Everyday Life in Byzantium

by Tamara Talbot Rice

  The destruction of Constantine I’s church of Haghia Sophia during the Nika riots was regarded as a national disaster. Not only was the church the first to be built in Constantinople, but it had from the start been intended to serve as the official fountainhead of Christianity. The church had played so important a part in the lives of the Byzantines that Justinian announced his intention of replacing the destroyed cathedral with another of the same name, but one which would vie in beauty with any church in Christendom. He employed as his architects a mathematician, believed to be an Armenian, called Anthemius of Tralles, and one Isidore of Miletus. Working in close collaboration with Justinian they made use of all the known architectural devices to construct in the course of only five years one of the largest, most complex and most impressive buildings in the world; they erected it with such skill and care that it has withstood earthquakes, bombardments and numerous other vicissitudes for nearly 1,500 years and has never ceased to arouse the wonder and admiration of all who see it.

  Begun in 532, Haghia Sophia is virtually a three-aisled basilica, the central aisle being much wider than the others. It measures 241 feet long and 224 feet wide; but its outstanding features are its height, its walls towering 179 feet above floor level, and the diameter, 100 feet, of its immensely broad but surprisingly low, flat dome. Piers and columns combined to support the galleries, where the empress’s pew occupied the whole of the west end, thus facing the altar. Four great piers carried the weight of the large central dome and the two semi-domes set at either end of it. It is, however, the central dome which is the marvel of the cathedral. It is set so low that it is difficult to think of its base as a drum; its gentle curve seems to reflect that of the sky when seen over the sea. Though by no means the tallest dome in the world it was, until present-day methods of building in concrete were evolved, the largest in circumference and the lightest in appearance. Indeed, the first dome was too shallow and too wide and collapsed in 558 as the result of an earthquake. It was rebuilt without loss of time, with but slight alterations and with complete success. Architects of all ages have been dazzled by its quality; so much so that Sir Christopher Wren, commissioned to replace St Paul’s Cathedral after the Great Fire of London, sent for the measurements of the dome of Haghia Sophia.

  The dome was accepted as unique and even Justinian and his architects never tried to re-create it. Instead, when building the scarcely less famous church of the Holy Apostles in Constantinople, to serve as the imperial mausoleum, Justinian gave it a cruciform plan and roofed each of the arms as well as the central area with smaller domes. This decision led to the introduction of a new style in architecture and a new shape in the skyline for, whereas Haghia Sophia’s dome was almost impossible to reproduce, the five- or multi-domed roof-line was capable of endless repetition and variation, and it was the multiple-domed type of church that came to characterise the Orthodox world and to serve as a model for St Mark’s Cathedral at Venice and for other domed churches elsewhere. In the ninth century, after the iconoclasts had been overthrown, church plans became increasingly complicated; double churches like that of Mary Panachrantus, or triple ones like that of Christ the Pantocrator—both of which may still be visited in Istanbul—became popular, at any rate in the capital. As time went on the drums supporting the domes of such churches became higher, the domes themselves smaller and the windows cut in the drums taller. After 1261, when the Byzantines regained control of Constantinople, the churches built there became smaller still and far more intimate, but their style and ground plans did not change and at any rate the Church of the Chora (Karieh Camii) retained the sumptuous interior decorations associated with a more prosperous age.

  94 The Monastery of the Brontocheion, Mistra

  The Romans had generally used brick or stone for their buildings, setting both in cement and constructing their vaults on a wooden centring. Until about the seventh century it was quite usual in Constantinople to use large blocks of dressed stone for buildings of importance, but the technique which was to become customary in Byzantium was already employed at Haghia Sophia; it consisted of using several, generally five, courses of brick to alternate with several courses of stone. Indeed, the method had been used by Theodosius II (408-50) when building the walls of Constantinople. Byzantine bricks were stamped with a mark or monogram from very early times. Builders appear to have worked by eye rather than rule so that, when drawn out, their buildings are seen to be strangely asymmetrical. However, this was never evident to the eye. Masons went to great pains either to point the outside walls as neatly as possible or else to cover them with plaster and colour wash. External sculptures were never used to decorate the façades of the earlier churches, though from about the thirteenth century bricks were often set in the external walls to form decorative patterns; in such cases the walls were left un-plastered. Glazed pottery dishes were sometimes set high up in them to add a touch of colour. From the thirteenth century, as in the church of Haghia Sophia at Trebizond, external sculptures were occasionally introduced, but in Byzantium their role was never so important, nor their number so great as in the Caucasus or in Western Europe.

  It is not only the professional builder who evokes our admiration; Byzantium’s monks were time and again responsible for the construction of some of the most astonishing and picturesque buildings that exist. They invariably chose to construct their monasteries on sites of great natural beauty, usually on crags extremely difficult of access. Hacking away great ledges they erected formidable structures which seem to cling to the rock face like splayed-out sponges. The monasteries which survive on Mount Athos are superb examples of the form, and though mostly of comparatively recent date, they reflect the style of the Byzantine age. They are built either of stone or of wooden beams forming a sort of framework which is filled in with clay. Because of their remote situations monasteries were always enclosed within stout defensive walls and were generally provided with no more than one entrance gate. It led into a courtyard where the monastery’s main church occupied a central position, and its subsidiary chapels less important ones. The galleries containing the abbot’s lodging, the monks’ cells and the guest rooms, without which no monastery was complete, encircled the courtyard. The refectory was generally situated at ground level; it was fitted out with D-shaped tables similar to those shown in Byzantine paintings of the Last Supper; these were built of stone and were fitted with either marble or scrubbed wooden tops. The kitchens, store rooms, workshops and distilleries, all of them essential features of a monastery, were also situated at ground level but, as a precaution against fire, the library was generally to be found in a free-standing tower.

  The architectural skill of the monks was shared by artisans. If wells in the poorest villages were simple constructions formed of wooden beams, in the richer towns they were far more decorative for they often followed classical models. Here, as in so much of their art, the Byzantines do not seem to have felt any great desire for novelty, for comparison between the wells and fountains illustrated in the sixth-century mosaic pavement of the Great Palace and those which appear in the mural mosaics of the fourteenth-century church of the Chora shows that no marked change of style had developed during the intervening years.

  95 Reliquary for a fragment of the True Cross. At the top Christ appears between two angels; Helena, Constantine and Longinus are shown at the bottom Ivory, with a silver cross, c. AD 963-9

  96 The Annunciation to St Anne A glass wall mosaic from Kahrie Candi, fourteenth century

  The Byzantine love of severe forms, especially in the architectural exteriors of the earlier churches, was matched only by their delight in splendid interiors. Their ingenuity and wealth made the latter magnificent. This was especially true of their churches and palaces, both of which were considered to mirror different aspects of the celestial sphere. It was for this reason that even in the poorest parishes attempts were made to adorn the interior of the churches from floor level to dome. Whenever funds permitted, the earlier floors were mad
e of carefully selected marble slabs similar to those used in Constantinople’s Haghia Sophia. In later times geometric effects were preferred. In the (probably twelfth-century) marble floor of the monastery of Studius in Constantinople, round stones were set at the corners of the floor; these were hollowed out into animal and other shapes and the incisions filled in with either inlay or carved stone or marble of contrasting colour. Inlaid decorations of this type had become extremely popular as early as the tenth century. Somewhat earlier, floors formed of stone and marble mosaic sections (generally triangular in shape) and of coarser appearance than Roman floor mosaics started to be laid. The technique is known as opus sectile and is thought to have been used for the first time by Basil I (867-86) in the church of the Nea in the Great Palace. In due course the incised and opus sectile techniques were combined to produce such astonishing icons as the one of St Eudoxia which was discovered during excavations of the church of Mary Panachrantus in 1928 in. Istanbul. On it the saint’s figure is hollowed out of a marble slab, her face is made of a carved piece of ivory whilst her garments are formed of inlaid stones, the border being executed in opus sectile.

  At the height of their prosperity the Byzantines relied to a great extent on wall mosaics for the splendour of their church interiors. Immense skill was required for comparable effects to be achieved by means of small glass cubes as by brushwork but they proved superlative masters of this difficult technique. The art of wall mosaic was not invented by the Byzantines. It had already been tried out in Pompeii and in early Christian Rome where the first mosaics to be set up in churches were placed in the apse. By the sixth century, when the magnificent mural decorations at Ravenna were produced, the art had fully evolved. The techniques consisted in setting glass cubes of appropriate shades and sizes into plaster which was sufficiently damp to hold them in position. The glass reached the mosaicist in the form of slabs; these were divided into rods which were then cut to the desired sizes, the smallest cubes being used for such sections as eye sockets and the larger ones for draperies or backgrounds. The cubes were made in a vast range of delicate as well as deep colours, together with others where a glass base was covered with gold leaf secured on top by a thin layer of glass; the gold cubes produced a vibrating, shimmering effect admirably suited for backgrounds symbolising paradise. They were so skilfully set by Byzantine artists that the most subtle and delicate compositions were created, the material serving not only to catch and hold the eye, but also to reflect light.

  In their religious paintings and mosaics the Byzantines, once again combining those elements which appealed to them from Hellenistic, Roman and Eastern art with their own strongly mystical yet basically earthly conception of the physical appearance of the holy hierarchy, succeeded in transforming the existing idioms into something wholly new. The personages depicted in Byzantine art differ from ordinary human beings both in their physical appearance and in their style of dress. They are clothed in draperies (variants of the classical costume) of the glorious colours which we associate with the sky, whether seen in rainbows or sunsets, because the sky—the abode of these privileged few—is but the floor of heaven. To emphasise the celestial nature of the colours and the ascetic characteristics of the personages the human figures represented in the paintings are considerably elongated. Their faces are not abstracted, yet they are not strictly naturalistic. Their eyes, the mirrors of man’s soul, are greatly enlarged, owing their shape to Egyptian funerary portraits of the opening centuries of our era. The mouth, the vehicle of pain and delight, assumes a form devised by the Byzantines to express these sentiments. The thin, slightly pinched nose is lengthened whilst the faces (furrowed by the suffering endured by those who have mastered the flesh), though initially based on prevailing Greek features, are given a triangular shape in order to express the Byzantine conception of pain. On the other hand the frontal manner in which most of the figures are presented derived from the East. The use of draperies, both as robes and as hangings suspended from two buildings to indicate that the scene is taking place indoors (for no interiors appear in Byzantine art), stem from classical Greece; so too do certain venerable figures, such as Joseph, whose appearance frequently recalls that of an ancient Greek philosopher. On the other hand much of the realism of the art came from Rome, whilst where emotion intrudes into the solemnity of a biblical scene Syrian influence was at work, the dramatic element being absent from the art of Constantinople and Salonica.

  97 Tenth-century icon of St Eudoxia

  98 Sixth-century mosaic of a water mill

  Decorative motifs other than those consisting of Christian symbols may in the first instance have been inspired by designs common to Hellenistic Greece, Rome and Pompeii, but in later times Byzantium’s Eastern neighbours also often acted as prompters, the marvellously inventive decorations produced at one time or another by the artists of Persia, India, even of Central Asia and China being greatly appreciated in Byzantium. These numerous trends acted as stimulants, spurring the Byzantines to create designs so varied, so ingenious, so elegant and, in some cases, so in advance of their time that, if seen out of their context, they are liable to be mistaken for Renaissance discoveries.

  From wall to panel painting was only a short step. The Byzantines lost no time in taking it, adapting the funerary painted portraits in use in Egypt to create the icon. Of the few that survive many deserve to be numbered with the great religious paintings of Christendom. On two occasions Byzantine art excelled itself; both periods rank as golden ages in its history and are seen at their most splendid in painting and sculpture. The first Golden Age derived its impetus from Justinian, the second flourished during the years when the gifted members of the Macedonian dynasty ruled the Empire. The book illuminations which were produced during these periods are among the loveliest in existence. The interlaced designs devised for the chapter headings and tail-pieces are remarkably inventive and elaborate. Decorative capital letters add variety to the script, and marginal adornments, whether in the form of a flower, an animal or a minute genre scene, enliven the pages of many volumes. However, it is the full-page illustrations that constitute their chief glory. Once the ban on figural art had been lifted, the religious illuminations evolved along the same lines as the mural and icon paintings, but interest in portraiture was given freer outlet in the illuminations than in the larger works. A rich gallery of imperial portraits, eminent public men and wealthy donors survive; though extremely severe and formalised they yet succeed in revealing character. Furthermore they reflect the image which Byzantine dignitaries strove to project when acting in an official capacity.

  Many of the emperors delighted in sculpture. As late as the eleventh century, when sculptures were being produced at the wish of Romanus III (1028-34), Psellus noted that ‘of the stones quarried, some were split, others polished, others turned for sculptures: and the workers of these stones were reckoned the like of Phidias, Polygnotus and Zeuxis’. Nevertheless, the nation as a whole appears to have been less drawn to that art than to any of the others. This is rather surprising when we remember the legacy left to the Byzantines in this field by ancient Greece and Rome, but the lack of interest is surely to be explained by the fear that statues in the round might lead to a revival of idol worship—a practice which required combating if not within Byzantium’s borders, then at any rate in areas visited by Greek missionaries. In early times at least the Byzantines had been keen followers of the Roman tradition, not hesitating to erect statues to their emperors and to encourage sculptors to record their features. A number of heads of Constantine I survive. These, like the statue of Valentinian I at Barletta, the head of Arcadius at Istanbul, of Theodora at Milan and of Flacilla, the wife of Theodosius, in the Metropolitan Museum show that they were accomplished portraitists. The earliest of these heads are strongly Roman in style, but though more vital and strongly individualised they are not as perceptive as the later ones. In early times carved sarcophagi were produced. Like the contemporary busts they adhered to classical
conventions. The series of fourth-century Sidamara sarcophagi are decorated with scenes of a Hellenistic origin combined with a background of Eastern scrolls. However, by that date the Byzantines had started to prefer plain sarcophagi decorated at most with a monogram.

  Until about the sixth century the capitals which they used in their churches were executed in an under-cut technique designed to give the abstract, stylised or geometric patterns a lace-like quality which made the design stand out against a dark ground. Especially characteristic of the art as a whole are the slabs on which symbolic or abstract designs of marked distinction appear in low relief. It is, however, to their ivory carvings that we must turn to appreciate to the full the genius of Byzantine sculptors for, although these works are small in size, most are monumental in character.

  99 Detail from a Sidamara sarcophagus

  100 Capital in Haghia Sophia

  101 Gold cup depicting the spirit of Constantinople

  The carved ivory plaques constituted a most important branch of Byzantine art. Not only Constantinople but, during the early Byzantine period, Milan and Rome in the West, and Antioch and Alexandria in the East were leading centres of the industry. Ivory plaques were not only used by the consuls to announce their appointment but also by those wishing to record their marriage. A fine panel (now in the Victoria and Albert Museum in London) was made to mark the marriage of a member of the Symmachi family to a Nicomachi. Even more ornate plaques were carved to record coronations. In the fifth and sixth centuries plaques displaying religious designs were fitted together to form pyxes—round or octagonal vessels for holding the Host. At the same time other artists, reacting to the same influences as those which led metal-workers to create designs personifying nations, cities or rivers, adorned their plaques with personifications of Rome or Constantinople. Others preferred to seek inspiration in classical literature, others in genre scenes. The plaques were mounted to form doors, furniture, such as the sixth-century throne of Bishop Maximian (now preserved at Ravenna), jewel boxes, such as the magnificent tenth-century Veroli casket (in the Victoria and Albert Museum), book covers and so on.