Drewer-Recent Approaches To Early Christian and Byzantine Iconography 1996

RECENT APPROACHES TO EARLY CHRISTIAN AND BYZANTINE ICONOGRAPHY
Author(s): Lois Drewer

Source: Studies in Iconography , 1996, Vol. 17 (1996), pp. 1-65
Published by: Board of Trustees of Western Michigan University through its Medieval
Institute Publications
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RECENT APPROACHES TO EARLY CHRISTIAN AND
BYZANTINE ICONOGRAPHY
Lois Drewer
Has the "New Art History" reached Early Christian and Byzantine studies?
When that question was raised by Robin Cormack it received only a qualifi
affirmative.1 However, the editorial in the March 1994 issue of Art Histo
entitled "The Image in the Ancient and Early Christian Worlds" refers approv
ingly to "the energetic shifts of attention towards different forms of cultura
awareness and the object-viewer relationship" characteristic of what is describe
as the "post-Weitzmann era."2 In this essay I consider recent work in icono
raphie studies in the light of current critical trends. By approaching the questio
broadly, it is possible to perceive a positive attitude toward the "new meth
ologies" and in any case to highlight an encouraging amount of exciting and in
novative research in Early Christian and Byzantine iconography.
At the outset it seems appropriate to emphasize that, as in other areas of
medieval studies, the best of past art historical writing encompassed a wid
variety of methodological approaches, including some which have a remarkable
consonance with widely hailed "new" critical trends. For example, Andre
Grabar's4 precise and thoughtful exposition of visual "signs" in Early Christian
art employs many aspects of semiotic analysis, although using different analytic
vocabulary. Similarly, Otto Demus5 emphasizes the awareness of the viewer
experience in the design of mosaics like the Annunciation at Daphni in which th
Archangel and Mary gesture across the real space of the crossing, creating wha
Demus called an "icon in space" which enfolds the worshipper. This sophist
cated interpretation of the relationship between the figurai program and the arc
tecture places the viewer at the center of the analysis. Current object-response
theory, like the other "new methodologies," helps to make explicit the assump
tions behind such observations and puts at the forefront the goal of understandi
the impact of the "work of art" on contemporaries. In addition, the scope
inquiry has been broadened by focusing on categories of objects previousl
marginalized, such as pilgrimage objects or household goods, and has bee
Studies in Iconography 17 — 1996

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enriched by new questions inspired by the investigation of such topics as gender,
literacy, ritual, and social and class relations in relation to the production and
reception of Early Christian and Byzantine art.6
Late Antique and Early Christian Art
The most surprising development in the Early Christian field—and a very

welcome one—is the appearance of three new book-length studies that seek to
redefine some of the fundamental questions concerning the relationship of Early
Christian art to contemporary Greco-Roman art. In The Clash of Gods: A Rein
terpretation of Early Christian Art, Thomas Mathews7 challenges the idea that
many aspects of the newly created image of Christ were based on the ico
nography and ritual associated with the Roman emperor, an approach Mathews
characterizes as the "Emperor Mystique." Instead he suggests that the sources are
to be found in the imagery of the ancient gods, philosophers, and magicians. He
emphasizes the far-reaching changes involved in the creation of a specifically
Christian iconography and objects to the view of Early Christian culture as a
sub-set of the "Late Antique World." In Art and the Roman Viewer, Jas Eisner8
also stresses the extent of transformation not only in content but also in ways of
viewing the same image from Roman to Early Christian art. In contrast, in The
Invisible God: The Earliest Christians on Art, Corby Finney9 argues for a funda
mental continuity between pagan and Christian culture in its formative stages.
Finney begins with Early Christian attitudes toward art, specifically their attack
on Greek art. He argues that, far from expressing aniconic views, these polemical
writers rejected the pagan gods rather than images per se. Therefore, the presence
of images in the earliest Christian catacombs, such as the Catacomb of Callistus,
is not an anomaly to be explained by class differences or a "popular-elite" di
chotomy, but rather it is in accord with fundamental Christian beliefs as ex
pressed in second-century writings on images.
The discussion of the continuities of Classical and Early Christian visual
culture has focused on catacomb painting and tomb sculpture.10 Josef Engemann
explores some of the mechanisms by which Late Antique art was "Christian
ized,"11 including the insertion of specifically Christian motifs into existing
pagan or imperial programs. Workshops which had pagan, Christian, and Jewish
clients frequently employ a common visual repertory, adapting only a few motifs
to the requirements of each religious group.12 The presence of a Hercules cycle
within the Christian catacomb of Via Latina continues to be a focus for the dis
cussion of these issues. Is this a Christian allegory of Hercules, or evidence for
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joint burial of pagan and Christian members of the same family within a small
private catacomb?13 Tomb monuments with niches decorated with either mytho
logical or Christian motifs in Late Antique Egypt provide another body of evi
dence for the coexistence of different religious groups, at least in the sphere of
private life.14
Orality and Imagery
Investigations of the attitude toward images and their function has proved
fruitful in both Early Christian and Byzantine studies. For the Early Christian
West several reassessments of Gregory the Great's famous letters on the function
of images as the "books of the illiterate" are especially useful. Informed by
recent work on literacy and orality in medieval society, Michael Camille and
Herbert Kessler15 ask what role images, and the inscriptions or captions often
found in Early Christian as well as later medieval paintings, can have in a
society in which most of the viewers could not read the words. Celia Chazelle16
examines Gregory's text in the context of contemporary references to images,
pointing out that Gregory refers specifically to narrative cycles, not to presenta
tional or iconic images. She stresses the pastoral context of Gregory's statements
on the function of pictorial "stories" of the deeds of holy persons. In addition to
Gregory's letters scholars often cite Paulinus of Nola's defense of images and
especially of tituli:
This was why we thought it useful to enliven all the houses of Felix
with paintings on sacred themes, in the hope that they would excite the
interest of the rustics by their attractive appearance, for the sketches are
painted in various colours. Over them are explanatory inscriptions, the
written word revealing the theme outlined by the painter's hand. So
when all the countryfolk point out and read over to each other the
subjects painted, they turn more slowly to thoughts of food, since the
feast of fasting is so pleasant to the eye. In this way, as the paintings
beguile their hunger, their astonishment may allow better behaviour to
develop in them. Those reading the holy accounts of chastity in action
are infiltrated by virtue and inspired by saintly example.17
We receive a vivid picture of readers explaining the scenes to eager crowds of

illiterate viewers, telling the stories and reading out the captions or names over
the figures. By extension we can imagine that preachers may have made use of
some of the pictures to aid the congregation in following the points of some of
their homilies.18 In the accounts discussed by Kessler and Chazelle, there is no

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doubt of the ultimate primacy of the word. Images serve to remind viewers of
ideas and histories they already know or can have explained to them.
Text and Image: Manuscript Illumination
The complexity of the relationship between text and image19 in Early

Christian narrative cycles is emphasized in numerous recent studies of illumi
nated manuscripts.20 Here, even though miniatures are juxtaposed with textual
passages, there is rarely a straightforward correspondence. In his essay in the
commentary volume to the facsimile of the Rossano Gospels William Loerke
emphasizes that the miniatures of the frontispiece cycle include details drawn
from all four gospels, and thus comprise "a pictorial preface to all four gospels,
rather than the occasional illustration of part of one gospel."21 In addition the
miniaturist deliberately departs from the text by, for example, substituting Christ
for the "bridegroom" and the garden of Paradise for the "wedding feast" in the
miniature of the Parable of the Wise and Foolish Virgins (4).22 The presence of
such extra-textual elements in manuscript illumination makes the persistence of
questions of "sources" inevitable.
Clearly these miniatures presuppose knowledge of texts or "stories of holy
persons" beyond what is written in the manuscript itself. How did the viewer
acquire this knowledge? For the changes in the Wise and Foolish Virgins
miniature Loerke is able to cite Psalm commentaries that could have been dis
seminated through homilies or readings and hymns within the liturgy.23 Thus the
viewer of the frontispiece cycle could have become acquainted with the infor
mation needed to interpret the miniature either through reading or hearing. In
fact, Loerke, pointing to the higher degree of wear evident on the pages of the
frontispiece cycle than on the text pages, suggests that small groups were shown
the miniatures, perhaps by a reader who guided them through the pictorial nar
rative, expounding on its meaning and relationship with the Old Testament pro
phecies depicted on the text scrolls in the lower half of the page.24
Even in the Cotton Genesis, which Weitzmann and Kessler characterize on
the basis of their painstaking reconstruction25 as exhibiting "exquisite literalism,"
extra-biblical elements appear. They point to the detailed and distinct representa
tion of "virtually every action reported in the Genesis text." At the same time
they maintain that "the illustrators went well beyond the text to present a pic
torial exegesis of Genesis."26 Some of these additions to, or variants from, an
iconography derived from the biblical text are attributed by Weitzmann and
Kessler to Jewish legends.27 This continues a rich vein of scholarship on the
4 Approaches to Byzantine Iconography

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influence of Midrash and Haggadah on Christian exegesis and illustration of
biblical subjects.28 Many such motifs have been identified and their source in
Jewish legend convincingly argued. An often-cited example is the appearance of
the snake on the back of a camel in the Temptation of Eve in the Istanbul
Octateuch (Istanbul, Seraglio, MS 8, fol. 43v). This motif follows the account
in the Pirkê Rabbi Eliezer. '"Now the serpent was more subtil than any beast of
the field' (Gen. 3:1). Its appearance was something like that of the camel, and
he [Satan] mounted and rode upon it."29
The question of how these motifs entered Christian iconographie cycles—
through the use of fully illuminated Jewish Bibles, now lost, as models, or
through textual transmission whether written or oral—remains unresolved.30
Recent studies on Christian-Jewish relationships in this period argue the possi
bility of contact and discussion between Christian and Jewish groups and the
essential unity of many aspects of their shared culture.31 However, Katrin
Kogman-Appel32 stresses the importance of distinguishing among Jewish texts
that were well known to Christian scholars, such as the writings of Josephus and
Philo and apocrypha, and rabbinic texts that remained relatively inaccessible to
them.
Were the narrative cycles in the Early Christian manuscripts that have come
down to us original creations or copies based on earlier visual models? If the
latter, what kinds of models are presupposed? The central role of these questions
in the study of Early Christian and Byzantine illuminated manuscripts is the
result of the ground-breaking study by Kurt Weitzmann in 1947,33 where he
proposes a new method of analyzing pictorial cycles by organizing them into
"recensions" on the analogy of text criticism. He observes that early manuscripts
contain very dense cycles of illustrations34 that are copied more or less
accurately, but usually in reduced numbers and simplified versions, over time.
Although Weitzmann's ultimate goal is the reconstruction of the original
"archetype" for a pictorial cycle, he also articulates a series of propositions to
explain both the similarities and variations between any two members of a
pictorial recension.35 In the case of the Cotton Genesis and its thirteen medieval
"copies" Weitzmann and Kessler demonstrate the remarkable persistence of a
complex iconographie rendering of the Genesis text over many centuries and
across different media, most notably a translation into monumental art in the
thirteenth-century narthex mosaics of San Marco in Venice.36 However, three
other Genesis recensions have been recognized,37 so clearly a variety of
"models" was available to the designer of any new Genesis scene or cycle.
Can the "philological" methodology pioneered by Weitzmann be applied

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with equal success to other Early Christian and Byzantine "recensions"? In recent
studies focus has largely shifted from the search for the "earliest archetype" of a
narrative cycle38 to the unique "local" qualities of each work of art. Where
"borrowings" are recognized, they are more often considered to be selective and
the reasons for such divergencies are subject to investigation.39 Possible sources
other than manuscript cycles have also been brought into the discussion. For
example, Loerke argues that the two Communion of the Apostles miniatures and
the Trial scenes in the Rossano Gospels were based on monumental art, on dome
and wall paintings in pilgrimage shrines in the Holy Land. This is one of the
primary arguments he presents for localizing the production of this manuscript in
Jerusalem.40
Furthermore, a more creative role is sometimes assigned to the artist or his
advisors—admitting the possibility of "originality"—in the interpretation of a
textual or visual "model" or in devising a new solution for a specific purpose. An
example can be seen in recent work on the late sixth- or seventh-century
Ashburnham Pentateuch (Paris, BN, nouv. acq. lat. 2334).41 Franz Rickert42 and
Dorothy Verkerk43 interpret extratextual visual elements, some of which were
previously traced to Jewish sources, within a purely Christian context. Verkerk
focuses on specifically Christian interpolations. These include the candle held in
two hands and issuing from a cloud in place of the "pillar of cloud" and "pillar
of fire" which guided the Israelites in the Crossing of the Red Sea (fol. 68r), and
the substitution of a Christian altar with Eucharistie vessels and loaves of bread
in place of the altar with basins for the blood of sacrificial bulls in the scene of
Moses Reading the Covenant (fol. 76r). Verkerk argues that the Ashburnham
Pentateuch miniatures demonstrate a reading of the text which explores its
typological meaning for a Christian community, and that some of the interpolated
motifs derive from direct observation of contemporary Christian liturgical
experience.
The clearest case for the "new" creation of a narrative cycle for a preserved
manuscript can be made, interestingly enough, for one of the earliest, the
Quedlinburg Itala, an early fifth-century Latin manuscript of Samuel and Kings
(Berlin, Staatsbibl., theol. lat. fol. 485). Detailed instructions written in a rapid
cursive script by a "programmer" for the artists specify the figures and attributes
to depict in each scene. The elaboration and length of these directions suggest the
invention of a new Kings cycle for this manuscript rather than the transfer of an
existing pictorial prototype.44 John Lowden45 has recently argued that this may
be the norm, rather than the exception, for the richly illustrated luxury
manuscripts of the fifth to sixth centuries.

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Text and Image: Ekphrasis
One aspect of the text-image question which has received renewed attention
is the interpretation of rhetorical texts about art, particularly the ekphrasis, a
"descriptive speech bringing the thing shown vividly before the eyes,"46 which
is used for subjects such as persons, places, times, and events. In an article that
remains fundamental, Henry Maguire47 explores the relationship between
Byzantine and Classical ekphraseis, and the role of convention and quotations
from earlier authors. He proposes several models for understanding possible rela
tionships between such epigrams and real or imaginary works of art. Recently,
Liz James and Ruth Webb have returned to these questions. They particularly
criticize the use of ekphraseis as sources of archaeological data on lost works of
art and architecture. James and Webb point out that ekphrasis is primarily a tech
nique for "presenting events taking place in time rather than static objects"49
such as works of art. This analysis helps to explain why so often the author of
the ekphrasis seems to elaborate so freely on events, emotions, and reactions sug
gested by visual images: the emphasis is on the narrative depicted rather than on
the depiction in a specific painting. Thus the ekphrasis "aims to recreate for the
listener the effect of the subject on the viewer."50
Among the most interesting Early Byzantine ekphraseis are those composed
for the occasion of the dedication of a church, which often provide invaluable
insight into contemporary views of its program and symbolic content. One of
these, an epigram praising the patron Anicia Juliana, her royal ancestors, and the
glory of the church she had built and dedicated to St. Polyeuctos, was actually
discovered in recent archaeological excavations carved in high relief around its
interior.51 Mary Whitby and Ruth Macrides and Paul Magdalino reexamine the
literary qualities and circumstances of composition of Paul the Silentiary's poems
on Justinian's Hagia Sophia in Constantinople.52 Kathleen McVey investigates
the theological and literary context of the sixth-century Syriac hymn on the
Cathedral at Edessa, attributing it to the intellectual circle of Jacob of Sarug.
Andrew Palmer and Lyn Rodley focus on the challenges of interpreting the
symbolic language of the same Syriac text in terms of architectural form.53
Pilgrimage and Art
From the previous discussion it will be clear that questions of "sources" in

one form or another continue to dominate the study of Early Christian art. New
ground has been broken, however, by expanding the subject matter to new
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categories of visual artifacts, particularly pilgrimage "souvenirs" and objects of
everyday life. Here fresh questions of function and even of archetype-copy have
yielded exciting new results. The most familiar of the objects associated with pil
grimage are the Monza and Bobbio loca sancta ampullas, small pewter flasks
produced in Palestine ca. 600.54 Weitzmann55 and others have recognized that
the scenes of Christ's life and passion depicted on these flasks include extra
biblical elements such as grills, lamps, and censers which reflect the appearance
of the pilgrimage shrines associated with each event. In addition, Weitzmann
regards some of the scenes on the ampullas as reduced versions of the major cult
images of the pilgrimage shrines, usually the apse mosaic or fresco.56
In Byzantine Pilgrimage Art, which accompanied an exhibition at Dum
barton Oaks in 1982, Gary Vikan57 shifted the focus of discussion of these
objects from their value as topographical references to Holy Land churches and
the decoration of these churches to their function as one category of eulogia or
"blessings" that the faithful acquired through the experience of pilgrimage. He
defined the loca sancta ampullas as one of many types of amulets intended
through the place and circumstances of their origin as well as their imagery to
make contact with the divine and invoke personal protection against hostile
forces. Filled with oil or dust from sacred sites in the Holy Land, the ampullas
were worn as protective amulets suspended from a chain around the neck, as can
be seen in a tenth-century fresco of a praying anchorite from the Cathedral at
Faras in Nubia cited by Vikan.58
In a series of studies that draw in part on anthropological approaches,59
Vikan and others interpret the imagery on Early Byzantine pilgrimage objects in
functional and experiential terms. In "Loca Sancta Souvenirs: Sealing the
Pilgrim's Experience" Cynthia Hahn60 argues that the "blessing" with its image
was regarded as the seal of the experience of pilgrimage and marked the pilgrim
as one of the Elect. In "Pilgrims in Magi's Clothing"61 Vikan emphasizes
pilgrimage as a ritualistic reenactment of biblical events. He notes that in the
Crucifixion scene on the Dumbarton Oaks ampulla and on related Bobbio
ampullas, the two kneeling figures venerating the cross (who are not part of the
historical event) are very similar in appearance to the Magi in Adoration scenes.
These figures represent the role of the pilgrims: "the pilgrim is here being at
least partially subsumed within the identity of his biblical antetype."62 Vikan
argues that the striking popularity of the Adoration of the Magi on all categories
of pilgrimage objects—ampullas, tokens and jewelry—is due to the desire of the
pilgrim to evoke through sympathetic magic the same level of protection enjoyed
by the Magi, Christianity's "archetypal protected travellers."63 Vikan suggests in

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"Guided by Land and Sea"64 that other imagery on pilgrimage objects, such as
Christ Walking on Water, the Tempest Calmed, and ships, are not necessarily
associated with a specific holy site, but rather address the anxieties of sea
travellers.
In "Art, Medicine and Magic in Early Byzantium"65 Vikan demonstrates

that several categories of Early Byzantine amulets are not simply apotropaic, but
specifically medicinal. The healing practices at the shrine of St. Symeon the
Younger (d. 592), who lived on a column on the "Miraculous Mountain"
southwest of Antioch in imitation of his famous fifth-century predecessor at
Qal'at Siman, are recorded in detail in a lengthy contemporary vita.66 In addi
tion, several dozen clay Symeon tokens are preserved. These show Symeon on
his column, a monk with a censer climbing a ladder toward him, another monk
kneeling at the foot of the column, and two flying angels bringing crowns. These
tokens constitute one form of Symeon's "blessing," the dust made from the earth
of the "Miraculous Mountain" and stamped with his image, which were crumbled
and applied externally as medicine to heal the afflicted. The role of the image
in a healing process that also involved fervent prayer and the burning of incense
was to evoke the presence of St. Symeon to effect the cure. Here the relationship
between the mass-produced image of the saint on the clay token and the
"antetype" is analogous to that of an icon,67 with the important difference that
the material object imprinted with the image is employed as the instrument of
the cure.
Everyday Life
Interest in ordinary, often mass-produced, objects extends to include all

types of personal and household possessions. Two exhibitions held in 1989
placed emphasis on a wide range of Early Christian objects, including many
whose interest is in their function and iconography, rather than their purely aes
thetic qualities. Beyond the Pharaohs: Egypt and the Copts in the 2nd to 7th
Centuries A.D.68 includes tools, household vessels, jewelry, and garments as well
as church decoration and liturgical objects. Art and Holy Powers in the Early
Christian House69 focuses entirely on domestic and personal items. In the cata
logue introduction Eunice Dauterman Maguire, Henry Maguire, and Maggie
Duncan-Flowers point out the strong apotropaic and magical function of much
of the decoration of such objects. Motifs such as knots and interlace, the "much
suffering eye," concentric circles, rayed serpents, keys, and octagons are among
the devices that provide protection from evil. Other themes are intended to attract

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good fortune, including representations of the riches of the earth and sea; female
personifications of earth and abundance; the blessings of the Nile; Christian
inscriptions; the cross; symbolic creatures such as fish, sheep, and birds; saints;
holy riders; and biblical scenes. Also counted among the tokens of good fortune
are, perhaps surprisingly, pagan mythological subjects. The authors of the cata
logue suggest that their continuing popularity on household objects need not be
interpreted necessarily as evidence of lingering paganism. Rather, "pagan sub
jects continued to be acceptable in Christian households insofar as they served
as symbols of the physical rather than of the spiritual world."70 In this way
Neptune on a serving dish could signify an abundance of seafood, and Bacchus
of wine. Mythological themes thus could continue to evoke earthly prosperity
within a purely Christian household. The splendid publication of the Late An
tique and Byzantine collections of the Virginia Museum of Art by Christine
Kondoleon and Anna Gonosova71 provides in the introductory essays and cata
logue entries many additional opportunities for considering the rich cultural mix
in the imagery of objects of everyday use.
Among items of personal adornment, one special group, marriage rings and
other jewelry, has been extensively studied by Vikan.72 He suggests that although
Byzantine marriage rings developed directly from their Roman antecedents and
share many iconographie motifs such as paired portraits, bride and groom
clasping hands, and inscribed or pictured references to "concord," the Christian
rings have a distinctive iconography. Christ rather than the personification of
concord brings the couple together: "What is paramount now is no longer the
traditional contractual gesture of clasped hands, but rather Christian benediction,
since among the Byzantines a harmonious marriage was no longer viewed as an
achievement of husband and wife, but as a gift from God."73
Magic
As we have seen, the line between apotropaic and magical practices and
symbols in Early Christian society is hard to draw. By examining a group of
amulets excavated in a domestic quarter, James Russell74 demonstrates the
integration of signs against the evil eye and other magical motifs into the daily
life of the small town of Anemurium in Asia Minor. In "Magic and Geometry
in Early Christian Floor Mosaics and Textiles" Maguire75 analyzes some
repeating geometric patterns such as eight-rayed rings, swastikas, concentric
circles, and Solomonic knots which function as magical or propitious agents in
Early Christian floor mosaics—even in churches—and textiles. Maguire proposes

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that the repetition of these potent signs did not always imply a devaluation into
mere ornament, but was a means of multiplying their benefits.76 Christopher
Walter77 traces the continuation and adaptation in a Christian context of magical
holy riders, especially Solomon on horseback defeating a female demon, and its
influence on the iconography of Christian military saints. On the other hand,
Maguire78 argues that explicitly Christian images on secular clothing, including
scenes from the gospels or the story of Joseph, as well as holy warriors and
riders, also function in Late Antique society as "magical" motifs.
A group of amuletic arm bands combine loca sancta scenes similar to those
of the Monza and Bobbio ampullas with the holy rider and magical symbols such
as the pentalpha.79 These amuletic armbands and related objects are especially
interesting because of their free combination of Christian scenes and "magical"
symbols. It is clear that what are often regarded as two distinct belief systems
coexisted comfortably in everyday life in Early Byzantium.80
Women
In spite of the burgeoning scholarship on the role of women in Early

Christianity,81 surprisingly little has been done as yet to investigate images of
women in Early Christian art or the impact of women patrons on Early Christian
iconographie programs.82 A notable exception is the study by Kathryn A. Smith
on Susannah and the Elders,83 where third- to fourth-century representations of
the theme on Early Christian sarcophagi and catacomb painting are discussed in
terms of the contentious contemporary debates on asceticism and restrained sexu
ality within marriage as parallel routes to salvation.
Two portraits of empresses continue to attract attention, the Translation of
Relics ivory in the Cathedral Treasury at Trier and the mosaic of Theodora in
San Vitale, Ravenna. In the Trier ivory an empress holding a large cross stands
at the portal of a church still under construction. She greets a procession in
which two bishops riding on an imposing cart bring a gabled reliquary casket
toward the church. This ivory is difficult to date, and the empress has been
variously identified. But whether this is Empress Pulcheria with the relics of St.
Stephen Protomartyr (421), as Kenneth Holum and Vikan argue, or Eudoxia with
relics of St. Thomas (ca. 400), as Laurie J. Wilson has recently suggested, there
is no doubt that the Trier ivory vividly conveys the role of an Early Byzantine
empress in the religious life of the city.84
Interpretations of the Theodora mosaic in San Vitale are even more diverse,
and I can only briefly summarize them here. According to Mathews the mosaic

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depicts the liturgy of the First Entrance, in which Theodora presents the chalice
as an offering. Sabine MacCormack suggests that the shell niche that frames
Theodora indicates that this is a posthumous portrait (after 548). Irina
Andreescu-Treadgold presents technical evidence for two phases in the imperial
panels, arguing that the portrait of Theodora belongs to the earlier phase
(544_45). Charles Barber sees Theodora's costume, the niche, and her position
between "a male public office holder and a female without office" as references
to her "status as as a transgressor of the perceptions of gender in this society."
Eisner stresses the role of the imperial figures as mediators between humanity
and Christ and within the social order. Thus Theodora "stands between the public
world of men and the private world of women."85 Gillian Clark discusses the
effect on the viewer of Theodora's jewelry and clothing. Renée Standley stresses
the significance of these panels as donor portraits, reminding us that San Vitale
was built on imperial property with funds provided by Julianus Argentarius, pos
sibly as an imperial agent. Derek Baker argues that the panels are not primarily
liturgical, but rather commemorate Justinian and Theodora as benefactors to the
church. Paula Leveto sees the panel as a commemorative donor portrait, but
identifies the figure not as Theodora, but as Amalasuntha, the Ostrogothic
queen.86
In "Women and the Faith in Icons in Early Christianity" Judith Herrin87
sees women's devotion to icons as a private and personal form of worship,
accessible to those who were excluded from participation in the public liturgy.
Women could venerate icons without restriction either at home or in processions,
churches, and pilgrimage shrines. Herrin provides evidence from saints' lives for
women protecting icons even at the height of the Iconoclast controversy, most
notably Empress Theodora, wife of the Iconoclast emperor Theophilus, who
continued to venerate icons within the imperial palace and led the campaign in
842 to restore the veneration of icons.88
Icons
One of the most exciting developments in recent Early Christian and

Byzantine studies is the phenomenal surge of interest in icons and their
veneration, as evident in major exhibitions and conferences.89 Particularly
important work is the identification and cataloguing of early icons, especially
those from the rich treasury at the Monastery of St. Catherine, Mount Sinai.90
Valuable new information about previously known icons has come from conser
vation and technical studies.91 For the most part attention has shifted away from

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questions of the dating and provenance of individual panel paintings, on which
progress by conventional art historical means seems to have stalled,92 to exam
ination from a variety of perspectives of their function in society.
In an influential paper, "A Dark Age Crisis," Peter Brown93 sees the ex
panding use of icons and the growing influence of holy men as part of the same
religious phenomenon. Both are manifestations of the belief in intercession and
"the consequent psychological need to focus one's attention and hopes on the
face of the intercessor,"94 whether holy icon or monk. Brown rejects the idea of
icons as an expression of the "popular belief' of the masses, stressing rather that
the cult of icons transcended all social boundaries, from the poorest to the elite.95
Icons of urban patron saints, such as St. Demetrius of Thessalonica, became the
focus of collective feeling in the provincial towns. According to Brown's
analysis they represent signs of a centrifugal tendency in the empire and a means
of strengthening local loyalties and attachments.
On the other hand, in "Elites and Icons" Averil Cameron96 associates the
increase in devotion to icons in the second half of the sixth century with
centralizing imperial initiatives, including the promotion of the Cult of the Virgin
as the protectress of the city of Constantinople, and the use of her icons as
palladia during military sieges. In addition Cameron traces to the late sixth
century the first stages in the development of the complex imperial ceremonial
recorded in the tenth-century Book of Ceremonies of the Emperor Constantine
Porphyrogenitus,97 in which the emperor takes a leading role in liturgical
ceremonies and religious processions honoring relics and icons throughout the
city. In Cameron's interpretation icons play an important social role as one of the
expressions of a renewed sense of "cultural integration" and urban identity. In
"The Language of Images"98 Cameron stresses the epistemological role of icons
in the late sixth to eighth centuries, tracing their function as "guarantors of truth"
in a society in which Christian knowledge prevailed even in "secular" spheres.
She argues that this powerful role ascribed to religious images helps to explain
some of the questions that subsequently arose about their legitimacy during the
Iconoclast controversy.
In another approach to the question of the "power of the image" in the
immediate pre-Iconoclast period Jeffrey Anderson99 analyzes the formal qualities
of the encaustic icon of Christ Pantocrator at Mount Sinai, for which he accepts
a mid-sixth-century date, within the conventions of naturalistic portraiture. He
argues that the portrait qualities of the painting, including asymmetrical features,
bright and lively eyes, and naturalistic setting, created a sense of immediacy—the
"illusion of sudden confrontation with an individual"—that later theologians and

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at least some of the pious found disturbing in representations of Christ and other
holy figures. In contrast, Anderson argues, in post-Iconoclastic icons formal
qualities such as abstraction, gold backgrounds, and various framing devices are
used to achieve a greater sense of aesthetic distance.
The idea that the physicality of sixth- to seventh-century icon portrayals is
connected with their authority is supported by the Hodegos of Anastasius
Sinaites, a seventh-century handbook for the Orthodox, analyzed by Anna
Kartsonis in Anastasis: The Making of an Image.100 Anastasius argues for the
superiority of "material productions" or "material proofs" over textual references,
even biblical quotations, in making a theological statement or combating heresy.
He demonstrates this kind of visual argumentation in a section where, countering
heretical statements about Christ's death on the cross, he points to an illustration
in his text: "As already mentioned we sketched on a tablet the holy cross [or
crucifixion] together with an inscription, and placing a finger upon it we cross
questioned them."101 Kartsonis reconstructs this illustration as the Crucifixion
with Christ dead on the cross, since Anastasius refers to the body of Christ
throughout his argument.102 The fact that Christ's body can be seen and touched
is a greater source of authority than the written words of the text or the
inscription.
Kartsonis relates Anastasius' Hodegos to a number of hymns, homelies, and
commentaries that concern the Death and Resurrection of Christ written in the
second half of the seventh century, culminating in the Council in Trullo (the
Quinisext Council) of 691-92. She argues that this is the context in which the
new iconography of the Anastasis, showing Christ raising Adam from Hades,
developed. This theme, which has no scriptural basis, largely replaced the Holy
Women at the Tomb as an image of the Resurrection of Christ, and later became
a regular component of the Middle Byzantine feast cycle.103
Kathleen Corrigan104 connects the theological concerns of the second half
of the seventh century with the iconography of the encaustic icon of St. John the
Baptist from Mount Sinai (now in the Museum of Western and Oriental Art,
Kiev). Here John the Baptist stands looking upward and pointing his right hand
toward a bust of Christ in a medallion. He holds a scroll inscribed "Behold the
lamb of God who takes away the sins of the world" (John 1:29). The Virgin
appears in another medallion above his left shoulder. As Corrigan argues, this
image of John the Baptist as witness corresponds to the point of view expressed
in Canon 82 of the Council of 691—92, where the symbolic Lamb of God is
rejected in favor of an image of Christ in human form. Writings of the sixth to
seventh centuries stressed that John the Baptist's testimony to both Christ's

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divinity and humanity was based on physical experience. Corrigan traces this
idea in the context of contemporary debates over the relationship between the
human and divine in Christ and explores sixth- to seventh-century depictions of
John the Baptist where he also appears as witness to the two natures of Christ.
Iconoclasm
Discussion of the question of the function of images in Byzantium cente

on the ongoing investigation of Iconoclasm: its origins, theological argument
and consequences.105 The official condemnation of images began probably
726 and extended to 843, with a significant intervening period of restoration
images from 787 to 814 under Empress Irene and her two successors. Jaro
Pelikan's Imago Dei: The Byzantine Apologia for /cons106 provides a thoro
analysis of the theological arguments on both sides of the issue.
Was there any religious art during Iconoclasm? Triumphal crosses we
placed in the apses of St. Irene, Constantinople, St. Sophia, Thessaloniki, and
Church of the Dormition, Nicaea.107 The extent to which the Church du
Iconoclasm destroyed figurative art in the churches is still being debat
Similarly the geographic range of the Iconoclasts' influence is uncertain.
Kartsonis108 points out some exceptions to the strict enforcement
restrictions on figurative religious art even in the capital. She argues that at l
during Second Iconoclasm (815-43) official policy was primarily aimed a
curtailing the public veneration of new religious images. Private use of ic
continued at least to some extent, even in the imperial palace where Emp
Theodora venerated her icons in secret. Kartsonis proposes that some objects
a group of historiated phylacteries whose dates range from the late eighth to
tenth or eleventh centuries were produced for personal devotion during I
oclasm. These small gold or silver reliquary crosses and their bronze relati
decorated with the Crucifixion and the Virgin surrounded by medallions
saints, and sometimes with an additional cycle of scenes from the life of Chr
are intended to be suspended on a chain around the neck. They were apparent
not worn openly as decorative jewelry, but hidden from public view under t
owner's outer garments.109 A spectacular example is the ninth-century Plisk
Cross in Sofia (only 4.2 x 3.2 cm), which consists of an outer gold c
decorated with a Christological cycle, a second gold cross with Crucifixion an
the standing Virgin, and an inner undecorated wooden cross with embed
fragments of relics.110

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Restoration of Images
The restoration of icons in 843 was apparently not followed by an

immediate rush to provide figurai decoration in churches.111 In the capital
Patriarch Photius delivered a homily in 867 to dedicate the monumental apse
decoration of the Virgin and Child flanked by Archangels.112 The accompanying
inscription refers explicitly to Iconoclasm: "The images which the impostors [i.e.
the Iconoclasts] had formerly cast down here, pious emperors have again set
up."113 In this solemn image the enthroned Virgin places her right hand on the
shoulder of the Christ Child seated frontally on her lap. Both gaze outward
toward the viewer. In his homily Photius argues that pictures are superior to
words.114 But in his "description" Photius refers to the inward gaze of the Virgin
toward her child, even while she is outwardly detached:
A virgin mother, with a virgin's and a mother's gaze, dividing in

indivisible form her temperament between both capacities, yet belittling
neither by its incompleteness. With such exactitude has the art of
painting, which is a reflection of inspiration from above, set up a
lifelike imitation. For, as it were, she fondly turns her eyes on her
begotten Child in the affection of her heart, yet assumes the expression
of a detached and imperturbable mood at the passionless and wondrous
nature of her offspring, and composes her gaze accordingly.115
In "Ekphrasis and Art in Byzantium" James and Webb point out that the function
of ekphrasis is "to go beyond the particular image and express instead its
spiritual significance." Photius is not describing the physical appearance of the
mosaic, which presumably was fully visible to his audience as the homily was
being delivered. His purpose was to meditate on the Virgin's spiritual nature as
the guarantee of the Incarnation and salvation. Photius discusses the real
archetype, not a particular manifestation revealed in the mosaic.116
Recently several art historians have reexamined some of the texts and
works of art associated with the restoration of images in 787 and 843 to assess
the arguments presented to defend the legitimacy of religious imagery.117 For the
most part they question the usual view that the emphasis on the return to
traditional practices led to a conservative movement in Middle Byzantine art.
Barber118 examines the use of the relationship of word and image in the
arguments of Patriarch Nicephorus of Constantinople (d. 828) against Iconoclasm
and in defense of icons. According to Barber, Nicephorus's treatment of word
and image as equally authoritative is a necessary prerequisite for his under

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Standing of the relationship between an icon and its archetype. Like Anastasius
Sinaites in the late seventh century Nicephorus argues for the superiority of the
depiction of the Crucifixion over the cross as an affirmation of Christ's human
as well as divine nature.
Eisner119 compares the treatment of the theme of the Transfiguration of

Christ before and after Iconoclasm. He points out that in the few surviving early
examples at Sinai, Sant'Apollinare in Classe, and Porec the Transfiguration is an
isolated image in the apse of the church, whereas after Iconoclasm it becomes
part of the cycle of feast scenes and so acquires a complex liturgical context.
Using the terms of the theory of ritual developed by the anthropologist Victor
Turner, Eisner suggests that the image of the Transfiguration has undergone a
shift in its "positional meaning," the relationship of the symbol to other symbols
in the total social or ritual system.120
In "Perception and Conception: Art, Theory, and Culture in Ninth-Century
Byzantium" Leslie Brubaker121 contrasts the impassive appearance of saints
undergoing martyrdom in the illuminations of the Homilies of Gregory of
Nazianzus in Paris (BN gr. 510, fols. 32v and 340r) with the emotional
description of tortures in the Life of Tarasius written by Ignatius the Deacon
between 843 and 847.122 Brubaker argues that Ignatius's shift from the point of
view of the protagonists to the imagined emotional effect on the viewer marked
a dramatic change in the Byzantine perception of images: "Ignatios' new rhetoric
reflects a new way of seeing and of thinking about seeing, rather than a dramatic
shift in the images themselves."123
Brubaker develops her arguments about the Byzantine perception of art in
an important article, "Byzantine Art in the Ninth Century: Theory, Practice and
Culture."124 She examines post-Iconoclastic texts related to the definition and
justification of images, the role of tradition, the function of images, and the
relationship between images, texts, and speech in an effort to understand some
puzzling features of extant ninth-century manuscript illuminations. In the
Homilies of Gregory of Nazianzus in Milan (Bibl. Ambrosiana, MS E. 49/50
inf.), for example, she notes the apparent contradiction in the presentation of
very simple compositions of figures in minimal settings, but using very rich
materials—nearly all the drapery of the figures is gilded. She observes that "the
Milan pictures conform with general iconophilic prescriptions that art be
functionally instructive and 'made from the purest and most splendid
material.'"125 On the question of tradition vs. invention Brubaker notes that
nearly all of the miniatures in the ninth-century manuscripts she discusses rely
on traditional iconographie formulas. There are, however, a few iconographie

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features that appear to be ad hoc inventions. She calls these "single instance
adjustments"—details or scenes inserted to make a specific and topical point. An
example is the unique image of the Archangel Michael handing Adam a hoe in
the Original Sin narrative included in the Paris Gregory manuscript (BN gr. 510,
fol. 52v), which she argues was invented to illustrate the preoccupation of Photius
and his circle with the "toilsome life" accorded humanity after the Fall.'26
In Visual Polemics in the Ninth-Century Byzantine Psalters Corrigan127
demonstrates that the marginal illustrations function as a visual commentary
defining the Byzantine Orthodox position not only on the veneration of images
but also on other important issues of dogma. She argues that the opponents
addressed are not only Iconoclasts but also Jews and, by extension, Muslims.
Manuscript Illumination: Model and Copy
Questions of model and copy continue to dominate the study of narrative

cycles in Byzantine illuminated manuscripts, although with increasing qualifi
cations and a new appreciation for variety and innovation on the part of Byzantine
artists and patrons. As in the case of Early Christian manuscripts Weitzmann's
fundamental and pioneering methodology establishes the terms of the discussion.
In his paper, "Ruminations on Edible Icons: Originals and Copies in the Art of
Byzantium," Vikan provides an extremely helpful description and assessment of
the "philological method of picture criticism" carried out by Weitzmann and his
students as it applies to Byzantine manuscripts.128 He uses as his primary example
the comparison of a miniature of the Punishment of Dathan and Abeiram, two
Israelites who rebelled against Moses (Num. 16), from a twelfth-century
Octateuch manuscript (Vatican City, Bibl. Apos. Vat., gr. 746, fol. 340v) and a
very close copy of the same subject in an Octateuch dating around 1300 (Mount
Athos, Vatopedi Monastery, MS 605, fol. 150r).129 He addresses the question of
the motivation for this practice: "Why, when it came to narrating the biblical
story in pictures, did the Byzantines so consistently choose imitation over
invention?"130 Vikan provides a cultural and theological explanation based on the
ideal of mimesis as it applied to all aspects of Orthodox religious life, starting
with imitation of Christ and the saints and including the replication of sacred
images: "It was the business of the Byzantine artist to copy—to imitate and
thereby perpetuate his model—as it was the business of the Byzantine Christian
to do likewise. For each, mimesis was an act of value in its own right, through
which they might gain access to the sanctity and power of the archetype."131
Others, although for the most part recognizing the fundamental utility of the
"philological approach," have sought to limit its application in specific cases.

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Questions have been raised about its applicability to the thirty-four surviving
illuminated manuscripts of Gregory of Nazianzus's Liturgical Homilies, which
demonstrate very great diversity in illustrating the same text.132 Anderson points
out that in the case of Byzantine psalters with marginal illustrations, "not one of
the three ninth-century examples, Chludov, Pantocrator cod. 61, or Paris, gr. 20,
is the copy of another."133 And Lawrence Nees makes a strong case for
reopening the question of possibilities for creativity and even originality on the
part of Byzantine as well as early medieval Western artists.134
Lowden's work on the Vatopedi Octateuch presents a different kind of
challenge. He questions one of the underlying assumptions of the Weitzman
methodology, according to which a "copy" can be distinguished from an
"original" because "errors" or reductions inevitably creep in during the process
of copying itself. On the basis of textual and codicological analysis Lowden
demonstrates that the Vatopedi Octateuch was copied directly from the earlier
Octateuch in the Vatican Library (gr. 746), without any of the "lost"
intermediaries that usually have to be postulated. This provides a significant
opportunity for analysis of the workshop practices that are assumed to govern the
transmission from model to copy at any point in a pictorial "recension." As we
have seen in the example cited above, many of the miniatures are very close
copies. In other cases, however, Lowden discovered that, far from a reduction
from the pictorial prototype, some miniatures of the copy show distinct signs of
a desire to improve on the original, sometimes based on a new reading of the
text.135 In other words, these miniatures clearly represent examples of the kind
of "creative copying" noted by Hanns Swarzenski in the Western art of the
eleventh century.136
Although the question of the "sources" of Byzantine imagery, especially
narrative cycles, continues to be debated, attention has shifted towards the cir
cumstances of production and the function of Byzantine illuminated manuscripts.
Anderson137 investigates two eleventh-century manuscripts produced in the same
scriptorium, the Studios monastery in Constantinople, and probably from the
same model, an illuminated manuscript similar to the ninth-century Chludov
Psalter. As we know from the colophon, the Theodore Psalter was made in 1066
by a Studite monk for his abbot Michael. In the marginal illuminations Theodore
freely omitted, modified, and added subjects in relation to his model. The
choices he made emphasize monastic virtues, particularly charity, chastity, and
temperance, and he introduces numerous saints as exemplars for the moral life
appropriate for his abbot. On the other hand, Anderson argues, the same model
was modified to serve very different ends in the making of the Barberini Psalter,

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commissioned ca. 1095 by Emperor Alexius Comnenus to counter charges of
iconoclasm, which resulted from his alienation of church property, including
liturgical objects with depictions of Christ, the Virgin, and saints. Here the
scenes attacking Iconoclasts reaffirm Alexius's orthodoxy on the question of the
veneration of images.
Annemarie Weyl Carr138 studies a group of tiny eleventh- to twelfth
century psalters and gospel books made for private devotional use, in most cases
for monks and priests. She explains the appearance of overtly Christian themes
such as the Virgin and Child or the Deesis in the psalters and the personal use
of gospel books in the context of early Comnenian religious expression which
emphasized private devotional activity.
In "The Discourse of Icons" Robert Nelson139 uses modern semiotic
analysis and viewer response theory to analyze the function of an icon-portrait
of Christ introduced before Psalm 77 in a Psalter-New Testament in Dumbarton
Oaks (MS 3; 1083—84). Rather than illustrating the text, the image of Christ
actively engages the Byzantine beholder in dialogue, and elicits, in addition to
looking and reading, the devotional responses of touching and kissing, as can be
seen from the physical condition of the miniature.
Cycles of scenes in illuminated manuscripts also inspire devotional use.
Weyl Carr140 argues that the thirty-two framed gospel scenes in an early thir
teenth-century manuscript in the Staatsbibliothek, Berlin (MS quarto 66) cannot
be understood in the usual analytic categories of narration or exegesis of the text.
Rather their emotionally charged imagery invites "affective contemplation." Like
icons they serve to focus and intensify spiritual meditation.
Rhetoric, Ekphraseis, and Epigrams
In Art and Eloquence in Byzantium14* Maguire opens a new way of

discussing the relationship between text and image by considering the influence
of rhetoric, particularly ekphrasis (description), antithesis, hyperbole, and threnos
(lament), on Byzantine literature and art. He argues that rhetorical techniques
were such an integral part of the theological and liturgical writings and thought
of the Church that they became a natural part of the visual vocabulary of the
Byzantine artist and patron.
Sermons and poems that describe or seem to describe real works of art
provide tantalizing clues to Byzantine perceptions and interpretations of art. In
some cases such texts provide our only information about important lost decor
ative cycles, such as the two important descriptions of the mosaics of the Church

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of the Holy Apostles in Constantinople by Constantine of Rhodes (10th c.) and
Nikolaos Mesarites (12th c.).142
Another interesting case study is provided by Magdalino's reconstruction
of the decorative program of a secular building, the Bath of Leo VI (886-912)
in Constantinople, on the basis of a poem by Leo Choirosphaktes.143 In addition
to two figures identified by Magdalino as the emperor holding a sword and the
empress scattering flower petals, the poem alludes to river gods, fishing and fish
banquet scenes, and various birds and animals, including a lion and a serpent
identified as a symbol of wisdom. Magdalino interprets these motifs as a
pictorial celebration of the Christian emperor's wisdom and cosmic kingship. But
what is the date of this decorative program? Cyril Mango argues that the subjects
represented would be normal in a Late Antique decorative program, and he
suggests that Leo VI merely restored a late-fifth-century bath.144 Is the poet
describing a tenth-century bath, and thus providing invaluable clues to the ico
nographie programs of Middle Byzantine secular buildings, about which we
know next to nothing? Or is he describing a Late Antique bath, of which at least
figurai mosaic pavements are preserved?
In "Epigrams, Art, and the 'Macedonian Renaissance'" Maguire also turns
to epigrams to throw light on secular imagery, in this case a tenth-century poem
by John Geometres on aquatic subjects, which Maguire associates with various
classical or classicizing works of art. He leaves open the question of whether the
poet is referring to a Late Antique work or to an object produced in the so-called
"Macedonian Renaissance." He suggests that in either case such epigrams can
help us understand the Middle Byzantine attitude toward the classical subjects
that continued to be popular in the decoration of secular luxury objects.145
At times the link between an epigram and a specific work of art is
unproblematic because it is inscribed on the work itself.146 Corrigan discusses
a small Crucifixion icon at Mount Sinai (2nd half, 9th c.)147 intended for
personal use, probably by a monk, in the light of the epigram painted around its
frame:
Who would not be confounded, be in fear and tremble

Seeing you, O Saviour, dead on the cross,
Who rent the garment of death
And is covered with the robe of incorruption.148
Corrigan focuses on the new elements in the rendering of the scene—Christ's

closed eyes, crown of thorns, the blood flowing from his side, and the loincloth
that he wears. As she notes, there was considerable vacillation at this time in the

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choice of an appropriate garment—the colobium or the loincloth—for the
crucified Christ.149 Examining a series of clothing metaphors associated with
baptism and the Good Friday liturgy, she suggests that the phrase "garment of
death" in the epigram may have been interpreted as the purple woolen colobium,
whereas the "robe of incorruption" may have been seen as the white linen
loincloth. Parallels between the symbolism of baptismal robes and monastic
garments suggest that these phrases would have special resonance on an object
of meditation for a monk.
Epigrams similarly frame manuscript illuminations in some tenth-century

manuscripts.150 A particularly interesting case is the Leo Bible (Vatican City,
Bibl. Apos. Vat., Reg. gr. 1), where each of the fifteen full-page miniatures is
accompanied by an epigram composed by the donor, the eunuch Leo, patrician,
court chamberlain, and treasurer, probably around 940.151 What is striking about
these miniatures is the close collaboration they exhibit between the donor and
author of the epigrams and the illuminators. Mathews, who drew attention to the
importance of these epigrams, points out that although the miniatures are placed
as frontispieces to each of the books of the Bible, they "often depend not directly
on the overt subject matter of each book but rather on the interpretation proposed
in the epigrams."152
Recently David Olster153 has reinterpreted the exegetical commentary
implicit in the epigrams of the Leo Bible in the context of a new theology of
language developed by the iconodules during the Iconoclastic controversy, which
gives Moses's role a new primacy. While the patristic writers argued for the
authenticity of Moses's writings on the ground that he had been taught script by
God, they denied that Moses, the personification of the Old Dispensation, could
have experienced a complete mystical link with God. This view is expressed in
the mosaic of Moses Receiving the Tablets of the Law on the east wall of St.
Catherine's, Mount Sinai, where Moses averts his head. Only in the Transfig
uration in the apse below do Moses and Elijah gaze directly at Christ,
recognizing his divinity.154
The iconodule theologians, on the other hand, privileged both language and
icon as media through which to approach the divine. They therefore argued that
Moses's revelation at Sinai, where God first commanded him to make icons
(those of the cherubim) and gave him the invention of script and literacy, was
a true perception of Christ. There Moses "learned how to make not only images
of the cherubim with paints, but icons of the Word in words."155 In the frame
around the frontispiece to Exodus in the Leo Bible (fol. 115v), Leo's epigram
emphasizes Moses' experience öf the theophany of Christ through the script:

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"The painter has shown us the famous, inspired Moses taking possession of the
tablets and being amazed at the Laws divinely composed in script, written with
[or by] the unutterable Word."156 Accordingly, the miniature shows Moses
ascending Sinai and receiving the Law from God's hand, at which he directly
and intently gazes.157
In a rich article on the Monastery of the Theotokostes Peges (the Virgin
of the Source) in Constantinople, Alice-Mary Talbot158 provides interesting
examples of the different ways texts reveal Byzantine attitudes toward religious
art and its function. The treatise on the healing miracles at the shrine by
Nicephorus Callistus Xanthopulus contains a description of the mosaic image of
the Virgin above the holy spring: "In the middle of the dome, where there is the
ceiling of the church, the artist perfectly depicted with his own hands the life
bearing Source who bubbles forth from her bosom the most beautiful and eternal
infant in the likeness of transparent and drinkable water which is alive and
leaping."159 This mosaic, perhaps created during the reign of Emperor
Andronicus II (1282—1328), was probably the source for a new iconographie type
of the Virgin, given the epithet Zoodochos Pege ("life-receiving source"). It
portrayed the orant Virgin with a frontal Christ Child on her breast above a
spring of water or sitting in a basin from which water flowed.160 One of the
epigrams by the poet Manuel Philes cited by Talbot was definitely written to be
inscribed on an icon or fresco of this type,161 and others probably had this
function also.
Liturgy and Art: Icons and Textiles
The studies of Hans Belting have drawn attention to the close relationship
of icons with the liturgy and liturgical processions.162 He proposes that the
iconographie type of the Man of Sorrows was invented in response to new
services for Good Friday which expanded the range of meditation on the death
and burial of Christ, including hymns invoking the lamentations of Mary. The
majestic double-sided procession icon in Kastoria (12th c.), for example,
combines the funeral portrait of Christ with an image of the sorrowful Virgin
holding the Christ Child.163
Nancy Sevcenko164 distinguishes between the display of icons, for example
in victory processions or for private devotion, and their use in liturgical rites.
Frescoes representing the final strophes of the Akathistos Hymn show an icon of
the Virgin carried in procession, surrounded by clergy and chanters.165 Weekly
processions involving icons of the Virgin can be documented in Constantinople

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since the sixth century.166 In the twelfth and later centuries there is evidence for
the famous icon of the Virgin Hodegetria regularly carried in procession through
the city under the care of "servants of the Holy Icon," members of a special
confraternity distinguished by their dress in red linen robes with hoods or special
hats.167
In "Icon Programs of the 12th and 13th Centuries at Sinai," Weitzmann168
discusses the function of special types of icons. He thinks the iconostasis beams
were made to order at the monastery to fit both the width of the chapels for
which they were intended and their dedications. Similarly, most chapels in the
monastery apparently were equipped with large vita icons, with a half- or full
length figure of the saint framed by narrative scenes, of which six are preserved
(St. Catherine, St. George, St. Nicholas, St. Panteleimon, Moses, and John the
Baptist).169 Another interesting group consists of the calendar icons that exist in
series covering the saints and liturgical feasts for each month of the year.
The iconography of the vita icon of St. Basil, now in the Menil collection,
is studied by Brubaker and Weyl Carr.170 Sevcenko proposes that such painted
vita icons may have been modelled after icons with elaborately worked metal
revetments that include busts and some narrative scenes.171
Valerie Nunn172 explores the role of textiles associated with icons, the
podea, which hung below the icon, and the encheirion, an embroidered icon
cover. A group of eleventh- to twelfth-century epigrams records the donation of
such hangings as ex-votos or thank offerings for healing accomplished through
the miraculous powers of the icon. Slobodan Curcic173 investigates the
iconography and use of another important embroidered liturgical textile, the
epitaphios, which shows the dead Christ, usually surrounded by mourning angels.
These were carried in procession on Good Friday and Holy Saturday. Curcic
proposes that during the rest of the year they were displayed on the tombs of
individuals named in their commemorative inscriptions, creating a symbolic
evocation of the Holy Sepulchre within the church.
Liturgy and Art: The Middle Byzantine Church Program
According to Demus's still fundamental analysis, the decorative program

of a Middle Byzantine church consists of three main parts: single images of
saints in the lowest zone, narrative scenes from the life of Christ corresponding
to the major feasts of the liturgical calendar in the middle zone, and what he
called "dogmatic" images such as Christ Pantocrator and related images in the
dome and the Virgin in the apse.174 Recently some refinements of Demus's

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system have been proposed, particularly concerning the feast cycle. Ernst
Kitzinger, in "Reflections on the Feast Cycle in Byzantine Art," found only one
Middle Byzantine church decorated with the "standard" set of twelve feast
scenes. This is the church of the Panagia Amasgou at Monagri in Cyprus (1st
half, 13th c.).175 The other churches exhibit selections, substitutions, or additions
of some scenes. The arrangement within the churches follows, with some
exceptions, the "biographical" sequence of the life of Christ, not the order of the
feast in the liturgical calendar. As Kitzinger shows, the pictorial feast cycle of
a Middle Byzantine church can be related not only to the annual commemora
tions of the major feasts of the liturgical year but also to the daily celebration of
the mass, which is also seen as a sacramental reenactment of Christ's life. This
was demonstrated by Grabar in his study of the eleventh-century liturgical scroll
(Jerusalem, Greek Patriarchate, Stavrou 109), where the silent prayers of the
priest are accompanied by scenes depicting events from Christ's life, most of
which correspond with the feast cycle.176
Kitzinger argues that the essential feature of a pictorial feast cycle in a
Middle Byzantine church is that it constitute a "summa" of Christ's life. There
is a strong concentration on depictions of events from the beginning and from
the end of his earthly existence, and the scenes are arranged to form a closed
chain within the church. Within this framework variations in the number and
choice of individual scenes can occur.177
Mathews's "The Sequel to Nicaea II in Byzantine Church Decoration" also
emphasizes that the narrative cycle of scenes from the life of Christ is not
presented in the order of the liturgical year, and therefore he objects to calling
it a "feast" or "festival" cycle.178 He argues that the cycle's purpose was to
instruct beholders in the events of the life of Christ and in particular to elicit
from them "a powerful emotional involvement in the events of the Gospel."179
By their placement in the church they also reinforce the liturgical action.
Mathews develops this concept in particular with regard to the image of Christ
Pantocrator in the dome.180 He understands the meaning of the Pantocrator as
dependent upon its relationship to the action in the space below the dome, where
the congregation gathers for the liturgy. The reading of the gospel, the
culmination of the first half of the liturgy, and the adminstration of Communion
to the faithful are both performed underneath the dome on the step before the
sanctuary. The reading of the gospel is mirrored by the gospel book held by the
Pantocrator; the eucharist transforms the worshipper into a state of identification
with Christ, whose image envelops the space overhead. Mathews stresses the
intense spiritual response ("transformation") experienced by the worshipper

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through the liturgy in its spatial and pictorial setting: "The dome defined a
magical space in which one encountered the divine. Here the worshipper found
himself at the very center of creation, encompassed with the saints, ringed
around with the example of Christ's life, and on direct axis with his Lord
overhead."181
In response to Mathews, Barber's "From Transformation to Desire"182 chal
lenges the liturgical framing of the imagery in a Middle Byzantine church. His
concern is with the relationship between the image and its archetype, especially
as defined by post-Iconoclastic writers. He interprets Mathews's argument as
implying that the image of the Pantocrator is transformed (rather than that the
worshipper is transformed): "Mathews speaks of the Savior embracing the wor
shipper and of the participant being incorporated within the communion of saints.
Hence we might speak of the image as a site of transformation equivalent to that
of the eucharistie gifts."183 Invoking the Lacanian concept of desire, Barber
argues for the separation of art and worship after Iconoclasm. Unlike the
Eucharist, the icon does not assume the presence of Christ and so cannot be a
site of transformation. Barber calls it rather a site of desire, which maintains "the
sense of difference between the one looking, the medium of portrayal, and the
one portrayed, and it defers forever the actual presence of the latter."184 In a
related paper, "From Image into Art,"185 Barber examines the concept of
"image" in the anti-Iconoclastic writings of Patriarch Nicephorus, arguing that
he, in effect, redefines "the image-as-icon as a work of art."186
Liturgy and Art: Sacred Space and Pictorial Programs
The analysis of the liturgical function of specific spaces within the Byz
antine church has proved a useful approach toward understanding important
features of the iconographie program. Mathews187 provides a succinct account
of changes in church planning from early to medieval Byzantine architecture,
which he describes in general as an evolution from open to closed forms,
combined with a "miniaturization" in the scale of buildings. He associates these
design changes with liturgical developments that resulted in the reorganization
of the sanctuary so that the laity were divided from the clergy by an opaque
chancel barrier, which ultimately became the iconostasis.188
A new program of fresco decoration for the lower zones of the apse that
are visible only to the clergy emerges in the late eleventh and early twelfth cen
turies.189 Bishops officiating before the Hetoimasia (prepared throne) or the Mel
ismos (Christ Child on the altar) hold scrolls inscribed with the first phrases of

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prayers from the liturgy performed by the clergy before the altar in the same
space.190 Walter's semiotic study of the iconography of bishops and church
rites191 analyzes the development of the eucharistie scenes with officiating
bishops as well as the Communion of the Apostles in the apse and the celestial
liturgy in the dome.
Other recent studies focus on the relationship between the monumental
decorative program and the liturgical function of subsidiary architectural spaces,
especially side chapels, the narthex, and tomb surroundings. The function of
many of the "subsidiary chambers" clustering around the east or west ends of the
church remains largely unknown.192 Even the changing role of the prothesis and
diaconicon and its effect on the iconographie program have been too little
studied.193
In her 1969 book Gordana Babic defines the function of many Early
Christian and Byzantine annexed chapels as the commemoration of saints,
deceased monks, and deceased founders.194 Recently, other scholars have also
drawn attention to the funerary aspects of some of the iconographie programs of
private chapels, churches, and monasteries established by wealthy families to
provide for burial and perpetual prayers for their souls.195 Sevcenko describes the
tomb furnishings, including a mosaic icon of the Virgin in a silver-gilt frame,
provided by Isaac Comnenus for his place of burial in the monastery he founded
at Pherrai in Thrace. In the typikon (foundation charter) for the monastery, Isaac
provides for at least fifty monks to chant prayers for the repose of his soul
before this icon.196 Natalia Teteriatnikov discusses a number of what she aptly
calls "private salvation programs" in Middle and Late Byzantine chapels. These
usually include Passion subjects, especially the Crucifixion and Anastasis in
close proximity to the donor's tomb, portrait, or epitaph.197 Robert Ousterhout
analyzes the temporal structuring of the fresco program of the funeral chapel of
Theodore Metochites in the church of St. Savior in Chora at Constantinople (ca.
1316-21), which links images of past resurrection, the Anastasis, and Christ's
miracles of the raising of the dead, with the reassurance of future salvation for
the deceased in the scenes of the Last Judgment.198
Babic identifies another kind of function for one of the lateral chambers in
the early thirteenth-century church of the Mother of God at Studenica. She
argues that the south vestibule, which is decorated with portraits of the major
Byzantine hymnographer-monks, including John of Damascus and Joseph the
Hymnographer, functioned as a chorostasion, the space where the monks of the
choir stand to chant during church services. This is parallel to the use of the
lateral apses as choirs in Athonite churches.199

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The multiple functions of the narthex—including baptism, burial, and
commemoration of the dead—and the office of the hours probably account for
the complexity of its decorative programs. Svetlana Tomekovic200 analyzes three
main groups of themes in the narthexes of eleventh- to thirteenth-century
monastic churches: the Last Judgment; scenes of the Passion and Resurrection
of Christ, particularly those commemorated during Holy Week; and scenes from
the life of the patron saint of the church. In a number of narthexes the site of the
baptism of the faithful is marked by a fresco of the Baptism of Christ, often in
a niche in the southeast wall.201 In the fourteenth-century Serbian churches of
Gracanica, Pec, and Decani, freestanding baptismal fonts occupy a position along
the southeast wall of the narthex. Curcic202 observes that they were placed in
front of frescoes depicting the genealogical tree of the Nemanjic dynasty. Zaga
Gavrilovic203 further explores the association of the ruler and baptism in her
studies of the imperial connotations of the theme of Divine Wisdom: the
emperor, whose deeds are directly inspired by Christ's wisdom, leads all
Christians to enlightenment.
A similar evocation of a ritual actually performed in the narthex space is
explored by William Tronzo204 in his paper on the Washing of the Feet in the
mosaic decoration of the narthexes of Hosios Loukas, Nea Moni on Chios, and
Daphni. He argues that the mosaic scenes mirror the activities of the monks in
their ritual reenactment of the biblical event during the Holy Thursday liturgy.
Tronzo demonstrates that the unique elaboration of the theme at Nea Moni with
three preparatory scenes (Christ laying aside his garments, taking up the towel,
and pouring water into a basin) corresponds exactly with the readings and actions
prescribed in the Euchologion for the abbot of the monastery as he performs this
rite.
Burials in the narthex and adjacent spaces are well attested,205 and the
funerary function of the space is often appropriately commemorated with
elaborate Last Judgment cycles or other eschatological themes. At Decani (ca.
1350) the northeast bay of the narthex functions as a funerary chapel, as Curcic
has demonstrated.206 On the east wall is depicted an unusual liturgical theme
with the dead Christ on the altar flanked by two officiating bishops, St. John
Chrysostom and St. Basil the Great, the authors of the Eastern Orthodox liturgy.
The founder's sarcophagus tomb and other burials are found along the north
wall, and scenes from the life of the founder's patron saint, St. George, line the
north and east walls.
The crypt of a Byzantine church is a space whose liturgical function has

been little studied. In Art and Miracles in Medieval Byzantium, Carolyn

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Connor207 investigates the pictorial program in relation to the function of the
crypt of the katholikon of Hosios Loukas, that of funerary chapel and center of
the healing cult of St. Luke of Steiris. Two large tombs of founders or abbots of
the monastery are framed by Passion scenes, and the intercessory theme is
indicated by the Deesis in the apse and two scenes of St. Luke interceding for
monks. The monumental tomb of St. Luke in the north arm of the crypt was the
site of healing miracles described in the vita of the saint, which took place by
incubation, sleeping in close proximity to the tomb, and by anointment with oil
from lamps hanging over the tomb or moisture exuded from it. Additional
crowds of pilgrims were accommodated at the ciborium shrine of St. Luke on the
main level of the katholikon, directly above the tomb.208
In his study of the Palaeologan refectory at Apollonia, John Yiannias209
considers the question of whether the Last Supper has the same meaning when
depicted in the apse of a refectory, where the liturgical Eucharist is not per
formed, as it has in the feast cycle of the main church. He interprets the
prevalence in refectories of subjects from the Lenten liturgy, especially Holy
Week, as a model for the monks' control of the passions and self-sacrifice. Other
themes such as the Hospitality of Abraham and the Wedding at Cana provide
scriptural precedents for the monks' daily meals.
Hagiography
The burgeoning interest in saints' lives has been fruitful in many aspects
of Byzantine studies. Sevcenko's invaluable book on the illustrated manuscripts
of saints' lives by Symeon Metaphrastes210 has made the major Byzantine saints
much more accessible to us. Alexander Kazhdan and Maguire211 suggest that the
incidental references to works of art in saints' lives offer a different view of art
than the ekphrasis. The authors of saints' lives are especially concerned with the
power of images and how they work in the lives of the men and women who
behold them. In "From the Evil Eye to the Eye of Justice" Maguire212 presents
case studies of the power of saints to combat envy and avert injustice. St.
Nicholas in particular is represented in narrative cycles intervening directly to
prevent the execution of innocent men.
The standing figures of saints in the lowest zone of the Middle and Late
Byzantine church program have generally been analyzed by category— bishops,
monks, warriors, martyrs, women—and by the date of their feasts in the church
calendar. In "Disembodiment and Corporality in Byzantine Images of the Saints"
Maguire213 argues that the various classes of saints are presented in different

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formal modes, so that the incorporality and immobility of monks are contrasted
with the solid three-dimensionality of military saints. Here figure style serves an
iconographie function.
Liz James214 eloquently makes the case for a more attentive look at the
selection of saints within groups, which varies greatly from church to church.
She explores as a case study some of the reasons for the choices of monastic
saints represented in the Enkleistra of St. Neophytus near Paphos, Cyprus. In my
own work on Byzantine saints in church decoration I observe that some of these
frontal standing figures, which seem to be so self-contained, are actually
members of family groups.215
As Thalia Gouma-Peterson216 has pointed out, narrative cycles of scenes
from the lives of saints are relatively rare in Byzantine monumental decoration.
They become more common in the fourteenth century, and recent publication of
fresco cycles from small churches in Crete add cycles of St. Anthony,
Constantine the Great, and St. Marina (Margaret) to Gouma-Peterson's list.217
The most popular hagiographical cycles, those of St. George and St. Nicholas,
have been studied by Temily Mark-Weiner and Sevcenko, respectively. Both
demonstrate that the pictorial cycles of these saints' lives often substantially
diverge from any of the known textual sources.218
Social Functions, Everyday Life, Pilgrimage, and Magic
Cormack's Writing in Gold219 presents case studies of how art functioned

in Byzantine society, drawing together saints' lives, homilies, monastic typika,
and other texts with preserved works of art. For example, he shows how
objects—liturgical vessels, reliquary crosses, icons—enhance the spiritual
prestige of the seventh-century holy man Theodore of Sykeon and further the
cult of the military saint Demetrius.
Objects of everyday life from the later Byzantine periods have as yet
attracted little attention. Nicolas Oikonomides, drawing on eleventh- to fifteenth
century inventories, gives us a glimpse of the contents of a Byzantine house,220
and the study of Byzantine ceramics brings to our attention a whole array of
secular household objects decorated with plants and animals, fabulous creatures,
and, rarely, human figures.221
Although the travel goal of many pilgrims shifted to Constantinople as a
result of centuries of imperial relic collecting for the capital, souvenir objects
testify to a continuity of pilgrimage activity at other sites as well. In the late
tenth century, the monastery of St. Symeon Stylites the Younger experienced a

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revival. But instead of the earthenware eulogia of the Early Christian period,
pilgrims now received lead medallions depicting the column saint flanked by
angels and by two intercessors, his disciple Conon and his mother Martha.222 At
Thessaloniki lead ampullas with representations of St. Demetrius and St.
Theodora, dated from the twelfth to the fifteenth centuries, served as containers
for myrrh, the sanctified oil that extruded from their relics.223
Maguire224 also sees continuity in apotropaic strategies in the arrangement
of re-used ancient reliefs on the exterior of the "Little Metropolis" in Athens
(late 12th to early 13th c.). Groups of wild animals are surrounded by crosses
and circles that harness their destructive powers. Similarly the demonic power
of pagan figures on the reliefs is neutralized by the prominent display of crosses
around them.
Patronage
Both Cormack and Anthony Cutler225 present sceptical views about the
effect of levels of patronage on Byzantine iconographie programs—or at least on
our ability to detect such differences. Cutler contrasts communal or cooperative
patronage of church decoration with that in private or family foundations. He is
also interested in the phenomenon of imitation in less expensive materials of
categories of objects originally executed in precious metals. Cormack questions
the utility of categories such as those distinguishing the metropolitan and
provincial or the aristocratic and monastic in explaining the choices made by
patrons of works of art. Both authors argue that material resources—cost, quality
of materials, and speed of execution—account for more than do class distinctions
for differences in works of art.226 In "Uses of Luxury" Cutler227 explores the role
of conspicuous consumption of luxury objects in Byzantine society and the
appearance of an iconography of display appropriate to the donor's status and
goals.
Maria Panayotidi228 presents a very interesting case study of the relative
role of patron and artist in two fresco cycles in Cyprus. Inscriptions give the
name of the painter of the hermitage of St. Neophytus, Theodore Apseudes, and
the dates of 1183 (Enkleistra) and 1196 (naos). The mural decoration in the
church of the Panagia tou Araka at Lagoudera names the donor, Leon Authentes,
and gives the date, 1192. While the name of the painter at Lagoudera is not
preserved, close stylistic and technical similarities support the idea that Theodore
Apseudes executed most of the frescoes. The iconographie program of the
hermitage shows evidence of strong personal intervention by St. Neophytus,

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especially in expressing his hope for personal salvation and establishment in
Paradise.229 At Lagoudera, in contrast, Leon Authentes, a local dignitary
presumably with a classical education, had his church decorated with a more
"standard" Middle Byzantine program. In an inscription he prays not only for
future salvation but also for earthly happiness for himself, his wife, and children.
In addition to differences in the donors' social status and intentions, Panayotidi
attributes some features of the iconographie program to the artist, Theodore
Apseudes, but notes that he expressed himself stylistically in the same way in
both works.
Women and Art
Two studies provide useful guides to the investigation of women and

Byzantine art. Weyl Carr surveys the evidence for women patrons and artist
(scribes and embroiderers), and Irmgard Hutter discusses the image of women in
Byzantine art.230
The investigation of portraits of Byzantine women as donors provides
insight not only into how real women chose to be depicted but also into th
circumstances of their patronage of art. Lucy-Anne Hunt's "A Woman's Prayer
to St. Sergios in Latin Syria"231 examines an icon at Mount Sinai in which a
Frankish woman wearing a long black veil kneels and clasps the foot of the
mounted soldier saint Sergius. Hunt attributes the icon to a Syrian Orthodox
workshop in Tripoli (mid to 3rd quarter, 13th c.). She explores instances o
women commissioning and venerating icons in Palestine and Syria in the twelfth
and thirteenth centuries and their influence on religious iconography in the region
Sevcenko includes two women donors in her study, "The Representation of
Donors and Holy Figures on Four Byzantine Icons."232 She identifies the kneelin
figure on the thirteenth-century carved and painted vita icon of St. George from
Kastoria (Athens, Byzantine Museum) as a widow wearing a black hood and
proposes that the donor may have commissioned the icon in memory of her dea
husband. Her own personal protectors are the female saints Marina and possibly
Irene painted on the back of the icon. A second female donor is Maria
Palaiologina, the despota of Epirus, who had herself represented wearing a
splendid red gown, crown, and loros, within the group of apostles in a fourteenth
century icon of the Incredulity of St. Thomas (Meteora, Monastery of the
Metamorphosis).
Women are shown playing an important role in the veneration of a famous
icon in a thirteenth-century fresco in the narthex of the katholikon of th
Monastery of Vlacherna near Arta,233 the burial church of the family of th

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despots of Epirus, and from ca. 1230 a women's monastery. The fresco depicts
the Tuesday procession of the Virgin Hodegetria icon in Constantinople. The
icon, carried by a bearer dressed in red, is surrounded by clergy and a crowd of
women, including three noble women carrying lamps or incense burners. The
procession is moving through the marketplace, where traders display their wares
in baskets and on benches. These include an old woman offering drinks in small
jars hanging from a chain around her neck. Myrtali Acheimastou-Potamianou
proposes that the patron of the frescoes was the basilissa Anna Palaiologina,
represented with her mother and sister at the head of the group of women, and
that the narthex paintings were executed shortly after 1284 to celebrate the
reaffirmation of the separation of the Eastern and Western churches by Emperor
Andronicus II.234
Politics and Art
Maguire235 argues for the close interrelationship of style and iconograph

in visual panegyrics of Byzantine emperors. He contrasts two conventions
court encomium: the first, a metaphor of the emperor as a garden of the grace
lends itself to expression through classicizing style and attributes, whereas th
second, praise of the supernatural qualities of the emperor, gives rise to highl
abstract images in which the divine sanction of angels or Christ is explicit.236
Catherine Jolivet-Lévy237 traces a range of iconographie types of "images
power" during the Macedonian dynasty (867—1056). Divine election is repr
sented through symbolic coronation by Christ, angels, or the Virgin and
analogies with historical and biblical leaders such as Constantine the Gre
David, Moses, and Joshua. Magdalino and Nelson238 collect textual evidence for
lost twelfth-century imperial portraiture and provide commentary both on th
interpretation of the texts and on their relationship to surviving works of ar
Among the interesting themes discussed, some otherwise unattested, is a L
Judgment, possibly including a portrait of the emperor Alexius I (1081-1118),
depicted in a judicial chamber or throne room.239
Ioli Kalavrezou240 discusses a representation of the imperial virtue
generosity in the mosaic portrait of Zoe and her consort(s) presenting gifts t
Christ, which is remarkable for the fact that the portrait of Romanus III was
replaced by that of Zoe's second husband, Constantine IX Monomachus, and th
heads of Zoe and Christ were also altered. Kalavrezou suggests that
reworking of the mosaic constituted a visual commentary by the donor of th
mosaic, probably Patriarch Michael Cerularius, which resulted in showin

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Constantine in a more subservient position than the original figure of
Romanus.241 A more overt criticism of an emperor, possibly also to be associated
with Patriarch Cerularius, is seen in the extended cycle of scenes of David's sin
and repentance in the mid-eleventh-century psalter, Vatican City, Bibl. Apos.
Vat., gr. 752.242
Recent "political" interpretations of aspects of Middle Byzantine church
decoration include two proposed commemorations of Emperor Nicephorus
Phocas's military victories through parallels with Joshua. Nicole Thierry243
suggests that the frescoes of the "Great Pigeon House" church at Çavuçin in
Cappadocia, where the rare scene of Joshua before the Archangel Michael
appears directly above the portraits of Nicephorus Phocas with Empress
Theophano and his generals, commemorate the emperor's victorious eastern
campaigns of 964—65. Connor argues that the same scene on the façade of the
church of the Panagia at Hosios Loukas is a prayer of thanks for the victory of
Nicephorus Phocas over the Arabs in Crete in 961.244
Maguire245 suggests that the imperial patronage by Constantine IX
Monomachus (after 1042) influenced the choice and arrangement of feast scenes
at Nea Moni on Chios. Here four scenes, the Nativity, Baptism, Crucifixion, and
Anastasis, which are featured in imperial panegyrics and court ceremonial as
parallels with the emperor's deeds and triumphs, receive unusual emphasis. Other
scenes that normally form important parts of the feast cycle, the Raising of
Lazarus and the Entry into Jerusalem, were relegated to the narthex. The Virgin
is represented not by the scene of her death, the Koimesis, but as an agent of
military victory in the dome of the narthex, where she is surrounded by military
saints and other martyrs.246
In "Some Palatine Aspects of the Cappella Palatina in Palermo," Curcic
builds on Kitzinger's association of adventus iconography with the Entry into
Jerusalem directly opposite the royal box on the north wall of the chapel, to
suggest further royal connotations.247 He argues that the Transfiguration directly
above the Entry provides a divine theophany as a pendant to the real "appear
ance" of the king in the royal box directly opposite. Curcic proposes that the
basilican western component of the Cappella Palatina functioned as a royal
audience hall, focusing on the "royal throne" on the west wall of the nave. The
surviving decorative framework of the throne, including guardian lions and a
platform approached by six steps, suggests symbolic associations with the throne
of Solomon.248
Mark Johnson249 argues that the mosaic program in the sanctuary of Cefalù
Cathedral was designed to provide a suitable setting for its intended purpose as

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a burial church for Roger II and his successors. He proposes that two "views"
were incorporated into the program for the occupants of the bishop's throne and
the king's throne on the south and north sides of the sanctuary. The bishop saw
Melchisedek and other episcopal role models on the north wall, whereas the king
looked across to David and Solomon and saints with royal connections.
Byzantium and its Neighbors
The cultural interaction of the Byzantine empire with its neighbors is an

area of research that seems poised for exciting new developments. The reception
of Byzantine stylistic and iconographie motifs in the West has been explained,
since Demus's Byzantine Art and the West, by the movement of objects (whether
through diplomatic gifts, trade, or plunder), artists, and model books. These old
assumptions are being re-examined and new questions asked.250 On the mil
lennium of the death of the Byzantine princess Theophano, the question of the
impact of her arrival at the Ottonian court has been reopened. Her retinue of
attendants must have included artisans, and she brought a full panoply of luxury
display objects fitting her status, including silks, gold and silver objects, and
manuscripts.251 Nelson demonstrates a sure example of a Byzantine artist
working in Italy, who painted a Last Judgment fresco in Genoa Cathedral (ca.
1310), and Paul Hetherington examines a well-documented case of the
importation of Byzantine enamel and silver reliquaries into Siena in 1359.252
However, in papers presented at the 1993 Dumbarton Oaks Symposium, Nelson
and Cutler demonstrated how little documentary evidence we have for the
presence of Byzantine illuminated manuscripts and ivories in the West before the
fifteenth century. Nonetheless, the striking iconographie parallels demonstrated
by Anne Derbes253 between Byzantine art and Italian panel paintings produced
between ca. 1235 and ca. 1300 show that, by whatever means, the Italian artists
were au courant with contemporary Byzantine iconography.
How can the receptivity of Western artists to Byzantine art be explained,
and what use did they make of their "models"? Belting254 stresses the authority
of Eastern models as authentic replicas of ancient prototypes. Derbes, among
others, argues that Italian painters were inspired by the dramatic and emotional
immediacy of Palaeologean painting, and freely adapted and modified what they
2*5 S
observed to serve their own purposes.
With the discovery of "Crusader" icons at Mount Sinai, and more intensive
study of the manuscript illumination, frescoes, and sculpture of the Latin
Kingdom of Jerusalem, which exhibit intriguing new permutations of Eastern and

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Western artistic traits, the scope of inquiry has opened to explore a wide range
of models of cultural exchange.256 Barbara Zeitler257 addresses the encounter
between East and West by examining case studies that document the perceptions
of Western art by Eastern Orthodox viewers and vice versa. Hunt258 examines
the "colonialist" assumptions underlying the historiography of "Crusader" art and
argues for a more complex model of artistic interchange than the current East
West polarization, taking into account the role of indigenous Christians as
cultural intermediaries.
In this survey of recent work on Early Christian and Byzantine ico

nography, we have seen an exciting range of new approaches and questions,
many profiting from the "New Art History" and interdisciplinary perspectives.
The central focus is on the function of the work of art and the context of its
creation and use in society. The expansion of subject matter from "art" to the
"image" and "everyday objects" suggests greater interest in imaginative
connections with the ordinary life of the past. We are working with more
complex models of cultural interaction and its impact on the visual arts. Much
remains to be done: for example, the study of art in relation to gender; work on
secular objects and their context, especially domestic; the role of texts within
works of art in relation to the literacy of the audience; iconographie programs
and the liturgical function of different spaces within a church. It will be
interesting to see what entirely new topics and perspectives emerge from this
vital sense of expanding possibilities in the field of Early Christian and
Byzantine iconography.
NOTES
1. Robin Cormack, "'New Art History' vs. 'Old History': Writing Art History," Byzant
Modern Greek Studies 10 (1986): 223—28.
2. Art History 17, no. 1 (March 1994): viii. For further comments on the Weitzmann leg
below.
3. See Pamela Sheingorn, "Medieval Drama Studies and the New Art History," Mediae
(1995): 143-52, for insight into the changes which have occurred within the discipline
history. For recent surveys of the state of research in medieval art, which include refere
Early Christian and Byzantine iconography, see Cormack, "'New Art History'"; Herbert L.
"On the State of Medieval Art," Art Bulletin 70 (1988): 166-87; Leslie Brubaker, "Pa
Universes: Byzantine Art History in 1990 and 1991," Byzantine and Modern Greek Stu
(1992): 203-33; Henry Maguire, "Byzantine Art History in the Second Half of the Tw
Century," in Byzantium: A World Civilization, ed. Angeliki E. Laiou and Henry Ma

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(Washington, D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks, 1992), 119—55; Brendan Cassidy, "Introduction: Iconography,
Texts, and Audiences," Iconography at the Crossroads, Papers from the Colloquium Sponsored by
the Index of Christian Art, Princeton University, 23-24 March 1990, ed. Brendan Cassidy, Index
of Christian Art Occasional Papers 2 (Princeton: Index of Christian Art, Princeton University, 1993),
3-15; and Leslie Brubaker, "Life Imitates Art: Writings on Byzantine Art History, 1991-1992,"
Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies 17 (1993): 173-223. See also related methodological surveys
of recent developments in Byzantine history and archaeology: John Haldon, "'Jargon' vs. 'the
Facts'? Byzantine History-Writing and Contemporary Debates," Byzantine and Modern Greek
Studies 9 (1984—85): 95-132; Jakov N. Ljubarskij, "New Trends in the Study of Byzantine
Historiography," Dumbarton Oaks Papers 47 (1993): 131-38; and Marcus L. Rautman,
"Archaeology and Byzantine Studies," Byzantinische Forschungen 15 (1990): 137—65.
4. André Grabar, Christian Iconography: A Study of its Origins, A. W. Mellon Lectures in the Fine
Arts, 1961; Bollingen Series 35.10 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1968), xliii—1. See also
André Grabar, "Peut-on parler de l'acte d'écrire lorsqu'il s'agit d'images?" Cahiers internationaux
de symbolisme 15-16 (1967-68): 15-27.
5. Otto Demus, Byzantine Mosaic Decoration: Aspects of Monumental Art in Byzantium (London:
Paul, Trench, Trubner, 1948), 13-14, 23—25; cited by Robert S. Nelson, "The Discourse of Icons,
Then and Now," Art History 49 (1989): 152.
6. In this essay it has not been possible to cite all the interesting new studies on Early Christian and
Byzantine iconography. In particular I have not been able to cover all of the iconographie studies
on individual monuments and regions or on specific iconographie themes. I would like to briefly
draw attention to a selection of these here.
Monuments and regions. Cappadocia: Catherine Jolivet-Lévy, Les églises byzantines de

Cappadoce: Le programme iconographique de l'abside et de ses abords (Paris: Éditions du Centre
national de la recherche scientifique, 1991); Lyn Rodley, Cave Monasteries of Byzantine
Cappadocia (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1985); Nicole Thierry, Haut moyen-âge en
Cappadoce, vol. 2 (Paris: Paul Geuthner, 1994); Castelseprio: Paula Leveto, "The Marian Theme
of the Frescoes in S. Maria at Castelseprio," Art Bulletin 72 (1990): 393-413; Elasson: Efthalia C.
Constantinides, The Wall Paintings of the Panagia Olympiotissa at Elasson in Northern Thessaly,
Publications of the Canadian Archaeological Institute at Athens 2 (Athens, 1992); Mani: Nikolaos
V. Drandakis, Fresques byzantines du Messa Magne (Magne occidental) (Athens, 1995) (Greek with
French summary, 485—502); Mount Sinai apse mosaic: Jas Eisner, "The Viewer and the Vision:
The Case of the Sinai Apse," Art History 17 (1994): 81-102; William C. Loerke, "Observations on
the Representation of Doxa in the Mosaics of S. Maria Maggiore, Rome, and St. Catherine's,
Sinai," Gesta 20 (1981): 15-22; William C. Loerke, '"Real Presence' in Early Christian Art," in
Monasticism and the Arts, ed. Timothy Gregory Verdon and John Dally (Syracuse, N.Y.: Syracuse
University Press, 1984), 42—48; Jerzy Miziolek, "'Transfiguratio Domini' in the Apse at Mt. Sinai
and the Symbolism of Light," Journal of the Warburg and Courtauld Institutes 53 (1990): 42-60;
Patmos: Doula Mouriki, "The Wail-Paintings of the Chapel of the Virgin at the Monastery of St.
John the Theologian on Patmos," Deltion tes Christianikes Archaiologikes Hetaireias, ser. 4, 14
(1987-88): 205-66 (Greek with English summary, 264-66); Ravenna, Baptistery of the Orthodox:
Annabel Jane Wharton, "Ritual and Reconstructed Meaning: The Neonian Baptistery in Ravenna,"
Art Bulletin 69 (1987): 358-75; Rome, Santa Maria Maggiore: Katrin Kogman-Appel, "Die
alttestamentlichen Szenen im Langhaus: Von Santa Maria Maggiore und ihr Verhältnis zu jüdischen
Vorlagen," Kairos 22-23 (1990-91): 27-52; Margaret R. Miles "Santa Maria Maggiore's Fifth
Century Mosaics: Triumphal Christianity and the Jews," Harvard Theological Review 86 (1993):
155-75; Ursula Schubert, "Die Kindheitsgeschichte Jesu als politische Theologie am Triumph

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bogenmosaik von Santa Maria Maggiore in Rom," Byzantine East. Latin West: Art Historical
Studies in Honor of Kurt Weitzmann, ed. Doula Mouriki et al. (Princeton: Princeton University,
Department of Art and Archaeology, 1995), 81-89; Joanne Deane Sieger, "Visual Metaphor as
Theology: Leo the Great's Sermons on the Incarnation and the Arch Mosaics at S. Maria
Maggiore," Gesta 26 (1987): 83-91; Sarcophagus of Junius Bassus: Elizabeth Struthers Malbon,
The Iconography of the Sarcophagus of Junius Bassus (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1990).
Themes. Apocalypse: Dale Kinney, "The Apocalypse in Early Christian Monumental
Decoration," The Apocalypse in the Middle Ages, ed. Richard K. Emmerson and Bernard McGinn
(Ithaca, N.Y.: Cornell University Press, 1992), 200-16; Costume: Melita Emmanuel, "Hairstyles
and Headdresses of Empresses, Princesses, and Ladies of the Aristocracy in Byzantium," Deltion
tes Christianikes Archaiologikes Hetaireias, ser. 4, 17 (1993—94), 113—20; Elisabeth Piltz, "Costume
in Life and Death in Byzantium," Bysans och Norden, Acta for Nordiska forskarkursen i bysantinsk
konstvetenskap 1986, ed. Elisabeth Piltz, Acta Universitatis Upsaliensis, Figura n.s. 23 (Uppsala:
Upsaliensis Academia; Stockholm: Almqvist & Wiksell, 1989), 153-65; Elisabeth Piltz, Le costume
officiel des dignitaires byzantins à l'époque Paléologue, Acta Universitatis Upsaliensis, Figura n.s.
26 (Uppsala: Upsaliensis Academia, 1994); Deesis: Anthony Cutler, "Under the Sign of the Deesis:
On the Question of Representativeness in Medieval Art and Literature," Dumbarton Oaks Papers
41 (1987): 145—54; Jews: Elisbeth Revel-Neher, The Image of the Jew in Byzantine Art (Oxford:
Pergamon Press, 1992); Mandylion: Tania Velmans, "Valeurs sémantiques du Mandylion selon son
emplacement ou son association avec d'autres images," in Studien zur byzantinischen
Kunstgeschichte: Festschrift fur Horst Hallensleben zum 65. Geburtstag, ed. Birgitt Borkopp,
Barbara Schellewald, Lioba Theis (Amsterdam: Adolf M. Hakkert, 1995), 173—84; Nature: Henry
Maguire, "Christians, Pagans, and the Representation of Nature," in Begegnung von Heidentum und
Christentum im spätantiken Ägypten (Riggisberg: Abegg-Stiftung, 1993), 131-60; Henry Maguire,
Earth and Ocean: The Terrestrial World in Early Byzantine Art, Monographs on the Fine Arts
sponsored by The College Art Association of America 43 (University Park: Pennsylvania State
University Press, 1987); Rainbow: Liz James, "Colour and the Byzantine Rainbow," Byzantine and
Modern Greek Studies 15 (1991): 66-94; Tree of Jesse: Vesna Milanovic, "The Tree of Jesse in
the Byzantine Mural Painting of the Thirteenth and Fourteenth Centuries," ZograflQ (1989): 48-60;
Veil: Hélène Papastavrou, "Le voile, symbole de l'Incarnation: Contribution à une étude
sémantique," Cahiers archéologiques 41 (1993): 141—68; Virgin and Child: Gordana Babic, "Les
images byzantines et leur degres de signification: L'example de l'Hodigitria," in Byzance et les
images, Cycle de conférences organisé au musée du Louvre par le Service culturel du 5 octobre au
7 décembre 1992, ed. André Guillou and Jannic Durand (Paris: La Documentation française, 1994),
189-222; Robert P. Bergman, "The Earliest Eleousa: A Coptic Ivory in the Walters Art Gallery,"
Journal of the Walters Art Gallery 48 (1990): 37—56; Annemarie Weyl Carr, "The Presentation of
an Icon at Mount Sinai," Deltion tes Christianikes Archaiologikes Hetaireias, ser. 4, 17 (1993—94):
239-48; Ioli Kalavrezou, "Images of the Mother: When the Virgin Mary Became Meter Theou,"
Dumbarton Oaks Papers 44 (1990): 165-72; Doula Mouriki, "Variants of the Hodegetria on Two
Thirteenth-Century Sinai Icons," Cahiers archéologiques 39 (1991): 153—82.
1 would like to take this opportunity to thank Annemarie Weyl Carr, Anthony Cutler,
Pamela Sheingorn, Ida Sinkevié, Maria Vassilaki, and Katrin Kogman-Appel for their stimulating
suggestions and discussions.
7. Thomas F. Mathews, The Clash of Gods: A Reinterpretation of Early Christian Art (Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 1993). See reviews by Dale Kinney, Studies in Iconography 16 (1994):
237—42; Peter Brown, Art Bulletin 77 (1995): 499-502; and W. Eugene Kleinbauer, Speculum 70
(1995): 937-41.
8. Jas Eisner, Art and the Roman Viewer (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995).

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9. Paul Corby Finney, The Invisible God: The Earliest Christians on Art (New York: Oxford
University Press, 1994). Other interesting recent books on the early phases of Christian art include
Sister Charles Murray, Rebirth and Afterlife: A Study of the Transmutation of Some Pagan Imagery
in Early Christian Funerary Art, BAR International Series 100 (Oxford: B.A.R., 1981); Graydon
F. Snyder, Ante Pacem: Archaeological Evidence of Church Life before Constantine (Macon, Ga.:
Mercer University Press, 1985); and Geir Hellemo, Adventus Domini: Eschatological Thought in
4th-Century Apses and Catecheses, trans. Elinor Ruth Waaler, Supplements to Vigiliae Christianae
5 (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1989).
10. For continuities in imperial iconography see Sabine G. MacCormack, Art and Ceremony in Late
Antiquity (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1981); Jean-Pierre Sodini, "Images sculptées
et propagande impériale du IVe au VIe siècle: Recherches récentes sur les colonnes honorifiques
et les reliefs politiques à Byzance," in Byzance et les images, ed. Guillou and Durand, 41—94; and
Marlia Mundeil Mango, "Imperial Art in the Seventh Century," in New Constantines: The Rhythm
of Imperial Renewal in Byzantium, 4th-13th Centuries, Papers from the Twenty-sixth Spring
Symposium of Byzantine Studies, St. Andrews, March 1992, ed. Paul Magdalino (Aldershot,
Hampshire: Variorum, 1994), 109-38.
11. Josef Engemann, "Christianization of Late Antique Art," Seventeenth International Byzantine
Congress: Major Papers, Dumbarton Oaks/Georgetown University, Washington, D. C., August 3—8,
1986 (New Rochelle, N.Y.: Aristide D. Caratzas, 1986), 83-115; Josef Engemann, "Altes und Neues
zu Beispielen heidnischer und christlicher Katakombenbilder im spätantike Rom," Jahrbuch fur
Antike und Christentum 26 (1983): 128-51. See also the essays in the exhibition catalogue,
Frankfurt am Main, Liebieghaus, Spätantike und frühes Christentum, Ausstellung im Liebieghaus,
Museum Alter Plastik, Frankfurt am Main, 16. Dezember 1983 bis 11. März 1984, ed. Herbert Beck
and Peter Bol (Frankfurt am Main: Das Liebieghaus, 1983).
12. In addition to Engemann, "Altes und Neues," and studies cited by him see Paul Corby Finney,
"Images on Finger Rings and Early Christian Art," Dumbarton Oaks Papers 41 ( 1987): 181—86; and
Ross S. Kraemer, "Jewish Tuna and Christian Fish: Identifying Religious Affiliation in Epigraphic
Sources," Harvard Theological Review 84 (1991): 141-62.
13. Josef Fink, Bildfrömmigkeit und Bekenntnis: Das Alte Testament, Herakles und die Herrlichkeit
Christi an der Via Latina in Rom (Cologne: Bühlau, 1978); Antonio Ferrua, The Unknown
Catacomb: A Unique Discovery of Early Christian Art (New Lanark: Geddes & Grosset, 1991),
130-41, 158-59, figs. 123-30; and Beverly Berg, "Alcestis and Hercules in the Catacomb of Via
Latina," Vigiliae Christianae 46 (1994): 219-34. See also William Tronzo, Via Latina Catacomb:
Imitation and Discontinuity in Fourth-Century Roman Painting (University Park.: Pennsylvania
State University Press, 1986) on these catacomb paintings.
14. Thelma K. Thomas, "Greeks or Copts? Documentary and Other Evidence for Artistic Patronage
during the Late Roman and Early Byzantine Periods at Herakleopolis Magna and Oxyrhynchos,
Egypt," in Life in a Multi-Cultural Society: Egypt from Cambyses to Constantine and Beyond, ed.
Janet H. Johnson, Studies in Ancient Oriental Civilization 51 (Chicago: Oriental Institute of the
University of Chicago, 1992), 317-20; and Hans-Georg Severin, "Zum Dekor der
Nischenbekrönungen aus spätantiken Grabbauten Ägyptens," in Begegnung von Heidentum und
Christentum im spätantiken Ägypten, 63-85.

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15. Michael Camille, "Seeing and Reading: Some Visual Implications of Medieval Literacy and
Illiteracy," Art History 8 (1985): 26-49; Herbert L. Kessler, "Pictorial Narrative and Church
Mission in Sixth-Century Gaul," in Pictorial Narrative in Antiquity and the Middle Ages, Studies
in the History of Art 16; Center for Advanced Study in the Visual Arts, Symposium Series 4
(Washington, D.C.: National Gallery of Art, 1985), 75—91, rpt. in Studies in Pictorial Narrative
(London: Pindar Press, 1994), 1—32; Herbert L. Kessler, "Pictures as Scripture in Fifth-Century
Churches," Studio Artium Orientalis et Occidentalis 2 (1985): 17—31, rpt. in Studies in Pictorial
Narrative, 357—92; and Herbert L. Kessler, "Diction in the 'Bibles of the Illiterate,'" in World Art:
Themes of Unity in Diversity, Acts of the XXVIth International Congress of the History of Art, ed.
Irving Lavin (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1989), 2:297—308, rpt. in Studies
in Pictorial Narrative, 33—48. See also Nicholas Gendle, "Art as Education in the Early Church,"
Oxford Art Journal 3, no. 1 (1980): 3—8; and Lawrence Duggan, "Was Art Really the 'Book of the
Illiterate'?" Word and Image 5 (1989): 227—51.
16. Celia M. Chazeile, "Pictures, Books, and the Illiterate: Pope Gregory I's Letters to Serenus of
Marseilles," Word and Image 6 (1990): 138—53.
17. Carmen 27, lines 580-95, in Rudolf Carel Goldschmidt, Paulinus' Churches at Nola: Texts,
Translations and Commentary (Amsterdam: Noord-Hollandsche uitgevers maatschappij, 1940),
64-65; trans. P. G. Walsh, The Poems of St. Paulinus of Nola, Ancient Christian Writers 40 (New
York: Newman Press, 1975), 291. On this text see Camille, "Seeing and Reading," 32—33; Kessler,
"Pictures as Scripture," 361-62; Kessler, "Diction in the 'Bibles of the Illiterate,"' 297—98; Duggan,
"Was Art Really the 'Book of the Illiterate'?" 229; and Chazeile, "Pictures, Books and the
Illiterate," 144.
18. Chazeile, "Pictures, Books and the Illiterate," 147-48; cf. Kessler, "Pictorial Narrative," 85-86;
and Camille, "Seeing and Reading," 33.
19. See Guglielmo Cavallo, "Testo e immagine: Una frontière ambigua," Tes to e immagine nell'alto
medioevo, 15-21 aprile 1993, Settimane di studio del Centro italiano di studi sull'alto medioevo 41
(Spoleto, 1994), 31-62, and the other essays in this conference volume.
20. The study of the iconography of the miniatures in Late Antique and Early Christian illuminated
manuscripts has become easier through the publication of nearly complete photographic coverage
by Reiner Sörries, Christlich-antike Buchmalerei im Überblick (Wiesbaden: Dr. Ludwig Reichert
Verlag, 1993), and recent facsimiles and studies of the individual manuscripts.
21. William C. Loerke, "The Rossano Gospels: The Miniatures," Codex Purpureus Rossanensis,
Museo dell'Arcivescovado, Rossano Calabro: Commentarium, ed. Guglielmo Cavallo, Jean
Gribomont, and William C. Loerke (Graz: Akademische Druck- und Verlagsanstalt, 1987), 110. See
also Petra Sevrugian's study of the Rossano and Sinope Gospels (Der Rossano-Codex und die
Sinope-Fragmente: Miniaturen und Theologie [Worms: Wernersche Verlagsgesellschaft, 1990]),
which explores in particular the theological context of the miniatures.
22. Loerke, Codex Purpureus Rossanensis, 129-31.
23. Ibid., 130.

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24. Ibid., 113. The date of the portrait of Mark in the Rossano Gospels (241), long regarded as the
only surviving full-page evangelist portrait earlier than the tenth century, has recently been
questioned by Otto Kresten and Giancarlo Prato, "Die Miniatur des Evangelisten Markus im Codex
Purpureus Rossanensis: Eine spätere Einfügung," Römische historische Mitteilungen 27 (1985):
381—99. They argue, mostly on codicological grounds, that this folio was produced ca.1000,
probably in southern Italy, and inserted into the manuscript. For responses see Sevrugian, Der
Rossano-Codex, 80-81; and William C. Loerke, "Incipits and Author Portraits in Greek Gospel
Books: Some Observations," in Byzantine East, Latin West, ed. Mouriki et al., 377—83.
25. Kurt Weitzmann and Herbert L. Kessler, The Cotton Genesis: British Library Codex Cotton
Otho B. VI, The Illustrations in the Manuscripts of the Septuagint 1 (Princeton: Princeton University
Press, 1986).
26. Weitzmann and Kessler, Cotton Genesis, 35-36.
27. Studies on the Vienna Genesis also continue to emphasize the influence of Jewish sources for
some of its iconography. Mira Friedman argues that these motifs derive from "pictorial Jewish
tradition." See "On the Sources of the Vienna Genesis," Cahiers archéologiques 37 (1989): 5-17;
and "More on the Vienna Genesis," Byzantion 59 (1989): 64—77.
28. For an important collection of such studies see No Graven Images: Studies in Art and the
Hebrew Bible, ed. Joseph Gutmann (New York: Ktav Publishing House, 1971). More recent
discussions include Joseph Gutmann, "Early Synagogue and Jewish Catacomb Art and its Relation
to Christian Art," Aufstieg und Niedergang der römischen Welt, II, 21.2 (Berlin: de Gruyter, 1984),
1313—42; Joseph Gutmann, "The Dura Europos Synagogue Paintings and their Influence on Later
Christian and Jewish Art," Artibus et Historiae 17 (1988): 25-29; Kurt Weitzmann and Herbert L.
Kessler, The Frescoes of the Dura Synagogue and Christian Art, Dumbarton Oaks Studies 18
(Washington, D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks, 1990); Joseph Gutmann, The Dura-Europos Synagogue: A
Re-Evaluation (1932-1992), South Florida Studies in the History of Judaism 25 (Atlanta: Scholars
Press, 1992), xxviii—xxxii; Kurt Schubert, "Jewish Pictorial Traditions in Early Christian Art,"
Jewish Historiography and Iconography in Early and Medieval Christianity, ed. Heinz
Schreckenberg and Kurt Schubert (Assen/Maastricht: Van Gorcum and Minneapolis: Fortress Press,
1992), 139-260; Massimo Bernabô, "Searching for Lost Sources of the Illustration of the
Septuagint," in Byzantine East, Latin West, ed. Mouriki et al., 329—37; and the papers from the
Vienna conference "Die jüdische Wurzel der frühchristlichen Kunst," ed. Kurt Schubert, in Kairos
22-23 (1990-91): 1-97.
29. Pirkê de Rabbi Eliezer, trans. Gerald Friedlander (London, 1916), 92; cited by Kurt Weitzmann,
"The Illustration of the Septuagint," in Studies in Classical and Byzantine Manuscript Illumination,
ed. Herbert L. Kessler (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1971), 74, fig. 56. See also Kurt
Weitzmann, "The Question of the Influence of Jewish Pictorial Sources on Old Testament
Illustration," in Studies in Classical and Byzantine Manuscript Illumination, ed. Kessler, 82. Both
of these essays are also reprinted in No Graven Images.
30. See Joseph Gutmann, "The Illustrated Jewish Manuscript in Antiquity: The Present State of the
Question," Gesta 5 (1966): 39-44 (rpt. in No Graven Images, 232—48); and Rainer Stichel, "Gab
es eine Illustration der jüdischen Heiligen Schrift in der Antike?" Tesserae: Festschrift fiir Josef
Engemann. Jahrbuch für Antike und Christentum. Ergänzungsband 18 (Münster: Aschendorffsche
Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1991), 93-111.

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31. See, for example, Leonard Victor Rutgers, "Archaeological Evidence for the Interaction of Jews
and Non-Jews in Late Antiquity," American Journal of Archaeology 96 (1992): 101—18.
32. Katrin Kogman-Appel, "Bible Illustration and Jewish Traditions," paper presented at the
conference Imaging the Early Medieval Bible, organized by John Williams, University of Pittsburgh,
March 17, 1995.
33. Kurt Weitzmann, Illustrations in Roll and Codex: A Study of the Origin and Method of Text
Illustration, Studies in Manuscript Illumination 2 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1947; rev.
ed., 1970).
34. Weitzmann and Kessler (Cotton Genesis, 35) postulate that the Cotton Genesis originally
portrayed 500 separate episodes in 360 miniatures.
35. Weitzmann, Illustrations in Roll and Codex, rev. ed., 182-92; and Weitzmann and Kessler, The
Frescoes of the Dura Synagogue, 5—9.
36. Weitzmann and Kessler, Cotton Genesis, 18—29; and Kurt Weitzmann, "The Genesis Mosaics
of San Marco and the Cotton Genesis Miniatures," in Otto Demus, The Mosaics of San Marco in
Venice (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1984), 2: 105-42.
37. Weitzmann and Kessler, Cotton Genesis, 41-42.
38. Weitzmann and Kessler, (ibid., 42-43) regard the Cotton Genesis as one copy of a lost
archetype.
39. It should be stressed that divergencies could not easily have been recognized without the
painstaking tracing of "recensions" by Kurt Weitzmann and his school.
40. William C. Loerke, "The Miniatures of the Trial in the Rossano Gospels," Art Bulletin 43
(1961): 186—92; William C. Loerke, "The Monumental Miniature," in The Place of Book
Illumination in Byzantine Art (Princeton: Art Museum, Princeton University, 1975), 61—97. See also
Ernst Kitzinger, "The Role of Miniature Painting in Mural Decoration," in The Place of Book
Illumination in Byzantine Art, 99-142.
41. O. von Gebhardt, The Miniatures of the Ashburnham Pentateuch (London, 1883). For color
illustrations of selected folios see Kurt Weitzmann, Late Antique and Early Christian Book
Illumination (London: Chatto & Windus, 1977), pis. 44—47.
42. Franz Rickert, Studien zum Ashburnham Pentateuch (Ph.D. diss., Univ. of Bonn, 1986), studies
the title page and Flood illuminations. Joseph Gutmann, who argued for a Jewish model for the
manuscript ("The Jewish Origin of the Ashburnham Pentateuch Miniatures," Jewish Quarterly
Review 44 [1953]: 55—72; rpt. in No Graven Images, 329-46), accepts Rickert's conclusions; see
Gutmann, "Dura Europos Synagogue Paintings and Their Influence," 29 n. 9.
43. Dorothy Verkerk, "Exodus and Easter Vigil in the Ashburnham Pentateuch," Art Bulletin 77
(1995): 94-105. In her dissertation, "Liturgy and Narrative in the Exodus Cycle of the Ashburnham
Pentateuch" (Rutgers Univ., 1992), Verkerk argues for a late sixth-century dating and an Italian
origin. See also her paper, "Provincial and Peculiar? The Ashburnham Pentateuch between Rome

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and Tours," presented at the University of Pittsburgh conference, Imaging the Early Medieval Bible,
March 17, 1995.
44. See Inabelle Levin, The Quedlinburg Itala: The Oldest Illustrated Biblical Manuscript (Leiden:
E. J. Brill, 1985), 57-66, for a careful analysis of the evidence. Only fourteen miniatures in framed
groups of four survive on four pages. Some of the instructions are translated in Caecilia Davis
Weyer, Early Medieval Art 300-1150: Sources and Documents (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice
Hall, 1971), 23-25.
45. John Lowden, "Concerning the Cotton Genesis and Other Illustrated Manuscripts of Genesis,"
Gesta 31 (1992): 40-53. In a paper, "In the Beginning . . .: Biblical Illustration," presented at the
University of Pittsburgh conference, Imaging the Early Medieval Bible, March 17, 1995, Lowden
stresses the codicological diversity of the surviving Early Christian illuminated manuscripts and
proposes that the appearance in the fifth century of images in biblical texts may have been a
response to demand created by the presence of monumental narrative cycles in churches.
46. Liz James and Ruth Webb, '"To Understand Ultimate Things and Enter Secret Places':
Ekphrasis and Art in Byzantium," Art History 14 (1991): 4, quoting Aphthonios, Progymnasmata
(late 4th c.).
47. Henry Maguire, "Truth and Convention in Byzantine Descriptions of Works of Art," Dumbarton
Oaks Papers 28 (1974): 111-40. See also Robert Grigg, "Byzantine Credulity as an Impediment
to Antiquarianism," Gesta 26 (1987): 3—9, on the relationship of the Byzantine ekphrasis to
antiquity.
48. James and Webb, "Ekphrasis and Art in Byzantium," 1—17.
49. Ibid., 7.
50. Ibid., 9. See below for further discussion of this valuable article.
51. Cyril Mango and Ihor Sevcenko, "Remains of the Church of St. Polyeuktos at Constantinople,"
Dumbarton Oaks Papers 15 (1961): 243-47; and R. Martin Harrison, A Temple for Byzantium: The
Discovery and Excavation of Anicia Juliana's Palace-Church in Istanbul (London: Harvey Miller,
1989), 33-34, 127-30.
52. Mary Whitby, "The Occasion of Paul the Silentiary's Ekphrasis of S. Sophia," Classical
Quarterly, n.s., 35 (1985): 215-28; and Ruth Macrides and Paul Magdalino, "The Architecture of
Ekphrasis: Construction and Context of Paul the Silentiary's Poem on Hagia Sophia," Byzantine and
Modern Greek Studies 12 (1988): 47-82. For an English translation of the passages describing
Hagia Sophia, see Cyril Mango, The Art of the Byzantine Empire 312-1453, Sources and
Documents in the History of Art (Englewood Cliffs, N.J.: Prentice-Hall, 1972), 80-96.
53. Kathleen E. McVey, "The Domed Church as Microcosm: Literary Roots of an Architectural
Symbol," Dumbarton Oaks Papers 37 (1983): 91-121; and Andrew Palmer, with an appendix by
Lyn Rodley, "The Inauguration Anthem of Hagia Sophia in Edessa: A New Edition and Translation
with Historical and Architectural Notes and a Comparison with a Contemporary Constantinopolitan
Kontakion," Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies 12 (1988): 117-67.

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54. André Grabar, Ampoules de Terre Sainte (Monza - Bobbio) (Paris: Klincksieck, 1958). For
additions to the group see Josef Engemann, "Palästinensische Pilgerampullen im F. J. Dölger-Institut
in Bonn," Jahrbuch für Antike und Christentum 16 (1973): 5—27; and Liselotte Kötzsche
Breitenbruch, "Pilgerandenken aus dem Heiligen Land: Drei Neuerwerbungen des
Württembergischen Landesmuseums im Stuttgart," Vivarium: Festschrift Theodor Klauser zum 90.
Geburtstag, Jahrbuch für Antike und Christentum, Ergänzungsband 11 (Münster: Aschendorffsche
Verlagsbuchhandlung, 1984), 229-46.
55. Kurt Weitzmann, "Loca sancta and the Representational Arts of Palestine," Dumbarton Oaks
Papers 28 (1974): 31-55.
56. Pilgrimage objects which lack inscriptions present special difficulties in localizing their origin.
Maggi Duncan-Flowers, "A Pilgrim's Ampulla from the Shrine of St. John the Evangelist at
Ephesus," in The Blessings of Pilgrimage, ed. Robert Ousterhout, Illinois Byzantine Studies 1
(Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1990), 125-39, associates a group of clay flasks with a portrait
of a seated male figure writing in a book on one side, and a standing man holding a book on the
other, with the shrine of St. John the Evangelist at Ephesus. She argues that they were containers
for the holy dust or manna emitted from the Evangelist's tomb and distributed to pilgrims. Other
ampullas from Asia Minor have a diverse, non-specific iconography and may have been part of the
wares of travelling peddlers of objects of popular piety; see Sheila D. Campbell, "Armchair
Pilgrims: Ampullae from Aphrodisias in Caria," Mediaeval Studies 50 (1988): 539-45. See also a
group of ampullas from Asia Minor with male and female riders in Catherine Metzger, Les
ampoules à eulogie du musée du Louvre (Paris: Editions de la Réunion des musées nationaux,
1981), cat. 98-103.
57. Gary Vikan, Byzantine Pilgrimage Art, Dumbarton Oaks Byzantine Collection Publications 5
(Washington, D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks, 1982).
58. Kazimierz Michalowski, Faros: Die Kathedrale aus dem Wüstensand (Einsiedeln: Benziger
Verlag, 1967), pl. 46; see also Vikan, Byzantine Pilgrimage Art, 24, fig. 17.
59. Cf. Victor Turner, Image and Pilgrimage in Christian Culture: Anthropological Perspectives
(New York: Columbia University Press, 1978). For an analysis of anthropological approaches to
pilgrimage and a case study see Simon Coleman and Jas Eisner, "The Pilgrim's Progress: Art,
Architecture and Ritual Movement at Sinai," World Archaeology 26 (1994): 73-89.
60. Cynthia Hahn, "Loca Sancta Souvenirs: Sealing the Pilgrim's Experience," in The Blessings of
Pilgrimage, ed. Ousterhout, 85—96.
61. Gary Vikan, "Pilgrims in Magi's Clothing: The Impact of Mimesis on Early Byzantine
Pilgrimage Art," in The Blessings of Pilgrimage, ed. Ousterhout, 97-107.
62. Ibid., 103.
63. Ibid., 105.
64. Gary Vikan, "'Guided by Land and Sea': Pilgrim Art and Pilgrim Travel in Early Byzantium,"
Tesserae: Festschrift für Josef Engemann, 74—92.

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65. Gary Vikan, "Art, Medicine, and Magic in Early Byzantium," Dumbarton Oaks Papers 38
(1984): 65-86.
66. Paul van den Ven, La vie ancienne de S. Symèon Stylite le Jeune (521—592) (Brussels: Société
des Bollandistes, 1962—70).
67. Gary Vikan, "Ruminations on Edible Icons: Originals and Copies in the Art of Byzantium,"
Retaining the Original: Multiple Originals, Copies, and Reproductions, Center for Advanced Study
in the Visual Arts, Symposium Papers 7; Studies in the History of Art 20 (Washington, D.C.:
National Gallery of Art, 1989), 55—56; and Gary Vikan, "Icons and Icon Piety in Early Byzantium,"
in Byzantine East, Latin West, ed. Mouriki et al., 569-77.
68. Florence D. Friedman, ed., Beyond the Pharoahs: Egypt and the Copts in the 2nd to 7th
Centuries A.D. (Providence: Rhode Island School of Design, Museum of Art, 1989).
69. Urbana-Champaign, University of Illinois, Krannert Art Museum, Art and Holy Powers in the
Early Christian House, ed. Eunice Dauterman Maguire, Henry Maguire, and Maggie J. Duncan
Flowers, Illinois Byzantine Studies 2 (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1989).
70. Ibid., 16.
71. Anna Gonosova and Christine Kondoleon, eds., Art of Late Rome and Byzantium in the Virginia
Museum of Fine Arts (Richmond: Virginia Museum of Fine Arts, 1994).
72. Gary Vikan, "Art and Marriage in Early Byzantium," Dumbarton Oaks Papers 44 (1990):
145-63.
73. Ibid., 163.
74. James Russell, "The Archaeological Context of Magic in the Early Byzantine Period," in
Byzantine Magic, ed. Henry Maguire (Washington, D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks, 1995), 35—50.
75. Henry Maguire, "Magic and Geometry in Early Christian Floor Mosaics and Textiles," Jahrbuch
der Österreichischen Byzantinistik 44 (1994): 265—74.
76. For some of these signs at the thresholds of churches see also Ernst Kitzinger, "The Threshold
of the Holy Shrine: Observations on Floor Mosaics at Antioch and Bethlehem," in Kyriakon:
Festschrift Johannes Quasten, ed. Patrick Granfield and Josef A. Jungmann (Münster: Aschendorff,
1970), 2: 639-47.
77. Christopher Walter, "The Intaglio of Solomon in the Benaki Museum and the Origins of the
Iconography of Warrior Saints," Deltion tes Christianikes Archaiologikes Hetaireias, ser. 4, 15
(1989-90), 33-42.
78. Henry Maguire, "Magic and the Christian Image," in Byzantine Magic, ed. Maguire, 51—71. See
also Henry Maguire, "Garments Pleasing to God: The Significance of Domestic Textile Designs in
the Early Byzantine Period," Dumbarton Oaks Papers 44 (1990): 215—24.

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79. Gary Vikan, "Two Byzantine Amuletic Armbands and the Group to which They Belong,"
Journal of the Walters Art Gallery 49-50 (1991—92): 33—51, with earlier bibliography. Vikan points
out that some also contain specifically medicinal references. In one case the word Hygieia is
inscribed on a holy rider; others show the Chnoubis, a serpent with lion head, which has been
recognized since antiquity as effective in the cure of abdominal disorders; see Vikan, "Art,
Medicine, and Magic," 75, fig. 10.
80. In his study of exotikä in the Greek island of Naxos in early modern times, Demons and the
Devil: Moral Imagination in Modern Greek Culture (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991),
Charles Stewart observed very similar phenomena. He concludes that "magical" practices were not
a parallel belief system to that of the Orthodox church nor even anti-Christian. Rather he sees them
as thoroughly integrated within the prevailing Orthodox Christian belief system. This may be an
appropriate parallel for the presence of Solomonic riders, pentalphas, and Chnoubis figures in a
Christian context as late as the sixth to seventh centuries.
81. See, among others, Elizabeth A. Clark, Women in the Early Church (Wilmington: Michael
Glazier, 1983); Bernadette J. Brooten, "Early Christian Women and Their Cultural Context: Issues
of Method in Historical Reconstruction," in Feminist Perspectives on Biblical Scholarship, ed.
Adela Yarbro Collins (Atlanta, Ga.: Scholars Press, 1985), 65-91; and Gillian Clark, Women in Late
Antiquity: Pagan and Christian Lifestyles (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1993).
82. Studies of female personifications in Early Christian art can be cited: Peter Dückers, "Agape
und Irene: Die Frauengestalten der Sigmamahlszenen mit antiken Inschriften in der Katakombe der
Heiligen Marcellinus und Petrus," Jahrbuch für Antike und Christentum 35 (1992): 147-67; and
Fredric W. Schlatter, "The Two Women in the Mosaic of Santa Pudenziana," Journal of Early
Christian Studies 3 (1995): 1-24. Kenneth G. Holum's study of the Theodosian empresses docu
ments their church building from Constantinople to the Holy Land, but we know relatively little
about how the churches were decorated; Theodosian Empresses: Women and Imperial Dominion
in Late Antiquity (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1982). The splendid church of St. Poly
euctos in Constantinople built by Anicia Juliana reveals an intriguing combination of "classical" and
"Sassanian" taste in its lavish sculptural decoration. See Harrison, A Temple for Byzantium; Lois
Drewer, "Byzantine Aristocratic and Royal Women and the Patronage of Churches," paper
presented at the Twenty-Sixth Annual Conference of the Center for Medieval and Early Renaissance
Studies, SUNY at Binghamton, Oct. 15-17, 1992; and Christine Milner, "The Image of the Rightful
Ruler: Anicia Juliana's Constantine Mosaic in the Church of Hagios Polyeuktos," New Constantines,
ed. Magdalino, 73-81.
83. Kathryn A. Smith, "Inventing Marital Chastity: The Iconography of Susanna and the Elders in
Early Christian Art," Oxford Art Journal 16, no. 1 (1993): 3-24.
84. The ivory is believed to be a plaque from a reliquary casket, but whether it is contemporary
with the translation of relics depicted is disputed. It is usually dated to the sixth century; see
Wolfgang Fritz Volbach, Elfenbeinarbeiten der Spätantike und des frühen Mittelalters, 3rd rev. ed.
(Mainz am Rhein: Philipp von Zabern, 1976), 95-96, cat. 143, pl. 76. For the identifications as
Pulcheria or Eudoxia see Kenneth G. Holum and Gary Vikan, "The Trier Ivory, Adventus
Ceremonial, and the Relics of St. Stephen," Dumbarton Oaks Papers 33 (1979): 113-33; Holum,
Theodosian Empresses, 104-09, fig. 15; and Laurie J. Wilson, "The Trier Procession Ivory: A New
Interpretation," Byzantion 54 (1984): 602-14. Suzanne Spain, "The Translation of Relics Ivory,
Trier," Dumbarton Oaks Papers 31 (1977): 279-304, suggests that the subject is the return of the

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True Cross to Jerusalem by Emperor Heraclius and Empress Martina in 630. John Wortley, "The
Trier Ivory Reconsidered," Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies 21 (1980): 381-94, argues that the
translation of St. Stephen's relics in 421 is a legendary event, popularized and depicted perhaps in
the eighth century.
85. Thomas F. Mathews, The Early Churches of Constantinople: Architecture and Liturgy
(University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1971), 146-47; Sabine G. MacCormack, Art
and Ceremony in Late Antiquity (Berkeley: University of California Press, 1981), 259-66; Irina
Andreescu-Treadgold and Warren Treadgold, "Dates and Identities in the Imperial Panels of San
Vitale," Byzantine Studies Conference, Abstracts of Papers 16(1990): 52—54; Charles Barber, "The
Imperial Panels at San Vitale: A Reconsideration," Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies 14 (1990):
37—38; and Eisner, Art and the Roman Viewer, 182.
86. Gillian Clark, Women in Late Antiquity, 106-10; Renée Justice Standley, "The Role of the
Empress Theodora in the Imperial Panels at the Church of San Vitale in Ravenna," in
Representations of the Feminine in the Middle Ages, ed. Bonnie Wheeler, Feminea Medievalia 1
(Dallas: Academia Press, 1993), 161—74; Derek Baker, "Politics, Precedence and Intention: Aspects
of the Imperial Mosaics at San Vitale, Ravenna," in Representations of the Feminine, ed. Wheeler,
175-216; and Paula Leveto, "The Women of Ravenna," paper presented at the 30th International
Congress on Medieval Studies, Western Michigan University, Kalamazoo, Michigan, May 4-7,
1995.
87. Judith Herrin, "Women and the Faith in Icons in Early Christianity," Culture, Ideology and
Politics: Essays for Eric Hobsbawm, ed. Raphael Samuel and Gareth Stedman Jones (London:
Routledge & Kegan Paul, 1982), 56-83; and Judith Herrin, "Public and Private Forms of Religious
Commitment Among Byzantine Women," in Women in Ancient Societies: An Illusion of the Night,
ed. Léonie J. Archer, Susan Fischler, and Maria Wyke (New York: Routledge, 1994), 197—203.
88. Some skepticism about seeing a special role for women in the veneration and protection of icons
has been voiced, for instance by Robin Cormack, "Women and Icons; and Women in Icons," paper
presented at the symposium, "The Art and Culture of Medieval Russia," Art Museum, Princeton
University, January 29-30, 1993; and Leslie Brubaker, "Image, Audience, and Place: Interaction
and Reproduction," in The Sacred Image East and West, ed. Robert Ousterhout and Leslie Brubaker,
Illinois Byzantine Studies, 4 (Urbana: University of Illinois Press, 1995), 206-11. See also George
L. Huxley, "Women in Byzantine Iconoclasm," in Women and Byzantine Monasticism, Proceedings
of the Athens Symposium 1988, ed. Jacques Y. Perreault, Publications of the Canadian Archae
ological Institute at Athens 1 (Athens, 1991), 11—24; and Alexander Kazhdan and Alice-Mary
Talbot, "Women and Iconoclasm," Byzantinische Zeitschrift 84—85 (1991—92): 391—408.
89. Florence, Palazzo Strozzi, AJfreschi e icône dalla Grecia (X—XVII secolo), 1986; London. Royal
Academy of Arts, From Byzantium to El Greco: Greek Frescoes and Icons, 1987; Baltimore,
Walters Art Gallery, Holy Image, Holy Space: Icons and Frescoes from Greece, 1988; Krems an
der Donau, Ikonen: Bilder in Gold. Sakrale Kunst aus Griechenland, 1993. Icons are also featured
prominently in general exhibitions of Byzantine art; see, for example, Brussels, Musées royaux
d'Art et d'Histoire, Splendeur de Byzance, 1982; Athens, Byzantine and Post-Byzantine Art, 1985;
Paris, Louvre, Byzance: L'art byzantin dans les collections publiques françaises, 1992; London,
British Museum, Byzantium: Treasures ofByzantine A rt and Culture from British Collections, 1994.

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90. Georgios and Maria Soteriou, Eikones tes mones Sina, Collection de l'Institut français d'Athènes
(Athens, 1956-58); Kurt Weitzmann, The Monastery of Saint Catherine at Mount Sinai: The Icons,
I, From the Sixth to the Tenth Century (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1976); and George
Galavaris, "Early Icons (from the 6th to the 11th Century)," in Sinai: Treasures of the Monastery
of Saint Catherine, ed. Konstantinos A. Manafis (Athens: Ekdotike Athenon, 1990), 91—101.
91. See, for example, Manolis Chatzidakis, "An Encaustic Icon of Christ at Sinai," Art Bulletin 49
(1967): 197—208; and Pietro Amato, De vera effigie Mariae: Antiche icône romane, Roma, Basilica
di S. Maria Maggiore 18 giugno - 3 luglio 1988 (Milan: Amoldo Mondadori; Roma: De Luca,
1988).
92. The proposed dating of the encaustic icons of Christ Pantocrator, the Virgin and Child with SS.
Theodore and George, and St. Peter at Mount Sinai ranges from the mid-sixth to the mid-seventh
centuries; Ernst Kitzinger, Byzantine Art in the Making (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University
Press, 1977), 117—18, 120-21; and Weitzmann, Mount Sinai, Icons, I, cat. nos. B.l, B.3, B.5. For
the current state of the question see James Trilling, "Sinai Icons: Another Look," Byzantion 53
(1983): 300-11; and Kathleen Corrigan, "The Witness of John the Baptist on an Early Byzantine
Icon in Kiev," Dumbarton Oaks Papers 42 (1988): 1.
93. Peter Brown, "A Dark-Age Crisis: Aspects of the Iconoclastic Controversy," English Historical
Review 88 (1973): 1—34; rpt. in Society and the Holy in Late Antiquity (Berkeley: University of
California Press, 1982), 251—301.
94. Ibid., 270.
95. Ibid., 273-75.
96. Averil Cameron, "Images of Authority: Elites and Icons in Late Sixth-Century Byzantium," Past
and Present 84 (1979): 3—35; rpt. in Averil Cameron, Continuity and Change in Sixth-Century
Byzantium (London: Variorum, 1981), ch. 18.
97. See also Averil Cameron, "The Construction of Court Ritual: The Byzantine Book of Cere
monies," Rituals of Royalty: Power and Ceremonial in Traditional Societies, ed. David Cannadine
and Simon Price (Cambridge: Cajnbridge University Press, 1987), 103—36.
98. Averil Cameron, "The Language of Images: The Rise of Icons and Christian Representation,"
The Church and the Arts, ed. Diana Wood, Studies in Church History 28 (Oxford: Blackwell, 1992),
1—42.
99. Jeffrey C. Anderson, "The Byzantine Panel Portrait Before and After Iconoclasm," The Sacred
Image East and West, ed. Ousterhout and Brubaker, 25-44. See also Chatzidakis, "Encaustic Icon
of Christ"; and Weitzmann, Mount Sinai, Icons, I, cat. no. B.l, 13-15, pis. I—II, XXXIX-XLI.
100. Anna D. Kartsonis, Anastasis: The Making of an Image (Princeton: Princeton University Press,
1986), 40-67.
101. Ibid., 44.

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102. The importance of this text for the iconography of Christ dead on the cross was recognized
by Hans Belting and Christa Belting-Ihm, although they conclude that the illustration in the original
text of the Hodegos was a diagram of a cross rather than the Crucifixion. See "Das Kreuzbild im
'Hodegos' des Anastasios Sinaites: Ein Beitrag zur Frage nach der ältesten Darstellung des toten
Crucifixus," Tortulae: Studien zu altchristlichen und byzantinischen Monumenten, ed. Walter
Nikolaus Schumacher, Römische Quartalschrift, 30. Supplementheft (Rome: Herder, 1966), 30-39.
103. See also Anna D. Kartsonis, "The Emancipation of the Crucifixion," Byzance et les images,
ed. Guillou and Durand, 151—87.
104. Corrigan, "Witness of John the Baptist," 1—11. The icon is dated by Weitzmann (Mount Sinai,
Icons, I, cat. B.l 1, 32—35, pis. XIV, LVII) to the sixth century.
105. Fundamental for the study of Byzantine Iconoclasm are André Grabar, L'Iconoclasme byzantin:
Le dossier archéologique, 2nd rev. ed. (Paris: Flammarion, 1984), and the essays in Iconoclasm,
Papers given at the Ninth Spring Symposium of Byzantine Studies, University of Birmingham,
March 1975, ed. Anthony Bryer and Judith Herrin (Birmingham: Centre for Byzantine Studies,
University of Birmingham, 1977).
106. Jaroslav Pelikan, Imago Dei: The Byzantine Apologia for Icons, A. W. Mellon Lectures in the
Fine Arts, 1987, Bollingen Series 35 (Washington, D.C.: National Gallery of Art; Princeton:
Princeton University Press, 1990). See also Herbert L. Kessler, "'Pictures Fertile with Truth': How
Christians Managed to Make Images of God Without Violating the Second Commandment," Journal
of the Walters Art Gallery 49-50 (1991—92): 53-65.
107. Robin Cormack, "The Arts during the Age of Iconoclasm," Iconoclasm, ed. Bryer and Herrin,
35—44; and Jacqueline Lafontaine-Dosogne, "Pour une problématique de la peinture d'église
byzantine à l'époque iconoclaste," Dumbarton Oaks Papers 41 (1987): 321-37.
108. Anna D. Kartsonis, "Protection against All Evil: Function, Use and Operation of Byzantine
Historiated Phylacteries," Byzantinische Forschungen 20 (1994): 73-102.
109. Ibid., 99 and n. 77.
110. Ibid., 87—88, figs. 7—10; Anna D. Kartsonis, Anastasis, 95 ff., figs. 26 a-e. See also Ljudmila
Donceva, "Une croix pectorale-reliquaire en or récemment trouvée à Pliska," Cahiers
archéologiques 25 (1977): 60-66.
111. See Robin Cormack, "Painting after Iconoclasm," in Iconoclasm, ed. Bryer and Herrin, 147.
112. Homily 17; The Homilies of Photius, Patriarch of Constantinople, trans. Cyril Mango,
Dumbarton Oaks Studies 3 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1958), 279-96. See also
Robin Cormack, "Interpreting the Mosaics of S. Sophia at Istanbul," Art History 4 (1981): 135-38,
figs. 1, 3; and Robin Cormack, Writing in Gold: Byzantine Society and Its Icons (London: George
Philip, 1985), 142-58. Nicolas Oikonomides, "Some Remarks on the Apse Mosaic of St. Sophia,"
Dumbarton Oaks Papers 39 (1985): 111-15, argues that the homily refers to a standing Virgin and
Child Hodegetria painted in 867 on plaster covering the mosaic in the apse.

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113. Cyril Mango, Materials for the Study of the Mosaics of St. Sophia at Istanbul, Dumbarton
Oaks Studies 8 (Washington, D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks, 1962), 84, figs. 106-10.
114. "For even if the one introduces the other, yet the comparison that comes about through sight
is shown in every fact to be far superior to the learning that penetrates through the ears. Has a man
lent his ear to a story? Has his intelligence visualized and drawn to itself what he has heard? Then,
after judging it with sober attention, he deposits it in his memory. No less—indeed much
greater—is the power of sight. For surely, having somehow through the outpouring and effluence
of the optical rays touched and encompassed the object, it too sends the essence of the thing seen
on to the mind, letting it be conveyed from there to the memory for the concentration of unfailing
knowledge. Has the mind seen? Has it grasped? Has it visualized? Then it has effortlessly
transmitted the forms to the memory." Homily 17; Homilies of Photius, 294; cited by Rosamond
McKitterick, "Text and Image in the Carolingian World," in The Uses of Literacy in Early
Mediaeval Europe, ed. Rosamond McKitterick (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990),
299. This article (297—318) goes far to clarify the differences in attitude toward the image in ninth
century Europe and Byzantium.
115. Homily 17; Homilies of Photius, 290.
116. James and Webb, "Ekphrasis and Art in Byzantium," 4, 12—13, fig. 1.
117. John J. Yiannias, "A Reexamination of the 'Art Statute' in the Acts of Nicaea II," Byzan
tinische Zeitschrift 80 (1987): 348-59, provides an important corrective to the interpretation of a
statement delivered during the Second Council of Nicaea in 787 which is usually regarded as an
assertion of the Church's right to exercise control over ecclesiastical art. According to Yiannias's
close reading the text, far from placing restrictions on the artist, affirms that "the making of images
is an obligation lawfully imposed by the Church Fathers" (358).
118. Charles Barber, "The Body within the Frame: A Use of Word and Image in Iconoclasm,"
Word and Image 9 (1993): 140-53.
119. Jas Eisner, "Image and Iconoclasm in Byzantium," Art History 11 (1988): 471-91.
120. Ibid., 473, citing Turner, Image and Pilgrimage in Christian Culture, 146, 247-48; and David
Freedberg, "The Hidden God: Image and Interdiction in the Netherlands in the Sixteenth Century,"
Art History 5 (1982): 143.
121. Leslie Brubaker, "Perception and Conception: Art, Theory and Culture in Ninth-Century
Byzantium," Word and Image 5 (1989): 19-32.
122. A sample passage reads: "For who would see a man represented in colors and struggling for
truth, disdaining fire . . . and would not be drenched in warm tears and groan with compunction?
Who, seeing a man . . . finally tortured to death, would not leave the scene beating his breast in
the affliction of his heart?" Earlier descriptions, such as that of John Chrysostom in his sermon All
the Martyrs, enumerate the tortures endured by the saints, but affirm that they did not suffer, but
departed in joy. See Brubaker, "Perception and Conception," 19, and figs. 1-2.
123. Brubaker, "Perception and Conception," 23.

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124. Leslie Brubaker, "Byzantine Art in the Ninth Century: Theory, Practice and Culture,"
Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies 13 (1989): 23—93.
125. Ibid., 45, quoting Nicephorus, Antirrheticus 2, 348.
126. Brubaker, "Byzantine Art in the Ninth Century," 47—48, 75; and Leslie Brubacker, "Politics,
Patronage and Art in Ninth-Century Byzantium: The Homilies of Gregory of Nazianzus in Paris,"
Dumbarton Oaks Papers 39 (1985): 1-13.
127. Kathleen Corrigan, Visual Polemics in the Ninth-Century Byzantine Psalters (Cambridge:
Cambridge University Press, 1992). See also Suzy Dufrenne, "La manifestation divine dans
l'iconographie byzantine de la Transfiguration," Nicée II, 787—1987: Douze siècles d'images
religieuses, Actes du Colloque international Nicée II tenu au Collège de France, Paris, les 2, 3, 4
octobre 1986, ed. François Boespflug and Nicolas Lossky (Paris: Cerf, 1987), 185-206, who
discusses variations in the shape of the mandorla and number of rays of light as evidence of intense
spiritual meditation on the Transfiguration as a vision of the Second Coming in the Middle
Byzantine period. In the same conference proceedings, Christopher Walter, "Le souvenir du IIe
concile de Nicée dans l'iconographie byzantine," Nicée II, 167-83, stresses the continuity of
traditional themes after Iconoclasm, but he also points to some iconographie innovations, including
the use of a circular medallion portrait of Christ to represent his virtual presence.
128. Vikan, "Ruminations on Edible Icons," 47—59. Although implicitly accepting the broad
applicability of this methodology in the study of Byzantine iconography, Vikan recognizes that it
does not explain all cases: "At least a portion of the iconography of Byzantium was transmitted
from generation to generation substantially unchanged along rootlike stemmata very much like those
governing the transmission of texts" (47).
129. Vikan, "Ruminations on Edible Icons," 47—48, figs. 1—2. See also the discussion of these two
miniatures by John Lowden, "The Production of the Vatopedi Octateuch," Dumbarton Oaks Papers
36 (1982): 120, figs. 17-18.
130. Vikan, "Ruminations," 48.
131. Ibid., 57.
132. Christopher Walter, "Liturgy and the Illustration of Gregory of Nazianzen's Homilies: An
Essay in Iconographical Methodology," Revue des études byzantines 29 (1971): 183—212, a review
of George Galavaris, The Illustrations of the Liturgical Homilies of Gregory Nazianzenus, Studies
in Manuscript Illumination 6 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1969).
133. Jeffrey C. Anderson, "On the Nature of the Theodore Psalter," Art Bulletin 70 (1988): 552;
cited by Lawrence Nees, "The Originality of Early Medieval Artists," in Literacy, Politics, and
Artistic Innovation in the Early Medieval West, papers delivered at "A Symposium on Early
Medieval Culture," Bryn Mawr College, Bryn Mawr, Penn., ed. Celia M. Chazelle (Lanham, Md.:
University Press of America, 1992), 78.
134. Nees, "Originality," 77-109. See also Originality and Innovation in Byzantine Literature, Art
and Music, ed. A. R. Littlewood (forthcoming).
Studies in Iconography 17 — 19% 51

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135. Lowden, "Production of the Vatopedi Octateuch," 115-26; see also Lowden, The Octateuchs:
A Study in Byzantine Manuscript Illustration (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press,
1992), 45—104, for a more extended discussion of these issues.
136. Hanns Swarzenski, "The Role of Copies in the Formation of the Styles of the Eleventh
Century," Romanesque and Gothic Art, Studies in Western Art, Acts of the Twentieth International
Congress of the History of Art 1 (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1963), 7-18.
137. Jeffrey C. Anderson, "The Date and Purpose of the Barberini Psalter," Cahiers archéologiques
31 (1983): 35-67; Anderson, "On the Nature of the Theodore Psalter," 550-68.
138. Annemarie Weyl Carr, "Diminutive Byzantine Manuscripts," Codices Manuscripti 6 (1980):
130-65.
139. Robert S. Nelson, "The Discourse of Icons, Then and Now," Art History 12 (1989): 144—57.
140. Annemarie Weyl Carr, "Passionate Illumination: The Gospel Cycle of Berlin quarto 66," paper
presented at the Delaware Valley Medieval Association conference at Bryn Mawr, March 31,1990.
On the manuscript see Richard Hamann-MacLean, "Der Berliner Codex Graecus Quarto 66 und
seine nächsten Verwandten als Beispiele des Stilwandels im frühen 13. Jahrhundert," in Studien zur
Buchmalerei und Goldschmiedekunst des Mittelalters: Festschrift fur Karl Hermann Usener zum
60. Geburtstag am 19. August 1965 (Marburg: Verlag des Kunstgeschichtlichen Seminars der
Universität Marburg an der Lahn, 1967), 225-50.
141. Henry Maguire, Art and Eloquence in Byzantium (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1981).
See also Henry Maguire, "The Art of Comparing in Byzantium," Art Bulletin 70 (1988): 88-103,
on the rhetorical technique of comparison.
142. On the descriptions of the Church of the Holy Apostles see Richard Krautheimer, "A Note on
Justinian's Church of the Holy Apostles in Constantinople," Mélanges Eugène Tisserant (Vatican
City: Biblioteca Apostolica Vaticana, 1964), 2: 265—70; rpt. in Studies in Early Christian, Medieval,
and Renaissance Art (New York: New York University Press, 1969), 197—201. See also Ann
Wharton Epstein, "The Rebuilding and Redecoration of the Holy Apostles in Constantinople: A
Reconsideration," Greek, Roman and Byzantine Studies 23 (1982): 79—92; and Theonie Baseu
Barabas, Zwischen Wort und Bild: Nikolaos Mesarites und seine Beschreibung des Mosaikschmucks
der Apostelkirche in Konstantinopel (Ende 12. Jh.), Dissertationen der Universität Wien 230
(Vienna: VWGÖ, 1992). See also the strictures by James and Webb, "Ekphrasis and Art in
Byzantium," 1-4, on the "archaeological" use of ekphraseis, and their discussion of the descriptions
of the Church of the Holy Apostles, 9-12.
143. Paul Magdalino, "The Bath of Leo the Wise," Maistor: Classical, Byzantine, and Renaissance
Studies for Robert Browning, ed. Ann Moffatt, Byzantina australiensia 5 (Canberra: Australian
Association for Byzantine Studies, 1984), 225-40; and Paul Magdalino, "The Bath of Leo the Wise
and the 'Macedonian Renaissance' Revisited: Topography, Iconography, Ceremonial, Ideology,"
Dumbarton Oaks Papers 42 (1988): 97—118.
144. Cyril Mango, "The Palace of Marina, the Poet Palladas, and the Bath of Leo VI," in
Euphrosynon [Festschrift for Manolis Chatzidakis] (Athens, 1991—92), 1:321—30. Mango suggests
that the couple with sword and flowers were mythological, probably a sea god and goddess.

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145. Henry Maguire, "Epigrams, Art, and the 'Macedonian Renaissance,'" Dumbarton Oaks Papers
48 (1994): 105—15. Cf. Ioli Kalavrezou Maxeiner, "The Cup of San Marco and the 'Classical' in
Byzantium," Studien zur mittelalterlichen Kunst 800-1200: Festschriftfur Florentine Miitherich zum
70. Geburtstag, ed. Katharina Bierbrauer, Peter K. Klein, and Willibald Sauerländer (Munich:
Prestel-Verlag, 1985), 167—74.
146. Another type of text which is physically attached to a work of art, the donor inscription, often
gives interesting information about the aims of the donor and the circumstances of the creation of
the work of art. Nicholas Oikonomides analyzes the inscriptions on the tenth-century ivory triptych
(Palazzo Venezia, Rome) which call upon the martyrs and the bishops represented on the wings to
bring military victory to an emperor Constantine (possibly Constantine VII, 945-59); see "The
Concept of 'Holy War' and Two Tenth-Century Byzantine Ivories," in Peace and War in
Byzantium: Essays in Honor of George T. Dennis, S. J., ed. Timothy S. Miller and John Nesbitt
(Washington, D.C.: The Catholic University of America Press, 1995), 62-86. For monumental art
see Sophia Kalopissi-Verti, Dedicatory Inscriptions and Donor Portraits in Thirteenth-Century
Churches of Greece, Österreichische Akademie der Wissenschaften, Philosophisch-historische
Klasse, Denkschriften 226; Veröffentlichungen der Kommission fur die Tabula Imperii Byzantini
5 (Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1992).
147. Kathleen Corrigan, "Text and Image on an Icon of the Crucifixion at Mount Sinai," in The
Sacred Image East and West, ed. Ousterhout and Brubaker, 45-62. On the icon see also Weitzmann,
Mount Sinai, Icons, I, cat. no. B. 51, 82—83, pl. CVII.
148. Corrigan, "Text and Image on an Icon of the Crucifixion," 50.
149. Corrigan, "Text and Image on an Icon," 46-47, figs. 13, 17, describes two instances where the
loincloth worn by the crucified Christ has been overpainted with a colobium: a Sinai icon dated by
Weitzmann (Mount Sinai, Icons, I, cat. no. B.32, 57—58, pis. XXIII, LXXXIV) to the seventh or
eighth century, and fol. 30v of the Paris manuscript of the Homilies of Gregory of Nazianzus (ca.
879-83; BN, gr. 510). The example in the Gregory manuscript was noted by John R. Martin, "The
Dead Christ on the Cross in Byzantine Art," in Late Classical and Mediaeval Studies in Honor of
A. M. Friend, Jr., ed. Kurt Weitzmann (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1955), 191. See also
the discussion of ninth-century Crucifixion imagery in Alexander Kazhdan and Henry Maguire,
"Byzantine Hagiographical Texts as Sources on Art," Dumbarton Oaks Papers 45 (1991): 10-11.
Elizabeth A. Fisher, "Image and Ekphrasis in Michael Psellos' Sermon on the Crucifixion," Byzan
tinoslavica 55 (1994): 44—55, provides a translation and discussion of an ekphrasis contained in an
eleventh-century sermon.
150. See, for example, Hans Belting and Guglielmo Cavallo, Die Bibel des Niketas (Wiesbaden:
Ludwig Reichert, 1979), 27, color pl. 3.
151. For what is known about Leo see Cyril Mango, "The Date of Cod. Vat. Regin. Gr. 1 and the
'Macedonian Renaissance,"' Acta ad archeologiam et artium historiam pertinentia 4 (1969):
121-26.
152. Thomas F. Mathews, "The Epigrams of Leo Sacellarios and an Exegetical Approach to the
Miniatures of Vat. Reg. Gr. 1," Orientalia Christiana periodica 43 (1977): 99. Mathews (124—33)
publishes the text and a translation of each of the epigrams.

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153. David Olster, "Byzantine Hermeneutics after Iconoclasm: Word and Image in the Leo Bible,"
Byzantion 64 (1994): 419-58.
154. Ibid., 430, figs. 3-4.
155. Ibid., 434.
156. Ibid., 440.
157. Ibid., 440-45; flg. 2.
158. Alice-Mary Talbot, "Epigrams of Manuel Philes on the Theotokos tes Peges and Its Art,"
Dumbarton Oaks Papers 48 (1994): 135-65.
159. Ibid., 137.
160. Ibid., figs. 1-5. For the iconography of the Virgin of the Source see also Tania Velmans,
"L'iconographie de la 'Fontaine de Vie' dans la tradition byzantine à la fin du moyen âge," in
Synthronon: Art et archéologie de la fin de l'antiquité et du moyen âge (Paris: Klincksieck, 1968),
127-34.
161. Talbot, "Epigrams of Manuel Philes," 143-44. Another epigram was written to be inscribed
on a stone panagiaron, a small liturgical paten with an image of the Virgin of the Source; others
are associated with objects presented to the Virgin in thanksgiving for miraculous cures; see Talbot,
"Epigrams," 145-46, 148-50, 161-64. Cf. Manuel Philes's epigrams connected with the
parekklesion of the Church of St. Mary Pammakaristos, one of which is inscribed on the cornices;
see Hans Belting, Cyril Mango, Doula Mouriki, The Mosaics and Frescoes of St. Mary Pamma
karistos (Fethiye Camii) at Istanbul (Washington, D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks Center for Byzantine
Studies, 1978), 16-17, 56-57, 69.
162. Hans Belting, The Image and its Public in the Middle Ages: Form and Function of Early
Paintings of the Passion, trans. Mark Bartusis and Raymond Meyer (New Rochelle, N.Y.: Aristide
D. Caratzas, 1990); and Hans Belting, Likeness and Presence: A History of the Image before the
Era of Art, trans. Edmund Jephcott (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1994).
163. Hans Belting, "An Image and its Function in the Liturgy: The Man of Sorrows in Byzantium,"
Dumbarton Oaks Papers 34-35 (1980-81): 1—16.
164. Nancy Patterson Sevcenko, "Icons in the Liturgy," Dumbarton Oaks Papers 45 (1991): 45-57.
165. Ibid., 48-50. See Sevcenko's notes 26-27 for bibliography on this important cycle of scenes
venerating the Virgin; see also Vasiliki Limberis, Divine Heiress: The Virgin Mary and the Creation
of Christian Constantinople (London: Routledge, 1994).
166. Sevcenko, "Icons in the Liturgy," 51—54, with bibliography.
167. Nancy Patterson Sevcenko, '"Servants of the Holy Icon,"' in Byzantine East, Latin West, ed.
Mouriki et al., 547—56. See below for discussion of a thirteenth-century representation of this
procession.

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168. Kurt Weitzmann, "Icon Programs of the 12th and 13th Centuries at Sinai," Deltion tes
Christianikes Archaiologikes Hetaireias, ser. 4, 12 (1984): 63—116.
169. Doula Mouriki, "Icons from the 12th to the 15th Century," Sinai: Treasures of the Monastery
of Saint Catherine, ed. Manafis, color figs. 46, 51—53. On the vita icon of Moses see Doula
Mouriki, "A Moses Cycle on a Sinai Icon of the Early Thirteenth Century," in Byzantine East, Latin
West, ed. Mouriki et al., 531—46.
170. Leslie Brubaker, "The Vita Icon of Saint Basil: Iconography," Four Icons in the Menil
Collection, ed. Bertrand Davezac, The Menil Collection Monographs 1 (Houston: Menil Foundation,
1992), 70-93; and Annemarie Weyl Carr, "The Vita Icon of Saint Basil: Notes on a Byzantine
Object," Four Icons, ed. Davezac, 94-105.
171. Nancy Patterson Sevcenko, "Vita Icons and 'Decorated' Icons of the Komnenian Period, Four
Icons, ed. Davezac, 56-69.
172. Valerie Nunn, "The Encheirion as Adjunct to the Icon in the Middle Byzantine Period,"
Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies 10 (1986): 73-102.
173. Slobodan Curcic, "Late Byzantine Loca Sanctal Some Questions Regarding the Form and
Function of Epitaphioi," in The Twilight of Byzantium: Aspects of Cultural and Religious History
in the Late Byzantine Empire, Papers from the Colloquium held at Princeton University, 8—9 May
1989, ed. Slobodan Curcic and Doula Mouriki (Princeton: Princeton University, Department of Art
and Archaeology, Program in Hellenic Studies, 1991), 251-61.
174. Demus, Byzantine Mosaic Decoration, 16-29.
175. Ernst Kitzinger, "Reflections on the Feast Cycle in Byzantine Art," Cahiers archéologiques
36 (1988): 53. For Monagri see Susan Boyd, "The Church of the Panagia Amasgou, Monagri,
Cyprus, and its Wallpaintings," Dumbarton Oaks Papers 28 (1974): 277—349.
176. André Grabar, "Un rouleau liturgique constantinopolitan et ses peintures," Dumbarton Oaks
Papers 8 (1954): 161-99; and Kitzinger, "Reflections on the Feast Cycle," 53-54. This is also
emphasized by Jean-Michel Spieser, "Liturgie et programmes iconographiques," Travaux et
mémoires 11 (1991): 575—90.
177. Kitzinger, "Reflections on the Feast Cycle," 57-58. Kitzinger (58-67) sees the same emphasis
on the "wholeness of the Savior's life" in the selection of scenes on pilgrimage ampullas and related
loca sancta objects.
178. Thomas F. Mathews, "The Sequel to Nicaea II in Byzantine Church Decoration," Perkins
Journal 41 (1988): 14—17. This point is also made by Spieser, "Liturgie et programmes
iconographiques," 584-85; but it should be remembered that Byzantine texts use this terminology.
See Kitzinger, "Reflections on the Feast Cycle," 51; cf. Henry Maguire, "The Mosaics of Nea
Moni: An Imperial Reading," Dumbarton Oaks Papers 46 (1992): 205.
179. Mathews, "Sequel to Nicaea II," 17.

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180. Ibid., 17—19. See also Thomas F. Mathews, "Psychological Dimensions in the Art of Eastern
Christendom," in Art and Religion: Faith, Form and Reform, 1984 Paine Lectures on Religion, ed.
Osmund Overby (Columbia: University of Missouri, Columbia, 1986), 14—21; Thomas F. Mathews,
"The Transformation Symbolism in Byzantine Architecture and the Meaning of the Pantokrator in
the Dome," in Church and People in Byzantium, Society for the Promotion of Byzantine Studies,
Twentieth Spring Symposium of Byzantine Studies, Manchester, 1986, ed. Rosemary Morris
(Birmingham: Centre for Byzantine, Ottoman and Modern Greek Studies, University of
Birmingham, 1990), 191—214.
181. Mathews, "Sequel to Nicaea II," 19.
182. Charles Barber, "From Transformation to Desire: Art and Worship after Byzantine
Iconoclasm," Art Bulletin 75 (1993): 7—16.
183. Ibid., 8.
184. Ibid., 15.
185. Charles Barber, "From Image into Art: Art after Byzantine Iconoclasm," Gesta 34 (1995):
5-10.
186. Ibid., 7. See also the remarks by James Trilling, "Medieval Art without Style? Plato's
Loophole and a Modern Detour," Gesta 34 (1995): 58.
187. Thomas F. Mathews, "'Private' Liturgy in Byzantine Architecture: Toward a Re-appraisal,"

Cahiers archéologiques 30 (1982): 125—27.
188. See Ann Wharton Epstein, "The Middle Byzantine Sanctuary Barrier: Templon or
Iconostasis?" Journal of the British Archaeological Association 134 (1981): 2—28; and Christopher
Walter, "A New Look at the Byzantine Sanctuary Barrier," Revue des études byzantines 51 (1993):
203—28. Mathews ("'Private' Liturgy") also suggests that the proliferation of side chapels in Middle
Byzantine churches may be related to the practice of performing "private" liturgy in small churches
or in chapels attached to larger churches.
189. See the fundamental study of Gordana Babic, "Les discussions christologiques et le décor des
églises byzantines au Xlle siècle: Les évêques officiant devant THétimasie et devant l'Amnos,"
Frühmittelalterliche Studien 2 (1968): 368-86.
190. On the Melismos and related themes see Christopher Walter, "The Christ Child on the Altar
in the Radoslav Narthex: A Learned or a Popular Theme?" in Studenica et l'art byzantin autour de
l'année 1200, ed. Vojislav Korac (Belgrade: Académie serbe des sciences et des arts, 1988),
219-24; and Tania Velmans, "Interférences sémantiques entre l'Amnos et d'autres images
apparentées dans la peinture murale byzantine," in Harmos [Festschrift for Nikolaos K.
Moutsopoulos] (Thessaloniki, 1991), 3:1905-28, with earlier bibliography. For the texts on the
scrolls held by the bishops see Gordana Babié and Christopher Walter, "The Inscriptions upon
Liturgical Rolls in Byzantine Apse Decoration," Revue des études byzantines 24 (1976): 269-80;
rpt. in Christopher Walter, Studies in Byzantine Iconography (London: Variorum, 1977), 10. See
also the most recent discussion by Sharon Gerstel, "Monumental Painting and Eucharistie Sacrifice
in the Byzantine Sanctuary: The Example of Macedonia," Ph.D. diss., New York Univ., 1994; and

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Sharon Gerstel, "Liturgical Scrolls in the Byzantine Sanctuary," Greek, Roman and Byzantine
Studies 35 (1994): 195-204.
191. Christopher Walter, Art and Ritual of the Byzantine Church, Birmingham Byzantine Series 1
(London: Variorum, 1982). Walter (7, 31—34) was one of the first Byzantinists to specifically
embrace semiotics as a methodology. See the remarks by Cormack, '"New Art History,'" 226-28;
cf. the review by Thomas F. Mathews, Art Bulletin 66 (1984): 155-57.
192. Slobodan Curcic, "Architectural Significance of Subsidiary Chapels in Middle Byzantine

Churches," Journal of the Society of Architectural Historians 36 (1977): 94—110; Barbara
Schellewald, "Zur Typologie, Entwicklung und Funktion von Oberräumen in Syrien, Armenien und
Byzanz," Jahrbuch fur Antike und Christentum 27—28 (1984-85): 171—218; and Natalia Teteriat
nikov, "Upper-Story Chapels near the Sanctuary in Churches of the Christian East," Dumbarton
Oaks Papers 42 (1988): 65—72. See the review of the current state of the question in Sible de
Blaauw, "Architecture and Liturgy in Late Antiquity and the Middle Ages: Traditions and Trends
in Modern Scholarship," Archiv für Liturgiewissenschaft 33 (1991): 11—12.
193. Suzy Duffenne, "Images du décor de la prothèse," Revue des études byzantines 26 (1968):
297—310; Svetlana Tomekovic, "The Iconographie Program of Side Chapels of the Triple
Sanctuary," Byzantine Studies Conference, Abstracts of Papers 19 (1993): 9-11.
194. Gordana Babic, Les chapelles annexes des églises byzantines: Fonction liturgique et
programmes iconographiques (Paris: Klincksieck, 1969). See also the review by Slobodan Curcic,
Art Bulletin 55 (1973): 448-51.
195. On these family foundations see John Philip Thomas, Private Religious Foundations in the
Byzantine Empire (Washington, D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks, 1987). Anna Tsitouridou, "Die Grab
konzeption des ikonographischen Programms der Kirche Panagia Chalkeon in Thessaloniki,"
Jahrbuch der Österreichischen Byzantinistik 32, no. 5 (1982): 435-41, discusses the Ascension in
the dome and the Last Judgment in the narthex of the Panagia ton Chalkeon in relation to its
function as a funerary church; see also Maguire, "The Mosaics of Nea Moni," 205-06. Gordana
Babic, "Les programmes absidaux en Géorgie et dans les Balkans entre le XIe et le XIIIe siècle,"
in L 'arte georgiana dal IXalXIVsecolo, Atti del terzo Simposio intemazionale sull'arte georgiana,
Bari - Lecce, 14-18 ottobre 1980, vol. 1, ed. Maria Stella Calo' Mariani (Galatina: Congedo, 1986),
129-33, points out the presence of the intercessory theme of the Deesis in the apse as indicative
of a funerary church or chapel.
196. Nancy Patterson Sevcenko, "The Tomb of Isaak Komnenos at Pherrai," Greek Orthodox
Theological Review 29 (1984): 135-40; and Sevcenko, "Icons in the Liturgy," 53—54. See also
Charles Barber, "The Monastic Typikon for Art Historians," in The Theotokos Evergitis and
Eleventh-Century Monasticism, ed. Margaret Mullet and Anthony Kirby, Belfast Byzantine Texts
and Translations 6.1 (Belfast: Belfast Byzantine Enterprises, 1994), 208-12, on the rituals
surrounding the founder's tomb.
197. Natalia Teteriatnikov, "Private Salvation Programs and their Effect on Byzantine Church
Decoration," Arte medievale, ser. 2, 7, no. 2 (1993): 47-63.
198. Robert Ousterhout, "Temporal Structuring in the Chora Parekklesion," Gesta 34 (1995): 63-76.

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199. Gordana Babic, "Les moines-poètes dans l'église de la Mere de Dieu à Studenica," in
Studenica et I'art byzantin autour de l'année 1200, ed. Koraé, 205-17. Babic argues that a similar
clustering of portraits of hymnographer-monks in the north arm of the naos of Nerezi (1164) also
identifies that space as the chorastasion of the church. For Byzantine chanters and their iconography
see Neil K. Moran, Singers in Late Byzantine and Slavonic Paintings (Leiden: E. J. Brill, 1986).
In a forthcoming study Slobodan Curcic suggests another specialized function for the katekoumena,
upper-level chambers usually located above the narthex, as in the fourteenth-century churches of
Bogorodica Ljeviska at Prizren, Gracanica, and the Peribleptos at Mistra. He argues that these
rooms, all of which are relatively difficult of access but have windows opening into the naos so the
liturgy could be seen and heard, were designed for distinguished church patrons who intended to
retire at the end of their lives as monks in their own foundations. See Slobodan Curcic, "What was
the Real Function of the Late Byzantine KatechoumenaT Byzantine Studies Conference, Abstracts
of Papers 19 (1993): 8-9.
200. Svetlana Tomekovic, "Contribution à l'étude du programme du narthex des églises monastiques
(XIe-première moitié du XIIIe s.)," Byzantion 58 (1988): 140-54.
201. See ibid., 141 n. 4.
202. Slobodan Curcié, "The Original Baptismal Font of Gracanica and its Iconographie Setting,"
Zbornik Narodnog Muzeja 9-10 (1979): 313-23.
203. Zaga Gavrilovic, "Divine Wisdom as Part of Byzantine Imperial Ideology: Research into the
Artistic Interpretations of the Theme in Medieval Serbia; Narthex Programmes of Lesnovo and
Sopocani," Zograf 11(1980): 44—53; see also Zaga Gavrilovic, "Kingship and Baptism in the
Iconography of Decani and Lesnovo," in Decani et I 'art byzantin au milieu du XIVe siècle, ed. V.
J. Djuric (Belgrade: Académie serbe des sciences et des arts, 1989), 297-304.
204. William Tronzo, "Mimesis in Byzantium: Notes toward a History of the Function of the
Image," Res 25 (Spring, 1994): 61—76.
205. See Natalia Teteriatnikov, "Burial Places in Cappadocian Churches," Greek Orthodox
Theological Review 29 (1984): 143-48; and Florence Bach, "La fonction funéraire du narthex dans
les églises byzantines du XIIe au XIVe siècle," Histoire de l'art 7 (1989): 25-33. Some western
chapels take on functions similar to those of the narthex. Théano Chatzidakis-Bacharas, Les
peintures murales de Hosios Loukas: Les chapelles occidentales (Athens: Christianike Archaiologike
Hetaireia, 1982), identifies the southeastern chapel of the katholikon of Hosios Loukas as a
baptistery and the northwestern chapel as a funerary chapel. Ida Sinkevic, "Middle Byzantine
Narthexes with Adjacent Chapels," Byzantine Studies Conference, Abstracts of Papers 19 (1993):
12, argues from the example of St. Panteleimon, Nerezi, and others that western chapels function
as integral parts of the narthex already in the Middle Byzantine period.
206. Slobodan Curcic, "Form and Function of Epitaphioi," 256-57. On the St. George cycle see
Christopher Walter, "The Cycle of Saint George in the Monastery of Decani," in Decani et l'art
byzantin au milieu du XIVe siècle, ed. Djurié, 347—57.
207. Carolyn L. Connor, Art and Miracles in Medieval Byzantium: The Crypt at Hosios Loukas and
its Frescoes (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1991). See also The Life and Miracles of Saint
Luke of Steiris, text, translation and commentary by Carolyn L. Connor and W. Robert Connor

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(Brookline, Mass.: Hellenic College Press, 1994). Connor's dating of these frescoes to the third
quarter of the tenth century remains controversial. See also D. I. Pallas, "Zur Topographie und
Chronologie von Hosios Loukas: Eine kritische Übersicht," Byzantinische Zeitschrift 78 (1985):
94—107; Paul M. Mylonas, "Gavits arméniens et Litae byzantines: Observations nouvelles sur le
complexe de Saint-Luc en Phocide," Cahiers archéologiques 38 (1990): 99-122; and Nicolas
Oikonomides, "The First Century of the Monastery of Hosios Loukas," Dumbarton Oaks Papers
46 (1992): 245-55.
208. Carolyn L. Connor, "The Setting and Function of a Byzantine Miracle Cult," 1990 Annual
Conference of the College Art Association, New York: Abstracts and Program Statements (New
York, 1990), 69-70.
209. John J. Yiannias, "The Palaeologan Refectory Program at Apollonia," The Twilight of
Byzantium, ed. Curcic and Mouriki, 161—74. See also John J. Yiannias, "The Refectory Paintings
of Mount Athos: An Interpretation," in The Byzantine Tradition after the Fall of Constantinople,
ed. John J. Yiannias (Charlottesville: University Press of Virginia, 1991), 269-302.
210. Nancy Patterson Sevcenko, Illustrated Manuscripts of the Metaphrastian Menologion (Chicago:
University of Chicago Press, 1990). See also Nancy Patterson Sevcenko, "The Walters 'Imperial'
Menologion," Journal of the Walters Art Gallery 51 (1993): 43-64.
211. Kazhdan and Maguire, "Byzantine Hagiographical Texts as Sources on Art," 1—22.
212. Henry Maguire, "From the Evil Eye to the Eye of Justice: The Saints, Art, and Justice in
Byzantium," in Law and Society in Byzantium: Ninth-Twelfth Centuries, ed. Angeliki E. Laiou and
Dieter Simon (Washington, D.C.: Dumbarton Oaks, 1994), 217—39.
213. Henry Maguire, "Disembodiment and Corporality in Byzantine Images of the Saints," in
Iconography at the Crossroads, ed. Cassidy, 75-90.
214. Liz James, "Monks, Monastic Art, the Sanctoral Cycle and the Middle Byzantine Church," in
The Theotokos Evergitis and Eleventh-Century Monasticism, ed. Mullet and Kirby, 162—75.
215. Lois Drewer, "Saints and their Families in Byzantine Art," Deltion tes Christianities
Archaiologikes Hetaireias, ser. 4, 16 (1991—92), 259—70.
216. Thalia Gouma-Peterson, "Narrative Cycles of Saints' Lives in Byzantine Churches from the
Tenth to the Mid-fourteenth Century," Greek Orthodox Theological Review 30 (1985): 31—44.
217. Anthony: Svetlana Tomekovic, "Le cycle inédit de Saint Antoine dans l'église sous son
vocable à Soughia (Crète)," Byzantinische Forschungen 11 (1987): 445-63; Constantine the Great:
Maria Vassilaki, "Eikonogaphikoi kykloi apo te zoe tou Megalou Konstantinou," Kretike hestia, ser.
4, 1 (1987): 60-84; and Klaus Gallas, "Ein kretischer Konstantin-Freskenzyklus aus dem Anfang
des 14. Jahrhunderts," in Festschrift für Klaus Wessel (Munich: Maris, 1988), 125—30; Marina:
Jenny Albani, "The Wall Painting of the Church of Saint Marina at Mournes on Crete: An
Unknown Biographical Cycle of St. Marina," Deltion tes Christianikes Archaiologikes Hetaireias,
ser. 4, 17 (1993-94): 211-22 (Greek with English summary, 221-22).

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218. Temily Mark-Weiner, "Narrative Cycles of the Life of St. George in Byzantine Art" (Ph.D.
diss., New York Univ., 1977); and Nancy Patterson Sevcenko, The Life of Saint Nicholas in
Byzantine Art (Turin: Bottega d'Erasmo, 1983). Henry Maguire, "Two Modes of Narration in
Byzantine Art," in Byzantine East, Latin West, ed. Mouriki et al., 385—96, discusses the absence of
vivid details in the depiction of scenes from the life of Nicholas in contrast to that of the life of
Christ. Recent studies on hagiographical topics include: Archangels: Smiljka Gabelic, Cycles of the
Archangels in Byzantine Art (Belgrade, 1991) (Serbian with English summary, 139-48); and Silas
Koukiares, Miracles and Appearances ofAngels and Archangels in the Byzantine Art of the Balkans
(Athens: Dodone, 1989) (Greek with English summary, 206-08); Cypriot saints: Doula Mouriki,
"The Cult of Cypriot Saints in Medieval Cyprus as attested by Church Decoration and Icon
Painting," in "The Sweet Land of Cyprus," Papers Given at the Twenty-Fifth Jubilee Spring
Symposium of Byzantine Studies, Birmingham, March 1991, ed. A. A. M. Bryer and G. S.
Georghallides (Birmingham: Centre for Byzantine, Ottoman and Modern Greek Studies, University
of Birmingham; Nicosia: Cyprus Research Centre, 1993), 237—77; Eustace of Rome: Catherine
Jolivet-Lévy, "Hagiographie cappadocienne: À propos de quelques images nouvelles de saint Hiéron
et de saint Eustache," Euphrosynon, 1: 205-18; Catherine Jolivet-Lévy, "Trois nouvelles
représentations de la Vision d'Eustache en Cappadoce," Monuments et mémoires 72 (1991): 101-06;
Nicole Thierry, "Le culte du cerf en Anatolie et la Vision de saint Eustache," Monuments et
mémoires 72 (1991): 33-100; Nicole Thierry, "Vision d'Eustache, vision de Procope: Nouvelles
donnés sur l'iconographie funéraire byzantine," Harmos, 3:1845-60; and Tania Velmans, "L'église
de Zenobani et le thème de la vision de saint Eustache en Géorgie," Cahiers archéologiques 33
(1985): 18-49; Monks: Svetlana Tomekovié, "Formation de l'iconographie monastique orientale
(VIlIe-Xe siècles)," Revue bénédictine 103 (1993): 131-52; and Svetlana Tomekovié, "Le 'portrait'
dans l'art byzantin: Exemple d'effigies de moines du Ménologe de Basile II à Decani," in Decani
et l'art byzantin au milieu du XIVe siècle, ed. Djurié, 121-33; Patron Saints: Svetlana Tomekovié,
"Les repercussions du choix du saint patron sur le programme iconographique des églises du 12e
siècle en Macédoine et dans le Péloponnèse," Zograf 12 (1981): 25-42; Prophets: Ljubica D.
Popovich, "Compositional and Theological Concepts in Four Prophet Cycles in Churches Selected
from the Period of King Milutin (1282—1321)," Cyrillomethodianum 8-9 (1984—85): 283—317;
Stylites: Catherine Jolivet-Lévy, "Contribution à l'étude de l'iconographie mésobyzantine des deux
Syméon Stylites," in Les saints et leur sanctuaire à byzance: Textes, images et monuments, ed.
Catherine Jolivet-Lévy, Michel Kaplan, and Jean-Pierre Sodini (Paris: Publications de la Sorbonne,
1993), 35-47; Jean-Pierre Sodini, "Nouvelles eulogies de Syméon," in Les saints et leur sanctuaire
à byzance, 25-33; and Jean-Pierre Sodini, "Remarques sur l'iconographie de Syméon l'Alépin, le
premier stylite," Monuments et mémoires 70 (1989): 29-53; Theodosia: George Galavaris, "Two
Icons of St. Theodosia at Sinai," Deltion tes Christianikes Archaiologikes Hetaireias, ser. 4, 17
(1993—94), 313—16; and Doula Mouriki, "Portraits of St. Theodosia in Five Sinai Icons," in
Thymiama [Festschrift for Laskarina Bouras] (Athens: Benaki Museum, 1994), 213—19.
219. Robin Cormack, Writing in Gold: Byzantine Society and its Icons (Oxford: George Philip,
1985). See also the review by Annemarie Weyl Carr, Art Bulletin 70 (1988): 145—48.
220. Nicolas Oikonomides, "The Contents of the Byzantine House from the Eleventh to the
Fifteenth Century," Dumbarton Oaks Papers 44 (1990): 205-14.
221. See Eunice Dauterman Maguire and Henry Maguire, "Byzantine Pottery in the History of Art,"
in Demetra Papanikola-Bakirtze, Ceramic Art from Byzantine Serres, Catalogue of an exhibition
held at the Krannert Art Museum, Illinois Byzantine Studies 3 (Urbana: University of Illinois Press,
1992), 1-20.

91.12.174.206 on Sat, 12 Aug 2023 20:05:58 +00:00
222. Philippe Verdier, "A Medallion of Saint Symeon the Younger," Bulletin of the Cleveland
Museum of Art 61 (1980): 17—27; and Drewer, "Saints and their Families in Byzantine Art," 264,
266-67.
223. Ch. Bakirtzis, "Byzantine Ampullae from Thessaloniki," in The Blessings of Pilgrimage, ed.
Ousterhout, 140-49. See also the lead ampulla with St. Demetrius and St. George and the Church
of the Holy Sepulchre in the British Museum; Byzantium: Treasures of Byzantine Art and Culture
from British Collections, ed. David Buckton (London: British Museum, 1994), cat. 202, where it
is dated to the twelfth or thirteenth century.
224. Henry Maguire, "The Cage of Crosses: Ancient and Medieval Sculptures on the 'Little
Metropolis' in Athens," Thymiama, 169-72.
225. Anthony Cutler, "Art in Byzantine Society: Motive Forces of Byzantine Patronage," Jahrbuch
der Österreichischen Byzantinistik 31 (1981): 328-84; rpt. in Imagery and Ideology in Byzantine
Art (Aldershot, Hampshire: Variorum, 1992), ch. 11; Robin Cormack, "Aristocratic Patronage of
the Arts in 11th- and 12th-Century Byzantium," in The Byzantine Aristocracy IX to XIII Centuries,
ed. Michael Angold, BAR International Series 221 (Oxford: B.A.R., 1984), 158-72; and Robin
Cormack, "Patronage and New Programs of Byzantine Iconography," Seventeenth International
Byzantine Congress: Major Papers (Washington D. C.: Dumbarton Oaks, Georgetown University,
1986), 609-38.
226. This is in contrast to the view of V. J. Djuric, "La peinture murale byzantine: XIIe et XIIIe
siècles," in Actes du XVe Congrès international d'études byzantines, Athènes - Septembre 1976, vol.
1 (Athens, 1979), 159-252.
227. Anthony Cutler, "Uses of Luxury: On the Functions of Consumption and Symbolic Capital in
Byzantine Culture," in Byzance et les images, ed. Guillou and Durand, 287-327. See also Lydie
Hadermann-Misguich, "Tissus de pouvoir et de prestige sous les Macédoniens et les Comnènes: À
propos des coussins-de-pieds et de leurs représentations," Deltion tes Christianikes Archaiologikes
Hetaireias, ser. 4, 17 (1993—94): 121-42.
228. Maria Panayotidi, "The Question of the Role of the Donor and of the Painter: A Rudimentary
Approach," Deltion tes Christianikes Archaiologikes Hetaireias, ser. 4, 17 (1993—94): 143—56. See
also Maria Panayotidi, "The Character of Monumental Painting in the Tenth Century: The Question
of Patronage," in Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus and His Age, European Cultural Center of
Delphi, Second International Byzantine Conference, Delphi, 22—26 July 1987 (Athens, 1989),
285-331.
229. On St. Neophytos and the paintings in his hermitage see also Cyril Mango and E. J. W.
Hawkins, "The Hermitage of St. Neophytos and Its Wall Paintings," Dumbarton Oaks Papers 20
(1966): 119-206; Ann Wharton Epstein, "Formulas for Salvation: A Comparison of Two Byzantine
Monasteries and Their Founders," Church History 50 (1981): 385-400; Cormack, Writing in Gold,
215—51; Catia Galatariotou, The Making of a Saint: The Life, Times, and Sanctification of
Neophytos the Recluse (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1991); and Svetlana Tomekovic,
"Ermitage de Paphos: décors peints pour Néophytos le Reclus," in Les saints et leur sanctuaire à
byzance, ed. Jolivet-Lévy, Kaplan, and Sodini, 151-71.

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230. Annemarie Weyl Carr, "Women and Monasticism in Byzantium: Introduction from an Art
Historian," Byzantinische Forschungen 9 (1985): 1—15; and Irmgard Hutter, "Das Bild der Frau in
der byzantinischen Kunst," in Byzantios: Festschrift für Herbert Hunger zum 70. Geburtstag, ed.
W. Hörander et al. (Vienna: Ernst Beevar, 1984), 163—70.
231. Lucy-Anne Hunt, "A Woman's Prayer to St. Sergios in Latin Syria: Interpreting a Thirteenth
Century Icon at Mount Sinai," Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies 15 (1991): 96-145.
232. Nancy Patterson Sevcenko, "The Representation of Donors and Holy Figures on Four
Byzantine Icons," Deltion tes Christianikes Archaiologikes Hetaireias, ser. 4,17 ( 1993—94): 157-64.
On the visual relationship of donors (male and female) with their patron saints see also Nancy
Patterson Sevcenko, "Close Encounters: Contact between Holy Figures and the Faithful as
represented in Byzantine Works of Art," in Byzance et les images, ed. Guillou and Durand, 255—85.
233. Myrtali Acheimastou-Potamianou, "The Byzantine Wall Paintings of Vlacherna Monastery

(Area of Arta)," in Actes du xve Congrès international d'études byzantines, Athènes - Septembre
1976,2A (Athens, 1981), 1-14; Myrtali Acheimastou-Potamianou, "The Basilissa Anna Palaiologina
of Arta and the Monastery of Vlacherna," in Women and Byzantine Monasticism, ed. Perreault,
43—49; and Nancy Patterson Sevcenko, "Servants," 550, fig. 1.
234. Branislav Cvetkovic, "The Investiture Relief in Arta, Epiros," Zbomik Radova Vizantoloskog
Instituta 33 (1994): 103-12, proposes that Anna Palaiologina was also the patron of the
enlargements to the church of St. Theodora in Arta, and that she is the woman ruler represented in
the relief above St. Theodora's tomb. For another promising approach to the question of women
and Byzantine art see John Cotsonis, "Women and Sphragistic Iconography: A Means of
Investigating Gender-Related Piety," Byzantine Studies Conference, Abstracts of Papers 19 (1993):
59.
235. Henry Maguire, "Style and Ideology in Byzantine Imperial Art," Gesta 28 (1990): 217-31. On
the garden metaphor see also Henry Maguire, "Imperial Gardens and the Rhetoric of Renewal," in
New Cons tontines, ed. Magdalino, 181—98.
236. For Byzantine textual and visual comparisions of emperors to angels see also Henry Maguire,
"A Murderer among the Angels: The Frontispiece Miniatures of Paris. Gr. 510 and the Iconography
of the Archangels," in The Sacred Image East and West, ed. Ousterhout and Brubaker, 63—71.
237. Catherine Jolivet-Lévy, "L'image du pouvoir dans l'art byzantin à l'époque de la dynastie
macédonienne (867—1056)," Byzantion 57 (1987): 441—70. See also Leslie Brubaker, "To Legitimize
an Emperor: Constantine and Visual Authority in the Eighth and Ninth Centuries," in New
Constantines, ed. Magdalino, 139-58; and Robin Cormack, "The Emperor at St. Sophia: Viewer
and Viewed," in Byzance et les images, ed. Guillou and Durand, 223—53.
238. Paul Magdalino and Robert Nelson, "The Emperor in Byzantine Art of the Twelfth Century,"
Byzantinische Forschungen 8 (1982): 123-83; rpt. in Paul Magdalino, Tradition and Transformation
in Medieval Byzantium (Aldershot, Hampshire: Variorum, 1991), ch. 6.
239. Ibid, 124-26.

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240. Ioli Kalavrezou, "Irregular Marriages in the Eleventh Century and the Zoe and Constantine
Mosaic in Hagia Sophia," in Law and Society in Byzantium: Ninth—Twelfth Centuries, ed. Laiou and
Simon, 241—59.
241. On this mosaic see also Barbara Hill, Liz James, and Dion Smythe, "Zoe, the Rhythm Method
of Imperial Renewal," in New Constantines, ed. Magdalino, 223—25.
242. Ioli Kalavrezou, Nicolette Trahoulia, and Shalom Sabar, "Critique of the Emperor in the
Vatican Psalter gr. 752," Dumbarton Oaks Papers 47 (1993): 195—219.
243. Nicole Thierry, "Un portrait de Jean Tzimiskès en Cappadoce," Travaux et mémoires 9 (1985):
477-84. See also Lyn Rodley, "The Pigeon House Church, Çavuçin," Jahrbuch der Österreichischen
Byzantinistik 33 (1983): 301—39.
244. Carolyn L. Connor, "Hosios Loukas as a Victory Church," Greek, Roman and Byzantine
Studies 33 (1992): 293-308.
245. Maguire, "The Mosaics of Nea Moni," 205-14.
246. Doula Mouriki, The Mosaics of Nea Moni on Chios (Athens: Commercial Bank of Greece,
1985), 147-^48. Mouriki and others have argued that in the bearded Solomon (who is usually
represented clean-shaven) of the Anastasis scene may be recognized a portrait of the donor,
Constantine IX Monomachus, who saw himself as a New Solomon. See Mouriki, 137—38; and
Maguire, "The Mosaics of Nea Moni," 212-13, with other references.
247. Ernst Kitzinger, "The Mosaics of the Cappella Palatina in Palermo: An Essay on the Choice
and Arrangement of Subjects," Art Bulletin 31 (1949): 269-92; rpt. in The Art of Byzantium and
the Medieval West, ed. Kleinbauer, 290-319; and Slobodan Curcic, "Some Palatine Aspects of the
Cappella Palatina in Palermo," Dumbarton Oaks Papers 41 (1987): 125—44.
248. See also Ernst Kitzinger, "Mosaic Decoration in Sicily under Roger II and the Classical
Byzantine System of Church Decoration," in Italian Church Decoration of the Middle Ages and
Early Renaissance: Functions, Forms and Regional Traditions, Ten Contributions to a Colloquium
held at the Villa Spelman, Florence, ed. William Tronzo, Villa Spelman Colloquia 1 (Bologna:
Nuova Alfa, 1989), 147—65; William Tronzo, "The Medieval Object-Enigma, and the Problem of
the Cappella Palatina in Palermo," Word and Image 9 (1993): 197—228; and Beat Brenk, "Zur
Bedeutung des Mosaiks an der Westwand der Cappella Palatina in Palermo," in Studien zur byzan
tinischen Kunstgeschichte: Festschrift fur Horst Hallensleben zum 65. Geburtstag, ed. Borkopp,
Schellewald, and Theis, 185-94.
249. Mark J. Johnson, "The Episcopal and Royal Views at Cefalù," Gesta 33 (1994): 118-31. On
the royal iconography of the tenth-century palace church at Alt'amar see Lynn Jones, "The Church
of the Holy Cross and the Iconography of Kingship," Gesta 33 (1994): 104—17.
250. Otto Demus, Byzantine Art and the West (New York: New York University Press, 1970). For
analysis of the relationship between the capital of Byzantium and its "provincial" outposts see
Annabel Jane Wharton, Art of Empire: Painting and Architecture of the Byzantine Periphery: A
Comparative Study of Four Provinces (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press, 1988).

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251. Kaiserin Theophanu: Begegnung des Ostens und Westens um die Wende des ersten Jahr
tausends, Gedenkschrift des Kölner Schnütgen-Museums zum 1000. Todesjahr der Kaiserin, ed.
Anton von Euw and Peter Schreiner (Cologne: Schnütgen-Museum, 1991); Kunst im Zeitalter der
Kaiserin Theophanu, Akten des Internationalen Colloquiums veranstaltet vom Schnütgen-Museum,
Köln, 13.—15. Juni 1991, ed. Anton von Euw and Peter Schreiner (Cologne: Locher, 1993);
Rosamond McKitterick, "Ottoman Intellectual Culture in the Tenth Century and the Role of
Theophanu," Early Medieval Europe 2 (1993): 53-54; Judith Herrin, "Theophano: Considerations
on the Education of a Byzantine Princess," in The Empress Theophano: Byzantium and the West
at the Turn of the First Millennium, ed. Adelbert Davids (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press,
1995), 64—85; and Hiltrud Westermann-Angerhausen, "Did Theophano Leave Her Mark on the
Ottonian Sumptuary Arts?" in The Empress Theophano, ed. Davids, 244—64.
252. Robert S. Nelson, "A Byzantine Painter in Trecento Genoa: The Last Judgment at S. Lorenzo,"
Art Bulletin 67 (1985): 548-66; and Paul Hetherington, "A Purchase of Byzantine Relics and
Reliquaries in Fourteenth-Century Venice," Arte veneta 37 (1983): 9-30.
253. Anne Derbes, "Documenting the Maniera Greca," Byzantine Studies Conference, Abstracts of
Papers 20 (1994): 35—36. Anne Derbes's book, Picturing the Passion in Late Medieval Italy:
Narrative Painting, Franciscan Ideologies, and the Levant, is forthcoming from Cambridge
University Press.
254. Belting, The Image and its Public, 21—22.
255. Anne Derbes, "Images East and West: The Ascent of the Cross," in The Sacred Image East
and West, ed. Ousterhout and Brubaker, 110-31. Among the case studies of the interplay of
Byzantine and Western medieval art see: Hans Belting, "The 'Byzantine' Madonnas: New Facts
about Their Italian Origin and Some Observations on Duccio," Studies in the History of Art 12
(1982): 7—22; Birgitt Borkopp and Barbara Schellewald, '"Hinter vorgehaltener Hand'
Byzantinische Elfenbeinkunst im Westen," in Studien zur byzantinischen Kunstgeschichte
Festschrift für Horst Hallensleben zum 65. Geburtstag, ed. Borkopp, Schellewald, Theis, 147—71
Rebecca W. Corrie, "The Political Meaning of Coppo di Marcovaldo's Madonna and Child in
Siena," Gesta 29 (1990): 61—75; Anthony Cutler, "The Cult of the Galaktotrophousa in Byzantium
and Italy," Jahrbuch der Österreichischen Byzantinistik 37 (1987): 335—50; Anne Derbes, "Siena
and the Levant in the Later Dugento," Gesta 28 (1989): 190-204; Lois Drewer, "Margaret of
Antioch the Demon-Slayer, East and West: The Iconography of the Predella of the Boston Mystic
Marriage of St. Catherine," Gesta 32 (1993): 11-20; Jaroslav Folda, "The Kahn and Mellon
Madonnas: Icon or Altarpiece?" in Byzantine East, Latin West, ed. Mouriki et al., 501—10;
Jacqueline Lafontaine-Dosogne, "Le cycle de sainte Marguerite d'Antioche à la cathédrale de
Tournai et sa place dans la tradition romane et byzantine," Revue belge d'archéologie et d'histoire
de l'art 61 (1992): 87—125; Jacqueline Lafontaine-Dosogne, "Iconographie comparée du cycle de
l'enfance de la Vierge à Byzance et en Occident, de la fin du IXe au début du XIIIe siècle," Cahiers
de civilisation médiévale 32 (1989): 291-303; Jacqueline Lafontaine-Dosogne, "L'influence
artistique byzantine dans la région Meuse-Rhin du VIIIe au début du XIIIe siècle," in Byzantine
East, Latin West, ed. Mouriki et al., 181-92; Doula Mouriki, "Palaeologan Mistra and the West,"
in Byzantium and Europe, European Cultural Center of Delphi, First International Conference,
Delphi, 20-24 July 1985 (Athens, 1987), 209-46; Lyn Rodley, "The Writing on the Wall (or Not):
An Aspect of Byzantine Influence on Western Art," in England in the Twelfth Century, Proceedings
of the 1988 Harlaxton Symposium, ed. Daniel Williams (Woodbridge, N.H.: Boydell, 1990),
183-92; Archer St. Clair, "Narrative and Exegesis in the Exodus Illustrations of the San Paolo

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Bible: Aspects of Byzantine Influence," in Byzantine East, Latin West, ed. Mouriki et al., 193-202;
Il Medio Oriente e l'Occidente nell'arte del XIII secolo, Atti del XXIV Congresso internazionale
di storia dell'arte 2, ed. Hans Belting (Bologna: CLUEB, 1982); and Byzanz und der Westen:
Studien zur Kunst des europäischen Mittelalters (Vienna: Verlag der Österreichischen Akademie
der Wissenschaften, 1984).
256. Annemarie Weyl Carr, "East, West, and Icons in Twelfth-Century Outremer," in The Meeting
of Two Worlds: Cultural Exchange between East and West during the Period of the Crusades, ed.
Vladimir P. Goss and Christine Verzâr Bornstein (Kalamazoo, Mich.: Medieval Institute
Publications, 1986), 347—59; Jaroslav Folda, The Art of the Crusaders in the Holy Land, 1098-1187
(Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1995); Jaroslav Folda, ed., Crusader Art in the Twelfth
Century, BAR International Series 152 (Oxford: B.A.R., 1982); Jaroslav Folda, The Nazareth
Capitals and the Crusader Shrine of the Annunciation (University Park: Pennsylvania State
University Press, 1986); Jaroslav Folda, "The Saint Marina Icon: Maniera Cypria, Lingua Franca,
or Crusader Art?" in Four Icons, ed. Davezac, 106-33; Bianca Kiihnel, Crusader Art of the Twelfth
Century: A Geographical, an Historical, or an Art-Historical Notion? (Berlin: Gebr. Mann, 1994);
Gustav Kühnel, Wall Painting in the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem (Berlin: Gebr. Mann, 1988); and
Kurt Weitzmann, Studies in the Arts at Sinai, Essays (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1982),
211^108.
257. Barbara Zeitler, "Cross-Cultural Interpretations of Imagery in the Middle Ages," Art Bulletin
76 (1994): 680-94.
258. Lucy-Anne Hunt, "Art and Colonialism: The Mosaics of the Church of the Nativity in
Bethlehem (1169) and the Problem of'Crusader' Art," Dumbarton Oaks Papers 45 (1991): 69-85.
For "Orientalism" in the historiography of cultural relations between West and East in Late
Antiquity and the Middle Ages see Thelma K. Thomas, "'Orientalism' and the Creation of Early
Byzantine Style in the East," Byzantine Studies Conference, Abstracts of Papers 16 (1990): 58-59;
Annabel Jane Wharton, "Good and Bad Images from the Synagogue of Dura Europos: Contexts,
Subtexts, Intertexts," Art History 17 (1994): 1-25; and the papers presented at the College Art
Association session chaired by Annabel Wharton, "The Byzantine and Islamic Other: Orientalism
in Art History." See also the cross-cultural relations in Christian Egypt examined by Robert S.
Nelson, "An Icon at Mt. Sinai and Christian Painting in Muslim Egypt During the Thirteenth and
Fourteenth Centuries," Art Bulletin 65 (1983): 201-18; and Lucy-Anne Hunt, "Christian-Muslim
Relations in Painting in Egypt of the Twelfth to mid-Thirteenth Centuries," Cahiers archéologiques
33 (1985): 111-55.
Index of Christian Art,

Princeton University

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Late Antique and Early Christian Art

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Approaches to Byzantine Iconography

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Orality and Imagery

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Text and Image: Manuscript Illumination

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Pilgrimage and Art

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In "Art, Medicine and Magic in Early Byzantium"65 Vikan demonstrates

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In spite of the burgeoning scholarship on the role of women in Early

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One of the most exciting developments in recent Early Christian and

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Discussion of the question of the function of images in Byzantium cente

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The restoration of icons in 843 was apparently not followed by an

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Eisner119 compares the treatment of the theme of the Transfiguration of

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Manuscript Illumination: Model and Copy

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Rhetoric, Ekphraseis, and Epigrams

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