Byzantine art is the term commonly used to describe the artistic products of the Eastern Roman Empire from about the 5th century until the fall of Constantinople in 1453. (The Roman Empire during this period is conventionally known as the Byzantine Empire.)
The term can also be used for the art of states which were contemporary with the Byzantine Empire and shared a common culture with it, without actually being part of it, such as Bulgaria, Serbia or Russia, and also Venice, which had close ties to the Byzantine Empire despite being in other respects part of western European culture. It can also be used for the art of peoples of the former Byzantine Empire under the rule of the Ottoman Empire after 1453. In some respects the Byzantine artistic tradition has continued in Greece, Russia and other Eastern Orthodox countries to the present day.
Byzantine art grew from the art of Ancient Greece (see Greek art), and at least before 1453 never lost sight of its classical heritage, but was distinguished from it in a number of ways. The most profound of these was that the humanist ethic of Ancient Greek art was replaced by a Christian ethic. If the purpose of classical art was the glorification of man, the purpose of Byzantine art was the glorification of God, and particularly of his son, Jesus.
This had a number of consequences. The depiction of the male nude had been at the centre of the classical artistic tradition from its beginnings, and the female nude had been similarly elevated from the 4th century BC onwards. But the triumph of Christianity brought with it a sexual conservatism derived from its roots in Judaism, and the nude was banished from its dominant position in art.
In place of the nude, the figures of God the Father, Jesus Christ, the Virgin Mary, and the saints and martyrs of Christian tradition were elevated, and became the dominant - indeed almost exclusive - focus of Byzantine art. One of the most important forms of Byzantine art was, and still is, the icon: an image of Christ, the Virgin (particularly the Virgin and Child), or a saint, used as an object of veneration in Orthodox churches and private homes.
Another consequence of the triumph of Christianity was a decline in the importance of naturalistic representation in art. This is sometimes interpreted as a decline in artistic skills and standards, and it is true that some of the technical expertise of the classical world, particularly in sculpture, was lost in the Byzantine world.
The Byzantines also lost interest in the realistic depiction of actual people. Since no-one knew what Christ and the saints and martyrs actually looked like, ideal images were used, and this became the norm of Byzantine art. The only real exception to this was portraits of the Emperors, but even these came to be depictions of the imperial ideal than actual personal portraiture. There was a revival in realistic portraiture from the 12th century onwards, a development which some art historians believe influenced the Renaissance in western Europe.
The Byzantines did not see these changes as representing as a decline from the days of Ancient Greece. They saw it as the harnessing of artistic skill to the service of the one true religion, rather than using it for the production of pagan idols or the gratification of personal vanity and sensual pleasure, as the ancients (in their view) had done. While the classical artist strove to depict physical perfection in the human form, the Byzantine artist sought to depict the inner or spiritual nature of his subjects. To this end simplification and stylisation were perfectly acceptable.
In any case, it was only in some areas, principally sculpture, that the Byzantines lost the technical attainments of the ancients. In other areas they developed new techniques and reached new heights. Byzantine gold and silversmithing, enamel-work, jewellery and textiles were the equal of anything done in ancient times. In mosaics and icon-painting they developed major and original art forms of their own. In architecture they achieved masterpieces such as Hagia Sophia, a building of superior scale and magnificence to anything in the ancient world.
Artistic forms characteristic of Byzantine art began to develop in the Roman Empire as early as the 4th century, as the classical tradition declined in vitality and eastern influences were more widely felt. The founding of Constantinople in 324 created a great new artistic centre for the eastern half of the Empire, and a specifically Christian one. But other artistic traditions flourished in rival cities such as Alexandria and Antioch, as well as Rome. It was not until all of these cities had fallen - the first two to the Arabs and Rome to the Goths - that Constantinople established its supremacy.
The first great age of Byzantine art coincided with the reign of Justinian I (483-565). Justinian was the last Emperor to see himself as the rightful ruler of the whole Greco-Roman world, and devoted much of his reign to reconquering Italy, North Africa and Spain. He also laid the foundations of the imperial absolutism of the Byzantine state, codifying its laws and imposing his religious views on all his subjects by law. Part of his program of imperial glory was a massive building program, including Hagia Sophia and the Church of the Holy Apostles in Constantinople and the Basilica of San Vitale in Ravenna.
The Justinian Age was followed by a decline, since most of Justinian's conquests were lost and the Empire faced acute crisis with the invasions of the Avars, Slavs and Arabs in the 7th century. Constantinople was also racked by religious and political conflict. The rise of Islam had important consequences for Byzantine art, because many Christians came to accept the Islamic view that the depiction of the human form was blasphemous. In 730 Emperor Leo III banned the use of images of Jesus, Mary, and the saints. This inaugurated the Iconoclastic period (see Iconoclasm), which lasted, with interruptions, until 843.
The century of iconoclasm, coinciding as it did with the military and political crisis of the Empire, saw a great decline in artistic achievement. Unable to depict human figures, mosaicists borrowed floral and other designs from Arab and Persian traditions, and the minor arts continued to flourish. But with icon-painting banned and the state too preoccupied with warfare to commission major buildings, this was a thin period for Byzantine art.
The lifting of the ban on icons was followed by the Macedonian Renaissance, beginning with the reign of Emperor Basil I the Macedonian in 867. In the 9th and 10th centuries the Empire's military situation improved, and art and architecture revived. New churches were again commissioned, and the Byzantine church mosaic style became standardised. One of the best known examples is at the Osios Lukas Monastery, near Athens. There was a revival of interest in classical themes and more sophisticated techniques were used to depict human figures.
The Macedonian emperors were followed by the Comnenan dynasty, beginning with the reign of Alexius I Comnenus in 1057. Although Byzantium was no longer a great power - following the Battle of Manzikert in 1071 it lost most of its eastern territories to the Seljuk Turks - the Comneni were great patrons of the arts, and with their support Byzantine artists continued to move in the direction of greater humanism and emotion in their works. Themes such as the Virgin and Child and the Threnos (the lamentation over Christ's body) became more common, as did naturalistic portraits of the Emperors.
The finest Byzantine work of this period was actually outside the Empire: the Basilica of St Mark in Venice, begun in 1063. The basilica is based on the great Church of the Holy Apostles in Constantinople, now destroyed, and is thus an echo of the age of Justinian. The acquisitive habits of the Venetians means that the basilica is also a great museum of Byzantine artworks of all kinds.
Eight hundred years of continuous Byzantine culture were brought to an abrupt end in 1204 with the sacking of Constantinople by the knights of the Fourth Crusade, a disaster from which the Empire never recovered. Although the Byzantines recovered the city in 1261, the Empire was thereafter a small and weak state confined to the Greek peninsula and the islands of the Aegean.
Nevertheless the Palaeologan Dynasty, beginning with Michael VIII Palaeologus in 1259, was a last golden age of Byzantine art, partly because of the increasing cultural exchange between Byzantine and Italian artists. Byzantine artists developed a new interest in landscapes and pastoral scenes, and Italian-style frescoes began to replace the traditional mosaic-work.
The Byzantine era properly defined came to an end with the fall of Constantinople to the Ottoman Turks in 1453, but by this time the Byzantine cultural heritage had been widely diffused, carried by the spread of Orthodox Christianity, to Bulgaria, Serbia, Romania and, most importantly, to Russia, which became the centre of the Orthodox world following the Ottoman conquest of the Balkans. Even under Ottoman rule, Byzantine traditions in icon-painting and other small-scale arts survived.
The influence of Byzantine art in western Europe, particularly Italy, was seen in ecclesiastical architecture, through the development of the Romanesque style in the 10th century and 11th centuries. This influence was transmitted through the Frankish and Salic emperors, primarily Charlemagne, who had close relations with Byzantium.
The empire emerged gradually after AD 330, when Constantine moved the capital of the Roman empire to Byzantium, which was later renamed Constantinople and is now Istanbul.
Early Byzantine architecture is essentially a continuation of Roman architecture. Prime examples survive mostly in Ravenna and Constantinople and include the churches of St Irene, St Sophia, and Sts Sergius and Bakchus, the latter often referred to as Little Hagia Sophia. Secular structures include the walls of Constantinople and Basilica Cistern. A frieze in the Ostrogothic palace in Ravenna (now S Apollinare Nuovo) depicts an early Byzantine palace.
The 4th-century church of St Irene in Constantinople is a superb sample of the early Byzantine architecture
Gradually, a style emerged which was influenced more by the architecture of the near east, and used the Greek cross plan for the church architecture which mostly stands today. Brick replaced stone, classical orders were used more freely, mosaics replaced carved decoration, and complex domes were erected.
As early as the building of Constantine's churches in Palestine there were two chief types of plan in use: the basilican, or axial, type, represented by the basilica at the Holy Sepulchre, and the circular, or central, type, represented by the great octagonal church once at Antioch. Those of the latter type we must suppose were nearly always vaulted, for a central dome would seem to furnish their very raison d'etre. The central space was sometimes surrounded by a very thick wall, in which deep recesses, to the interior, were formed, as at the noble church of St George, Salonica (5th century?), or by a vaulted aisle, as at Sta Costanza, Rome (4th century); or annexes were thrown out from the central space in such a way as to form a cross, in which these additions helped to counterpoise the central vault, as at the mausoleum of Galla Placidia, Ravenna (5th century). The most famous church of this type was that of the Holy Apostles, Constantinople. Vaults appear to have been early applied to the basilican type of plan; for instance, at St Irene, Constantinople (6th century), the long body of the church is covered by two domes.
At St Sergius, Constantinople, and San Vitale, Ravenna, churches of the central type, the space under the dome was enlarged by having apsidal additions made to the octagon. Finally, at Hagia Sophia (6th century) a combination was made which is perhaps the most remarkable piece of planning ever contrived. A central space of 100 ft (30 m) square is increased to 200 ft (60 m) in length by adding two hemicycles to it to the east and the west; these are again extended by pushing out three minor apses eastward, and two others, one on either side of a straight extension, to the west. This unbroken area, about 260 ft (80 m) long, the larger part of which is over 100 ft (30 m) wide, is entirely covered by a system of domical surfaces. Above the conchs of the small apses rise the two great semi-domes which cover the hemicycles, and between these bursts out the vast lome over the central square. On the two sides, to the north and south of the dome, it is supported by vaulted aisles in two storeys which bring the exterior form to a general square.
At the Holy Apostles (6th century) five domes were applied to a cruciform plan, that in the midst being the highest. After the 6th century there were no churches built which in any way competed in scale with these great works of Justinian, and the plans more or less tended to approximate to one type. The central area covered by the dome was included in a considerably larger square, of which the four divisions, to the east, west, north and south, were carried up higher in the vaulting and roof system than the four corners, forming in this way a sort of nave and transepts. Sometimes the central space was square, sometimes octagonal, or at least there were eight piers supporting the dome instead of four, and the nave and transepts were narrower in proportion.
If we draw a square and divide each side into three so that the middle parts are greater than the others, and then divide the area into nine from these points, we approximate to the typical setting out of a plan of this time. Now add three apses on the east side opening from the three divisions, and opposite to the west put a narrow entrance porch running right across the front. Still in front put a square court. The court is the atrium and usually has a fountain in the middle under a canopy resting on pillars. The entrance porch is the nartliex. The central area covered by the dome is the solea, the place for the choir of singers. Here also stood the ambo. Across the eastern side of the central square was a screen which divided off the bema, where the altar was situated, from the body of the church; this screen, bearing images, is the iconastasis. The altar was protected by a canopy or ciborium resting on pillars. Rows of rising seats around the curve of the apse with the patriarch's throne at the middle eastern point formed the syntironon. The two smaller compartments and apses at the sides of the bema were sacristies, the diaconicon and protozesis.
The continuous influence from the East is strangely shown in the fashion of decorating external brick walls of churches built about the 12th century, in which bricks roughly carved into form are set up so as to make bands of ornamentation which it is quite clear are imitated from Cufic writing. This fashion was associated with the disposition of the exterior brick and stone work generally into many varieties of pattern, zig-zags, key-patterns &c.; and, as similar decoration is found in many Persian buildings, it is probable that this custom also was derived from the East. The domes and vaults to the exterior were covered with lead or with tiling of the Roman variety. The window and door frames were of marble. The interior surfaces were adorned all over by mosaics or frescoes in the higher parts of the edifice, and below with incrustations of marble slabs, which were frequently of very beautiful varieties, and disposed so that, although in one surface, the coloring formed a series of large panels. The better marbles were opened out so that the two surfaces produced by the division formed a symmetrical pattern resembling somewhat the marking of skins of beasts.
Ultimately, Byzantine architecture in the West gave way to Romanesque and Gothic architecture. In the East it exerted a profound influence on early Islamic architecture, with notable examples including the Umayyad Great Mosque of Damascus and the Dome of the Rock in Jerusalem. In Russia, Romania, and other Orthodox countries the Byzantine architecture persisted even longer, finally giving birth to local schools of architecture.
Neo-Byzantine architecture had a small following in the wake of the Neo-Gothic of the nineteenth century. It was developed on a wide-scale basis in Russia by Konstantin Thon and his numerous disciples.
This article is published under the GNU
Free Documentation License.
It uses material from the Wikipedia
article "Art of Italy".