How was this made?
Similar to an ivory oliphant and an ivory casket(shown here) this pen box was created out of the tusk of an elephant. The tusk of an African elephant can reach up to three meters in length and almost twenty centimeters in diameter at the base. The tusk has a hollow, known as the pulp cavity, which becomes gradually narrower. Only a minuscule canal runs up to the distal end.
To create Taurus's pen box, the tusk was hollowed out, cut into two pieces, finished with ornate designs, and attached with bronze handles. Its detailed animal iconography was carved easily due to the soft nature of ivory.