Moving Bones

Author(s):  
Judith Herrin

The rulers of Byzantium had a specific burial place, which had been established by Constantine I—the imperial mausoleum later attached to the Church of the Holy Apostles. The eponymous founder of the city was the first to be laid to rest in the mausoleum he had constructed, which was probably finished by his son Constantius II. By the sixth century so many emperors had joined him there that Justinian constructed another mausoleum similarly attached to the church for his own burial. A record compiled in the tenth century and attached to the Book of Ceremonies preserves an identification of some of these tombs in the two imperial mausolea. A slightly fuller Latin version is also preserved and was studied by Philip Grierson in 1962. From this document it is possible to find out which emperors and empresses ended up in the most desirable tombs in the capital. The survival of this information, when put together with other historical records, makes it clear that imperial bones were often moved around. This chapter traces some of their most surprising journeys.

1993 ◽  
Vol 24 ◽  
pp. 37-55 ◽  
Author(s):  
G. R. H. Wright

AbstractA small Christian monument of centralised plan built against the West Wall of Apollonia was excavated and slightly restored by the Libyan Department of Antiquities under the directorship of the late Professor Goodchild during the sixties. In 1967 the present writer, then architect to the Michigan Apollonia Expedition, was commissioned to make a set of drawings of the monument as a basis for its publication by Professor Goodchild to appear in the Michigan Report. Professor Goodchild's untimely death in 1968 nullified the project and eventually in its stead only a cursory notice of the monument appeared. The substantive treatment of the monument, utilising the prepared set of drawings, was reserved for the long laboured Corpus of Christian Antiquities of Cyrenaica. Unfortunately in turn this design was frustrated by the death of Professor Ward Perkins in 1986 so that the detailed drawings of the monument remained unpublished for 25 years. In 1991 old prints of the drawings were recovered and are published here with a commentary.This small square monument with a dome on four pillars giving a rudimentary cross-in-square plan is of late sixth century date. It is clearly sepulchral, whether it be a simple tomb or a martyrion. Thus in spite of its provincial guise it is of interest and significance (together with the Church at Qasr el Lebia) in the long vexed question of the origins of the ecumenical Byzantine cross-in-square plan.


1960 ◽  
Vol 28 (1) ◽  
pp. 70-90
Author(s):  
Walter M. Widrig ◽  
Richard Goodchild

Apollonia in Cyrenaica was founded by the Greeks as the port for the city of Cyrene, from which it is some 20 km. distant. In the Roman period its prosperity was such that it received autonomy and became one of the five cities of the Pentapolis; by the sixth century A.D. it had surpassed both Gyrene and Ptolemais in importance. Christian sources more commonly refer to Apollonia as ‘Sozusa,’ and it is from this Christian designation that the present Arab name of ‘Susa’ is derived.Witness to Apollonia's nourishing Christian life are its extensive Byzantine remains. Among these figure at least four churches, three of which have now been excavated, and what is probably the palace of the governor of the Pentapolis himself, the most recent structure to have been uncovered. What follows is a report on the ‘West’ Church excavated by the Department of Antiquities of the Provincial Government of Cyrenaica during the spring, summer, and fall of 1958 and again in the spring and summer of 1959. The consolidation and reconstruction of the church were begun simultaneously with the excavation and are still in progress.The West Church at Apollonia was first plotted by the Beecheys in 1821–1822. In their plan of Apollonia the church appears with a quite extensive forecomplex. Intervening time plus in some places an overlay of small Italian buildings completely obscured the outlines of the church and caused the forecomplex to disappear from view altogether. Yet excavation of the site has proved the Beecheys essentially correct.


1994 ◽  
Vol 47 (1) ◽  
pp. 1-38
Author(s):  
Peter Jeffery

From the fourth to the twelfth century, the city of Jerusalem had its own liturgical rite and chant repertory, which used the Greek language. Until recently, however, very little was known about this tradition because hardly any medieval manuscripts of it survived. But the Greek texts were translated into Georgian when the church of Georgia adopted the rite of Jerusalem as its own, and critical editions of these translations, made from tenth-century manuscripts, have recently been published. The translations show that the chant repertory of Jerusalem exercised much influence on the other medieval chant repertories in Greek, Syriac, Armenian, and Latin. When texts from Jerusalem survive in these other traditions, they tend to be set to melodies that are consistent with the modal assignments and neumes of the Georgian sources. This suggests that the features these melodies share do go back in some way to the lost melodies that were once sung in Jerusalem itself.


2013 ◽  
Vol 54 (4-5) ◽  
pp. 405-424
Author(s):  
Alina Nowicka -Jeżowa

Summary The article tries to outline the position of Piotr Skarga in the Jesuit debates about the legacy of humanist Renaissance. The author argues that Skarga was fully committed to the adaptation of humanist and even medieval ideas into the revitalized post-Tridentine Catholicism. Skarga’s aim was to reformulate the humanist worldview, its idea of man, system of values and political views so that they would fit the doctrine of the Roman Catholic church. In effect, though, it meant supplanting the pluralist and open humanist culture by a construct as solidly Catholic as possible. He sifted through, verified, and re-interpreted the humanist material: as a result the humanist myth of the City of the Sun was eclipsed by reminders of the transience of all earthly goods and pursuits; elements of the Greek and Roman tradition were reconnected with the authoritative Biblical account of world history; and man was reinscribed into the theocentric perspective. Skarga brought back the dogmas of the original sin and sanctifying grace, reiterated the importance of asceticism and self-discipline, redefined the ideas of human dignity and freedom, and, in consequence, came up with a clear-cut, integrist view of the meaning and goal of the good life as well as the proper mission of the citizen and the nation. The polemical edge of Piotr Skarga’s cultural project was aimed both at Protestantism and the Erasmian tendency within the Catholic church. While strongly coloured by the Ignatian spirituality with its insistence on rigorous discipline, a sense of responsibility for the lives of other people and the culture of the community, and a commitment to the heroic ideal of a miles Christi, taking headon the challenges of the flesh, the world, Satan, and the enemies of the patria and the Church, it also went a long way to adapt the Jesuit model to Poland’s socio-cultural conditions and the mentality of its inhabitants.


2017 ◽  
Vol 72 (1) ◽  
pp. 101-111
Author(s):  
Florian Mazel

Dominique Iogna-Prat’s latest book, Cité de Dieu, cité des hommes. L’Église et l’architecture de la société, 1200–1500, follows on both intellectually and chronologically from La Maison Dieu. Une histoire monumentale de l’Église au Moyen Âge (v. 800–v. 1200). It presents an essay on the emergence of the town as a symbolic and political figure of society (the “city of man”) between 1200 and 1700, and on the effects of this development on the Church, which had held this function before 1200. This feeds into an ambitious reflection on the origins of modernity, seeking to move beyond the impasse of political philosophy—too quick to ignore the medieval centuries and the Scholastic moment—and to relativize the effacement of the institutional Church from the Renaissance on. In so doing, it rejects the binary opposition between the Church and the state, proposes a new periodization of the “transition to modernity,” and underlines the importance of spatial issues (mainly in terms of representation). This last element inscribes the book in the current of French historiography that for more than a decade has sought to reintroduce the question of space at the heart of social and political history. Iogna-Prat’s stimulating demonstration nevertheless raises some questions, notably relating to the effects of the Protestant Reformation, the increasing power of states, and the process of “secularization.” Above all, it raises the issue of how a logic of the polarization of space was articulated with one of territorialization in the practices of government and the structuring of society—two logics that were promoted by the ecclesial institution even before states themselves.


2007 ◽  
Vol 1047 ◽  
Author(s):  
Eleni Pavlidou ◽  
N. Civici ◽  
E. Caushi ◽  
L. Anastasiou ◽  
T. Zorba ◽  
...  

AbstractIn this paper are presented the studies of the paint materials and the technique used in 18th century wall paintings, originated from the orthodox church of St Athanasius, in the city of Maschopolis, a flourishing economical and cultural center, in Albania. The church was painted in 1745 by Konstantinos and Athanasios Zografi, and during the last years, restoration activities are being performed at the church. Samples that included plasters and pigments of different colors were collected from important points of the wall paintings. Additionally, as some parts of the wall-paintings were over-painted, the analysis was extended to the compositional characterization of these areas. The identification of the used materials was done by using complementary analytical methods such as Optical Microscopy, Fourier Transform Infrared spectroscopy (FTIR), Scanning Electron Microscopy (SEM-EDS) and X-ray fluorescence (TXRF).The presence of calcite in almost all the pigments is indicative for the use of the fresco technique at the studied areas, while the detection of gypsum and calcium oxalate, indicates an environmental degradation along with a biodegradation. Common pigments used in this area at 15-16th centuries, such as cinnabar, green earth, manganese oxide, carbon black and calcite were identified.


2011 ◽  
Vol 122 (6) ◽  
pp. 297-298
Author(s):  
Christopher Cocksworth
Keyword(s):  
The City ◽  

Urban History ◽  
2010 ◽  
Vol 37 (3) ◽  
pp. 419-433
Author(s):  
FLAMINIA BARDATI

ABSTRACT:On account of their dual function as princes of the church and agents for the king of France, the French cardinals in Rome constitute a well-defined and self-contained community. They were governed by complex internal dynamics as well as by the need to present a unified front to the pope, in addition to the College of Cardinals and the citizenry of Rome. French cardinals present in Rome between 1490 and 1560 were mobile, as their physical presence in the city was not continuous: a number of them were stable residents in Rome, charged with diplomatic missions, while others only attended the conclaves. A special case is that of Jean du Bellay, who became fully integrated into the life of the city, established a literary salon open to artists and poets, and was involved in the study of Antiquities and the construction of a villa-garden complex, the Horti Bellayani.


Sign in / Sign up

Export Citation Format

Share Document