Ivory
The tusks of the elephant or walrus, one of the most durable and natural materials were used in the Palaeolithic era as raw material both in sculpture (prominent and tactile) and various decorative arts. The artworks of ivory preserved cover the entire range of figurines and carvings on the church altar as boxes, buckles, combs, etc. Despite the fact that the nature of ivory is offered for small-scale works of art, it is widely used and in a series of gold and ivory cult statues from the ancient Greeks. Of these, the most famous were the statue of Zeus at Olympia and the statue of Athena on the Acropolis of Athens (Pheidias). The statues of ivory were the most common form of Byzantine sculpture. The spread in Western Europe had a major influence, leading to remarkable sculptures of Karolingeianis and Romanesque art (culminating in the works of the period from the 9th to the 11th century). As regards other cultures, brilliant samples of art in ivory exist by Benin and Ife.