The Sources of Mediæval Style

Abstract

HE origins of mediæval art must be sought in the late antique, and of recent years these origins have been obscured by three conflicting theories accounting for the phenomenon of the late antique itself. Wickhoff sought to prove that its vital characteristic was a realistic rendering which he called “illusionism,” injected into Hellenistic tradition by the Romans; Riegl saw in late antique style the growth of an “optic point of view,” a process whereby the artist, so to speak, moved further and further away from the subject to be depicted; Strzygowski feels that the art of the Nearer East (Syria, Persia, Mesopotamia, Armenia) is chiefly responsible for the undeniable difference existing between early and late Greco-Roman work.