Byzantine Icons Research Articles

The So-Called Byzantine Diptych in the Winchester Psalter, British Library, MS Cotton Nero C. IV

One of the most outstanding features of the Winchester Psalter, British Library, MS Cotton Nero C. IV, is the inclusion of two icon-like images of the Virgin in its lengthy prefatory picture cycle. An iconographic analysis of the miniatures provides new evidence that this so-called Byzantine Diptych was not a faithful copy of a double Byzantine icon, as is generally believed, but the inventive creation of a western artist familiar with the Byzantine pictorial and iconographic traditions. The Byzantine Diptych is not to be explained as the copy of a lost Byzantine objet d'art which had reached England in some way or other, but as the work of an English artist who traveled east, perhaps as far as the Latin Kingdom of Jerusalem. The function of the Byzantine images in the Psalter involves an emphasis on the Virgin's evolving role as the most powerful intercessor, as revealed not only by observing the artist's awareness of Byzantine iconographic formulas and their meaning, but also by the examination of nine ...

The Representation of Donors and Holy Figures on four Byzantine Icons

The Representation of Donors and Holy Figures on four Byzantine Icons

The Witness of John the Baptist on an Early Byzantine Icon in Kiev

The Witness of John the Baptist on an Early Byzantine Icon in Kiev

De Ikoon van Pinksteren

Pentecost is a feast which found only very gradually its form and content. Reflection upon and confrontation with the scriptural data resulted in a rich pentecostal theology. This we see reflected in the many monuments of art which tried to visualize this pentecost experience. Especially in the West the artistic interpretation of the event florished with great variety and freedom. Because of the Iconoclastic movement of the 8th and 9th centuries the Eastern Church was forced to develop its thoughts about icons with greater precision. So iconography became closer lied to Church theology and liturgy than in the West. A byzantine icon of Pentecost can only be rightly understood in relation to the liturgy of Pentecost. It is a Feast-icon. Pentecost in byzantine liturgical tradition is the feast of the revelation of the triune God and of the path in history of the Church reflecting this mystery. That is what apostolicity means. The last part of the article describes how the classical icon of Pentecost „translates” this liturgical vision into colour. The Apostles sit together in unity, inspired by the Holy Spirit and proclaiming the Word of Truth to the whole cosmos, which is eager to accept this apostolic preaching. Because of this emphasis on apostolicity it is not right to depict the Blessed Virgin on the feast-icon of Pentecost.

Presidential Address: Two Methods in Search of a Substance

In tune with the overall theme of these meetings, this Presidential Address is an exercise in the uses of controversy. I am perturbed about present developments in American sociology which seem to foster the growth of both narrow, routine activities, and of sect-like, esoteric ruminations. While on the surface these two trends are dissimilar, together they are an expression of crisis and fatigue within the discipline and its theoretical underpinnings. I shall eschew statesmanlike weighing of the pros and cons of the issues to be considered and shall attempt instead to express bluntly certain of my misgivings and alarms about these recent trends in our common enterprise; let the chips fall where they may. Building on other students of science, Diane Crane (1972) has argued that scientific disciplines typically go through various stages of growth accompanied by a series of changes in the characteristics of scientific knowledge and of the scientific community involved in the study of the area. In stage one, important discoveries provide models for future work and attract new enthusiastic scientists. In the next stage, a few highly productive scientists recruit and train students, set priorities for research and maintain informal contacts with one another. All this leads to rapid growth in both membership and publications. But in later stages the seminal ideas become exhausted and the original theories no longer seem sufficient. At this point a gradual decline in both membership and publication sets in, and those who remain develop increasingly narrow, specialized, though often methodologically highly refined, interests. Unless fresh theoretical leads are produced at this point to inspire new growth, the field gradually declines. Such stages of growth and decline are, of course, not limited to the sciences. In other spheres of culture, religion and the arts for example, similar phenomena have been observed (cf. Thomas O'Dea, 1966; Max Weber 1963; Alfred Kroeber, 1957). One need only think of the creative effervescence in the communities of Christ's immediate disciples and their direct successors in contrast to quotidian routines and ritualized devotions of the later stages in what had now become the Church of Rome. Or consider the art of Byzantine icon painting where, after the early creative period, the same motives, even techniques, were endlessly repeated so that it takes a specialist to distinguish between paintings executed not just decades but even centuries apart. In religion and the arts, however, innovation is not a necessary condition for flowering and appeal, but in the sciences, when no innovation is forthcoming rigor mortis is not far away. The findings of Crane and others in the sociology of science typically refer not to a whole branch of knowledge but only to sub-fields within such branches. It would therefore be wrong to apply these findings to sociology as a whole, composed as it is of a wide variety of sub-areas each with its own pattern and rhythm of growth. Yet permit me nevertheless roughly, and per*Presidential Address delivered at the Annual Meeting of The American Sociological Association in San Francisco, August, 1975. 691

The Emperor and the Icon

The emperor has been credited with many things, why not icons? Modern art historians have enthusiastically subscribed to a theory crediting the emperor with a major role in the development of icons, brushing aside all evidence to the contrary, whether archaeological or literary. But early sources on the Christian icon consistently parallel it not with emperor cult, but with the private icon cult observable among the pagans, and a large body of Late Antique pagan icons (at least 30) has survived into the twentieth century with close similarities to early Byzantine icons.

Windows into Heaven: Russian Icons of the Brown Collection

In North America, Russian icons are not often seen as distinct from other religious artefacts. Yet, while the art of the Byzantine Empire and its affiliation with the Orthodox Church did influence the look of Russian icons, and Russian artists initially followed Byzantine icon guidelines in their production, they focused on optimistic rather than tragic images. By examining the crucifixion scene on three Russian icons from the Brown Collection at the University of Victoria Art Collections, this article explores the distinct use and importance of icons to the Russian people.

A Byzantine Reliquary of the True Cross from the Sancta Sanctorum

The small painted wooden reliquary of the True Cross found among the objects in the Sancta Sanctorum early in the twentieth century, after centuries of being hidden, is one of the few Byzantine icons which have come down to us.2 It is now in the Museo Cristiano of the Vatican Library. The upper face of the lid (Fig. 1) has represented upon it a Crucifixion which is motivated by the fact that the box is a reliquary of the Holy Cross. The most striking motif is the Virgin embracing the suppedaneum, a theme which does not appear elsewhere in Byzantine art, so far as I know. It may be found in Italian art3 of the thirteenth century, and widely spread throughout Europe at a later date, as an expression of pathos.