Indian Pietra Dura Table Top with Geometric Motif

A black hub, spokes in five colors, and a band of beads circling like a slow parade.

This pietra dura table top with geometric motif comes from Rajasthan, India, and is contemporary work in hardstone. The technique, in which shaped pieces of stone are cut and fitted into a ground without visible gaps, flourished under the Mughals and remains a living craft in the region. The black center is ringed by wedges of red, cream, salmon and veined black-and-white stone inside a thin golden band. Dark brown marble surrounds it, then a white ring of black dots, red ovals and tilted squares, then black and cream borders. It is 30 inches in diameter.

Geometry, with better materials than a protractor ever had.