Chryselephantine

Chryselephantine (Gk. gold and ivory), a kind of statuary employed by the ancient Greeks, especially in the case of large statues. The method was to make the framework of the statue of clay or stone or other material, and to overlay it with accurately fitting plates of ivory to represent flesh and plates of gold to represent, raiment. These plates could be detached, as, for instance, from statues only used occasionally in religious ceremonies. Famous examples of this statuary were the Olympian Zeus and Athene of the Acropolis, the work of Phidias. The Chryselephantine method was reserved for statues of the gods, and much offence was given by the Macedonian kings, who employed it for their own statues.