Nobody could blame you if it’s difficult to identify, because it has been cleverly altered! The horn has been painted on the reverse with green and red paints and backed with paper. The most translucent cow horn would have been chosen to enable the pigments on the reverse to shine through so brightly.
Earlier damage revealed the layering of pigment and horn. The red pigment was delaminating from the center of one of the red flowers, revealing the yellowish color of the horn. The horn was crushed, as we saw cracks lying over the pigment beneath it.
This type of layered decoration is known as marquetry. A thin layer, or veneer, of decoration is applied over a cheaper, less exciting wood substrate. Often, differently colored (and sometimes dyed) woods were used. As we've seen on the BVRB table, metals and other organic materials, things like turtle shell, mother-of-pearl, horn and ivory, could be used as well.
Cutting out all of the little shapes in this table, one by one, and trying to make them all the same seems like an impossible task! Luckily for BVRB, he didn’t have to do it that way. Instead, little packets formed from sheets of mother-of-pearl and prepared horn were assembled with a cover sheet displaying the pattern. With this layered bunch of materials, a number of shapes could be cut at once, making the whole process much more efficient. Cutting the flower out of the green background horn at the same time as it was cut into the mother-of-pearl and red horn also assured a perfect fit of the positive and negative elements.
Small holes were drilled at key points in the motif so that a fine saw blade could be introduced into the design. Greased paper was interleaved with the marquetry materials within the packet to lubricate the blade, which was also waxed from time to time. With the use of a very clever contraption called a chevalet, or marquetry donkey, the packet could be held steady and manipulated around a stationary blade to cut extremely intricate designs.