The Byzantine cave monastery of the Ilgarini mağarası (Paphlagonia) – the Chryse Petra of Nikon Metanoite?

Within the context of middle Byzantine court ceremonial, eunuchs controlled and ritualized visual and physical access to the sacred person of the Byzantine emperor. Middle Byzantine texts construct eunuchs as suitable vehicles of communication between the spiritual and the physical worlds. In Byzantine artistic contexts, however, a smooth face was not exclusive to eunuchs, since it was also used to convey male youthfulness. In Byzantium, purple was the imperial colour par excellence but it was also the colour that was employed to render the majesty of Christ and the dignity of the Mother of God in word and image. Carrying the victorious sign of Christ through the palace of the Byzantine emperor, the beardless, angel-like eunuch in his shimmering purple garments would have appeared as the ideal channel for the authority of both, traversing and transcending physical and conceptual boundaries between private and public, sacred and profane. Keywords: Byzantine eunuch; court ceremonial; God; imperial colour

Inhalt:Dirk KRAUSMÜLLER: Strategies of Equivocation and the Construction of Multiple Meanings in Middle Byzantine Texts; Johannes DIETHART: Zu neutralen Abstrakta auf –άτον im byzantinischen Griechisch; Martin HINTERBERGER: Tränen in der byzantinischen Literatur. Ein Beitrag zur Geschichte der Emotionen; Andreas RHOBY: Spontane Anmerkungen zum „goldenen“ Athen in Byzanz; Dariusz BRODKA: Eustathios von Epiphaneia und das Ende des Weströmischen Reiches; Leena Mari PELTOMAA: Herodias in the Poetry of Romanos the Melodist; Claudio DE STEFANI: Paolo Silenziario leggeva la letteratura latina?; Stavroula CONSTANTINOU: Generic Hybrids: The „Life“ of Synkletike and the „Life“ of Theodora of Arta; Athanasios KAMBYLIS: Michael Psellos' Schrift. Textkritische Bemerkungen; Alexandra STEFANIDOU: Kaiserliche Klöster Alexios' I. Komnenos auf Inseln des Byzantinischen Reiches; M. OP DE COUL: Deux inédits à l'ombre de Prodrome; Kimiter G. ANGELOV: The Confession of Michael VIII Palaiologos and King David: On a Little Known Work by Michael Holobolos; Alexander BEIHAMMER: Identität, Eigen- und Fremdwahrnehmung im zyprischen Griechentum der frühen Frankenzeit: Ein Interpretationsversuch anhand von zeitgenössischen Briefen und Urkunden; Werner SEIBT: Der bisher jüngste Bleisiegeltypus byzantinischer Kaiser; Dorotei GETOV: Fragmenta Serdicensia Lost and Found; Hans BUCHWALD: Directions in Byzantine Architectural Research; Vincenzo RUGGIERI: La scultura bizantina nel territorio di Antiochia di Pisidia; Besprechungen; Kurzanzeigen