especially popular in Egypt from the fifth century until the Islamic conquest around 640

Outside Alexandria the classical elegance tended to give way to a markedly voluptuous rendering, suggestive almost of Indian art. It distinguished the ivories of Lower Egypt, and was present also in the textiles, but it was perhaps nowhere as marked as in the limestone carving which was developed almost as a national art in the region of the Delta between the fifth and seventh century ( Ill. 4 ). The fat, luscious nudes were wholly distinct from the severe, almost stylized figures favoured at Constantinople at the same period.

These things are unmistakable, but the Egyptian provenance is less easy to establish in the case of ivories bearing religious themes, for work done at Antioch and in the more cultured centres in Syria would seem to have been very closely akin to the Alexandrine, and

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