Hunting Horn (Oliphant)

The term oliphant refers to an ivory horn such as the one used by the legendary hero Roland, one of Charlemagne’s paladins, to sound the call for battle. Many such horns have been preserved. Usually decorated with hunting and animal motifs, they were made in Islamic-Arab countries as well as in Norman Sicily and in Lower Italy. Many of them served as containers for relics in the church treasuries of the West.