SOLD Hand-carved Alabaster Dove antique merit certificates I didn't know what this

I didn't know what this curious ball was when I found it

Loss and darkening to the paint as evident

As darning was a skill taught to young women of all classes--including in orphanages

with hand-painted decoration for the skirts of the dancing girls

right down to those wonderful scrolled feet

SOLD Hand-carved Alabaster Dove antique merit certificates I didn't know what thisThe alabaster doves I have foound most similar in manner to this one are later 19th century Italian; whether that is the case here I am not certain, but it certainly seems to have a good amount of age. This one certainly seems poised as if to perch on the edge of an urn and perhaps it once did; there is a little roughness to the flat underside of the feet but not enough to tell me for sure. Whatever the case, I love a dove, and a marble carving, and I