These miniature carved altars were made from boxwood in the 16th century. In total, at the moment, there are 135 such carved altars in the world and each of them baffles scientists with one question - how they were made.
It is believed that these carved boxes were made between AD 1500 and 1530, either in Flanders or the Netherlands.
Historians associate the appearance of these carved altars with the emergence of a new social class - the bourgeoisie. They were made precisely in that small time period when the bourgeoisie had already emerged, and the church had not yet split. The representatives of the new class needed portable religious utensils and were ready to pay dearly for them. But with the changes in the church, carved boxes gradually fell out of fashion.
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Using a microscope and three-dimensional scans, scientists have figured out how complex these miniature altars turned out to be. The inner layers adjoin each other so tightly that they hide the decorations that are behind them. Only with the help of X-rays can they be detected. The products contain tiny spiers, the size of which does not exceed a grass seed.
Despite research, much of the manufacturing process remains a mystery.