Gothic Art and Architecture, religious and secular buildings, sculpture, stained glass, and

illuminated manuscripts and other decorative arts produced in Europe during the latter part of
the Middle Ages (5th century to 15th century). Gothic art began to be produced in France
about 1140, spreading to the rest of Europe during the following century. The Gothic Age
ended with the advent of the Renaissance in Italy about the beginning of the 15th century,
although Gothic art and architecture continued in the rest of Europe through most of the 15th
century, and in some regions of northern Europe into the 16th century. Originally the word
Gothic was used by Italian Renaissance writers as a derogatory term for all art and
architecture of the Middle Ages, which they regarded as comparable to the works of
barbarian Goths. Since then the term Gothic has been restricted to the last major medieval
period, immediately following the Romanesque. The Gothic Age is now considered one of
Europe’s outstanding artistic eras.

Gothic Architecture
Architecture reached a new peak in Europe during the 12th
century with the development of the Gothic style. The main
features of this style were the pointed arch and vault, flying
buttresses, delicate tracery, and the distinctive rose window made
of stained glass.
Culver Pictures
Microsoft ® Encarta ® 2008. © 1993-2007 Microsoft
Corporation. All rights reserved.

II ARCHITECTURE

Architecture was the dominant expression of the Gothic

Age. Emerging in the first half of the 12th century from
Romanesque antecedents, Gothic architecture continued
well into the 16th century in northern Europe, long after
the other arts had embraced the Renaissance. Although a
vast number of secular monuments were built in the Gothic
style, it was in the service of the church, the most prolific builder of the Middle Ages, that the new
architecture evolved and attained its fullest realization.

The aesthetic qualities of Gothic architecture depend on a structural development: the ribbed vault
(see Arch and Vault). Medieval churches had solid stone vaults (the structure that supports the
ceiling or roof). These were extremely heavy structures and tended to push the walls outward,
which could lead to the collapse of the building. In turn, walls had to be heavy and thick enough to
bear the weight of the stone vaults. Early in the 12th century, masons developed the ribbed vault,
which consists of thin arches of stone, running diagonally, transversely, and longitudinally. The
new vault, which was thinner, lighter, and more versatile, allowed a number of architectural
developments to take place.

The growth of cities in Europe in the Gothic age (13th to 15th century) enabled illuminators to
form guilds, especially in Paris, where the finest manuscripts were made for members of the royal
family and nobility. A renewed interest in humans and their environment was shown by more
realistically rendered figures, clad in the costume of the day and set in real architecture.
Byzantine art and architecture arose in part as a response to the needs of the Eastern, or
Orthodox, church. Unlike the Western church, in which the popular veneration of the relics
of the saints continued unabated from early Christian times throughout the later Middle Ages,
the Eastern church preferred a more contemplative form of popular worship focused on the
veneration of icons. These were portraits of sacred personages, often rendered in a strictly
frontal view and in a highly conceptual and stylized manner. Although any type of pictorial
representation—a wall painting or a mosaic, for instance—could serve as an icon, it
generally took the form of a small painted panel. Something of the abstract quality of the
icons entered into much of the Byzantine art.

The still formative stage of Byzantine art in the

age of Justinian is reflected in the variety of
mosaic styles. They range from the austere
grandeur of the Transfiguration of Christ (circa
540) in the apse of the monastery church of
Saint Catherine at Mount Sinai to the mid-6th-
century processions of the martyrs in Sant'
Apollinare Nuovo in Ravenna, Italy, which
recall the endless rhythmic sequences of
marching figures in the art of the ancient Near
East.

The most extensive series of mosaics of the

Justinian age, and the finest, are those (finished
in 547) in the Church of San Vitale, Ravenna.
Rather than a mere expression of stylistic
diversity, the different pictorial modes of these mosaics were each adapted to its subject
matter. The Old Testament scenes in the choir exemplify the narrative mode, in which the
action takes place in picturesque settings of rocks and flowers against a background of rose-
tinted clouds, all reminiscent of the illusionistic landscapes of Pompeian painting.

As in art, a wide diversity characterizes the ecclesiastical architecture of the early

Byzantine period. Two major types of churches, however, can be distinguished: the basilica
type, with a long colonnaded nave covered by a wooden roof and terminating in a
semicircular apse; and the vaulted centralized church, with its separate components gathered
under a central dome. The second type was dominant throughout the Byzantine period.

In studying their prototypes the Byzantine artists learned anew the classical conventions
for depicting the clothed figure, in which the drapery clings to the body, thus revealing the
forms beneath—the so-called damp-fold style. They also wanted to include modeling in light
and shade, which not only produces the illusion of three-dimensionality but also lends
animation to the painted surfaces. Religious images, however, were only acceptable as long
as the human figure was not represented as an actual bodily presence. The artists solved the
problem by abstraction, that is, by rendering the darks, halftones, and lights as clearly
differentiated patterns or as a network of lines on a flat surface, thus preserving the visual
interest of the figure while avoiding any actual modeling and with it the semblance of
corporeality. Thus were established those conventions for representing the human figure that
endured for the remaining centuries of Byzantine art.
Early Christian Art and Architecture, art works and buildings produced between the
3rd and 7th centuries for the Christian church. The period overlaps the Late Antique period—
Roman art and architecture of the late 2nd to the 7th century—as well as the first three
centuries—5th to 7th century—of Byzantine art and architecture. Until the Edict of Milan
(313), by which Emperor Constantine the Great made Christianity one of the Roman
Empire's state religions, Christian art was restricted to the decoration of the hidden places of
worship, such as catacombs and meeting houses called titulae (converted private houses).
Most of the early representatives in painting and sculpture were derived from Roman art,
appropriately stylized to suit the spirituality of the religion. An iconography was devised to
visualize Christian concepts. For example, Christ was symbolized by a fish, a cross, or a
lamb, or by the combined Greek letters chi and rho (χ Ρ, the first two letters of the Greek
spelling of Christ) as a monogram. Christ the Good Shepherd was often shown as a beardless
young man, derived from pagan embodiments of Apollo, an image that persisted into the 6th
century in Italy.

Old Saint Peter's in Rome

One of the earliest examples of Christian architecture and

an excellent example of the basilica form, the church
known as Old Saint Peter’s, in Rome, Italy, was begun in
ad 333 and demolished in the 16th century by order of
Pope Julius II to make way for the new Saint Peter’s.
Based on the shape of a Latin cross, Old Saint Peter’s had
a long nave (central aisle) with a transept (projecting
wings) crossing the nave near the front of the church.
Roman Emperor Constantine the Great (306-337)
commissioned the construction of Old Saint Peter’s as a
church and public hall after legalizing the Christian
religion.

Under imperial sponsorship, Early Christian

architecture flourished throughout the empire on
a monumental scale. Buildings were of two
types, the longitudinal hall, or basilica, and the
centralized building, frequently a baptistery or a
mausoleum. The exteriors of Early Christian
buildings were generally plain and unadorned;
the interiors, in contrast, were richly decorated
with marble floors and wall slabs, frescoes, mosaics, hangings, and sumptuous altar
furnishings in gold and silver

In Rome, frescoes have survived in the catacombs, examples being scenes from the life of
Christ and the Virgin, in simple linear outline with a limited range of color, in the Catacombs
of Domitilla (3rd century).

Early Christian Catacomb, Rome

Examples of early Christian fresco painting can be found in underground tombs, such as
the catacombs on Via Latina in Rome, shown here. Early Christian artists borrowed
motifs from Roman mythology and gave them Christian significance. The figure of
Hercules killing the serpent, on the left, came to symbolize Jesus Christ triumphing over
Satan. The peacocks on the tomb stand for resurrection because of a belief that their
flesh does not decay after death.
I INTRODUCTION

Illuminated Manuscripts, calligraphic codices, or hand-drawn scrolls and books, enhanced by artists
with decorations and paintings. Manuscript illumination is the use of embellishment and illustration
to enhance the pages of a medieval manuscript. Illuminations are also called miniatures, a term
derived from the Latin term minium (red lead), the pigment once used to mark the opening words
of the text, and does not refer to diminutive size.

II MATERIALS AND TECHNIQUES

Paints for illumination were made from pigments of earth substances, such as red, brown, or
yellow ochers; or were derived from natural deposits of metals (for orange, red, and brown) or
from stones, such as lapis lazuli for blue. Azurite for blue and malachite for green came from
metallic ores, but blue was also extracted from the woad and indigo plants, for indigo blue. White
came from lime, lead, or the ashes of burned bird bones; yellow came from orpiment, a sulfide of
arsenic, or from saffron. Pigments were ground to a powder and fixed to the parchment with glair
—beaten egg whites allowed to stand until liquefied enough to flow easily from a brush. In Europe,
gold leaf was made by hammering gold sheets down to the thickness of a cobweb. The appearance
of lumped solid gold was achieved by layers of chalk or gesso, covered by bole, a pinkish earth
substance, which further enhanced the gold. Gold leaf was then fixed to the parchment with glair,
size (animal gelatin), honey, or sugar as a binder. The illuminator burnished the gold with an
animal tooth and often tooled geometric or floral designs on it. Treatises on the manufacture of
paints were written in medieval Europe and the Middle East.

During the Middle Ages, when manuscript painting was considered a high art, illuminators
decorated their codices in several ways. The book frequently opened with a carpet page—so called
because its abstract designs resemble an Oriental carpet—or an imaginary portrait of the book's
author or its patron. Within the text, initial letters were enlarged and adorned, sometimes
containing figures and scenes, and at times shaped into zoomorphic (animal-like) forms. In other
manuscripts, columns of writing were surrounded by botanical ornamentation, or the margins were
filled with playful birds, animals, and imaginary beings. Some biblical, historical, and literary
manuscripts contained full-page illustrations, either with the text or grouped together at the
beginning.

III EGYPTIAN ORIGINS

Manuscript illumination began in dynastic Egypt with the illustrated Book of the Dead. The ancient
Egyptians called these papyrus scrolls pert em hru,”coming forth by day.” In the 2nd millennium
BC, these were commissioned by royalty, nobility, priests and female temple musicians, and court
administrators; eventually, however, ready-made manuscripts, on which the purchaser could fill in
a name, were prepared by scribes. The texts consisted of descriptions of ceremonies preceding
burial, prayers recited by priests or relatives of the dead, and instructions for the conduct of the
deceased in the world beyond the grave. Certain scenes were favorites of the illustrators: the
funeral procession, mummification, weighing of the soul, the deceased in the heavenly fields, and
the presentation to Osiris, the Egyptian god of the dead.

The dry Egyptian climate preserved these buried papyrus scrolls. The finest is the Papyrus of Ani
(1570? BC, British Museum, London). After the 12th century BC the art declined, but Books of the
Dead continued to be made until the Hellenistic period (323-1st century BC). When the scribes of
Alexandria copied manuscripts for the city's great library, it is believed that they were inspired by
illustrated Egyptian literature and that they continued the practice for Greek literary and scientific
works. Only fragments of such illustrated texts remain, principally from the early centuries of
Christianity. Because classical literature was depicted in Hellenistic and Roman mosaics and wall
paintings, however, it is assumed that illustrated scrolls were the prototypes, or models, for
painting and sculpture as well as for later Byzantine and European illuminated manuscripts. It is
even possible that the Old Testament, translated from Hebrew to Greek in Alexandria, was
illuminated; a Bible written with gold letters is mentioned in Hellenistic Jewish sources.

IV CLASSICAL, EARLY CHRISTIAN, AND BYZANTINE MANUSCRIPTS

Few illuminated manuscripts from the Early Christian and Byzantine period (1st through the 6th
century) have been preserved. The important literary manuscripts are two by Virgil in the Vatican
Library and the Iliad by Homer in the Biblioteca Ambrosiana in Milan. The most sumptuous Bibles
are the Vienna Genesis (Nationalbibliothek, Vienna), a picture book with stories from the Book of
Genesis, and the Rossano Gospels (Museo Diocesano, Rossano, Italy), both transcribed in the 6th
century on purple parchment; and the Rabbula Gospels (586, Biblioteca Laurenziana, Florence). De
Materia Medica, an herbal written in the 1st century AD by the Greek physician Pedanius
Dioscorides, was illuminated about 512 in a famous version called the Vienna Dioscorides and was
frequently copied in the Byzantine and Islamic world. The miniatures of this period were painted in
illusionistic style, reminiscent of Hellenistic and Roman wall painting. After the iconoclastic period
(726-843), illuminators at the court of the Macedonian emperors in Constantinople (present-day
İstanbul) revived illusionistic painting and classical themes, even though the subjects were biblical.
The 10th-century Paris Psalter (Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris) has several frontispiece illustrations
of biblical figures giving thanks for the miracles performed for them, and a portrait of King David,
whose iconography was inspired by classical illustrations depicting Orpheus taming the beasts.

V IRISH AND ENGLISH MANUSCRIPTS

The centers for manuscript illumination from the 7th through the 9th century were monasteries in
Ireland and England. Gospel books and missals (books of prayers) were based on model
manuscripts from Italy and Coptic Egypt. The ornate, two-dimensional carpet pages of these Anglo-
Celtic manuscripts resemble Islamic Qur'ans and Hebrew Bibles from late 9th- and 10th-century
Tiberias. The style of ornament, however, particularly the interlacing zoomorphic forms, came from
pre-Christian Celtic metalwork (see Celts: Art). The manuscripts contained architecturally
decorated canon tables, lists of the Gospels' parallel passages, and portraits of the four Evangelists
with their symbols. In the Book of Kells (mid-8th century, Trinity College Library, Dublin), the
masterpiece of the age, the Madonna and Child and the temptation of Christ also appear. No
attempt was made to give the illusion of space or portraiture; people, animals, and objects were
rendered as flat patterns. See Irish Art.

VI THE CAROLINGIAN STYLE

In the late 8th and 9th centuries, Carolingian style dominated continental Europe. Biblical,
historical, and literary works were illuminated in monasteries for royal and ecclesiastical patrons.
Byzantine, Italian, Anglo-Celtic, and Merovingian prototypes existed, but a distinctly Carolingian
style developed, especially in the miniatures painted in the Hautvillers scriptorium near Reims,
France, in the 820s. In the Utrecht Psalter (8th century, University Library, Utrecht, the
Netherlands), with its wispy, dancelike pen-and-ink figures, the artist interpreted passages of the
Psalms literally, as if he were illustrating a story. Other Carolingian Bibles had narrative scenes
from the Old and New Testaments, but in the Ottonian period that followed (mid-10th and 11th
century), the latter was favored. Although Ottonian manuscripts were dazzling in their use of gold-
leaf backgrounds, the stylized figures were heavy and serious, with wide eyes staring out at the
reader.

VII ROMANESQUE MANUSCRIPTS

In 10th- and 11th-century England, styles were associated with such monasteries as Canterbury
and Winchester. The older Anglo-Celtic interlace style was rejected in favor of the Carolingian
style. By the Romanesque period (12th century) illuminators had become adept at integrating
illustration, decoration, and text. Large Bibles were made in England with historiated initials,
enlarged letters incorporating biblical scenes at the beginning of chapters or books. The
Winchester Bible (12th century, Winchester Cathedral Library) is an outstanding example of
historiation, as well as another aspect of Romanesque—the use of grotesques, that is, dragons or
other mythical figures, some part human and part beast. These figures were called drolleries in the
Gothic period, when they were used as marginalia (materials written in the margins).

VIII GOTHIC MANUSCRIPTS

The growth of cities in Europe in the Gothic age (13th to 15th century) enabled illuminators to form
guilds, especially in Paris, where the finest manuscripts were made for members of the royal family
and nobility. A renewed interest in humans and their environment was shown by more realistically
rendered figures, clad in the costume of the day and set in real architecture. As time went on, the
proportions of figure to background became more balanced, and more illusionistic effects were
sought. The illuminators who worked for Jean de France, Duc de Berry, in the late 14th and early
15th centuries depicted their patron's aristocratic life in minute detail, especially in the Très riches
heures du Duc de Berry (1413-1416, Musée Condé, Chantilly) by the Limbourg brothers.

IX RENAISSANCE MANUSCRIPTS
Renaissance patrons in France and Italy continued to commission illuminated manuscripts even
after printing was invented in the 1450s, but eventually the art declined in Europe. By the turn of
the 20th century, an excellent illuminator, now notorious as the Spanish Forger, was successfully
imitating medieval art. The revival of the book arts today has led contemporary calligraphers and
artists to use their skills as miniaturists.

X ARABIC AND PERSIAN MANUSCRIPTS

In the Middle East, manuscript illumination achieved the same glory as in Europe. Printing did not
have the same impact, and the hand-decorated book was appreciated into modern times. The first
Islamic illuminators used Late Antique and Byzantine prototypes, and codices often opened with
splendid carpet pages and portraits of the author and the patron.

The Qur'an was ornamented richly but never illustrated with figures. Scientific and literary works
came next, such as the Treatise on Fixed Stars (1009, Bodleian Library, Oxford, England) of al-Sufi
and the Maqamat of al-Hariri, of which 12 copies from the 13th and 14th centuries have been
preserved. The illustrations of the Maqamat, a popular book of 50 dramatic tales and a precursor
of the novel, reflected the middle-class Arab world. Another popular Arabic book was Kalilah and
Dimnah, a fable, originally Sanskrit, with two jackals as heroes, who tell tales within a tale. It was a
favorite of later Persian miniaturists as well. The illustrations in all these Arabic manuscripts from
Egypt and Iraq were simple, with minimal backgrounds and flat colors. A lifelike effect in animals
and humans, however, was achieved with exuberant facial expressions and gestures.

By the late 13th century Iran was becoming the manuscript center, and influences from Far
Eastern art can be seen. The illusion of space created by Chinese artists, not by perspective but by
juxtaposition of small figures against vertically rising high mountains and abysses, was fully
absorbed by Persian painters by the 15th century. At times landscape and figures were cut off by
the frame, implying a greater space beyond the picture. The Persian epic Shah nameh (Book of
Kings) by Firdawsi and the Khamseh (Quintet) by Nezami were the favorites of royal patrons. The
Timurid period's finest work, from Herāt in western Afghanistan, is Shah nameh (1430, Golestān
Museum, Tehrān, Iran) by Baysunghur. A carpet page was followed by a double-page patron's
portrait, a scene of a royal hunt staged for the prince who, mounted on his horse, is served wine by
his attendants. The 20 illustrations of Persian heroes in full battle scenes, slaying beasts, or
holding receptions all show a similar romantic and poetic quality, even if an occasional beheading
is also depicted. They seem to be set in an orderly, vertical tapestry garden that is shaped like a
mountain and sprinkled with perfectly spaced plants, set against a solid blue or gold sky. This is
true of Safavid miniatures as well, where interior scenes look like stage sets composed of folding
screens. The greatest painter of the Safavid period (late 15th and 16th century) was Bihzad, who
worked in Herāt and whose many students followed his style and paid homage by signing his
name.

XI INDIAN AND TURKISH MANUSCRIPTS

The tradition of illuminating western Indian manuscripts began with palm-leaf books from 1100 to
1350, which were eventually replaced by paper books. Persian influences began in the 14th
century, but their real impact was felt by the mid-16th century, when the northern Indian Mughal
emperors, like their counterparts in Iran, established palace workshops. The illuminators adopted
Persian lyricism, but color schemes differed, and faces were rendered in profile, even when the
figures were seen from front or rear. Literary classics were illustrated, and albums or portraits
were commissioned. Turkish miniatures from the 15th century were also influenced by the Persian
miniatures from the period of the Timurid and Safavid dynasties. The subjects were of a large
variety: lives of the prophets, scholars and saints, and Turkish conquerors and heroes; scientific
treatises; and sports such as falconry, archery, and horsemanship. Turkish miniature painting
excelled in the depiction of great crowd and festival scenes until the 18th century, when the art
declined.

XII HEBREW MANUSCRIPTS

The style of illuminated Hebrew manuscripts has followed that of the host country in which Jews
resided, so that the earliest, from Muslim countries, resembled Qur'an (Koran) illumination.
Geometric interlaces continued in Christian Spain, but figures were introduced, especially in the
Haggada (service book for the Passover home ceremony), which was influenced by 13th-century
illustrated French Bibles. In Germany, the Haggada, prayer books, and Bibles were decorated in
Gothic style. After the Renaissance, the ketubah (marriage contract), the Scroll of Esther, and
smaller prayer books were popular illuminated works. The most creative aspect of decorated
Hebrew manuscripts throughout all ages has been its micrography, in which lines of minute script
are formed into the outline of geometric, animal, and human figures.

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full advantage of the new Gothic vault. The architects of the cathedrals found that, since the
outward thrusts of the vaults were concentrated in the small areas at the springing of the ribs and
were also deflected downward by the pointed arches, the pressure could be counteracted readily
by narrow buttresses and by external arches, called flying buttresses. Consequently, the thick
walls of Romanesque architecture could be largely replaced by thinner walls with glass windows,
and the interiors could reach unprecedented heights. A revolution in building techniques thus
occurred.

With the Gothic vault, a ground plan could take on a variety of shapes. The general plan of the
cathedrals, however, consisting of a long three-aisled nave intercepted by a transept and followed
by a shorter choir and sanctuary, differs little from that of Romanesque churches. The cathedrals
also retained and expanded the loveliest creation of French Romanesque architecture, the chevet
—the complex of forms at the east end of the church that includes the semicircular aisle known as
the ambulatory, the chapels that radiate from it, and the lofty polygonal apse encircling the end of
the sanctuary. The major divisions of the interior elevation of the Gothic nave and choir are
likewise derived from Romanesque precedents. On the other hand, the tall attenuated piers of the
ground-story arcade, the pencil-thin vaulting shafts rising through the clerestory to the springing of
the ribs, and the use of the pointed arch throughout the whole edifice all contribute to those
unique soaring effects that constitute Gothic architecture’s most dynamic expression.
With the exception of the western facade, the exterior of the Gothic cathedral, with its towering
buttresses and batteries of winglike fliers, is essentially an exoskeleton designed for the support of
the vaults. The west front, on the other hand, was independently composed. The large
parallelogram of the Gothic harmonic facade, surmounted by twin towers, reiterates in its triple
portals and in its threefold vertical divisions the three aisles of the interior, and the large rose
window above the central portal provides a magnified focus for the whole design.

A Early Gothic Period

In France, during the first half of the 12th century, Gothic rib vaulting appeared sporadically in a
number of churches. The particular phase of Gothic architecture that was to lead to the creation of
the northern cathedrals, however, was initiated in the early 1140s in the construction of the chevet
of the royal abbey church of Saint-Denis, the burial church of the French kings and queens near
the outskirts of Paris. In the ambulatory of Saint-Denis, the slim columns supporting the vaults and
the elimination of the dividing walls separating the radiating chapels result in a new sense of
flowing space presaging the expanded spaciousness of the later interiors.

Saint-Denis led in the 1160s to the first of the great cathedrals, Notre Dame (begun 1163) in Paris,
and to a period of experimentation in voiding the walls and in reducing the size of the internal
supports. The addition of an extra story to the traditional three-story elevation of the interior
increased the height dramatically. This additional story, known as the triforium, consists of a
narrow passageway inserted in the wall beneath the windows of the clerestory (upper part of the
nave, containing windows) and above the large gallery over the side aisles. The triforium opens out
into the interior through its own miniature arcade.

B High Gothic Period

The complexities and experiments of this early Gothic period were finally resolved in the new
cathedral of Chartres (begun 1194). By omitting the second-story gallery derived from
Romanesque churches but retaining the triforium, a simplified three-story elevation was
reestablished. Additional height was now gained by means of a lofty clerestory that was almost as
high as the ground-story arcade. The clerestory itself was now lighted in each bay or division by
two very tall lancet windows surmounted by a rose window. At one stroke the architect of Chartres
established the major divisions of the interior that were to become standard in all later Gothic
churches.

The High Gothic period, inaugurated at Chartres, culminates in the Cathedral of Reims (begun
1210). Rather cold and overpowering in its perfectly balanced proportions, Reims represents the
classical moment of serenity and repose in the evolution of the Gothic cathedrals. Bar tracery, that
characteristic feature of later Gothic architecture, was an invention of the first architect of Reims.
In the earlier plate tracery, as in the clerestory at Chartres, a solid masonry wall is pierced by a
series of openings. In bar tracery, however, a single window is subdivided into two or more lancets
by means of long thin monoliths, known as mullions. The head of the window is filled with a tracery
design that has the effect of a cutout.
Reims follows the general scheme of Chartres. But another equally successful High Gothic solution
to the problems of interior design occurs in the great five-aisled cathedral at Bourges (begun
1195). Instead of an enlarged clerestory, as at Chartres, the architect of Bourges created an
immensely tall ground-story arcade and reduced the height of the clerestory to that of the
triforium. The brief interval of the High Gothic period is followed in the 1220s by the nave of
Amiens Cathedral. The soaring effects, muted at Chartres and Reims, were taken up again at
Amiens in the emphasis on verticality and in the attenuation of the supports. Amiens thus provided
a transition to the loftiest of the French Gothic cathedrals, that of Beauvais. By superimposing on a
giant ground-story arcade (derived from Bourges) an almost equally tall clerestory, the architect of
Beauvais reached the unprecedented interior height of 48 m (157 ft).

C Rayonnant Gothic Period

Beauvais was begun in 1225, the year before Louis IX, king of France, ascended the throne. During
his long reign, from 1226 to 1270, Gothic architecture entered a new phase, known as the
Rayonnant. The word Rayonnant is derived from the radiating spokes, like those of a wheel, of the
enormous rose windows that are one of the features of the style. Height was no longer the prime
objective. Rather, the architects further reduced the masonry frame of the churches, expanded the
window areas, and replaced the external wall of the triforium with traceried glass. Instead of the
massive effects of the High Gothic cathedrals, both the interior and the exterior of the typical
Rayonnant church now more nearly assumed the character of a diaphanous shell.

All these features of the Rayonnant were incorporated in the first major undertaking in the new
style, the rebuilding (begun 1232) of the royal abbey church of Saint-Denis. Of the earlier structure
only the ambulatory and the west facade were preserved. The spirit of the Rayonnant, however, is
perhaps best represented by the Sainte-Chapelle, the spacious palace chapel built by Louis IX on
the Île de la Cité in the center of Paris. Construction began in the early 1240s, and the chapel was
consecrated in 1248. Immense windows, rising from near the pavement to the arches of the vaults,
occupy the entire area between the vaulting shafts, thus transforming the whole chapel into a
sturdy stone armature for the radiant stained-glass windows.

In the evolution of Gothic architecture, the progressive enlargement of the windows was not
intended to shed more light into the interiors, but rather to provide an ever-increasing area for the
stained glass. As can still be appreciated in the Sainte-Chapelle and in the cathedrals of Chartres
and Bourges, Gothic interiors with their full complement of stained glass were as dark as those of
Romanesque churches. It was, however, a luminous darkness, vibrant with the radiance of the
windows. The dominant colors were a dark saturated blue and a brilliant ruby red. Small stained-
glass medallions illustrating episodes from the Bible and from the lives of the saints were reserved
for the windows of the chapels and the side aisles. Their closeness to the observer made their
details easily distinguishable. Each of the lofty windows of the clerestory, on the other hand, was
occupied by single monumental figures. Because of their often colossal size, they were also readily
visible from below. Beginning in the 1270s the mystic darkness was gradually dispelled as grisaille
glass—white glass decorated with designs in gray—was more often employed in conjunction with
colored panels, while the colors themselves grew progressively lighter in tone.
D Dissemination of Gothic Architecture

The influence of French Gothic architecture on much of the rest of Europe was profound. In France
the scheme of Bourges, with its giant arcade and short clerestory, met with little response, but in
Spain it was taken up again and again, beginning in 1221 with the Cathedral of Toledo and
continuing into the early 14th century with the cathedrals of Palma de Mallorca, Barcelona, and
Gerona. In Germany the impact of all phases of French Gothic architecture was decisive, from the
early Gothic four-story elevation of the Cathedral of Limburg-an-der-Lahn (1225?) to the choir of
Cologne Cathedral (begun 1248). Modeled on the Rayonnant choir of Amiens, the interior of
Cologne exceeds in height even that of Beauvais.

Italy and England, however, are the exceptions to this pervasive French influence. The peculiarly
Italianate idiom of the Gothic churches of Florence and the superficial reminiscences of the French
Gothic facades on the cathedrals of Siena and Orvieto are but transitory phases in a development
that leads from the Italian Romanesque to Filippo Brunelleschi and the beginnings of the
Renaissance.

In England, French Gothic architecture intruded itself only twice, once in the 1170s in the eastern
extension of Canterbury Cathedral and again in Henry III’s Westminster Abbey (begun 1245),
patterned on the general scheme of Reims, with Parisian Rayonnant modifications. Otherwise the
English architects developed their own highly successful Gothic idiom. Rejecting the aspiring
verticality and the functional logic of the French cathedrals, the English churches emphasize length
and horizontality, replacing the French polygonal apse with a square east end that is sometimes
further prolonged by a rectangular Lady chapel (a chapel devoted to the Virgin Mary, characteristic
of English cathedrals). This extreme elongation often includes two separate transepts. The
multiplication in the number of ribs, some of which are of a purely ornamental nature, is also
characteristically English.

The first major phase of this insular architecture, the early English period, is well represented
(except for the 15th-century tower and spire) by the Cathedral of Salisbury (begun 1220). The
introduction of bar tracery in Westminster Abbey led to an astonishing variety in tracery design.
This Decorated period, with its lavish ornamentation, also produced such poetic creations as the
lovely Angel Choir (begun 1256) of Lincoln Cathedral, and was responsible as well for that unique
masterpiece of medieval architecture, the astounding octagon (begun 1322) of Ely Cathedral, with
its wooden lantern and tower soaring over the crossing.

III SCULPTURE

Following a Romanesque precedent, a multitude of carved figures proclaiming the dogmas and
beliefs of the church adorn the vast cavernous portals of French Gothic cathedrals. Gothic
sculpture in the 12th and early 13th centuries was predominantly architectural in character. The
largest and most important of the figures are the over-life-size statues in the embrasures on either
side of the doorways. Because they are attached to the colonnettes by which they are supported,
they are known as statue-columns. Eventually the statue-column was to lead to the freestanding
monumental statue, a form of art unknown in western Europe since Roman times.
The earliest surviving statue-columns are those of the west portals of Chartres that stem from the
older pre-Gothic cathedral and that date from about 1155. The tall, cylindrical figures repeat the
form of the colonnettes to which they are bound. They are rendered in a severe, linear
Romanesque style that nevertheless lends to the figures an impressive air of aspiring spirituality.
During the next few decades the west portals of Chartres inspired a number of other French
portals with statue-columns. They were also influential in the creation of that sculptural ensemble
on the Cathedral of Santiago de Compostela, fittingly known as the Portico de la Gloria (completed
1188), one of the outstanding artistic achievements of medieval Spain.

All these proto-Gothic monuments, however, still retain a distinct Romanesque character. In the
1180s the Romanesque stylization gives way to a period of transition in which the statue begins to
assume a feeling of grace, sinuosity, and freedom of movement. This so-called classicizing style
culminates in the first decade of the 13th century in the great series of sculptures on the north and
south transept portals of Chartres.

The term classicizing, however, must be qualified, for a fundamental difference exists between the
Gothic figure of any period and the truly classical figure style. In the classical figure, whether
statue or relief, a completely articulated body can be sensed beneath, and separate from, the
drapery. In the Gothic figure no such differentiation exists. What can be discerned of the body is
inseparable from the folds of the garment by which it is enveloped. Even where the nude is
portrayed, as in the statues of Adam and Eve (before 1237) on the German Cathedral of Bamberg,
the body is largely reduced to an abstraction.

A Emergence of Naturalism

Beginning about 1210 on the Coronation Portal of Nôtre Dame and continuing after 1225 on the
west portals of Amiens Cathedral, the rippling surface treatment of the classicizing drapery was
replaced by more solid volumes. In the 1240s, on the west facade of Reims and in the statues of
the apostles in the Sainte-Chapelle, the drapery assumes those sharp, angular forms and deeply
carved tubular folds that are characteristic of almost all later Gothic sculpture. At the same time
the statues are finally liberated from their architectural bondage.

In the statues at Reims and in the interior of the Sainte-Chapelle, the exaggerated smile, almond-
shaped eyes, and clustered curls of the small heads and the mannered poses result in a
paradoxical synthesis of naturalistic forms, courtly affectations, and a delicate spirituality. Along
with these manneristic tendencies and the increased naturalism, a more maternal type of the cult
statue of the Virgin Mary playfully balancing the Christ child on the outward thrust of her hip made
its first appearance on the lower portal of the Sainte-Chapelle—an image that in the ensuing
centuries was disseminated in infinite variations throughout Europe.

B Diffusion of Gothic Sculpture

Although northern France was the creative heartland of Gothic sculpture, as it was of Gothic
architecture, some of the outstanding sculptural monuments were produced in Germany.
Expanding on the French Gothic style, German Gothic sculpture ranges from an expressionistic
exaggeration, sometimes verging on caricature, to a lyrical beauty and nobility of the forms. The
largest assemblage of German 13th-century sculpture, that of the Cathedral of Bamberg, created
under the influence of Reims, culminated about 1240 in the Bamberg Rider, the first equestrian
statue in Western art since the 6th century. Although the identity of the regal horseman remains
unknown, no other work so impressively embodies the heroic ideal of medieval kingship.

The influence of French Gothic sculpture in Italy was, like the architecture, more superficial and
transitory than in Germany. This influence can indeed be aptly described as Gothicizing trends in
the larger framework of the Italian proto-Renaissance that in sculpture began in 1260 with Nicola
Pisano’s marble pulpit in the Pisa Baptistry. Giovanni Pisano, the son of Nicola, was the first to
adopt the full repertory of French Gothic mannerisms. Of great inner intensity and power, the
statues of prophets and Greek philosophers he created about 1290 for the facade of the Cathedral
of Siena are also the masterpieces of this entire Italian period.

Although during the later decades of the 14th century an ever-increasing number of Italian
sculptors assumed the French Gothic mannerisms, again and again their works show the study of
the classical nude and differentiate between body and drapery in a way that is the mark of the
classical style. This Gothicizing phase had ended about 1400 with the advent of Lorenzo Ghiberti in
Florence and the beginnings in sculpture of the full Italian Renaissance.

IV DECORATIVE ARTS

In France throughout the 13th century the decorative arts were largely dominated by church art.
The medallions that form the illustrations in the Bibles moralisées (Moralized Bibles) of the second
quarter of the century frankly emulate the designs of stained glass. In Louis IX’s Psalter (composed
after 1255), the gables with rose windows that frame the miniatures were patterned after the
ornamental gables surmounting the exterior of the Sainte-Chapelle. Beginning about 1250 the
same courtly style informs both monumental statues and small ivory figurines. The elegant ivory
statuette of the Virgin Mary and Child (1265?, Louvre, Paris) from the Sainte-Chapelle was modeled
after the monumental statue from the chapel’s lower portal. The colossal group of Christ crowning
the Virgin Mary in the central gable of the west facade of Reims possesses all the intimate grace of
the same subject depicted in two contemporary statuettes, also in the Louvre. Beginning in the
1260s the large metal reliquary shrines take the form of diminutive Rayonnant churches, complete
with transepts, rose windows, and gabled facades (see Metalwork).

About 1300 the decorative arts begin to assume a more independent role. In the Rhineland,
German expressionism gave rise to works of a marked emotional character, ranging from the
statuettes of the school of Bodensee, such as that of the youthful seated Saint John tenderly laying
his head on the shoulder of Christ, to the harrowing evocation of the suffering Christ in the plague
crosses of the Middle Rhine. Later in the century the German sculptors were responsible for a new
type of the mourning Virgin Mary, seated and holding on her lap the dead body of Christ, the so-
called Pietà. In the second quarter of the century, Parisian manuscript illumination was given a
new direction by Jean Pucelle. In his Belleville Breviary (1325?, Bibliothèque Nationale, Paris), the
lettering, the illustrations, and the leafy borders all contribute to the totally integrated effect of the
decorated page, thereby establishing an enduring precedent for later illuminators. Of still greater
significance for future developments is the new sense of space imparted to the interior scenes in
his illustrations through the use of linear perspective. Pucelle had learned this technique from the
contemporary painters of the Italian proto-Renaissance (see Illuminated Manuscripts).

V LATE GOTHIC PERIOD

Paris had been the leading artistic center of northern Europe since the 1230s. After the ravages of
the Plague and the outbreak of the Hundred Years’ War in the 1350s, however, Paris became only
one among many artistic centers.

A Painting

As a result of this diffusion of artistic currents, a new pictorial synthesis emerged, known as the
International Gothic style, in which, as foreshadowed by Pucelle, Gothic elements were combined
with the illusionistic art of the Italian painters. Beginning in Paris in the 1370s and continuing until
about 1400 at the court of Jean de France, Duc de Berry, the manuscript illuminators of the
International Gothic style progressively developed the spatial dimensions of their illustrations, until
the picture became a veritable window opening on an actual world. This process led eventually to
the realistic painting of Jan van Eyck and the northern Renaissance and away from the conceptual
point of view of the Middle Ages. Thus, even though the International style is sometimes described
as Gothic, it nevertheless lies beyond the boundaries of the Gothic period itself, which by definition
is also medieval.

B Sculpture

Gothic sculpture, however, remained unaffected by the Italian proto-Renaissance. About 1400
Claus Sluter executed at Dijon for Philip the Bold, Duke of Bourgogne, some of the most
memorable sculptural works of the late Gothic period. Eschewing the slender willowy figure style
and aristocratic affectations of the 14th century, Sluter enveloped his figures in vast voluminous
robes. In the mourners on the tomb (begun 1385, Musée des Beaux-Arts, Dijon) of Philip the Bold,
Sluter created out of drapery alone eloquent images of sorrow. In the statues surrounding the Well
of Moses (1395-1403, Chartreuse de Champmol, Dijon) he transformed the Old Testament heroes
into earthy Flemish patriarchs, whose realistic depiction nevertheless conveys a feeling of spiritual
grandeur.

After Sluter’s death in 1406, his influence spread from Burgundy to the south of France, to Spain,
and later to Germany. By 1500, however, with Michel Colombe and the Mannerists of the school of
Troyes in France and with Tilman Riemenschneider, Veit Stoss, and Adam Kraft in Germany, the
era of Gothic sculpture drew to its close.

C Architecture

In France, late Gothic architecture is known as flamboyant, from the flamelike forms of its intricate
curvilinear tracery. The ebullient ornamentation of the flamboyant style was largely reserved for
the exteriors of the churches. The interiors underwent a drastic simplification by eliminating the
capitals of all the piers and reducing them to plain masonry supports. All architectural
ornamentation was concentrated in the vaults, the ribs of which formed an intricate network of
even more complicated patterns.

C1 Flamboyant Style

Flamboyant architecture originated in the 1380s with French court architect Guy de Dammartin.
The great surge in building activity, however, came only with the conclusion of the Hundred Years’
War in 1453, when throughout France churches were being rebuilt in the new style. The last
flowering of flamboyant architecture occurred between the end of the 15th century and the 1530s
in the work of Martin Chambiges and his son Pierre, who were responsible for a series of grand
cathedral facades, including the west front of Troyes Cathedral and the transept facades of Senlis
and Beauvais cathedrals. Disseminated over much of the Continent, flamboyant architecture
produced its most extravagant intricacies in Spain. In Portugal, during the reign of King Manuel I,
from 1495 to 1521, it developed into a national idiom known as the Manueline style, marked by a
profusion of exotic motifs.

C2 Perpendicular Style

Spurning the flamboyant style altogether, the English builders devised their own late Gothic
architecture, the Perpendicular style. The use of a standard module consisting of an upright
traceried rectangle, which could be used for wall paneling and window tracery alike, resulted in an
extraordinary unity of design in church interiors. The masterpiece of the style, the chapel of King’s
College (begun 1443), Cambridge, achieves a majestic homogeneity through the use of the new
fan vaulting, the fan-shaped spreading panels of which are in complete accord with the rectangular
panels of the walls and windows.

C3 Secular Buildings

The list of important secular monuments in the late Gothic period is long. In Belgium the series of
grand civic halls, some with tall belfried towers, begins very early with the great Cloth Hall
(completed 1380, destroyed 1915) of Ieper and continues with such later town halls as those of
Leuven (1448-1463) and Oudenaarde (1526-1530). In England and France the austere castles of
the 12th and 13th centuries had been little affected by the ecclesiastical architecture. In the last
quarter of the 14th century, however, the grim fortresses were gradually replaced by graceful
châteaux and impressive palaces that sometimes were the source of important architectural
innovations. The earliest monument in the flamboyant style, the large screen (1388) with traceried
gables that surmounts the triple fireplace in the ancient Palais des Comtes at Poitiers,
foreshadowed the pieced decorative gables on the exteriors of the flamboyant-style churches. In
about 1390 the largest of all medieval halls, that of London’s Westminster Palace, was provided
with a magnificent oaken hammer beam roof that furnished the prototype for numerous similar
roofs in the parish churches of English towns.
In France from the late 15th century to the 1520s, new châteaux in the flamboyant style were
being built extensively, from Amboise (1483-1501) and Blois (1498-1515) on the Loire, to Josselin
(early 16th century) in Brittany. The crowning features of their exteriors are those magnified
versions of dormer windows, the lucarnes. Sometimes, as on the facade added in 1508 to the
Palais de Justice at Rouen, the ornate lucarnes are each flanked by their own diminutive flying
buttresses. Other regional styles of secular architecture also flourished, from the Venetian Gothic
of the Doges’ Palace (begun 1345?) and the Ca d’Oro (1430?) to the Tudor Gothic of Hampton
Court (1515-1536) on the Thames and the Collegiate Gothic, which at Oxford lingered into the
early 17th century. By this time on the Continent, however, the luxuriant growth of late Gothic
forms had long since been replaced by the more intellectual and calculated architectural principles
of the Renaissance.

See also Architecture; Romanesque Art and Architecture; Sculpture; Renaissance Art and
Architecture.

Contributed By:
William M. Hinkle
Microsoft ® Encarta ® 2008. © 1993-2007 Microsoft Corporation. All rights reserved.

Byzantine Art and Architecture, the art of the Byzantine, or Eastern Roman, Empire. It
originated chiefly in Constantinople (present-day İstanbul), the ancient Greek town of
Byzantium, which the Roman emperor Constantine the Great chose in AD330 as his new
capital and named for himself. The Byzantine Empire continued for almost 1000 years after
the collapse of the Western Empire in 476. Byzantine art eventually spread throughout most
of the Mediterranean world and eastward to Armenia. Although the conquering Ottomans in
the 15th century destroyed much in Constantinople itself, sufficient material survives
elsewhere to permit an appreciative understanding of Byzantine art.

Byzantine art and architecture arose in part as a response to the needs of the Eastern, or
Orthodox, church. Unlike the Western church, in which the popular veneration of the relics
of the saints continued unabated from early Christian times throughout the later Middle Ages,
the Eastern church preferred a more contemplative form of popular worship focused on the
veneration of icons (see Icon). These were portraits of sacred personages, often rendered in a
strictly frontal view and in a highly conceptual and stylized manner. Although any type of
pictorial representation—a wall painting or a mosaic, for instance—could serve as an icon, it
generally took the form of a small painted panel.

Something of the abstract quality of the icons entered into much of Byzantine art. The artistic
antecedents of the iconic mode can be traced back to Mesopotamia and the hinterlands of
Syria and Egypt, where, since the 3rd century AD, the rigid and hieratic (strictly ritualized) art
of the ancient Orient was revived in the Jewish and pagan murals of the remote Roman
outpost of Dura Europos on the Euphrates and in the Christian frescoes of the early
monasteries in Upper Egypt. In the two major cities of these regions, Antioch and
Alexandria, however, the more naturalistic (Hellenistic) phase of Greek art also survived
right through the reign of Constantine. In Italy, Roman painting, as practiced at Pompeii and
in Rome itself, was also imbued with the Hellenistic spirit.

The Hellenistic heritage was never entirely lost to Byzantine art but continued to be a source
of inspiration and renewal. In this process, however, the classical idiom was drastically
modified in order to express the transcendental character of the Orthodox faith. Early
Christian art of the 3rd and 4th centuries had simply taken over the style and forms of
classical paganism. The most typical form of classical art was the freestanding statue, which
emphasized a tangible physical presence. With the triumph of Christianity, artists sought to
evoke the spiritual character of sacred figures rather than their bodily substance. Painters and
mosaicists often avoided any modeling of the figures whatsoever in order to eliminate any
suggestion of a tangible human form, and the production of statuary was almost completely
abandoned after the 5th century. Sculpture was largely confined to ivory plaques (called
diptychs) in low relief, which minimized sculpturesque effects.

Mosaics were the favored medium for the interior adornment of Byzantine churches. The
small cubes, or tesserae, that composed mosaics were made of colored glass or enamels or
were overlaid with gold leaf. The luminous effects of the mosaics, spread over the walls and
vaults of the interior, were well adapted to express the mystic character of Orthodox
Christianity. At the same time their rich, jewel-like surfaces were also in keeping with the
magnificence of the imperial court, presided over by the emperor, the de facto head of the
Orthodox church.

II. EARLY PERIOD

Although the 5th-century art of the empire is sometimes referred to as early Byzantine, it
should be more aptly called late Antique. It is a transitional phase between the classical
antiquity of Early Christian art and the emergence of a truly Byzantine style shortly after 500,
when the portraits of the Byzantine consuls on their ivory diptychs assume the hieratic,
depersonalized character of the icons. The golden age of early Byzantine art and architecture
falls within the reign (527-65) of the emperor Justinian, a prolific builder and a patron of the
arts.

A. Mosaics

The still formative stage of Byzantine art in the age of Justinian is reflected in the variety of
mosaic styles. They range from the austere grandeur of the Transfiguration of Christ (circa
540) in the apse of the monastery church of Saint Catherine at Mount Sinai to the mid-6th-
century processions of the martyrs in Sant' Apollinare Nuovo in Ravenna, Italy, which recall
the endless rhythmic sequences of marching figures in the art of the ancient Near East.

The most extensive series of mosaics of the Justinian age, and the finest, are those (finished
in 547) in the Church of San Vitale, Ravenna. Rather than a mere expression of stylistic
diversity, the different pictorial modes of these mosaics were each adapted to its subject
matter. The Old Testament scenes in the choir exemplify the narrative mode, in which the
action takes place in picturesque settings of rocks and flowers against a background of rose-
tinted clouds, all reminiscent of the illusionistic landscapes of Pompeian painting.
Beyond, on the curving wall of the apse, the emperor Justinian, surrounded by members of
his court, confronts the empress Theodora in the midst of her attendant ladies; both rulers are
sumptuously arrayed in diadems and imperial purple mantles. The emperor, venerated as
Christ's representative on earth, and the revered empress are depicted, along with their
retinues, in the uncompromising frontality and with the fixed gaze of the dematerialized
figures of icons.

The classical heritage is visible in the beardless Christ, who, like a youthful Apollo, sits on
the globe of the universe in the gold semidome of the apse—a Western type of the seated
Christ derived from Early Christian sarcophagi. All three modes—the narrative, the iconic,
and the classically inspired—are encountered again and again in all major periods of
Byzantine art.

B. Architecture

As in art, a wide diversity characterizes the ecclesiastical architecture of the early Byzantine
period. Two major types of churches, however, can be distinguished: the basilica type, with a
long colonnaded nave covered by a wooden roof and terminating in a semicircular apse; and
the vaulted centralized church, with its separate components gathered under a central dome.
The second type was dominant throughout the Byzantine period.

Hagia Sophia, or the Church of the Holy Wisdom, in Constantinople, built in five years by
Justinian and consecrated in 537, is the supreme example of the centralized type. Although
the unadorned exterior masses of Hagia Sophia build up to an imposing pyramidal complex,
as in all Byzantine churches it is the interior that counts. In Hagia Sophia the architects
Anthemius of Tralles and Isidorus of Miletus created one of the great interior spaces in the
history of architecture. The vast central dome, which rises some 56 m (185 ft) from the
pavement, is dramatically poised over a circle of light radiating from the cornea of windows
at its base. Four curved or spherical triangles, called pendentives, support its rim and are in
turn locked into the corners of a square formed by four huge arches. The transition between
the circular dome and its square base, achieved through the use of pendentives, was a major
contribution of Byzantine builders to the development of architecture. To the east a vast
semidome surmounts the three large vaulted niches of the sanctuary below. Arcades that
recall the arcaded naves of the basilica churches occupy the ground story on the north and
south sides of the central square. To the west is another huge semidome preceding a barrel-
vaulted narthex.

The ethereal quality of this “hanging architecture,” in which the supports—visible on the
exterior as four immense buttress towers—of the dome, pendentives, and semidomes are
effectively disguised, is reinforced by the shimmering mosaics and sheets of polished marble
that sheathe the interior walls and arches.

III. ICONOCLASTIC PERIOD

Along with an appreciation of religious works of art, a strong bias had always existed among
some members of the Eastern church against any depiction whatsoever of sacred scenes and
personages. This antiiconic movement resulted in 726 in the order of Emperor Leo III for the
destruction throughout the empire (Italy resisted) not only of icons, but of all representatives
of the human figure in religious art of any kind (see Iconoclasm).
During the ensuing iconoclastic period, however, the decorative arts flourished. Some idea of
their character may be gained from the work of indigenous Byzantine mosaicists who created
rich acanthus scrolls in the Dome of the Rock (685-705) at Jerusalem and delightful
landscapes with feathery trees in the Great Mosque in Damascus (706-15). From the
iconoclastic period date the oldest surviving examples of Byzantine silk textiles, some with
motifs inspired by earlier Persian designs. Imported from the East, these Byzantine textiles
were used in Western churches as altar hangings and as shrouds in the tombs of rulers and
saints.

IV. MID-BYZANTINE PERIOD: MACEDONIAN RENAISSANCE

In 843 the ban against icons was finally lifted, and a second golden age of Byzantine art, the
mid-Byzantine period, was inaugurated with the advent of the new Macedonian dynasty
(867-1056). During this appropriately named Macedonian Renaissance, Byzantine art was
reanimated by an important classical revival, exemplified by a few illuminated manuscripts
that have survived from the 9th and 10th centuries. As models for the full-page illustrations,
the artists chose manuscripts (now lost) from the late Antique period that were illustrated in a
fully developed Hellenistic style.

A. Painting

In studying their prototypes the Byzantine artists learned anew the classical conventions for
depicting the clothed figure, in which the drapery clings to the body, thus revealing the forms
beneath—the so-called damp-fold style. They also wanted to include modeling in light and
shade, which not only produces the illusion of three-dimensionality but also lends animation
to the painted surfaces. Religious images, however, were only acceptable as long as the
human figure was not represented as an actual bodily presence. The artists solved the
problem by abstraction, that is, by rendering the darks, halftones, and lights as clearly
differentiated patterns or as a network of lines on a flat surface, thus preserving the visual
interest of the figure while avoiding any actual modeling and with it the semblance of
corporeality. Thus were established those conventions for representing the human figure that
endured for the remaining centuries of Byzantine art.

B. Architecture

In contrast to the artistic experimentations in the Justinian age, the mid-Byzantine period was
one of consolidation. Recurring types of the centralized church were established, and the
program of their mosaic decoration was systematized in order to conform to Orthodox beliefs
and practices.

A common type of the mid-Byzantine centralized church was the cross-in-the-square. As at

Hagia Sophia, its most prominent feature was the central dome over a square area, from
which now radiated the four equal arms of a cross. The dome was usually supported,
however, not by pendentives but by squinches (small arches) set diagonally in the corners of
the square. The lowest portions of the interior were confined to the small areas that lay
between the arms of the cross and the large square within which the whole church was
contained.

C. Mosaic and Enamel

From the fragmentary mosaic cycles in Hosios Lukas, Daphni, and several other 11th-century
churches in Greece, the typical decorative program of the cross-in-the-square church can be
readily reconstructed. The program was based on the hierarchical importance of the subjects
disposed in an ascending scale. The lesser saints were relegated to the lowest and least
conspicuous areas of the interior. The more important saints were placed on the more
essential structural elements. On the larger wall surfaces and on the higher levels beneath the
dome were scenes from the Gospels and from the life of the Virgin Mary. The heavenly
themes, such as the ascension, were depicted on the vaults. Pentecost, represented by
energizing rays descending on the heads of the apostles, occupied the vault over the eastern
arm.

Beyond, in the center of the golden conch (semidome) of the apse, the Virgin bearing the
Christ child reigned in isolated splendor. From the lofty center of the dome a huge bust of the
bearded Christ, the Pantocrator, the awesome ruler of the universe, gazed down upon the
created world below. The church thus became a symbol of the cosmos, and the whole
interior, with its hierarchy of sacred images, was transformed into a vast three-dimensional
icon.

On a smaller scale were works in cloisonné enamel, a technique in which Byzantine artisans
were highly skilled (see Enamel). Surviving examples include a few Byzantine crowns
(among them the famous crown of St. Stephen of Hungary) and a number of sumptuous
reliquaries. The Byzantines also fashioned other magnificent liturgical objects of silver and
gold.

V. MID-BYZANTINE PERIOD: COMNENIAN ART

The second major phase of the mid-Byzantine period coincided with the rule of the Comneni
dynasty (1081-1185) of emperors. Comnenian art inaugurated new artistic trends that
continued into the succeeding centuries. A humanistic approach alien to earlier Byzantine art
informs the icon Virgin of Vladimir (circa 1125, State Tretyakov Gallery, Moscow). Instead
of showing her customary aloofness, the Virgin Mary here presses her cheek against that of
her child in an embrace. Comnenian humanism is again encountered in the new theme of the
Threnos, the lamentation over the dead body of Christ, rendered with intense pathos in a
fresco of 1164 in the church of Nezerine in Croatia. Like the Virgin of Vladimir, the fresco
was the work of a Constantinople painter.

The most extensive series of Comnenian mosaics are those created by Byzantine artists in the
large church at Monreale in Sicily, begun in 1174. The mosaic program, however, had to be
readapted to the basilica form of the interior. Following a Western precedent, scenes from the
Book of Genesis occupy the areas between and above the arches of the long nave arcade. The
Sacrifice of Isaac, Rebecca at the Well, and Jacob Wrestling with the Angel, all masterpieces
of a new dynamic narrative style, are skillfully adapted to the format of the undulating frieze
that continues around and above the arches. Above, in the vast semidome of the apse, looms
a gigantic bust of the Pantocrator.

The Sicilian mosaics are but one example among many of the exportation of mid-Byzantine
art to regions beyond the much-reduced confines of the empire. Some Byzantine influence
can also be detected in the domed churches of western France. During the 11th and 12th
centuries Byzantine art and architecture were the norm in the Venetian Republic. The five-
domed Church of Saint Mark's (begun c. 1063) was modeled in part on Justinian's cruciform
Church of the Apostles in Constantinople. In the Cathedral of Torcello the great panorama of
the Last Judgment on the western wall and the lovely standing figure of the Virgin in the
apsidal conch are genuine Byzantine creations. The Byzantine style was introduced into
Russia in the Cathedral of Hagia Sophia at Kyiv, founded in 1037. The pervasive influence
of Byzantine art on Western Europe continued into the 13th century. In the East, however,
the mid-Byzantine period came to an abrupt, shocking end in 1204 with the sack of
Constantinople by the Crusaders.

VI. PALAEOLOGUE PERIOD

A brief interlude of Western rulers in Constantinople was succeeded in 1261 by the last
Byzantine dynasty, that of the Palaeologan emperors (1258-1453). The final flowering of
Byzantine art occurred during the Palaeologue period, and its vitality and creativeness
remained undiminished.

A. Architecture

The new architectural features had already been foreshadowed under the Comneni. In
general, the vertical lines of the churches were emphasized, and the five-domed church
became the norm. The drums, or circular rings on which the domes rest, often assumed
octagonal form and grew taller. The domes themselves were sometimes reduced to small
cupolas. Special attention was also given to exterior embellishment.

B. Painting and Mosaic

More profound were the changes in the pictorial arts. With few exceptions, notably the
splendid mosaics of the Church of Christ the Savior in Chora (1310-1320) in Constantinople,
fresco painting everywhere replaced the more costly medium of mosaic decoration. The rules
governing the hierarchical program of the mid-Byzantine churches were also largely
abandoned. Narrative scenes sometimes occupied the vaults, and the figures tended to
diminish in size, resulting in a new emphasis on the landscapes and architectural
backgrounds. In the mosaics of the Church of Christ the Savior in Chora fantastic
architectural forms reminiscent of modern cubism were carefully coordinated with the
figures. In a contemporary fresco of the nativity in the Greek Church of the Peribleptos at
Mistra, a vast rocky wasteland poignantly emphasizes the isolation of the small figures of the
Virgin Mary and her child. In the background of the Raising of Lazarus in the Church of the
Pantanassa at Mistra (1428), a wide V-shaped cleft between two tall peaks is eloquent of the
chasm of death that separates the mummified corpse of Lazarus from the living Savior. In
emphasizing the settings, however, the artists were careful to avoid any sense of actual space
that might destroy the spiritual character of the scenes.

Although the basic compositions of the more traditional images were retained, they were
reinterpreted with exceptional vitality. In a fresco in the mortuary chapel adjoining the
Church of Christ the Savior in Chora the time-honored theme of the Anastasis, the descent of
Christ into limbo, was infused with extraordinary energy: The resurrected Christ strides
victoriously across the shattered gates of hell to liberate Adam and Eve from the infernal
regions. The Koimesis, the death and assumption of the Virgin Mary, was traditionally
depicted in terms of a simple but effective arrangement: The horizontal corpse of the Virgin
on her deathbed is counterbalanced by the central upright figure of Christ holding aloft the
small image of her soul. In the Serbian church at Sopoćani (circa 1265) this basic
composition of the Virgin and Christ is greatly amplified to include a whole cohort of angels
who are arranged in a semicircle around the figure of Christ.

These are but a few highlights of a vigorous and creative art that continued in the Balkans
right into the middle of the 15th century. By that time, however, the days of Constantinople's
glory were long past. Harassed by the Ottomans, the impoverished empire was reduced to
little more than the city itself. In 1453 the end came with the taking of Constantinople by
Muhammad II. Nevertheless, a long afterlife was granted the art and architecture of the
vanished empire. Hagia Sophia provided the model for the new mosques of Constantinople.
In Russia the churches continued to be built in an exotic Slavic version of the Byzantine
style. The age-old traditions of icon painting (later somewhat Westernized) were handed
down for generations in Russia and other parts of the Orthodox world.

Early Christian Art and Architecture, art works and buildings produced between the 3rd
and 7th centuries for the Christian church. The period overlaps the Late Antique period—
Roman art and architecture of the late 2nd to the 7th century—as well as the first three
centuries—5th to 7th century—of Byzantine art and architecture. Until the Edict of Milan
(313), by which Emperor Constantine the Great made Christianity one of the Roman
Empire's state religions, Christian art was restricted to the decoration of the hidden places of
worship, such as catacombs and meeting houses called titulae (converted private houses).
Most of the early representatives in painting and sculpture were derived from Roman art,
appropriately stylized to suit the spirituality of the religion. An iconography was devised to
visualize Christian concepts. For example, Christ was symbolized by a fish, a cross, or a
lamb, or by the combined Greek letters chi and rho (χ Ρ, the first two letters of the Greek
spelling of Christ) as a monogram. Christ the Good Shepherd was often shown as a beardless
young man, derived from pagan embodiments of Apollo, an image that persisted into the 6th
century in Italy.

II. ARCHITECTURE

Under imperial sponsorship, Early Christian architecture flourished throughout the empire on
a monumental scale. Buildings were of two types, the longitudinal hall, or basilica, and the
centralized building, frequently a baptistery or a mausoleum.

A. The Basilica

Christian worship, being congregational, requires a hall, and the Roman basilica—a civic hall
—became the model for both large and small churches. In Rome the principal shrines
became the sites of enormous timber-roofed basilicas, all erected in the 4th and 5th centuries
—Old Saint Peter's (replaced in the 16th century), Saint Paul's Outside the Walls, and Santa
Maria Maggiore, among others. The plan often included an atrium, or forecourt; a narthex, or
porch; a long nave (central hall) flanked by side aisles; a transept hall crossing the nave; and
a semicircular or polygonal apse (east end of a chapel, reserved for clergy) opposite the nave.
In front of the apse, the altar was set directly over the shrine. Pagan spoils (stolen, pillaged
goods) were used throughout; columns, decorative panels, masonry, and bronze roof tiles
from imperial buildings were incorporated in the new structures. Smaller basilican churches
were built in large numbers, as exemplified by the Church of Sant' Apollinare in Classe (5th
century) in Ravenna, and the Church of Santa Sabina (5th century) in Rome.
B. The Centralized Building

Baptisteries, mausoleums, and martyria (martyr shrines) were built in centralized form. They
were either circular or polygonal, with the object of veneration—the baptismal font, the
sarcophagus, or the holy place—visible to the faithful from the cloister or aisle circling the
site. A typical baptistery is that found next to San Giovanni in Laterano, Rome, parts of
which date from as early as 313. Built entirely of spoils, the elegant circular building has
massive bronze doors and, for the font, a huge porphyry (very beautiful and hard rock) basin,
both from the Baths of Caracalla. A typical mausoleum is the domed, circular Church of
Santa Costanza (4th century) in Rome, built as the tomb of Constantia, daughter of
Constantine the Great. Her magnificently carved porphyry sarcophagus, now in the Vatican
Museums in Rome, stood under the dome. Mausoleums were also built in the equal-armed
Greek cross form, such as the famous Tomb of Galla Placidia (5th century) in Ravenna. The
most famous martyria are the domed Church of the Holy Sepulchre (4th century; numerous
rebuildings) in Jerusalem, and the octagonal shrine of the Church of the Nativity (4th
century; rebuilt 6th century and later) in Bethlehem. Both have adjoining basilicas to
accommodate the crowds of pilgrims.

III. DECORATION

The exteriors of Early Christian buildings were generally plain and unadorned; the interiors,
in contrast, were richly decorated with marble floors and wall slabs, frescoes, mosaics,
hangings, and sumptuous altar furnishings in gold and silver (see Metalwork).

A. Fresco

The fragility of frescoes accounts for the scarcity of surviving examples. The baptismal
scenes (240?-250?, Yale University Art Gallery, New Haven, Connecticut) from an early
Christian temple in Dura-Europos, a remote Roman outpost in Syria, are well-preserved
examples. In Rome, frescoes have survived in the catacombs, examples being scenes from
the life of Christ and the Virgin, in simple linear outline with a limited range of color, in the
Catacombs of Domitilla (3rd century).

B. Mosaic

In the 4th century, the great mosaic tradition of Early Christian art began. Throughout the
empire, mosaics were used when an opulent effect was desired. In basilicas, sequences of
panels running the length of the nave above the column arcades would be devoted to Old
Testament scenes or processions of saints. The arch separating the nave from the sanctuary—
called the triumphal arch—was usually covered with mosaics from floor to ceiling. The half-
dome of the apse was customarily reserved for representations of Christ, the Virgin, and—in
churches dedicated to a saint—patron saints. Baptisteries and mausoleums were also
decorated with mosaics of appropriate scenes and motifs. Outstanding examples of Early
Christian mosaics abound in Italy and include the shimmering mosaics, predominantly in
blue and gold, in the Tomb of Galla Placidia in Ravenna; the overpowering transfiguration
scene, witnessed by St. Apollinaris, in the apse of Sant' Apollinare in Classe; the surviving
27 panels of Old Testament scenes in Santa Maria Maggiore; and the vault mosaics, replete
with pagan motifs, in the ambulatory (covered walkway) of Santa Costanza. Byzantine
mosaicists continued this tradition and made it one of the chief glories of Byzantine art.
C. Illuminated Manuscripts

Early Christian illuminated manuscripts are of an unusually high quality. Perhaps the most
luxurious is the 6th-century Vienna Genesis (Nationalbibliothek, Vienna), with purple-dyed
parchment pages throughout, and illustrations in the naturalistic style of Roman painting. In
the same rich category is the 6th-century Saint Augustine Bible (Fitzwilliam Museum,
Cambridge, England), sent to Augustine of Canterbury by Pope Gregory I; again, its
illustrations, with superb architectonic frames, are in the Roman style.

IV. SCULPTURE

Freestanding Early Christian sculpture is comparatively scarce; two marbles, however, are
unique—Christ as the Good Shepherd (4th century, Museo Laterano, Rome) and Jonah Cast
Up (250-275, Cleveland Museum of Art, Ohio), in which Jonah is spewed out of the mouth
of a sea monster.

Early Christian bas-reliefs survive in profusion in marble and porphyry. Notable are the
marble sarcophagus of Junius Bassus (359?, Grotte Vaticane, Rome), with ten Old and New
Testament scenes carved in very high relief, and the large, superbly carved and polished
porphyry sarcophagi (4th century, Vatican Museums) of Helena and Constantia, the mother
and daughter of Constantine the Great. The main portal of the Church of Santa Sabina is
adorned with monumental carved wood doors made in the 5th century.

Carved ivory from the period exists in abundance, particularly in the form of diptychs, pairs
of hinged ivory writing tablets with elaborately carved covers. Typical examples are the
diptych carved with the enthroned figure of the empress Ariadne (500-520, Kunsthistorisches
Museum, Vienna) and the diptych of the Virgin and Child enthroned and flanked by angels
(550?, Staatliche Museen, Berlin).

V. METALWORK

Gold and silver objects made in the period are outstanding in the history of metalwork. Altar
furnishings include a double-shelled silver goblet called the Chalice of Antioch (4th or 5th
century, Metropolitan Museum, New York City), covered with a delicate filigree of
grapevines and holy figures, and a set of silver altar furnishings (5th century, Walters Art
Gallery, Baltimore, Maryland) that includes pairs of tall candlesticks, pyxes (containers for
communion wafers), chalices, patens (shallow dish on which the wafers are laid for
communion service), and wine vessels, all of elegantly simple design.

In secular objects, the design is often elaborate and frequently mixes pagan and Christian
motifs, as on the luxurious wedding casket of Projecta (350?, British Museum, London) of
silver and silver gilt. Made to celebrate a Christian marriage, the large chest is decorated with
traditional Roman wedding motifs, including Venus, the goddess of love, in high relief on the
lid. Jewelry tended to be heavy, frequently incorporating sets of gold coins in finely wrought
gold filigree. A particularly opulent example is the luxurious pectoral (necklace covering the
chest) of 16 imperial coins and a large medallion of an emperor, all embedded in filigree,
with a sizable filigree pendant framing a religious medallion (early 7th century, Staatliche
Museen); the wearer thus honored both state and church, the two most important institutions
of the time.