Chapter 9: Byzantium

anthemius of tralles and isidorus of miletus, interior of hagia sophia

Constantinople. Pendentive construction made possible Hagia Sophia's lofty dome, which seems to ride on a halo of light. a contemporary said the dome seemed to be suspended by a "golden chain from heaven"

Anthems of Tralles and Isidorus of Miletus, Hagia Sophia

Constantinople. aerial view of hagia sophia. Justinian's reign was the first golden age of byzantine art and architecture. hagia sophia was the most magnificent of more than 30 churches Justinian built or restored in Constantinople alone. Hagia Sophia is a domed basilica. Buttressing the great dome are eastern and western half-domes whose thrusts descend, in turn, into smaller half domes surmounting columned exedrae.

Anthems of Tralles and Isidorus of Miletus, plan of Hagia Sophia

In Hagia Sophia, Justinian's architects succeeded in fusing two previously independent architectural traditions: the vertically oriented central-plan building and longitudinally oriented basilica

Virgin (theotokos) and child enthroned, apse mosaic, hagia sophia

Istanbul, Constantinople. After the repeal of iconoclasm, Basil I dedicated a huge new mosaic in the apse of Hagia Sophia depicting the Virgin and Child enthroned. An inscription says it replaced one the iconoclasts destroyed.

Theodora and attendants, mosaic on the south wall of the apse, San Vitale

Justinian's counterpart on the opposite wall is the powerful empress theodora. neither she nor justinian ever visited Ravenna. San Vitale's mosaics are proxies for the absent sovereigns.

Plan of San Vitale

Ravenna, Italy. Centrally planned like Justinian's churches in Constantinople, San Vitale has a design featuring an off-axis narthex and two concentric octagons. A dome crowns the taller, inner octagon.

Choir and apse of San Vitale with mosaic of Christ between two angles, Saint Vitalis, and Bishop Ecclesius

Ravenna, Italy. In the apse vault, a youthful Christ, seated on the orb of the world at the time of his second coming, extends the gold martyr's wreath to Saint Vitalis. Bishop Ecclesius offers Christ a model of San Vitale.

San Vitale

Ravenna, Italy. Justinian's general Belisarius captured Ravenna from the Ostrogoths. The city became the seat of Byzantine dominion in Italy. San Vitale honored Saint Vitalis, a second-century Ravenna martyr.

Justinian, Bishop Maximianus, and attendants, mosaic on the north wall of the apse, San Vitale

San Vitale's mosaics revel the new Byzantine aesthetic. Justinian is foremost among the weightless and speechless frontal figures hovering before the viewer, their positions in space uncertain.

Virgin (Theotokos) and Child between Saints Theodore and George

icon. sixth or seventh century. encaustic on wood. Monastery of Saint Catherine, Egypt. Byzantine icons are the heirs to Roman tradition of portrait painting on small wood panels, but their Christian subjects and function as devotional objects broke sharply from classical models.