Transfigurations of Hellenism

Transcription

Transfigurations of Hellenism
Probleme der Ägyptologie
Herausgegeben von
Wolfgang Schenkel
und
Antonio Loprieno
23. Band
Transfigurations of
Hellenism
Aspects of Late Antique Art in Egypt
AD 250–700
by
László Török
BRILL
LEIDEN • BOSTON
2005
This book is printed on acid-free paper.
Library of Congress Cataloging-in-Publication Data
Török, László, 1941–
Transfigurations of Hellenism : aspects of late antique art in Egypt, A.D. 250–700 /
by László Török.
p. cm. — (Probleme der Ägyptologie, ISSN 0169–9601 ; 23. Bd.)
Includes bibliographical references and indexes.
ISBN 90–04–14332–7 (hardback : alk. paper)
1. Art, Coptic. 2. Art, Hellenistic—Egypt. I. Title. II. Series.
N7382.T67 2005
709’.32’09015—dc22
2004062868
ISSN 0169–9601
ISBN 90 04 143327
© Copyright 2005 by Koninklijke Brill NV, Leiden, The Netherlands.
Koninklijke Brill NV incorporates the imprints Brill Academic
Publishers, Martinus Nijhoff Publishers and VSP.
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printed in the netherlands
*
For
Tomas Hägg • Bente Kiilerich • Per Jonas Nordhagen
Hjalmar Torp
the Bergen masters of Late Antiquity
with friendship and gratitude
*
CONTENTS
List of figures ............................................................................
xi
List of plates .............................................................................. xix
Acknowledgements .................................................................... xxiii
A note on the terminology ...................................................... xxv
I. Introduction: A visit to the Coptic Museum in
Old Cairo ............................................................................
II. Images of late antique Egypt in twentieth-century
art history ........................................................................
1. The Ahnas pitfall ............................................................
2. The myth of anti-Hellenism ..........................................
3. Pharaonic revival: myth and reality ..............................
4. The myth of Volkskunst and the contribution of
forgery to Coptic art history ........................................
5. From Ernst Kitzinger’s “Notes on Early Coptic
Sculpture” to Hjalmar Torp’s “Leda Christiana” ......
III. On methods ........................................................................
1. Function, chronology, and style ....................................
2. Chronology and the stratification of artistic
production ........................................................................
3. The limits of the investigation ......................................
IV. History, society, and art in late Roman and early
Byzantine Egypt ..................................................................
1. Images of social identity ................................................
2. History and society in late antique and early
Byzantine Egypt ..............................................................
2.1. The conquest of Ptolemaic Egypt ........................
2.2. Roman Egypt from Augustus to the late third
century ....................................................................
2.3. Late Roman Egypt ................................................
2.4. Christians and polytheists ......................................
2.5. Early Byzantine Egypt ............................................
1
9
9
12
17
20
31
37
37
40
44
51
51
58
58
64
73
86
97
viii
contents
V. Continuity and change 1: The survival of forms of
Alexandrian Hellenistic architecture ..............................
1. The limits of the evidence ........................................
2. Hellenistic and late antique illusionism: the niche
pediments and their architectural and cult context
3. Further glimpses of late antique Alexandria ............
VI. Continuity and change 2: New patterns of
monumentality ................................................................
1. The imperial cult sanctuary of the Tetrarchs in
the Amûn temple of Luxor ........................................
2. Modernity and archaizing in Shenoute’s
“White Monastery” at Sohag ....................................
3. The episcopal complex at Hermopolis Magna ........
4. Uses of the past ..........................................................
113
113
115
130
139
139
153
165
178
VII. Images for mortuary display ..........................................
1. Sculptors, workshops and modes of representation
1.1. Porphyry sculpture and the workshop at
Heracleopolis Magna ..........................................
1.2. The masters of acanthus foliage ........................
1.3. Sculptors’ workshops at Oxyrhynchos in the
fourth and early fifth centuries ..........................
1.4. The end of late antique illusionism in
architectural sculpture ........................................
183
183
VIII. Images of the good life: display and style ....................
1. Iconography of wealth ................................................
2. Styles of wealth ..........................................................
2.1. Praise to the glorious house. The tapestry of
the Erotes and its circle ....................................
2.2. From narrative to symbol. The great
Dionysiac tapestry in Riggisberg ........................
3. Ornaments for the patrician house and the
church ..........................................................................
4. Images and ideals. Creating an Egyptian style ........
5. Decline or transformation? Art for the less
wealthy ........................................................................
217
217
221
183
193
205
211
221
233
236
245
259
contents
ix
IX. The Christianization of art in late antique Egypt ..........
1. Classical tradition: from pagan to Christian ................
1.1. Double readings ......................................................
1.2. Creating new narratives ........................................
1.3. Portraying the holy ................................................
2. Ecclesiastical display and delight in the good
things ..............................................................................
2.1. The city of St Menas ............................................
2.2. Sculpture in the early Byzantine period ..............
2.3. Images for higher contemplation ..........................
269
269
269
275
288
Epilogue: Perennial Hellenism? ................................................
Abbreviations ..............................................................................
Index of names ..........................................................................
Index of places and monuments ..............................................
Museum index ..........................................................................
Illustrations ................................................................................
351
359
385
390
395
403
302
302
310
334
LIST OF FIGURES AND PLATES*
FIGURES
1. Limestone pilaster capital recarved in recent times. Recklinghausen,
Ikonenmuseum 501. After Wessel [1962].
2. Modern “Sheikh Ibada” sculpture. Private collection. After Koptische
Kunst Nachtrag fig. 8.
3. Limestone stela of Rhodia. Berlin, Museum für Spätantike und
Byzantinische Kunst 9666. After Effenberger – Severin 1992
Cat. 68.
4. Limestone stela of Theodora. Berlin, Museum für Spätantike und
Cat. 67.
5. Tunic decoration. Collection Bouvier. After Stauffer 1991 Cat. 42.
9. Painted wooden coffin. Malibu, J. Paul Getty Museum 82.AP.75.
After Parlasca 1996 fig. 1a.
10. Istanbul, Silivri Kapi, tomb chamber, sarcophagus front. After
Warland 1994 Pl. 71/3.
11. Limestone mortuary stela. Cairo, Coptic Museum 8004.
12. Manuscript illustration. London, The Egypt Exploration Society.
After Age of Spirituality Cat. 93.
13. Drawing on papyrus. London, The British Library Board pap.
3053. After Age of Spirituality Cat. 86.
14. Ivory comb. Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des Antiquités
Égyptiennes E 11874. After Cat. Paris-Agde Cat. 277.
15. Papyrus Goleniscev (“Alexandrian World Chronicle”), fol. 6v, illustration. Moscow, Pushkin Museum. After Elsner 1998b fig. 162.
16. Limestone niche pediment. Cairo, Coptic Museum 7011.
* Unless otherwise indicated, the photographs are from the author’s archives.
xii
list of figures and plates
18. Fragment of late Hellenistic limestone pediment. Alexandria,
Graeco-Roman Museum 3790. After Pensabene 1993 Pl. 132, top.
19. Marina el-Alamein, House 9, niche, reconstruction. After McKenzie
1996a fig. 26b.
20. Limestone portrait stela. Formerly Cairo, Coptic Museum 8026.
21. Limestone portrait stela. Kansas City, Nelson-Atkins Museum of
Art. After Parlasca 1966 Pl. 62/2.
22. Limestone niche pediment. Cairo, Coptic Museum 7030. After
Strzygowski 1904 fig. 34.
23. Limestone niche pediment. Cairo, Coptic Museum 7044. After
Strzygowski 1904 Pl. III/2.
24. Hermopolis West, “Maison Dionysiaque”, wall painting. After
Gabra – Drioton 1954 Pl. 10.
25. Luxor, Amûn temple and tetrarchic castrum. After El-Saghir et
al. 1986 Pl. I.
26. Luxor, tetrarchic castrum from the east, reconstruction by J.-C.
Golvin. After El-Saghir et al. 1986 Pl. XX.
27. Luxor, imperial cult sanctuary, south wall, wall painting, reconstruction drawing. After Deckers 1979 fig. 34.
28. Sohag, “White Monastery”. After Grossmann 1998a fig. 13.
29. Sohag, “White Monastery”, sanctuary, western apse, wall niche.
After Severin 1998a fig. 5.
30. Sohag, “White Monastery”, “south narthex”, east wall, niche.
After Severin 1998a fig. 6.
31. Hermopolis Magna, episcopal complex. After Grossmann 1998a
fig. 2.
32. Hauwariya-Marea, transept basilica. After Grossmann 1998a fig. 4.
33. Hermopolis Magna, “South Church”. After Grossmann 2002
fig. 58.
34. Limestone pilaster base. Cairo, Coptic Museum 7012.
35. Porphyry bust of emperor. Cairo, Egyptian Museum 7257. After
Strzygowski 1904 Pl. II.
36. Porphyry statue of enthroned emperor. Alexandria, GraecoRoman Museum 5934.
37. Porphyry statue group, Diocletianus and Galerius. Venice, San
Marco. After Effenberger – Severin 1992 fig. 13/a.
38. Porphyry statue of emperor. Berlin, Museum für Spätantike und
Cat. 10.
40.
41.
42.
43.
44.
45.
46.
47.
48.
49.
50.
51.
52.
53.
54.
55.
56.
57.
58.
59.
60.
61.
62.
63.
64.
65.
66.
67.
68.
xiii
Fragment of limestone frieze. Cairo, Coptic Museum 7020.
Limestone frieze. Cairo, Coptic Museum 7819.
Limestone relief. Cairo, Coptic Museum 7039.
Fragment of limestone niche pediment. Cairo, Coptic Museum
7050.
Limestone pilaster capital. Cairo, Coptic Museum 7051.
Limestone frieze, detail. Berlin, Museum für Spätantike und
Cat. 72.
Fragment of limestone niche pediment. Cairo, Coptic Museum
7061.
Limestone niche pediment. Cairo, Coptic Museum 7017.
Limestone keystone. Cairo, Coptic Museum 7031.
Limestone entablature fragment. Cairo, Coptic Museum 7021.
Fragment of marble frieze. Cairo, Coptic Museum 7023.
Limestone niche pediment. Berlin, Museum für Spätantike und
Cat. 65.
Limestone niche pediment. Trieste, Civici Musei di Storia ed
Arte 5620. After Cat. Hamm Cat. 16.
Limestone door lintel. Cairo, Coptic Museum, Old Wing, inner
courtyard.
Fragment of limestone frieze. Budapest, Museum of Fine Arts
93.11.A.
Limestone portrait stela. Cairo, Coptic Museum 8616.
Limestone niche pediment. Cairo, Coptic Museum 4475.
Fragment of limestone frieze. Alexandria, Graeco-Roman Museum
23779.
Fragment of limestone frieze. Alexandria, Graeco-Roman Museum
23494.
Limestone niche pediment (detail). Cairo, Coptic Museum 7035.
xiv
70. Sohag, “Red Monastery”, sanctuary, detail. After Severin 1998a
fig. 8.
71. Sohag, “Red Monastery”, limestone capital. After Severin 1977a
no. 276/d.
72. Tapestry hanging. Boston, Museum of Fine Arts. After Maguire
1999 fig. 9.
73. Decorated bone panel. Cairo, Coptic Museum 9060. After Strzygowski 1904 Pl. XI.
74. Decorated bone panel. Cairo, Coptic Museum 9063. After
Strzygowski 1904 Pl. XII.
75. Decorated bone panel. Cairo, Coptic Museum 9062. After Strzygowski 1904 Pl. XIII.
76. Tapestry hanging, detail. Riggisberg, Abegg Stiftung. After Simon
1970, cover.
77. Fragment of tapestry hanging. Cleveland, The Cleveland Museum
of Art 75.6. After Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. p. 87, right.
78. Silver dish with embossed decoration. Cairo, Egyptian Museum.
After Török 1988 Pl. XVII.
79. Alabaster statuette. Cairo, Egyptian Museum. After Török 1988
Pl. XXII.
80. Painted wooden panel. Cairo, Coptic Museum 7259.
81. Wooden relief. Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des Antiquités Égyptiennes AF 5168. After Rutschowscaya 1986 Cat. 343.
82. Wooden relief (detail). Cairo, Coptic Museum 7201.
84. Bawit, “south church”, limestone frieze. After Torp 1971 Pl. 31/1b.
85. Wooden relief. Cairo, Coptic Museum 840.
87. Fragment of tapestry hanging. Boston, Museum of Fine Arts,
Charles Potter Kling Fund 66.377. After Zaloscer 1974 fig. 87.
91. Fragment of tapestry hanging. Hildesheim, Pelizaeus Museum
4726. After Cat. Hamm Cat. 367.
92. Neck band from tunic. Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département
des Antiquités Égyptiennes E 29294. After Rutschowscaya 1990
fig. pp. 98–99.
xv
94. Tunic decoration. Frankfurt, Museum für Kunsthandwerk 3610.
After Weitzmann 1964 Pl. 12/2.
95. Tunic decoration. London, Victoria and Albert Museum 2140–
1900. After Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. p. 116, top.
96. Textile band. Düsseldorf, Kunstmuseum 12882. After Cat. Hamm
Cat. 379/a.
97. Decorated textile. Collection Bouvier. After Stauffer 1991 Cat. 30.
98. Tapestry hanging. London, British Museum 43049. After
Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. pp. 100–101.
99. Bone carving. Washington, Dumbarton Oaks Collection 42.1.
After Badawy 1978 fig. 3.10.
100. Bone carving. Alexandria, Graeco-Roman Museum 12109.
102. Bone carving. Cairo, Coptic Museum 5408.
107. Textile band. Paris, Musée National du Moyen Age-Thermes
de Cluny 13188. After Lorquin 1992 Cat. 22.
108. Inlaid chest front. Cairo, Egyptian Museum JE 71191. After
S. Wenig: Africa in Antiquity. The Arts of Ancient Nubia and the
Sudan II. The Catalogue. Brooklyn 1978 fig. 80.
109. Bone panel. Liverpool Museum M 100325. After Gibson 1994 Cat. 2.
110. Limestone stela. Berlin, Museum für Spätantike und Byzantinische
Kunst 4726. After Effenberger – Severin 1992 Cat. 66.
111. Terracotta statuette. Budapest, Museum of Fine Arts 84.16.A.
After Török 1993 I Cat. G 6.
112. Fragment of silk textile, drawing. Riggisberg, Abegg Stiftung.
After Kötzsche 1993 fig. 1.
113. Alexandria, Wescher catacomb, wall painting, watercolour copy.
After Venit 2002 fig. 159.
114. Painting on canvas. Riggisberg, Abegg Stiftung. After Kötzsche
1995 figs 1–2.
115. Fragment of painting on canvas. Paris, Musée du Louvre,
Département des Antiquités Égyptiennes E 12600. After Rutschowscaya 1992 Cat. 56.
116. Resist-dyed textile hanging, drawing. Paris, Musée du Louvre,
Département des Antiquités Égyptiennes E 11102. After Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. pp. 28–29.
xvi
117. Resist-dyed textile hanging. Riggisberg, Abegg Stiftung 1397.
After Baratte 1985 fig. 1.
118. Fragment of resist-dyed textile hanging. Cleveland, The Cleveland
Museum of Art, John L. Severance Fund 51.400. After Age of
Spirituality Cat. 390.
119. Fragment of resist-dyed textile hanging. London, Victoria and
Albert Museum 722–1897. After Age of Spirituality Cat. 391.
120. Abu Mena, the Great Basilica, the Tomb Church and the
Baptistery in the 5th century. After Grossmann 1998a fig. 3.
121. Abu Mena, the Tomb Church in the 6th century. After Grossmann 1998a fig. 10.
122. Abu Mena, Great Basilica, second period building. After Grossmann 1998b fig. 6, below.
123. Abu Mena, the town. After Grossmann 1998c Diagram 1.
124. Church of the Monastery of St Catherine at Mount Sinai, apse
mosaic. After Elsner 1995 fig. 17.
125. Boxwood carving. Berlin, Museum für Spätantike und Byzantinische Kunst 4782. After Cat. Hamm Cat. 91.
126. Ivory carving. Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des Objets
d’Art OA 3317. After Volbach 1976 no. 144.
127. Bawit, Monastery of Apa Apollo, excavated area. After Clédat
1999 Plan I.
128. Bawit, “south church”. After Severin 1977b fig. 1.
129. Limestone door lintel. Cairo, Coptic Museum 7381. After
Severin 1977a no. 280/b.
130. Bawit, “north church”, limestone column capital. After Clédat
1999 photo 206.
131. Bawit, “south church”, nave, north wall. After Severin 1977b
Pl. 36/b.
132. Bawit, “south church”, north door. After Severin 1977b Pl. 35.
133. Limestone column capital. Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des Antiquités Égyptiennes. After Pensabene 1993 Pl. 67/
580.
134. Saqqara, Monastery of Apa Jeremias, shafts of engaged limestone columns. After Badawy 1978 fig. 3.168.
135. Saqqara, Monastery of Apa Jeremias, limestone door jambs.
After Badawy 1978 fig. 3.169.
136. Limestone capital. Alexandria, Graeco-Roman Museum 21684.
137. Limestone relief. Cairo, Coptic Museum 35843. After Effenberger
1996 fig. 12.
xvii
138. Limestone relief. Cairo, Coptic Museum 37798. After Torp
1965b Pl. VI/a.
139. Limestone relief. Cairo, Coptic Museum 7100.
140. Limestone relief. Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des
Antiquités Égyptiennes E 16923. After Torp 1965b Pl. VI/c.
1965b Pl. I/a.
1965b Pl. I/b.
143. Limestone relief. Cairo, Coptic Museum 7102. After Cat. ParisAgde Cat. 85.
144. Limestone stela. Copenhagen, Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek Æ.I.N.
884. After Severin 1981b fig. 19.
145. Ivory panel. London, British Museum M&LA OA 9999. After
Buckton (ed.) 1994 Cat. 64.
146. Limestone pilaster (the “Paris Pilaster”). Paris, Musée du Louvre,
Département des Antiquités Égyptiennes X 5031. After Kitzinger
1938 Pl. LXXVII/1.
147. Limestone pilaster (the “Paris Pilaster”). Paris, Musée du Louvre,
Département des Antiquités Égyptiennes X 5031. After Torp
1971 Pl. 32/4.
148. Cairo, Church of Sitt Barbara, wooden door wing, details. Cairo,
Coptic Museum 738. After Severin 1977a no. 286.
149. Wooden corbel. Cairo, Coptic Museum 8775. After Strzygowski
1904 Pl. VII/1.
150. Bawit, “south church”, limestone column capital. Paris, Musée
du Louvre, Département des Antiquités Égyptiennes X 5060.
After Torp 1971 Pl. 32/1.
151. Bawit, “south church”, limestone column capital. Paris, Musée
du Louvre, Département des Antiquités Égyptiennes E 16963.
After Clédat 1999 photo 212.
152. Limestone column capital. Berlin, Museum für Spätantike und
Cat. 88.
153. Limestone column capital. Berlin, Museum für Spätantike und
Cat. 85.
154. Limestone frieze. Berlin, Museum für Spätantike und Byzantinische Kunst 4716. After Effenberger – Severin 1992 Cat.
86.
xviii
155. Saqqara, Monastery of Apa Jeremias, limestone column capital.
Cairo, Coptic Museum 8362. After Atalla n.d. II fig. p. 74,
right.
156. Limestone column capital. Cairo, Coptic Museum 7978.
157. Bawit, Monastery of Apa Apollo, Chapel LV, niche, detail.
After Clédat 1999 photo 132.
158. Bawit, Monastery of Apa Apollo, Chapel XXXVII, west wall,
wall painting. After Lucchesi Palli 1988 Pl. 5/3.
159. Bawit, Monastery of Apa Apollo, Chapel LVI, west wall, wall
painting. After Clédat 1999 photo 135.
160. Saqqara, Monastery of Apa Jeremias, Cell A, north wall, wall
painting. After Bolman (ed.) 2002 fig. 3.9.
161. Al-Akhbariya, church, fragments of wall painting. After Severin
1998a fig. 14.
162. Bawit, Monastery of Apa Apollo, Chapel III, north wall, wall
painting, watercolour copy. After Badawy 1978 fig. 4.30.
163. Bawit, Monastery of Apa Apollo, Chapel XLIII, dome from
the north. After Clédat 1999 photo 62.
164. Bawit, Monastery of Apa Apollo, Chapel XLIII, north wall,
detail of wall painting. After Clédat 1999 photo 75.
165. Bawit, Monastery of Apa Apollo, Chapel LIV, north wall, detail
of wall painting. After Clédat 1999 photo 130.
166. Fragment of painted pottery jar. Cambridge, Fitzwilliam Museum
E 19.1971. After Bourriau 1981 Cat. 184.
167. Bawit, Monastery of Apa Apollo, Chapel XLII, south wall,
detail of wall painting. After Rutschowscaya 1992 fig. p. 77.
168. Cairo, Church of al-Mo"allaqa, wooden lintel. Cairo, Coptic
Museum 753. Left half.
Museum 753. Right half.
Museum 753. Detail.
Museum 753. Detail.
Museum 753. Detail.
Museum 753. Detail.
Museum 753. Detail.
xix
Museum 753. Detail.
Museum 753. Detail.
177. Limestone relief. Cairo, Coptic Museum 8704. After Effenberger
1975 Pl. 44.
178. Limestone relief. Berlin, Museum für Spätantike und Byzantinische Kunst 4131. After Effenberger – Severin 1992 Cat. 94.
179. Bawit, Monastery of Apa Apollo, Chapel XLVI, niche, wall
painting, detail. After Clédat 1999 photo 89.
180. Bawit, Monastery of Apa Apollo, Chapel XLVI, niche, wall
painting, detail. After Clédat 1999 photo 91.
PLATES
I. Luxor, imperial cult sancuary, south wall, eastern half, detail
of wall painting. After Deckers 1979 fig. 22.
II. Tapestry hanging. Washington, The Textile Museum 71.118.
After Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. p. 38.
III. Tapestry hanging, detail. Washington, The Textile Museum
71.118. After Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. p. 39.
IV. Tapestry hanging. Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des
Antiquités Égyptiennes E 10530.
V. Fragment of tapestry hanging. Cairo, Coptic Museum 8454.
VI. Fragment of tapestry hanging. Lyon, Musée Historique des
Tissus 28927. After Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. p. 68, right.
VII. Tapestry hanging. Washington, The Textile Museum 71.18.
After Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. p. 65.
VIII. Fragments of tapestry hanging. Washington, Dumbarton Oaks
Collection 32.1. After Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. pp. 120–121.
IX. Fragments of tapestry hanging. Washington, Dumbarton Oaks
Collection 37.14. After Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. p. 64.
X. Fragments of tapestry hanging. New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art 31.9.3. After Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. pp. 88–89.
XI. Fragment of tapestry hanging. Cambridge, Mass., Fogg Art
Museum 1939.112.1,2. After Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. pp.
138–139.
XII. Fragments of tapestry hanging. Riggisberg, Abegg Stiftung
3100a. After Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. pp. 84–85.
xx
XIII. Fragment of tapestry hanging. Riggisberg, Abegg Stiftung
1637. After Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. p. 86.
XIV. Painted wooden panel. Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des Antiquités Égyptiennes E 14352. After Rutschowscaya 1992 Cat. 41.
XV. Painted wooden panel. Berlin, Museum für Spätantike und
Byzantinische Kunst 6115. After Effenberger – Severin
1992 Cat. 82.
XVI. Painted wooden relief. Berlin, Museum für Spätantike und
Byzantinische Kunst 4785. After Effenberger – Severin
1992 Cat. 99.
XVII. Antinoe, tomb of Theodosia, wall painting, watercolour
copy. After Cat. Paris-Agde fig. p. 107.
XVIII. Tunic (?) decoration. Berlin, Museum für Spätantike und
Byzantinische Kunst 4658. After Cat. Hamm Cat. 341/a.
XIX. Tunic decoration, detail. Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des Antiquités Égyptiennes AF 6067. After Cat. ParisAgde fig. p. 151.
XX. Incised and painted bone panel. Cairo, Coptic Museum
7065.
XXI. Incised and painted bone panel. Cairo, Coptic Museum
7066.
XXII. Incised and painted bone panel. Cairo, Coptic Museum
7067.
XXIII. Fragment of painting on canvas. Trier, Sammlung des
Archäologischen Instituts der Universität OL 1986.11e.
After Grimm 1998 fig. 52/b.
XXIV. Fragment of painting on canvas. Trier, Sammlung des Archäologischen Instituts der Universität OL 1986.11a. After
Grimm 1998 fig. 52/c.
XXV. Fragment of resist-dyed textile hanging. Berlin, Museum
für Spätantike und Byzantinische Kunst 9659. After Cat.
Hamm Cat. 420/b.
XXVI. Icon of St Peter. Monastery of St Catherine at Mount
Sinai. After Weitzmann 1976 Pl. VIII.
XXVII. Icon of Christ and St Menas. Paris, Musée du Louvre,
Département des Antiquités Égyptiennes E 11565. After
Cat. Paris-Agde Cat. 72.
XXVIII. Icon of the Virgin and Child. Monastery of St Catherine
at Mount Sinai. After Cormack 2000 fig. 45.
xxi
XXIX. Fragment of double-faced icon, front. Cairo, Coptic
Museum 9083.
XXX. Icon of Bishop Abraham of Hermonthis. Berlin, Museum
für Spätantike und Byzantinische Kunst 6114. After
Effenberger – Severin 1992 Cat. 84.
XXXI. Saqqara, Monastery of Apa Jeremias, painted limestone
column capital. Cairo, Coptic Museum 39817. After Atalla
n.d. II fig. p. 96.
XXXII. Bawit, Monastery of Apa Apollo, Chapel VI, niche, wall
painting. Cairo, Coptic Museum 7118. After du Bourguet
1967 fig. p. 42.
XXXIII. Bawit, Monastery of Apa Apollo, wall painting (detail).
Coptic Museum 12089.
XXXIV. Church of the Monastery of St Antony at the Red Sea,
wall painting. After Bolman (ed.) 2002 fig. 3.4.
XXXV. Tapestry hanging. Cleveland, The Cleveland Museum of
Art 67.144. After Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. p. 135.
XXXVI. Painted wooden relief. Cairo, Coptic Museum 7245.
XXXVII. Painted wooden relief, detail. Cairo, Coptic Museum 7245.
ACKNOWLEDGEMENTS
This book is the by-product of an exhibition of late antique and
early Byzantine art from Egypt.* In the course of the preparation
of this exhibition and the writing of its catalogue I was confronted
more dramatically than ever with the pitfalls of the dating of Egyptian
late antique and early Byzantine works of art, with the long shadow
cast by the biassed interpretation of Coptic culture in general and
Coptic art in particular that was presented by Josef Strzygowski and
his followers, and with the high-handed attitude of modern historians of art towards the Egyptian province of late antique-early Byzantine
art. If I suceeded in the rectification of some of the old preconceptions and in the delineation of a more realistic picture of Coptic art
as an integral part of the late antique-early Byzantine art of the
Mediterranean, it is owing first of all to what I have learnt from the
work of my friends and colleagues to whom this book is dedicated,
and to what I have learnt from the work of historians and art historians who, like Peter Brown, Glen Bowersock, Peter Grossmann,
Hans-Georg Severin or Jaś Elsner, steadily opposed the onerous traditions of Coptic art history.
For facilitating my work in Egypt, I am greatly indebted to the
authorities of the Supreme Council of Antiquities, Arab Republic of
Egypt, the staffs of the Coptic Museum, Cairo, Graeco-Roman
Museum, Alexandria, Alexandria National Museum, Alexandria, and
the library of the Deutsches Archäologisches Institut, Abteilung Kairo.
I also owe thanks to the Department of Antiquities, Museum of Fine
Arts, Budapest, and particularly to Mr. Géza Andó, without whose
assistance my field work in Egypt and the preparation of the illustration of this book could not have been completed. I am deeply
indebted to the staff at Koninklijke Brill, particularly to Ms. Mattie
Kuiper and Ms. Willy de Gijzel, Editors, Unit Religion and Social
Sciences.
Budapest in November, 2004.
* See, After the Pharaohs. Treasures of Coptic Art from Egyptian Collections. Museum of
Fine Arts, Budapest. 18 March –18 May 2005. Catalogue by L. Török. Budapest 2005.
A NOTE ON THE TERMINOLOGY
This book discusses some aspects of Egyptian art in the period
between the AD mid-third and late seventh centuries. This period
is roughly identical with what the modern literature defines as Late
Antiquity, extending from around AD 250 to around AD 800, “a
distinctive and quite decisive period of history that stands on its
own”.1 Its end is adapted here, however, to a special historical time
limit, namely, the Arab Conquest of Egypt in 639–646 (see Chapter
IV.2.5) which caused, with some delay, profound changes in artistic orientation as well as in the social/functional background and
structure of artistic production.2 In order to take into account the
outcome of earlier processes in the arts, this time limit is extended
to about AD 700.
Referring to the art of Egypt in this period as a whole, I shall
use the general term “late antique”. When dealing more concretely
with individual monuments or groups of monuments placed in the
context of a historical period, the term “late antique” covers the
period between the mid-third and the mid-fifth centuries, the term
“early Byzantine” the period between the mid-fifth century and the
Arab Conquest.3
1
Introduction in: Bowersock–Brown–Grabar (eds) 1999 vii–xiii ix.
The editors of Vol. XIV of The Cambridge Ancient History. Late Antiquity (xviii f.)
opted for AD 600 as a concluding date for the history of the late antique east arguing that the Persian wars and the Arab conquests of the earlier 7th cent. brought
about irreversible changes in power relations and political geography as well as in
religion and culture. Curiously, this argument does not take into account the date
of Egypt’s conquest.—Some scholars continue to argue for a shorter Late Antiquity
between Diocletian/Constantine and Justinian suggesting that the longer Late
Antiquity lacks a distinct political, economic, and cultural structure. From the particular aspect of Egyptian art, however, things seem different, as I shall try to show.
For the debate on the limits of Late Antiquity, see A. Giardina: Esplosione di tardoantico. Studi Storici 40 (1999) 157–180; A. Marcone: La tarda antichità e le sue
periodizzazioni. Rivista Storica Italiana 112 (2000) 318–334; Cameron, Averil: The
“Long” Late Antiquity: A Late Twentieth-Century Model. in: T.P. Wiseman (ed.):
Classics in Progress. Essays on Ancient Greece and Rome. Oxford 2002 165–191 and cf.
G. Fowden’s review of CAH XIV, JRS 15 (2002) 681–686.
3
For the periodisation of the late Roman and the Byzantine Empire cf. the
survey in Schreiner 1994 120 f. The Oxford Dictionary of Byzantium, ed. A.P. Kazhdan,
2
xxvi
a note on the terminology
Egyptian culture between the mid-third century and the Arab
Conquest and the culture of the Egyptian Christians after the Conquest
is frequently termed “Coptic”.4 The word “Copt” derives from Arabic
qibt, an abbreviation of Greek é¤guptiow, “Egyptian”. In turn, Greek
Aigyptios derives from the ancient Egyptian name of the city of
Memphis, Ówt-k-Pt˙. Coptic is the last written form of the ancient
Egyptian language, written in Greek alphabetic characters to which
seven signs were added. These derived from the Demotic writing
and covered Egyptian phonemes not present in Greek. The Coptic
writing system was developed in the AD third century.5 Initially, it
was used for biblical texts. By the middle of the fourth century it
was also used for Christian literary works and private letters. The
first legal texts occur in the sixth century, and, besides its literary
use, the increasing non-literary use of the Coptic also continues after
the Arab Conquest.6 In Arab usage Qibt referred to non-Muslims
and, before the ninth century, to non-Arabic speakers; accordingly,
the term “Copt” traditionally denotes the Christian descendants of
the ancient Egyptian population.
“Coptic” is also used to denote the Monophysite church of Egypt
(from the Fourth Ecumenical Council of Chalcedon, October 451)
and, in a far less precise manner, a period of Egyptian art history
whose upper and lower time limits (and frequently also contents)
greatly vary with different authors. On account of its vagueness and
the scholarly prejudices attached to it, the term “Coptic art” will be
New York 1991 includes the period stretching from the fourth to the fifteenth century.—Bagnall 1993 ix speaks about “late antiquity” beginning with “the emergence
of Egypt from the difficulties of the third century” and ending in the middle of the
5th century and about “Byzantine” Egypt after the middle of the 5th century.—
Cf. also A. Giardina: Egitto bizantino o tardoantico? Problemi della terminologia
e della periodizzazione. in: Criscuolo–Geraci (eds) 1989 89–103; CAH XIV 974 f.
According to Heinen 1998a 39 the late antique period starts with the tetrarchic
reforms of 284 and ends with the Arab Conquest in 639–646. In his view the
Coptic period starts only with the Conquest.—For the 20th-century trends in the
art historical periodisation of late antique and early Christian art cf. also Cormack
2000a 884 ff.
4
For the connections between the uses of the term and the modern search for
Coptic identity in Egypt recently, see J. Kamil: Christianity in the Land of the Pharaons.
The Coptic Orthodox Church. London-New York 2002.
5
H. Satzinger: Old Coptic. CE VIII 169–175.
6
For the language and writing cf. M. Krause: Koptische Sprache. LÄ III (1980)
731–737; Bagnall 1995 19 ff.—For the terminology cf. Krause 1998a 2; T. Thomas:
Copts. in: Bowersock – Brown – Grabar (eds) 1999 395 f.; Grossmann 1998a 209 ff.
a note on the terminology
xxvii
used in this book mainly in the discussion of the art historical perspectives of the earlier half of the twentieth century. If used occasionally in other contexts, it will refer to the art of the late antique-early
Byzantine periods as a whole without any ethnic, religious, or confessional distinctions and restrictions. Some of the more recent literature uses the term “Coptic art” in this sense.7 In contrast, the
earlier literature on the arts of Egypt in the late antique period and
on the Christian Egyptian arts of the Middle Ages (i.e., the arts of
the Christians in Islamic—Omayyad, Abbasid, Tulunid, Fatimid,
and Ayyubid—Egypt) used it either undefined or in the sense of a
particular historical/art historical hypothesis and connected it exlusively with the Monophysite Egyptians (see Chapter II.3, 4).8
Unless otherwise indicated, all dates are AD.
7
Severin 1998a; Török 1998.
For the various uses of the terms “Egyptian late antique”, “Christian Egyptian”,
and “Coptic” in the more recent literature, see, e.g., A. Effenberger in: Effenberger –
Severin 1992 50–55; Nauerth 1993 97; Krause 1998a 2–14; Brune 1999 100–107.
8
CHAPTER ONE
INTRODUCTION:
A VISIT TO THE COPTIC MUSEUM IN OLD CAIRO
. . . anyone who has attended closely to the movement of artefacts in a museum will know that the
assumption that, in a museum, artefacts are somehow static, safe, and out of the territory in which
their meaning and use can be transformed, is demonstrably false.1
Visiting the Coptic Museum in Old Cairo before the current renovation of the museum’s buildings would have turned their surroundings
into a desolate construction area,2 the candid late twentieth-century
tourist entered a shady, lush garden opening from the noisy Mari
Girgis Street running along the western side of the formidable remains
of the Roman fortress of Babylon.3 The old-fashioned garden’s winding palm alleys were lined with ancient marble columns, sculptures
and monumental vases. In its centre stood an enchanting Oriental
palace decorated with finely carved and inlaid wooden latticework
window grilles, or mashrabiya screens, which protected the interior
from the scorching sunshine of Egypt.
The surroundings did not fail to cast their spell on the tourist who
started his/her visit as if s/he would be allowed to walk through the
cabinets housing the collections of a fine patron of art rather than
studying the exhibition of a public museum mounted with the sober
impartiality of scholarship. Not only the opulent garden and the
halls of the palace with their marble tiles and wall panels, ornamental
1
C.S. Smith: Museums, Artefacts, and Meanings. in: P. Vergo (ed.): The New
Museology. London 1989 6–21 9.
2
I wrote this chapter in spring 2002.
3
For the tetrarchic military camp, see Pensabene 1993 25 ff.; P. Grossmann –
C. Le Quesne – P. Sheehan: Zur römischen Festung von Babylon—Alt-Kairo. AA
1994 271–278; P. Lambert (ed.): Fortifications and the Synagogue: The Fortress of Babylon
and the Ben Ezra Synagogue, Cairo. London 1994; P. Sheehan: The Roman Fortress
of Babylon in Old Cairo. in: Bailey (ed.) 1996 95–97.
2
chapter one
fountains and intricately carved wooden ceilings breathed the atmosphere of a refined aristocratic connoisseurship. The style of the
collection’s display also recalled a very special kind of early twentieth-century amateurism that was destined to serve the noble aim of
assisting the re-creation of the modern Coptic minority’s cultural
identity and the re-discovery and display of the ancient cultural heritage on the basis of which this identity was to be constructed.
As a result of the ongoing renovation of the Coptic Museum, the
enchanted palace will now be transferred into the world of twentyfirst-century museology4 and the modernization of the exhibition will
definitely dissolve the dated atmosphere of early twentieth-century
connoisseurship and political idealism. It will, however, still not be
able to dispel the helplessness that the candid visitor of the old palace
had to increasingly feel as s/he progressed from one gallery to the
other: for the more of the exhibits s/he saw the more s/he had the
impression of seeing beautiful—often rather strangely beautiful—but,
on the whole, perplexing objects. The aesthetic appeal of the sculptures carved from stone, wood, or bone, of the wall paintings detached
from the walls of churches and monastic cells, of the textiles woven
with astonishing skill from silk or linen and wool, of the fancy vessels made of bronze, clay, or glass; of the illuminated manuscripts
and the exquisite pieces of jewellery seemed to arise from an amazing mixture of familiarity and unfamiliarity. Some objects gave the
impression of arbitrarily re-interpreted Classical sculptures. Others
recalled Byzantine works of art. Again others brought to the visitor’s mind carvings or frescoes that s/he had seen in European
medieval churches. Many items resembled exotic objects encountered
in ethnographic collections or at shows of primitive art. In the final
effect, the visitor possessing an average secondary school knowledge
of art history always felt that the impression of the unfamiliar and
unfathomably exotic overwhelmed the impression of the familiar.
Neither the information provided by the labels of the exhibited
objects, by the guidebook, or by the official guide hired at the
museum’s entrance helped much in finding a thread on which s/he
could string the objects. The exhibits were said to come from a very
4
For the aims of the reconstruction cf. M. Basta: Renovation of the Coptic
Museum. in: Godlewski (ed.) 1990 275–279; Gabra – Alcock 1993 38 f.
introduction
3
long period of time extending from the second to the nineteenth
century, yet, as a whole, they were defined at the same time as representing the same self-contained, ethnically, religiously, and aesthetically homogeneous world—the world of the Copts of Egypt. And
it was just this self-contained homogeneity that appeared all but obvious when the visitor completed his/her attentive tour in the halls
and courts of the Coptic Museum.
While the obvious diversity of the exhibited objects contradicted
the claim of homogeneity, the chronological dates marked on the
labels with a perceptible vagueness blurred rather than explained the
relationship between works of art placed close to each other or far
apart in time and they made it a hopeless task, to compare them
with what the visitor knew about what was going on in European
art in the course of the same centuries. However fascinated they
were by what they saw, most visitors left the Coptic Museum in the
possession of a chaotic impression. The case had been markedly
different with the Egyptian Museum: when leaving this first and foremost aim of all cultural pilgrimages to Cairo, they could take with
them a fairly clear and dynamic historical picture of the main developments characterising the millennia of pharaonic, Greek, and Roman
Egyptian culture. By contrast, the image of “Coptic” Egypt they
were presented with in the old palace over the ruins of the fortress
of Babylon evoked a mysterious, timeless, self-centered post-Classical
world which could perhaps best be described in the terms of easily
overexaggerated dichotomies such as spiritual depth/formal simplicity, luxury/decline, originality/isolation, creativity/oppression.
Visits to collections of “Coptic” art may well have ended with
similar feelings of helplessness in any other great museum of the
world. The opaqueness of the explanations that one received in Old
Cairo was not a phenomenon restricted to this greatest of all collections of Egyptian antiquities from the late antique, Byzantine, and
early Islamic periods. On the contrary: all “Coptic” exhibitions, with
their labels and catalogues, and all available guide-books reflected
the same vagueness of explanation that was caused by the controversial results of the academic efforts directed since the late nineteenth century at understanding the history of the arts of Egypt in
these periods.
The first exhibition of Egyptian works of art dating from the late
antique and early Byzantine periods was mounted by Gaston Maspero
4
chapter one
in 1889 at Bulaq (Cairo) in the predecessor of the Egyptian Museum.5
As a result of diggings started in the 1880s at late Roman and
Christian sites, collections of “Coptic” antiquities were also founded
in Paris, London, Berlin, Brussels, St. Petersburg and other great
cities of the world. The architectural and decorative sculptures in
stone and other materials, the wall paintings, metal vessels, textiles,
terracottas, lamps and other objects of daily use which were displayed in Cairo first in the Salle Copte at Bulaq and later in the
galleries of the new Egyptian Museum,6 then in Europe in the Louvre,
the Musée Guimet, the South Kensington Museum, the KaiserFriedrich-Museum, the Musées Royaux d’Art et d’Histoire and the
Hermitage fascinated the general public and became a source of
inspiration for many artists at the turn of the century. What they
admired, however, could not be systematically described in the same
historical and aesthetic terms as Classical, or Renaissance, or ancient
Egyptian art used to be defined and interpreted in those days.
The reason for this was that the archaeological excavations conducted in the late nineteenth and the early twentieth century at
Egyptian late Roman and Christian sites were, with some isolated
exceptions,7 mines of objects rather than sources of historical, archaeo-
5
Gayet 1889/90.—The museum itself was founded by Auguste Mariette and
opened on 16 October 1863.
6
Maspero’s successor, J. de Morgan, who was not interested in its enlargement,
transferred a part of the “Coptic” collection to the Graeco-Roman Museum in
Alexandria. After his second appointment in 1899, Maspero resumed the collection
of post-Pharaonic antiquities. At the opening of the present building of the Egyptian
Museum in 1902, two halls were secured for the collection on the ground floor to
which a further hall was added on the first floor in 1915. In 1939 the collection
was made over to the Coptic Museum (transferred in 1945), except for some pieces
which were retained in the Egyptian Museum.—The finds from the late 4th-early
6th-cent. princely necropoleis at Qustul and Ballana in Lower Nubia were incorporated into the collections of the Egyptian Museum. Some of the more spectacular objects were transferred to the recently created Nubia Museum at Aswan in the
late 1990s; the bulk of the finds remained, however, in the Egyptian Museum where
at present they are displayed unsystematically in the ground floor halls housing the
objects from the Ptolemaic and Roman periods. For the Qustul and Ballana finds,
see Emery – Kirwan 1938; Török 1988; for the Nubia Museum cf. Musée de la
Nubie. Ministère de la Culture Conseil Supérieur des Antiquités Secteur des Musées Fonds pour
la Sauvegarde des Vestiges nubiens. Le Caire n.d.
7
For the excavations of Jean Clédat at Bawit, see below; for Flinders Petrie’s
researches at Heracleopolis Magna and Oxyrhynchos, see Petrie 1905, 1925. The
methods and aims of these excavations still did not anticipate, however, the archaeological methods and aims which were developed in the second half of the twentieth century.
introduction
5
logical and art historical information. Therefore, the scholarly appreciation of the “Coptic” period could not keep pace with the growth
of collections. While the exhibitions of pharaonic Egyptian art reflected
the progress made by Egyptology in the course of the late nineteenth
and the early twentieth centuries, the “Coptic” galleries in the same
museums remained accumulations of objects which represented no
more than disconnected illustrations torn from a lost book of which
only its title has survived.
“Coptic art” thus elicited the admiration of the public through
the apparent “modernity” of timeless monuments whose semantic,
formal, and stylistic relationship with pharaonic Egypt, Hellas, Rome,
and Byzantium remained ambiguous, strangely distorted and undefined.
Early twentieth-century artists and conoisseurs appreciated “Coptic”
art because it offered inspiration and justification for their own radical estrangement from nineteenth century academism and answered
their search for a simple and symbolic mode of artistic expression.8
While interest in Ancient Egypt developed on a large scale after
the mid-nineteenth century and while Egyptology was by the early
twentieth century no longer a sort of treasure hunting but a complex academic discipline, excavations at post-pharaonic sites remained
incidental. The Coptic renewal movement of the second half of the
nineteenth and the first half of the twentieth century inspired in
Egypt’s Coptic intelligentsia an emotionally charged antiquarian interest resulting in the salvage of Christian antiquities and the foundation of the Coptic Museum.9 The Coptic renewal benefited from the
8
For the modern reception of “Coptic” art cf. in general Rutschowscaya 1990
16 ff.; Brune 1999; for the impact of the exhibition of “Coptic” textiles at the 1900
Exposition universelle in Paris, see, e.g., M.-H. Rutschowscaya in: Cat. Paris-Agde
20 f.
9
A subscription for the building of a Coptic Museum was started in 1908 by
Marcus Simaika (made a Pasha in the 1910s). The first museum was established
temporarily in two rooms in the buildings of the al-Mo"allaqa church in Old Cairo.
The building of the Coptic Museum was erected nearby in 1908–1910 within the
walls of the Roman fortress of Babylon; the building plot was donated by Patriarch
Cyril V (1874–1927). The nucleus of its collection was constituted by objects from
private collections (including Simaika Pasha’s own collection) and donations of Coptic
churches and monasteries (waqf or objects lent “à titre perpétuel”). The museum
remained the property of the Coptic Patriarchate until 1931 when it became a state
collection (cf. Marcus H. Simaika Pacha: Guide sommaire du Musée Copte et des Principales
Églises du Caire. Le Caire 1937). In order to receive the collection of “Coptic” antiquities to be transferred from the Egyptian Museum, the building in Old Cairo was
enlarged with a new wing between 1937 and 1947. At present, the collections of
6
chapter one
early twentieth century excavations at Bawit (Emile Chassinat, Jean
Clédat and Charles Palanque in 1901–1902, Clédat and Palanque
in 1903, Clédat in 1904, 1905, Jean Maspero in 191210) and at
Saqqara ( James E. Quibell in 1905–191011) and from Hugh EvelynWhite’s research in the monasteries of the Nitrian desert.12 It could
not secure, however, a proportionate development of archaeological
work. The art historical picture formed of Egyptian late antiqueearly Byzantine art on the basis of the only partly published excavations at Bawit and Saqqara could be but general, given the field
methods of the early 1900s. The discovery of the Coptic heritage
promoted the formation of a new identity in Egypt’s Coptic community. Meanwhile, European archaeologists and art historians continued to disregard the chances presented in the work of clear-sighted
scholars as Alois Riegl for the integration of Coptic art history through
the methods of Classical archaeology.
The next chapter of this book is about the curious way that was
taken by the explorers of Egyptian late antique and early Byzantine
art in the late nineteenth and in the twentieth century. I shall then
discuss the efforts made in the course of the last decades at finding
(a) better way(s). I shall also explore the possibility of adding further
features to the new image of Egyptian late antique art which began
the Coptic Museum contain about 16,000 objects.—For the history of the creation
of the Coptic Museum cf. G. Gabra: The Story of the Coptic Museum. in: Emmel
et al. (eds) 1999 147–151; Bénazeth 2001 1 ff.; Reid 2002 275 ff. For the role of
Max Herz Bey (from 1912 Pasha), the Austro-Hungarian chief architect of the
Comité de conservation des monuments de l’art arabe and the first director of the
Arab Museum in Cairo, in the foundation of the Coptic Museum, see I. Ormos:
Max Herz (1856–1919). His Life and Activities in Egypt. in: M. Volait (ed.): Le
Caire—Alexandrie. Architectures européennes 1850 –1950. IFAO Études urbaines 2 (2001)
161–174 166; Reid 2002 270 ff. For the Coptic cultural movements in the late
19th-early 20th century cf. D. Behrens-Abuseif: Die Kopten in der ägyptischen Gesellschaft
von der Mitte des 19. Jahrhunderts bis 1923. Freiburg i.B. 1972; D. Bénazeth: Permanence
de la civilisation copte antique dans l’Égypte d’aujourd’hui. in: Cat. Paris-Agde 229–237;
Reid 2002 258 ff.
10
J. Clédat: Notes archéologiques et philologiques. BIFAO 1 (1901) 87–91; id.:
Lettre sur ses découvertes à Baouît, en Égypte. CRAIBL 1902 95–96; id.: Recherches
sur le kôm de Baouît. ibid. 525–546; C. Palanque: Rapport sur les recherches
effectuées à Baouît en 1903. BIFAO 5 (1906) 1–21; Clédat 1904–1906; Chassinat
1911; Clédat 1904–1906, 1910, 1916, 1926; Maspero – Drioton 1931–1943 I, II;
Clédat 1999. For a bibliography of the literature on the finds from Bawit, see
Rutschowscaya 1995.
11
Quibell – Lacau 1908; Quibell 1909, 1912.
12
Evelyn-White 1926–1933.
introduction
7
to take shape in the work of art historians who have tried to elevate its monuments from their traditional epistemological isolation
and to place them in the wider context of the world of Late Antiquity.
It will be a chronological book insofar as it will concentrate on
the interconnections between historical/social processes and changes
and processes and changes in the arts and insofar as it will discuss
processes in art historical research. Since almost all monuments of
Egyptian late antique and early Byzantine art arrived in the museums of the world from clandestine excavations or from the art market, this book cannot present a traditionally chronological art history.
The topical “case studies” presented here are intended, however, to
contribute not only to the understanding of “Coptic” art as an organic
part of a larger late Roman and early Byzantine context but eventually also to the creation of an essential chronological framework.
“Coptic art” is usually regarded as one coherent unit of art history. This is certainly wrong: the eight centuries (most histories of
Coptic art embrace the period from the late third to the late twelfth
century) of Egyptian late antique, early Byzantine and medieval
Christian art need to be divided into historically definable periods
and trends in the same way as the art of any contemporary region
is to be understood in terms of processes and trends and not as one
paradigm.
CHAPTER TWO
IMAGES OF LATE ANTIQUE EGYPT IN
TWENTIETH-CENTURY ART HISTORY
Few societies have ever been more multicultural
than those clustered about the Mediterranean.1
1. The Ahnas pitfall
The writing of the history of Egyptian art in the late antique and
early Byzantine periods started with a fatally misinterpreted archaeological excavation.2 The story has been told many times: let me
summarize it here in Hjalmar Torp’s words:3
It is . . . truly paradoxical that the first and almost the sole discovery
of Coptic figure reliefs resulting from a planned excavation should also
be the main source of the great confusion that has always prevailed,
and still prevails, concerning the interpretation of pre-Christian Coptic
sculpture. I refer here to the excavations conducted by Edouard Naville
at Heracleopolis Magna or Ahnas el-Medinah about 1890.4 In his
search for dynastic monuments in the area, Naville happened upon a
structure about 25 feet long and 20 wide, with an apse to the
north . . . The recovery of six large Corinthian capitals of columns in
the ruin enables one to deduce a three-aisled edifice . . . the capitals
hardly date later than the 4th century;5 and since they bear crosses
1
From: E.S. Gruen: Cultural Fictions and Cultural Identity. Transactions of the
American Philological Association 123 (1993) 1–14 2.
2
For a bibliography on Heracleopolis Magna, see Timm 1984–1992 I 1161–1172.
3
Torp 1969 101–103.
4
I.e., in 1891.
5
Today, from the six imported marble capitals only one is preserved: CM 7350,
Naville 1894 Pl. XVII; Strzygowski 1904 75 f., figs 102–104; Kautzsch 1936 30 f.
no. 81, Pl. 6; Severin 1977a 248 no. 274/b; Pensabene 1993 414 no. 460. In 1902
Strzygowski still saw the remaining five capitals lying around at the “church” site,
Strzygowski 1904 76.—For the type cf. Kautzsch 1936 30 f. no. 81.—For the dating cf. Severin 1977a 248 no. 274/b: late 4th cent.; Severin – Severin 1987 34;
Pensabene 1993 414 no. 460: late 4th-early 5th cent.; Severin 1993 63: early 5th
chapter two
10
inscribed in wreaths, the structure to which they belonged was certainly of Christian origin . . . In digging at the foot of the bases [of the
south column pair discovered in situ (?), Naville] . . . found a large architrave and pieces of the columns which stood on these bases.6
About the further course of the excavation we are informed by a
letter of Naville written to T. Hayter Lewis,7 quoted by Hjalmar
Torp:
‘I was quite certain that the building was a church when I saw the
heap of stones found lower down at a depth of eight or nine feet . . . The
stones consisted of a great number of lintels, friezes and cornices in
white limestone, with sculptured ornaments . . . I should not wonder if
a sculptured stone,8 bearing a coarse representation of Leda and her
swan, which was in a fellah’s house, had come from here.’ Since this
‘heap of stones’ revealed not only a niche-head with the representation of Orpheus playing his lyre before a rampant lion,9
adds Torp,
but also the fragments of two more niches,10 each sporting the figure
of a nude female—in all probability Aphrodite—it is difficult to understand the logic behind Naville’s statement that the building was certainly a church . . . The evil had been done: not so much in the
interpretation of the Christian building as a church or a chapel, as in
the belief that the pagan sculptured remains were part of that building. In this view it would seem that the Christian Copts not only gave
their cult edifices a sculptural decoration which included figures—a
cent., with reference to the earliest dated appearance of a related acanthus type on
carvings from the Hagia Sophia of Theodosius II, Schneider 1941 7, Pls 14–16.—
With reference to the cross inscribed into a wreath, Severin 1998b 101 suggests
that the capitals were carved from imported marble in Alexandria.
6
From the carvings illustrated in Naville 1894 the following can be identified:
Pl. XIV, top left: CM 7055, Strzygowski 1904 31 f. no. 7287, fig. 36 (= my fig.
39); top right: CM 7305, ibid. 48, fig. 56; centre left: CM 7346, ibid. 72 f., fig. 99;
centre right: CM 7007, ibid. 55 f. no. 7318, fig. 70 (lower half of the carving already
damaged); Pl. XV, top left: CM 7018 ibid. 35 no. 7291, fig. 42; centre left: CM
7314, ibid. 53, fig. 65; centre right: CM 7070, ibid. 53 f. no. 7315/b, fig. 66; Pl.
XVI, left: CM 7301, ibid. 45, fig. 52; centre, top: CM 7317, ibid. 55, fig. 69; 2nd
from top: CM 7025, ibid. 74 no. 7348, fig. 101; centre, 3rd from top: CM 7306
(right half of fragment only!), ibid. 48 f., fig. 57; centre, bottom: CM 7313, ibid. 52
f., fig. 64; right: CM 7038, ibid. 51 no. 7310, fig. 61 (= my fig. 55); Pl. XVII: CM
7350.
7
T. Hayter Lewis in: Naville 1894 32–33.
8
Now GRM 14140, Monneret de Villard 1923 30, fig. 35.
9
CM 7055, Strzygowski 1904 31 f. no. 7287, fig. 36, my fig. 39.
10
Two niche head fragments are illustrated in Naville 1894: in Pl. XIV, top left:
CM 7055, in Pl. XV, top right: unidentified.
images of late antique egypt
11
phenomenon which by itself would constitute an interesting and fairly
unusual occurrence in early Christian art—but that this decoration was
in addition absolutely pagan in character and contained images of the
nude Aphrodite as well as of Leda and the swan.
The shadow cast by the early twentieth-century excavations at the
monasteries of Bawit and Saqqara is similarly long.11 As a consequence of the excavators’ summary field methods, the—incomplete—
publications presented an utterly simplified building history in which
the sculptural decoration of the individual buildings was regarded as
homogeneous. While, as we shall see, doubts concerning the correctness of Naville’s archaeological interpretation of the Heracleopolis
Magna find complex were uttered as early as in 1923 by Monneret
de Villard, misgivings concerning the current interpretation of the
evidence from Bawit and Saqqara were articulated only much later.
Thus, the attribution of all sculptures from the so-called “south
church” at Bawit to the same sixth-century building period12 determined a completely irrealistic reconstruction of the architectural history of the monasteries and a confusing picture of diverse, but
seemingly contemporaneous stylistic trends existing side-by-side in
sixth-century Egyptian sculpture. In reality, as was shown from the
late 1970s by Hans-Georg Severin and Peter Grossmann,13 the socalled south and north churches at Bawit and the “main church” at
Saqqara contained great numbers of spolia (spoils) originating from
various earlier architectural contexts and ranging in date from the
fourth to the seventh century14 (see Chapters IX.2.2, 2.3).
11
For the literature of the excavations, see Chapter I notes 10, 11.
See, e.g., Krause – Wessel 1966 577 f.
13
Severin 1977b; Grossmann – Severin 1982; Severin 1986.
14
Severin 1986 101–104 suggests, without a detailed argumentation, a later, 5th
to 8th cent. range. Cf. also Severin 1993 76 ff. with note 41 where a response to
my 4th- and 5th-cent. datings of the Oxyrhynchos and Heracleopolis Magna sculptures (cf. Török 1990) is promised. Severin 1998a 300–302 repeats for the architectural carvings from Bawit and Saqqara the datings of Severin 1986 and 1993
without further arguments. In his 1998 paper Severin does not discuss figural
sculpture.
12
12
chapter two
2. The myth of anti-Hellenism
Historians too have their dark nights.15
The unclarified relationship between the imported Christian marble
capitals and the mythological reliefs from Heracleopolis Magna
inevitably confused the chronological investigation of Egyptian late
antique art. The perplexing features of the kind of “early Christian”
sculpture for which the mythological reliefs from the “Ahnas church”
were taken demanded an explanation. The problem was twofold:
how can the presence of Classical mythology in a Christian church
be explained? How can the marked deviation of these representations from the aesthetic canon of Hellenistic art be explicated? Two
ways were pointed out, the first by scholars such as Albert Gayet,
Georg Ebers, and Josef Strzygowski who set out to discover a special social milieu behind an art which they deemed unique in all of
its manifestations. The second was pointed out by Alois Riegl, who
set out in a more scholarly manner to analyse the stylistic components of Coptic art in order to find its place in the broader stylistic and social context of late antique art.16 With the erroneous starting
point provided by the misunderstood archaeological evidence, the
discourse inevitably made its way along the wrong track: it was the
first way that seemed more attractive and timely. The scholarly reasoning which the second followed was ahead of its time and found
no immediate followers.
The misguided search for the Eigenart of Coptic art led thus to
the strikingly paradoxical thesis according to which the presence of
Classical mythology in Egyptian early Christian churches was a consequence of a special “national” attitude which consciously rejected
Hellenism. The idea appeared in Albert Gayet’s catalogue of the
sculptures exhibited in the “Salle Copte” at Boulaq, where he defined
Coptic art with the help of two negations, namely, as an art which
“breaks with the traditions of 5000 years of Egyptian art”, and as
an art which deliberately declines the Hellenistic heritage.17 Monsignor
15
Iris Murdoch: The Green Knight. London 1993 274.
Riegl 1893a, 1893b, 1901.—For the evaluation of Riegl’s work cf. M. Iversen:
Alois Riegl: Art History and Theory. Cambridge (Mass.)-London 1993; J.-P. Caillet: Alois
Riegl et le fait social dans l’art de l’antiquité tardive. AnTard 9 (2001) 47–51.
17
Gayet 1889/90.
16
13
Gayet’s view was also shared by Georg Ebers, who defined Coptic
art as “etwas Besonderes, für sich Bestehendes”18 created by, and
for, Monophysite Egyptian Christians between the Council of Chalcedon (451) and the ninth century. Instead of a more detailed assessment of the stylistic features of the monuments discussed in his book,
Ebers supported his high-sounding, quasi-philosophical, yet in fact
vague and unsubstantial, definition with the same negations that also
appeared in Gayet’s work. In 1902, in the first monograph published
on Coptic art, Gayet suggested19 that the pagan themes of the
Heracleopolis Magna sculptures represent “a survival not of GrecoRoman, but rather of pharaonic beliefs.”20 According to Gayet, the
scene of Leda and the swan on one of the Heracleopolis Magna
carvings21 represented in fact the mythical conception of Pharaoh
and formed, in the context of a Christian church, a symbol of cosmic kingship. The presumed revival of pharaonic symbols and iconographic types was explained thus in the terms of a postulated
anti-Byzantine national movement unfolding after the Council of
Chalcedon—similarly to Ebers’ suggestion, who saw a close connection between the assumed denial of Byzantine style and the
Monophysite Egyptians’ supposed aversion to the aesthetic canon of
Hellenistic art.
Less paradoxical, yet not less preconceived, was the explanation
offered by Adolf Furtwängler for the inconsistency felt between
Classical themes and non-Classical style. Reacting to Josef Strzygowski’s
early views on Coptic art,22 the great Classical archaeologist formulated the judgement for Egypt which would be extended later over
the whole of late antique art and worded most dismissively in Bernard
Berenson’s famous The Arch of Constantine,23 namely, that Coptic art
represents decline and is nothing more than a
Zurücksinken der Kunst in gewisse allgemeine Eigenschaften des
Primitiven.24
18
G. Ebers: Sinnbildliches. Die koptische Kunst ein neues Gebiet der altkirchlichen Sculptur
und ihre Symbole. Leipzig 1892.
19
Gayet 1902 106–109.
20
Torp 1969 103.
21
GRM 14140, cf. Monneret de Villard 1923 30, fig. 35.
22
Strzygowski 1901, 1902.
23
Berenson 1954 31 f.
24
A. Furtwängler in: Berliner Philologische Wochenschrift 23 (1903) 946 ff., quoted in
Strzygowski 1904 xvii and Effenberger 1975 19.—Though Alois Riegl discussed the
14
chapter two
Furtwängler offers here a value judgement, yet, at the same time,
also directs attention to the problem of stylistic change. Instead of
realizing the necessity of a careful stylistic analysis, Strzygowski and
the authors of later syntheses on Coptic art chose, however, the path
of speculating about the mentality of Egyptian society and converted
the judgement on the “primitivity” of Coptic art into an apology
based on the hypothesis of the political-mental anti-Hellenism and
spiritual symbolism of Monophysite Christianity. At the same time,
the comparison of the stylistic traditions of Hellenism with the symbolic mode of Coptic art also seemed to corroborate the hypothesis
of the dichotomy of late antique/early Christian art.
Failing to ponder the significance of Naville’s remark concerning
the discovery of the mythological reliefs eight or nine feet below the
level of the column bases of the Christian edifice, the association of
the mythological reliefs with the supposed “Ahnas church”25 was also
maintained by Josef Strzygowski in his 1904 Catalogue général volume,26
and nor was it rejected with sufficient conviction in Ugo Monneret
de Villard’s 1923 monograph on the carvings attributed by him to
the Heracleopolis Magna workshop(s).27 It was these two works which
presented the bulk of the material on which subsequent research on
Coptic sculpture was based.
While refusing Gayet’s Christian reading of Leda’s iconography,
Strzygowski nevertheless interpreted the mythological scenes from
Heracleopolis Magna as evidence for a non-Hellenised or even anti-
Arch of Constantine as early as in 1901 in the terms of progress instead of decline,
Furtwängler’s view remained generally preferred.—More radically, Beckwith 1963
32 f. and J. Kollwitz: Alexandrinische Elfenbeine. in: Wessel (ed.) 1964 207–220
postulate a steady decline of classical art in Egypt after the Ptolemaic or the early
Roman period. This view also occurs in Torp 1965a 369 ff.
25
Strzygowski 1904 writes always “Kirche von Ahnas”.
26
The ominous perspectives of Strzygowski’s art historical theories are already
prevalent in the ideas and rhetorics of his Catalogue général volume: “. . . der Geist
ein unhellenistischer ist . . . wie die Schönheit des unbekleideten Körpers unter den
Händen des Ägypters zu Nudität wird” (Strzygowski 1904 xvi note 2), “auch der
Gnosticismus, bzw. das Christentum diesen Rassenzug nicht zurückdrängen konnten” (ibid. xvii) and “Gayet [und] Ebers mit ihrer Theorie vom Wiedererwachen des
nationalen Ägyptertums im Rechte waren. Wir sehen da endlich, was die lateinischen
sowohl wie die byzantinischen Quellen totgeschwiegen haben: dass es nicht nur ein
national-ägyptisches Christentum gegeben hat, sondern dass es in Schenute von
Atripe auch seinen Helden hatte” (ibid. xvii f.).—For a discussion of the ideological
context of Strzygowski’s subsequent art-historical work, see Brune 1999 23 ff., 72 ff.
27
Monneret de Villard 1923 24 ff.
15
Hellene native Egyptian taste for obscene nudity, which he also considered to be prevalent in the art of the Christian Copts,28 an absurd
idea also returning in Charles Rufus Morey’s handbook of early
Christian art.29 Neglecting the investigation of chronological questions,30
Gayet’s and Strzygowski’s successors were preoccupied with the task
of creating all-embracing theoretical definitions of Coptic art.
It is due to the highly characteristic amalgam of Strzygowski’s
imposing knowledge of wide areas of art history, the positivist acriby
of his object descriptions, and the elementary force of his apodictical statements on the character and the international context of
Coptic art that his Koptische Kunst could define the main current of
the discourse on the history of Coptic art for the next sixty or so
years—even though he offered no more than a sort of ethno-psychological characterization of his subject instead of providing an academic framework for its chronological, stylistic, and iconographic
assessment. The emotional charge of Strzygowski’s sympathetic image
of the artistic production of a suppressed people is to a considerable
extent responsible for the subjective approach of many art historians dealing with Coptic art.
Adventurous interpretations of the ideological and social context
of Coptic art would usually refer to Strzygowski’s work,31 yet Monneret
de Villard made no less misleading, or long-lasting, suggestions concerning the stylistic origins of the Heracleopolis Magna carvings.
While presenting a collection of the dispersed monuments originating from this site, Monneret de Villard succeeded in convincing many
of his readers that the formation of what he regarded as a homogeneous Heracleopolis Magna style may be ascribed to the activity
of Eastern, first of all Syrian, masters whom he also supposed to
28
Strzygowski 1904 42–45; cf. Strzygowski 1902.
Morey 1942 84.
30
Which may be explained only partly with the lamentable professional quality
of the few excavations that yielded “Coptic” objects during the course of the decades
following Naville’s work at Heracleopolis Magna, or with the fact that the bulk of
the stone carvings and other finds collected first by the Egyptian Museum and then
by the Coptic Museum in Cairo and the Graeco-Roman Museum in Alexandria
originated from the art market.
31
To quote only one of the boldest ideas deriving from Gayet’s Gnostic or
Christian reading of the mythological scenes from Heracleopolis Magna, J. Lauzière:
Le Mythe de Léda dans l’art copte. Bulletin de l’Association des Amis de l’Art Copte 2
(1936) 38–46 38 suggested that Leda and the swan symbolized St Anna’s immaculate conception of Mary.
29
16
chapter two
transmit Persian, Indian, and Central Asian influences.32 The “Syrian
connection”—which continues to haunt the lines written on “Coptic
art” in general art historical surveys—is also suggested in Monneret
de Villard’s study of the so-called “White” and “Red” Monasteries
at Sohag (see Chapter VI.2), which, according to him, were designed
by a Syrian architect.33 Paradoxically, what Monneret de Villard’s
broad perspective actually did not include was the political, social,
and cultural context of late antique and early Byzantine Egypt as
part of the Mediterranean world.
On the whole, the impressionistic treatment of Coptic art was considerably influenced by the great turning-away from the aesthetic
canons of the nineteenth century. It also bears the stamp of the universalist perspectives of Art Nouveau and was influenced by the discovery of newer and newer regions of primitive art—and, at the
same time, by the discovery and the unfolding political/popular cult
of folk art. No wonder that the other perspective of Coptic art that
was presented around the turn of the century by Alois Riegl, the
other great expert of late antique art, seemed pale and unattractive
when compared to Strzygowski’s passionate picture. To Riegl, the
generally assumed pharaonic features appeared insignificant, while
he identified stylistic features on account of which Egyptian works
of art resembled the artistic production of the late Roman Mediterranean rather than differed from it.34
Strzygowski’s failure to distinguish between high and low quality
works of art not only misguided his analysis of the “Coptic style” in
the direction of Volkskunst (see below), but also justified his fatalistic
attitude in relation to the missing absolute and relative chronologies
of Coptic art. It is this failure that explains the denial of the existence of a “monumental” or “official” Coptic art: the seemingly
purely art historical postulate forecasts the ideology represented in
the author’s later works:
Die Umwandlung des Altägyptischen in das Koptische geht nicht von
den monumentalen Künsten, sondern von der Kunstindustrie aus. Dort
zuerst wohl wird sich jenes Chaos entwickelt haben, worin der ägyptisch
empfindende Künstler mit technisch in der heimischen Art geschulter
32
Monneret de Villard 1923 81–94.
Monneret de Villard 1925 I 60. Stollmayer 1999 126 ff. demonstrates that all
Syrian “models” quoted by Monneret de Villard postdate the churches at Sohag.
34
Riegl 1893a, 1893b, 1901.
33
17
Hand griechische Figuren und syrisch-hellenistische Ornamente bildet.
Es ist dieses Stilgemisch, das ich Koptisch nenne. Entscheidend ist also
nicht etwa der christliche Inhalt. Das Koptische bereitet sich in hellenistischer und römischer Zeit vor, die Erhebung des Christentums
zur Staatsreligion findet es voll entwickelt; es war damals auch schon
in die monumentale Kunst eingedrungen. Das Koptische setzt sich
demnach aus drei Elementen zusammen: Geist und Technik sind ägyptisch, die Gegenstände der Darstellung und die Formtypen zumeist
griechisch, die ornamentalen Schmuckmotive stark syrisch. Ausser Spiel
bleiben Rom und Byzanz.35
3. Pharaonic revival: myth and reality
The revival of pharaonic traditions in the art of late antique Egypt
and the anti-Hellenic nationalism of the Christian Egyptians are
hypotheses which mutually presume and corroborate each other. The
first hypothesis has been repeated as a general characterization of
Coptic art ever since Gayet’s work. On a more concrete level, however, the list of examples for a pharaonic revival is brief: a symbol,
an iconographic type, and two buildings are referred to.
The first example is the adaptation of the Egyptian hieroglyph
'n¢, “life” as crux ansata, a type of the sign of the cross. The second
example cited traditionally is the iconographic type of Mary lactans
which is said to have derived from the image of Isis lactans.36 The
third is the architecture of the two famous churches surviving from
Shenoute’s monasteries at Sohag,37 namely, the so-called Deir Anbâ
35
Strzygowski 1904 xvi.
Müller 1963.
37
On the life and work of Shenoute, abbot of a large monastery on the west bank
opposite Atripe/Panopolis between the 380s and 464/5, see J. Leipoldt: Schenute von
Atripe und die Entstehung des national ägyptischen Christentums. Leipzig 1903; Amélineau
1907–1914; J. Leipoldt – W.E. Crum: Sinuthii Archimandritae Vita et Opera Omnia IIIIV. Paris 1908–1913; J.W.B. Barns: Shenute as an Historical Source. in: Actes du X e
Congrès International de Papyrologues Varsovie-Cracovie 3–9 Septembre 1961. WroclawWarszawa-Krakow 1964 151–159; J. Frandsen – E. Richter-Aeroe: Shenoute: A
Bibliography. in: Young (ed.) 1981 147–176; D.N. Bell: Besa: The Life of Shenoute.
Kalamazoo 1983; J. Timbie: The State of Research on the Career of Shenoute of
Atripe. in: B.A. Pearson – J.E. Goehring (eds): The Roots of Egyptian Christianity.
Philadelphia 1986 258–270; T. Orlandi: Coptic Literature. ibid. 51–81 63 ff.; D.W.
Young: Coptic Manuscripts from the White Monastery: Works of Shenute. Wien 1993; S.L.
Emmel: Shenoute’s Literary Corpus. Ph.D. Dissertation Yale University. University
Microfilms, Ann Arbor 1993; S. Elm: ‘Virgins of God’: The Making of Asceticism in Late
Antiquity. Oxford 1994; Orlandi 1998 133 ff.; and cf. also Rousseau 1985; Rousseau
2000 745 ff.
36
18
chapter two
Shinûda or Deir el Abiad (“White Monastery”)38 and Deir Anbâ
Bishûy or Deir el Ahmar (“Red Monastery”)39 where the batter of
the external walls, the cavetto cornices of these walls and of several
door frames, and further the waterspouts are compared to pharaonic
temple architecture40 (see Chapter VI.2).
No doubt, the exegetic interpetation of the 'n¢ hieroglyph as the
sign of the cross41 represents a significant moment in the creation of
Christian imagery and thus of the transformation of Egyptian culture.42 With reference to Rufinus’ Ecclesiastic History,43 it is suggested
traditionally that the Christianization of the 'n¢ sign occurred after
the demolition of the Serapeum of Alexandria in 391,44 when, following a dispute between Christians and gentiles on the meaning of
the sign found on the stones of the destroyed temple, the small
Serapis busts adorning the door- and window-frames of private houses
in the city mysteriously disappeared and in their place painted 'n¢
signs appeared: signs which, when previously discovering them on
the stones of the Serapeum, the Christians had identified as true
symbols of salvation. It would seem, however, that Rufinus’ story
fitted an already formulated interpretation of the 'n¢ into the discourse on the demolition of the Serapeum: a Christian discourse
38
The church stood within a monastic building complex which remained, however, largely unexplored. It appears as Deir el Abiad, “White Monastery”, in the
earlier literature. Cf. Grossmann 1984–1985; Timm 1984–1992 II 601–634; R.-G.
Coquin – M. Martin – P. Grossmann – H.-G. Severin: Dayr Anba Shinudah. CE
III 761–777; for the remains of the monastic buildings and an enclosure wall in
the neighbourhood of the church, see ibid. p. 767.
39
For the two churches, see Monneret de Villard 1925–1926.
40
Deichmann 1938.
41
Rufinus, Hist. eccl. 11.29; Socrates, Hist. eccl. 5.17; Sozomenos, Hist. eccl. 7,15
and see M. Cramer: Das altägyptische Lebenszeichen im christlichen (koptischen) Ägypten. Eine
kultur- und religionsgeschichtliche Studie auf archäologischer Grundlage. 3rd edn. Wiesbaden
1955.
42
For the replacement of the image of Harpocrates with the 'n¢-cross in an otherwise unchanged mortuary stela type of the Roman period, see K. Parlasca: Eine
Gruppe spätantiker Grabreliefs aus Ägypten. in: Fluck – Langener et al. (eds) 1995
246–251; cf. Effenberger 1996 40 and Cat. Hamm Cat. 63 (S. Schaten). Parlasca
supposes that the pagan variant continued to be produced after the appearance of
the Christian variant and dates the earliest known exemplar of the latter (Cat. Hamm
Cat. 63) to the 3rd century, which seems too early (see below, on the 'n¢-cross).
43
2.29.
44
Cf., e.g., H. Leclercq: Croix et crucifix XXVI. Croix ansée. in: DACL III
(1914) 3120–3123; J. Doresse: Les livres secrets des gnostiques d’Égypte I. Paris 1958 162;
Dinkler – Dinkler-von Schubert 1991 26 f.; Effenberger 1996 36.
19
demonstrating that, against all fears, Egypt would after all not be
destroyed if Alexandria abandoned her old gods.45
The Mary lactans-type presents, as we shall see in Chapter IX.1.1,
another example for the Christian reading of a pagan image. While
the transformation of the meaning of the 'n¢ sign and the lactans
image is meaningful for the art historian, its lessons cannot be
extended to stylistic aspects of Coptic art. In this respect, the case
of the third example seems slightly different. For a more detailed
discussion of Shenoute’s church architecture at Sohag I refer to
Chapter VI.2 below.
The Christian interpretation of the 'n¢ sign and the Mary lactans
image as well as the external appearance of the two churches at
Sohag are significant manifestations of the transformation of Egyptian
culture. They are highly relevant if we want to understand the intellectual background of the processes in contemporary artistic production. It is, however, only the external architecture of Deir Anbâ
Shinûda and Deir Anbâ Bishûy that may be termed, in a rather
imprecise manner, a revival of pharaonic forms: the term archaizing would be more appropriate.
The Christian readings of a symbol and of an iconographic type
represent a reinterpretation rather than a revival. In his Koptische
Kunst, Arne Effenberger dismisses the notion of revival, suggesting
instead the existence of “related features” shared by ancient Egyptian
and Coptic art, such as the preference for Flachrelief, horror vacui,
frontal representation of the human figure, hierarchy of figure sizes
within a scene, and the use of primary colours. While none of these
features is especially characteristic for ancient Egyptian art, all of
them may appear in the late antique art of the Mediterranean region
(and other regions of art history) as an iconographic tradition, a stylistic trend, or a characteristic feature of the production of a provincial workshop. While Effenberger illustrates, e.g., horror vacui with
fourth-century reliefs from Heracleopolis Magna46 (cf. Chapters V.2,
VII.1.1, 1.2) and regards the features listed by him as characteristic
45
Cf. Fowden 1986/1993 183; Brown 1998a 634 f.
Effenberger 1975 183 f. with Pls 19, 22; 190 with Pls 24, 25.—Effenberger
ibid. 183 f. goes as far as to suggest that the treatment of the hair and the facial
features in the Pan head Berlin 6601 (Effenberger – Severin 1992 Cat. 62, dated
around AD 200) is only seemingly naturalistic: in fact, it reflects the “Coptic” taste
for decorativity and horror vacui.
46
20
chapter two
for the whole of Egyptian late antique and early Byzantine art, other
authors consider them as characteristic only for the art of the
Monophysite Egyptians. This view was of course inherent in the
description of Coptic art presented by Strzygowski: for the features
in question are features of what would be defined by his successors
as Volkskunst. Characteristically, the paradigm of decline is reversed
here by suggesting the superiority of Volkskunst. According to Pierre
du Bourguet’s essay in the catalogue of the 1963 Essen exhibition47
(cf. Chapter II.5), Coptic artists, after having extricated themselves
from the ties of the Classical canon, became able to articulate the
deeper, invisible, hidden essence of things with the help of a symbolic, reduced manner of representation. Still according to du Bourguet,
it is actually this symbolic mode that connects Coptic art to the art
of the pharaohs.48
4. The myth of Volkskunst and the contribution of forgery to Coptic
art history
The vagueness of the chronology of post-second-century AD Egyptian
art and the curiously insensitive attitude of Gayet and Strzygowski
and their followers towards the enormous quality differences within
the material discussed by them contributed to an indirect definition
of Coptic art as not a “Machtkunst” (Strzygowski)49 and then to its
interpretation as a “popular or folk art”, “Volkskunst”.50 In Gayet’s
early work, the ideologically charged contraposition of “Coptic” and
“Greek” embraced the whole artistic production of the late antique
and early medieval periods.51 In his 1902 book Gayet laid the accent
47
P. du Bourguet: Die koptische Kunst als mögliche Erbin der pharaonischen
Kunst. in: Christentum am Nil 122–130. Summary statements on the Volkskunst character of “Coptic” art are already missing from du Bourguet 1967.
48
E. Drioton: Boiseries coptes de style pharaonique. BSAC 15 (1960) 69–78
identifies the characteristics of a revival of “pharaonic” style in wooden reliefs of
the Louvre collection. The pieces in question (Rutschowscaya 1986 Cat. 359–363)
display, however, modern iconographic types created in the same manner as certain “Sheikh Ibada” types. Also, their style associates the reliefs in the Louvre with
the “Sheikh Ibada” group.
49
Strzygowski 1941; for the ideological background of this work cf. Brune 1999
71 ff.
50
Grüneisen 1922 7; Dimand 1941 54; Zaloscer 1948 xx f.—Cf. Brune 1996.
51
Gayet 1889/90.
21
on the postulate of a post-Chalcedon Monophysite, Coptic, art which
functioned, in his view, as a conscious expression of Egyptian national
opposition against Byzantium and Byzantine culture. Remarkably,
Strzygowski’s and Gayet’s interpretation of Coptic art, which they
identified as a whole with the art of the Monophysite Egyptians as
a folk art, forecasts the twentieth-century discourse on Early Christian
art as a “folk art” created by uneducated believers against the opposition of the theologians.52
The “Greek”–“Coptic” contraposition also resulted in baseless statements in more concrete issues. E.g., Strzygowski not only emphasized ominously that “for the Hamite, the Arian Hellas remained
incomprehensible”,53 but also suggested that
die koptischen, mit den byzantinischen so eng verwandten Kapitellformen
nicht erst von Konstantinopel aus angeregt wurden, sondern im Gegenteil
wohl von koptischen, nach der Prokonnesos ausgewanderten Steinmetzen
nach dem Norden übertragen worden sind.54
In 1957, in a museum catalogue listing fourth to seventh century
AD stone carvings originating from luxuriously decorated edifices
and textiles of the highest quality,55 Klaus Wessel identified Coptic
art with the art of the
Nachkommen der altägyptischen Bevölkerung, die in Mittel- und
Oberägypten unter griechischer und römischer Herrschaft von der
Teilnahme an der Kultur und dem Staatsleben der Antike weitgehend
ausgeschlossen war . . . Diese Kunst ist recht eigentlich Volkskunst.56
In his influential 1963 Koptische Kunst, Wessel drew a sharp dividing
line between
der Kunst der ‘Griechen’ im Lande und der der Kopten . . . weil diese
beiden Bevölkerungsteile durch ihren rechtlichen, sozialen, und kulturellen
52
H. Koch: Die altchristliche Bilderfrage nach den literarischen Quellen. Göttingen 1917;
J. Kollwitz: Bild III (christlich). RAC II (1954) 318–341; T. Klauser: Erwägungen
zur Entstehung der altchristlichen Kunst. Zeitschrift für Kirchengeschichte 76 (1965) 1–11;
J.D. Breckenridge: The Reception of Art into the Early Church. Atti IX Congresso
Internazionale di Archeologia Cristiana, Roma 1975 I. Città del Vaticano 1978 361–369.
For the arguments against this view, see Engemann 1997 8 (with earlier literature).
53
“[Das] arische Hellas ist dem Hamiten unverständlich geblieben”, Strzygowski
1904 xx.
54
Strzygowski 1904 xviii.
55
E.g., Wessel 1957 68 I. 4452 (fig. 12), 71 I. 6144 (fig. 13), 71 f. I. 6145 (stone);
92 without inv. no. (fig. 22) (textile).
56
Wessel 1957 31 ff.
22
chapter two
sowie späterhin auch durch ihren religiösen bzw. konfessionellen Status
scharf getrennt waren.57
His view conforms with a description of the dichotomy of Alexandria’s
Hellenic, urban culture and the rustic culture of the Egyptian hinterland presented in 1963 by Wolfgang Fritz Volbach. Identifying
the latter with Monophysite Christianity, Volbach also credits the
Egyptian monks with a decisive role in the development of Coptic art.58
According to Volbach, Coptic art has a homogeneous character in
all periods and it is
[ä]usserlich . . . durch den Gegensatz zu der illusionistischen Kunst des
Hellenismus in der strengen Form und einer starken provinziellen
Stilisierung gekennzeichnet.59
The missing chronology of the monuments and the postulate of a
timeless provincial/folk art thus support each other mutually. Later
statements on stylistic changes are meant to further corroborate the
theory of Volkskunst:
[Die] abstrakte Stilbildung entspricht dem Wesen des ägyptischen
Mönchtums. Dabei werden viele alte Stilelemente bewusst wiederaufgenommen oder kommen aus dem Unterbewusstsein des Volkes.60
In less extreme terms, the contraposition of “Greek” and “Coptic”
also occurs in another much-quoted study published in 1963 in which
Géza de Francovich postulates a complete absence of any influence
from Byzantium after the middle of the fifth century, i.e., the Council
of Chalcedon.61
The postulate of a Greek/Coptic contraposition in the arts received
powerful support from the historiography of the 1950s and 1960s.
57
Wessel 1963 83.
Volbach 1963.
59
Volbach 1963 138.
60
Ibid. (my Italics).—In his discussion of the Rhodia stela in Berlin (cf. Ch. III.2),
Effenberger 1975 171 suggests that Rhodia may have been a nun and thus “die
abstrakte Stilbildung hier also direkt mit der auf Heiligung durch Entweltlichung
gerichteten Grundhaltung des koptischen Mönchtums zu verbinden wäre”.—For a
similarly schematic and low-quality rendering of body and drapery, see, e.g., the
togatus on a Constantinopolitan sarcophagus front, Grabar 1963 Pl. XIII/3 = Firatli
et al. 1990 62 Cat. 104.
61
G. de Francovich: L’Egitto, la Siria e Costantinopoli: problemi di metodo.
Rivista dell’Istituto Nazionale d’Archeologia e Storia dell’Arte 11–12 (1963) 83–229. Cf. the
review of Torp 1965a 364–367.
58
23
Behind Hilde Zaloscer’s plainly formulated, radically prejudiced vision
of Egyptian history, which she summarized thus:62
Der Hass gegen die Fremdherrschaft, gleichbedeutend mit Ausbeutung,
sollte ein characteristisches und bedeutungsvolles Phänomen der ägyptischen Geschichte bleiben: das hellenistische Ägypten vererbte es der
römischen Ära, von ihr übernahm es schliesslich das christliche Ägypten
we may discern, in a however simplified and distorted form, the contours of the dark image presented in E.R. Dodds’ Pagan and Christian
in an Age of Anxiety.63 Yet Zaloscer’s militant attitude also bears the
stamp of the tragic experiences of twentieth-century Europe.64
Considering the material discussed and illustrated in Wessel’s 1963
monograph, we find mostly high quality late antique stone and bone
carvings and some of the grand textiles on the “Greek” side of the
great divide, while post-Conquest, mostly low quality, objects are
placed on the “Coptic” side. The majority of the “Coptic” pieces
represent what is described by Wessel as Volkskunst. They are intended
to support the work’s principal thesis according to which “provincial Greek art” and “Coptic art” were two separate worlds which
diametral entgegengesetzt gegenüberstehen. Zwischen ihnen gibt es
keine Brücke, keinen Weg, keine Verbindung. Aus diesem verfallenen
Heidentum konnte die christliche Kunst nichts aber auch gar nichts,
sich zu eigen machen. Alt und neu stehen im unversöhnlichen
Gegensatz.65
The division of the monuments of Egyptian art along ethnic (Greek/
Roman versus native Egyptian), social and ethnic (non-Egyptian ruling classes versus native peasantry), religious (pagan versus Christian),
and confessional (Monophysite versus Orthodox) dividing lines was,
however, a postulate which was accepted without inquiring about
independent historical evidence for such contrapositions, or about
62
Zaloscer 1974 20.
E.R. Dodds: Pagan and Christian in an Age of Anxiety. Some Aspects of Religious
Experience from Marcus Aurelius to Constantine. Cambridge 1965.
64
Similar experiences may have influenced Sirarpie Der Nersessian’s remark, also
quoted with sympathy by Zaloscer 1974 53, according to which “Christianity took
[in Egypt] the form of a political opposition” (Some Aspects of Coptic Painting. in:
Coptic Egypt. Papers Read at a Symposium Held under the Joint Auspices of New York University
and Brooklyn Museum. Brooklyn 1944 44).
65
Wessel 1963 38.
66
Such as, e.g., the supposed exlcusive connection of the Maria Galaktotrophousa
63
24
chapter two
actual art historical criteria such as iconographic and/or stylistic
differences which might render classifications of this sort possible.66
The misinterpretation of the character of Egyptian early Christian
sculpture and the definition of Coptic art as a Volkskunst contributed
decisively to the shaping of the iconography and style of the limestone sculptures produced in (an) Egyptian workshop(s) in the late
1950s and the 1960s.67 With the false provenances of Ahnas (Heracleopolis Magna), Bahnasa (Oxyrhynchos), and, primarily, Sheikh
Ibada (ancient Antinoopolis/Antinoe), faked68 mortuary stelae (based
on fourth-century Oxyrhynchos types), reliefs, niche heads, column
and pilaster capitals, and even statues in the round69 flooded the
international art market and also found their way in the world’s
great and prestigious museum collections.
Most of the “Sheikh Ibada” sculptures—some of which were produced by radical and distorting reworking of (in most cases incompletely preserved) antique pieces70—combine Christian symbols with
iconographic and figure types and stylistic features that derived from
non-Christian models.71 Their “iconography” ranges from a more or
less faithful imitation of original models (which receive, however, a
fantastic reinterpretation by the addition of incongruous attributes)
to the creation of entirely new types. The latter combine heterogeneous figural and ornamental types with Christian symbols or invent
“new” iconographic types. Ex novo created iconographic types may
“illustrate” some text (as the Brooklyn “paralytic”, see below) or be
based on a representation executed in another medium.72
type with the Orthodox church (Wessel 1963 130 ff.). In fact, however, the type
occurs both in Orthodox and Monophysite contexts, see van Moorsel 1970.
67
For these sculptures cf. G. Koch: Ein ungewöhnliches “koptisches” Grabrelief
im Getty Museum. in: Göttinger Orientforschungen II.8. Göttingen 1986 25–30; v. Falck –
Wietheger 1990; Thomas 1990 127–149; Severin 1995; H.-G. Severin: Anmerkungen
zur Rezeption koptischer Skulptur im Koptischen Museum. in: Emmel et al. (eds)
1999 365–374; Thomas 2000 xxiii; Spanel 2001.
68
S. Boyd – G. Vikan: Questions of Authenticity among the Arts of Byzantium [Catalogue
of an exhibition held at Dumbarton Oaks, January 7–May 11, 1981]. Washington
1981; for a detailed analysis of the technical signs for fakery, see Thomas 1990
139–149. Cf. also A. Kakovkin: Quelques rémarques sur les faux dans l’art copte.
MC 21–22 (1993) 263–264.
69
E.g., Wessel 1963 figs 8, 69; Parlasca 1978 Pl. 47.
70
Severin 1995.
71
E.g., Christentum am Nil Cat. 84, 85 (among the latter’s models: niche head CM
7970); Wessel 1963 figs 44, 46, 61.
72
The use of an unusual material may also be revealing, see, e.g., the stela of
25
Let us quote some examples. A high relief scene decorating a
hybrid architectural member (frieze? pilaster capital?) in the Art
Museum of Princeton University73 presents, as to its style, a “folk
art treatment” of the scene of the Judgement of Paris. It was based,
however, on a drawing or a photograph reproducing a Classical
work of art certain details of which, as, e.g., the broken-off right leg
of Paris, were not correctly understood by the forger. The scene is
Christianized by the addition of a cross on Athena’s shield. In other
cases the non-Egyptian model is combined with Egyptian models,
as, e.g., in the case of two fragments of a limestone frieze in
Copenhagen decorated with the busts of a man and a woman framed
in wreaths.74 While the female bust presents a superficial rendering
of a Hellenistic and Roman Isis type or, what is equally likely, a
stereotype rendering of a female figure type on stelae from Terenuthis
(Kom Abu Billou), the male bust seems to have been copied from
a drawing or photograph of an AD fourth-century Western work of
art.75 Several genuinely antique column and pilaster capitals were
upgraded by the recarving of their abacus rosettes in the form of a
bust (fig. 1)76 or a head.77 In general terms, the recarved capitals are
modelled on a widely distributed Roman type, yet their direct models were found in museums in Egypt.78 There are also freely invented
figural capital types as, e.g., a pilaster capital in Recklinghausen with
a monk carved from basalt, a stone not used for figural sculpture in this period:
Brown 1971/1989 fig. 70 (Christie’s, London).
73
Zaloscer 1974 fig. 48.
74
Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek Æg. inv. 1734–1735, acquired in 1960 (!), Parlasca
1972 77, Pl. 8/3, 4.
75
Cf., e.g., the apostle busts on the lid of the Brescia Lipsanotheca, Volbach
1976 no. 107.
76
Recklinghausen, Ikonenmuseum inv. no. 501, Wessel [1962] (the catalogue is
unpaginated). The corner volutes are also recarved in the form of birds; the bust
is intended to represent a Byzantine emperor wearing a diadem decorated with a
cross above the forehead. Wessel op. cit. identifies the bust as representation of
Tiberius II. Cf. Severin 1998b 102 with note 57.—See also Brussels, Musées Royaux
d’Art et d’Histoire 31/3/1967, M. Rassart-Debergh: Antiquités romaines et chrétiennes
d’Égypte. Musées Royaux d’Art et d’Histoire. Bruxelles 1976 Cat. 10, with bust of Erote
(?).
77
Recklinghausen, Ikonenmuseum inv. no. 504, Wessel [1962] (the catalogue is
unpaginated).
78
E.g., pilaster capital from Heracleopolis Magna, CM 44069, Strzygowski 1904
75 (head of personification held by flying Genii in the abacus zone); marble capital, Alexandria, GRM 3851, published by Badawy 1978 fig. 3.183 (head of Erote
in centre of abacus).
26
chapter two
the birth of Aphrodite and, in lieu of corner leaves and volutes, figures
of Erotes holding Aphrodite’s shell.79 A late Roman mortuary stela
type, examples of which are recorded from Oxyrhynchos, constituted
the model for the “Sheikh Ibada” type of the “boy with hand cross”.
Besides a rendering in the round,80 figures of this type occur on stelae81
as well as in the decoration of niche heads.82 There are furthermore
pieces where the faker did not make a clear decision between a stela
and an architectural relief.83
There are also fantastic iconographic types created ex novo. For
example, on a limestone block in Leiden,84 discussed by Badawy as
a “figured capital”,85 we see on the short side a woman reclining
against a Sphinx and on the longer side a procession of four naked
men (thought to represent priests of Suchos!) carrying a perplexed
crocodile. Among the most astonishing inventions of the “Sheikh
Ibada” workshop(s) are a sculpture in the round depicting the “paralytic rising to carry his bed” in Brooklyn86 and a relief with a “cult scene”
in Berlin.87 In the latter, a mortuary symbol borrowed from pagan
Oxyrhynchos stelae appears side-by-side with the cross, presenting
thus a cunningly calculated, fictive case of syncretistic iconography.
The success of fantastic forgeries like these was secured by the
fact that every single new “Sheikh Ibada” carving that turned up
79
Ikonenmuseum inv. no. 526, Christentum am Nil Cat. 103.
Brooklyn acc. no. 63.36, Thomas 1990 fig. I.33 (modern); Spanel 2001.—
Discussed as antique by V.H. Elbern: HIC SCS SYMION. Eine vorkarolingische
Kultstatue des Symeon Stylites in Poitiers. Cah. Arch. 16 (1966); id.: Neue Aspekte
frühmittelalterlicher Skulptur in Gallien. in: II. Kolloquium über spätantike und frühmittelalterliche Skulptur. Mainz 1971 13–24 15.
81
E.g., private collection, Christentum am Nil Cat. 84; ibid. Anhang Pl. A III;
Recklinghausen, Ikonenmuseum, inv. no. unknown, Brown 1971/1989 fig. 8.
82
Recklinghausen, Ikonenmuseum inv. no. 544, Koptische Kunst Nachtrag Cat. 547;
Thomas 1990 fig. II.81. Variant: orans figure of boy with cross pendant, Recklinghausen, Ikonenmueum 524, Christentum am Nil Cat. 88; Thomas 1990 fig. II.80.
83
E.g., Berlin, Staatliche Museen Preussischer Kulturbesitz 5/62, 6/62, Christentum
am Nil A II, A III; Elbern 1978 83, Pl. 7/a, b: nude (!) boys with crosses.
84
Leiden, Rijksmuseum F 1962/8.2, L’art chrétien du Nil. Kristelijke kunst langs de
Nijl. Studio 44 12/2–17/3/74 Passage 44. Bruxelles n.d. Cat. 40 (M. Rassart-Debergh).
85
Badawy 1978 125, fig. 3.15.
86
Brooklyn 62.44, J.D. Cooney in: The Brooklyn Museum Annual 2–3 (1960–1962)
40–47, figs 5, 6; Badawy 1978 fig. 3.69 (antique); Spanel 2001 (modern).
87
Two pairs of figures: a naked boy holding a bunch of grapes before a man,
and a man holding a cross before a man with a bunch of grapes, Staatliche Museen
Preussischer Kulturbesitz inv. no. 21/61, Christentum am Nil Cat. A VI; Elbern 1978
83 f., Pl. 8.
80
27
on the art market provided a new argument for the correctness of
the current image of “Coptic” art. Still, it is rather surprising that
experts like Klaus Parlasca, while disagreeing with the Volkskunst theory and noticing that there are forgeries among the “Sheikh Ibada”
sculptures, nevertheless discussed the Brooklyn “paralytic” and carvings representing “boys with hand crosses” in Berlin88 and Munich89
as genuine works of art which could shed light on hitherto unknown
processes in fourth-century Egyptian art.90
All these carvings display the same idiosyncratic rendering of the
human face going back to fourth-century models from Oxyrhynchos:
yet the same face type also occurs in completely incongruous contexts such as, e.g., semicircular niche heads decorated with personifications91 copied from sixth-century models.92 The ignorance of the
logics of stylistic context is also apparent in the usually poor quality re-carvings (?) or forgeries of first- and second-century Terenuthis
stelae.93
It is difficult to understand why the “Sheikh Ibada” sculptures did
not irritate museum curators with their affected and superficial classicizing. What misled the museum curators was perhaps that they
resembled sculptures from other regions of ancient art which were
88
Elbern 1978 83, Pl. 7/a, b (see above).
Christentum am Nil Cat. 84; Effenberger 1975 Pl. 11.
90
Parlasca 1978, disregarding the warning uttered by J. Beckwith in his review
of Effenberger 1975, BiOr 34 (1977) 329.
91
Brooklyn 58.80, Christentum am Nil Cat. 85; Thomas 1990 fig. II.27, torso of
figure holding globe with cross and sceptre. By the same twentieth-century master:
Richmond, Virginia Museum of Fine Arts 63.56.1, Thomas 1990 fig. II.84, torso
of figure holding cornucopia and sceptre.
92
CM 7969 (unpublished). Cf. especially the identical neck ornaments.—A somewhat doubtful semicircular niche head of the same iconographic type from the CM
collection (inv. no. not known) is illustrated on the front cover of Atalla n.d. II.
93
E.g., Munich, Ägyptische Sammlung 5987, Koptische Kunst Nachtrag Cat. 543;
Wessel 1963 fig. 74.—There are, however, also pieces of apparently excellent quality as, e.g., a relief formerly in the collection of E. Kofler, Luzern, Parlasca 1972
73, Pl. 7/1. The carving repeats the rare mortuary relief type (cf. Leipzig, Ägyptisches Museum der Universität inv. no. 2495, Cat. Hamm Cat. 18) representing a
mummy on the mortuary bed flanked by two Anubis figures and two female busts
(Isis and Nephthys?). Below this scene is added, however, the representation of a
female bust between two hovering Erotes. The finely carved faces repeat the “Sheikh
Ibada” type which was taken from a later stylistic context than the iconographic
type of the mortuary scene. Moreover, the boat on which the mortuary bed is
placed in the original scene type was completely misunderstood by the master of
the Kofler relief.
89
28
chapter two
considered genuine, yet mediocre, works of art: and their iconographic “novelty” was attractive. As to the stylistic stereotypes, the
makers of the “Sheikh Ibada” sculptures relied primarily on sculptures from Heracleopolis Magna and Oxyrhynchos which they could
study in the museums of Cairo and Alexandria.94 As it is shown by
the recurrent treatment of the human face and the drapery, the masters of the mainstream “Sheikh Ibada” sculptures were influenced
above all by figural stelae (first of all by stelae of boys) from
Oxyrhynchos, examples of which, often recarved and as a rule
repainted,95 arrived on the European and American market together
with the fakes. While no genuine Oxyrhynchos stela of this type
seems to have commemorated a Christian, the fakes are usually
Christianized by the addition of a cross.
The bold inventiveness of the forgers was inspired by, and responded
to, the current art historical discourse on Egyptian late antique art
as an art uniting pharaonic Egyptian themes and stylistic features
with early Christian iconography and with the uncorrupted, naive
expressivity of Volkskunst.96 Examples for such a cleverly calculated
production may be excellently studied in the catalogue of the
Recklinghausen Ikonenmuseum collection published shortly before
the 1963 Essen exhibition. Let me quote here one relief depicting
two flying angels touching with their hands a bust placed between
them,97 and another one with the representation of two Nereids or
Sirens under the gourd (!), wearing necklaces with cross pendants.98
The first is interpreted by Wessel as a representation of the Ascension,
the second as an apotropaic image.
Other forgers lacked the fantasy and courage of the masters of
these daring compositions and produced more conventional and
faithful copies of museum pieces such as the semicircular niche
head Recklinghausen 519 with the representation of an apotheosis
94
As shown by Severin 1995 295 ff., two of the three figures on Berlin, Staatliche
Museen Preussischer Kulturbesitz 26/72, a radically reworked antique niche head
acquired by the museum in 1972, were modelled on figures from the reliefs CM
7816 and 7817/7848. 7816 was first published in 1977, 7817/7848 in 1990 by the
present writer (Török 1977 144, fig. 14; 1990 441, fig. 23, respectively).
95
Freshly repainted stelae also entered the collection of the Coptic Museum.
96
For the impact of the Volkskunst theory, see also Thomas 1990 149 note 184.
97
Inv. no. 502, Wessel [1962].
98
Inv. no. 508, Wessel [1962].
99
Wessel [1962]; Wessel 1963 fig. 91.
29
scene.99 With small changes in the decoration of the framing frieze,
and misunderstanding certain details of the original, it reproduces
Cairo, Coptic Museum 7968.100 While the production of the “Sheikh
Ibada” workshop(s) displays on the whole an interesting combination of inventiveness with the study of models and the knowledge of
some important elements of the current art historical view of Coptic
art, the forgeries also display marked quality differences which are
characteristic for a workshop which is not prepared to satisfy the
demands of a rapidly growing market. The acquisition of strikingly
poorly executed “Oxyrhynchos stelae”101 by prestigious collections
demonstrates the persuasiveness of the Volkskunst theory. It remains
completely incomprehensible, however, how carvings, in which every
single detail shows the misunderstanding of an easily identifiable model and where breaks and losses are cryingly inconsistent
with the normal patterns of damage, could find entrance into great
collections.102
Though the authenticity of some “Sheikh Ibada” sculptures was
doubted by scholars as early as 1963 when a group of them103 was
put on show in the Essen exhibition (fig. 2),104 their impact nevertheless remained lasting since, for the unsuspicious, they corroborated and at the same time complemented excellently the picture of
Egyptian early Christian art as it emerged from Naville’s Heracleopolis
Magna excavations. Regrettably enough, approximately 25 % of the
sculptures discussed and illustrated in Wessel’s 1963 monograph,105
also including the piece illustrated on the front cover of the book,106
100
Unpublished.
See, e.g., Recklinghausen, Ikonenmuseum inv. no. 518, Wessel [1962]; private collection, Christentum am Nil Cat. 84.
102
E.g., Koptische Kunst Nachtrag Cat. 551, fig. 10.
103
E.g., Koptische Kunst Nachtrag Cat. 527, 535, 533, 538, 541, 542, 547, 551, 555,
566.—Cat. 533 is identical with the Isis statue Berlin, Staatliche Museen Preussischer
Kulturbesitz inv. no. 19/61 which is, according to Severin 1995 293–295 (with Pls
18–19), a considerably reworked late antique piece.—These pieces were put on
show at Essen against the wish of Wolfgang Fritz Volbach, the organiser of the
exhibition. Cf. Severin 1995 293 f.
104
Now Recklinghausen, Ikonenmuseum, Koptische Kunst Nachtrag Cat. 547, fig. 8.
105
E.g., Wessel 1963 Pl. III, figs 7, 8, 11, 18, 20, 30, 44–47, 49, 59, 61, 69,
73, 76, 77, 90, 91 (the model of the latter: CM 7968, unpublished), 96–98.
106
Recklinghausen, Ikonenmuseum 516 (also Wessel 1963 p. 89, fig. III). This
piece is also prominently discussed, and illustrated in Effenberger 1975 144 ff., fig.
p. 145.—The impact of the fakes on the art historical discourse is also noted by
Severin 1998b 94.
101
30
chapter two
belong to the “Sheikh Ibada” group or to the wider circle of fakes
inspired by it.107 These artefacts receive a central place in Wessel’s
definition of “Coptic” art:
Hier kann man nicht einmal mehr von einer losen Anlehnung an
irgendeine antike oder spätantike Gestaltung reden, hier steht vielmehr
ein wuchtiger und ganz urtümlicher Archaismus vor uns, der eindrucksvoll numinos zu gestalten weiss, der Idole von geheimnisvoller
Urkraft schafft, die uns and die Uranfänge der Menschendarstellungen
zurückzuführen scheinen.108
Wessel’s definition of Coptic art as a Volkskunst would also be fully
accepted in Arne Effenberger’s 1975 monograph,109 where, similarly
to Wessel’s work, pieces from the “Sheikh Ibada group” play a key
role in the explanation of intellectual and stylistic developments leading from the world of pagan Oxyrhynchos stelae to Christian art.110
Modern pieces are treated as genuine evidence in the analysis of the
iconographic syncretism of fifth-century Egyptian art.111 The influence
of Wessel’s 1963 book is also obvious in the treatment of the
Heracleopolis Magna sculptures as products of a stylistically closed
local tradition, or in the late (fifth- and sixth-century) dating of most
mythological reliefs from this site.112 Effenberger also puts forward
the same hypothesis of a linear stylistic development leading from
the Classical canon to an increasing simplification, stylization, and
abstraction that also occurred in the work of Wessel.113
In these works Coptic art thus appears at the same time in the
chronological dimension of a stylistic “development” and in the timelessness of a Volkskunst. Characteristically, in the introduction to her
Kunst im christlichen Ägypten, Hilde Zaloscer connects her perception of
107
“Sheikh Ibada” stelae continue to be discussed as examples of genuine types
in the literature. E.g., Dunand – Lichtenberg 1995 2359 with note 193 assume the
the existence of Christian variants of the pagan “Antinoopolis”-type stelae on the
basis of stelae of boys with cross pendant in the Recklinghausen collection.
108
Wessel 1963 169, on a wooden carving in Recklinghausen, his figs 96–98.
109
In his 1975 book Effenberger ignores Torp’s “Leda Christiana” (see below).
110
See also Parlasca 1978.
111
Effenberger 1975 23 ff., 144 ff.
112
Effenberger 1975 172 ff. These datings would be changed, on the basis of
Török 1970, to 4th and (early) 5th-century datings in Effenberger 1981; then in
Effenberger 1996 to general 4/5th-century or 5th-century datings, this time with
reference both to Török 1990 and Severin 1993, two works which suggest divergent datings.
113
Effenberger 1975 137 and passim.
31
the art of late antique and early Byzantine Egypt to her twentiethcentury experience of an assumedly “timeless” land:114
Da sie [ i.e., her work] zum Grossteil in Ägypten entstanden ist, war
mir viel Literatur . . . nicht zugänglich . . . Wenn ich die Arbeit trotzdem veröffentliche, so geschieht dies aus der Überzeugung, dass oben
erwähntes Manko durch eine wichtige Tatsache kompensiert wird:
Wenn mir auch viel Literatur zu dem hier behandelten Problem entgangen sein mag, so entstand diese Arbeit nicht nur in unmittelbarem
Kontakt mit den Werken, sondern vor allem auch in der Lebensatmosphäre, in der sie einst entstanden sind, unter den Menschen, die
sie geschaffen haben, unter Lebensbedingungen, die die gleichen sind
wie damals, als diese Denkmäler entstanden.
From declaring Coptic art a Volkskunst which existed in a politically
and religiously motivated isolation from the Hellenic culture of the
upper classes, it also follows that the methods of art historical research
cannot be applied to it. Accordingly, Hilde Zaloscer refuses Hjalmar
Torp’s criticism115 of the essays published in the Essen catalogue on
the basis of a nihilistic reasoning:
Es handelt sich um eine gründliche, von vorbildlicher wissenschaftlicher
Akribie getragene Arbeit, nur ist die angewandte Methode für die
Untersuchung der Probleme der “koptischen” Kunst nicht anwendbar.
So wie H. Torp vorgeht, kann man die Beziehung der Malerschulen
von Siena und Florenz untersuchen, nicht aber das Verhältnis der hellenistischen Kunst Alexandriens zu der ihres ägyptischen Hinterlandes.116
5. From Ernst Kitzinger’s “Notes on Early Coptic Sculpture” to Hjalmar
Torp’s “Leda Christiana”
The hypotheses presented in the course of the 1960s by Klaus Wessel,
Pierre du Bourguet117 and several catalogue authors of the great exhibitions organised in 1963–1964 in Essen, Paris, Zürich, and Vienna118
could—as indicated by a monograph published by John Beckwith in
114
Zaloscer 1974 7.
Torp 1965a.
116
Zaloscer 1974 98.—Cf. also H. Zaloscer: Die koptische Kunst—der heutige
Stand ihrer Erforschung (Ein Problem der Methodik). Enchoria 21 (1994) 73–89.
117
Du Bourguet in L’art copte; du Bourguet 1967.
118
Christentum am Nil; Wessel (ed.) 1964; L’art copte; Koptische Kunst Zürich; Koptische
Kunst Nachtrag; Frühchristliche und koptische Kunst.
115
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chapter two
1963119—have been formulated in more balanced terms had their
authors paid more attention to an article published in 1938 by Ernst
Kitzinger.120 In his “Notes on Early Coptic Sculpture”, Kitzinger
presented a chronological study of third- to sixth-century stone carvings, mainly from Oxyrhynchos, Heracleopolis Magna, and Bawit.
He suggested a stylistic development from a “soft and more fleshy
figure style and . . . purer architectural forms” towards a style characterized by “the typical Coptic figures with their clumsy proportions and angular movements, sharply cut forms and deep shadows”,121
the first style being represented primarily by pieces from Oxyrhynchos
and the second by carvings from Heracleopolis Magna. Kitzinger
also pointed out that the mythological reliefs and the column capitals with crosses from Heracleopolis Magna cannot have been made
for the same building and that
both Strzygowski’s theory, which ascribes to Egyptian Christianity a
particularly sensual character, and the attempts of others to give the
pagan mythological subjects a Christian interpretation are, to say the
least, superfluous.122
While the reconstruction of a schematic linear development from a
“soft” to a “hard” style was not supported by later investigations,123
the datings suggested on the basis of stylistic connections with carvings from Constantinople and, in more general terms, the attempt
to examine Egyptian late antique sculpture within the framework of
Mediterranean late antiquity could have provided valuable working
tools. These remained, however, largely unused until the early 1970s
when Hjalmar Torp and other students of Egyptian late antique art
realised the complete hopelessness of working with undated objects.
They were also appalled by the artificial picture presented in the
Coptic art histories of the 1960s and puzzled by the splendid and,
119
Beckwith 1963.
Kitzinger 1938.—For a penetrating review of these exhibition catalogues further of Beckwith 1963, De Francovich 1963, and Wessel 1963, see Torp 1965a.
121
Kitzinger 1938 184.
122
Kitzinger 1938 192 f.
123
Török 1970, 1977; Severin 1977a, 1977b, 1981a, 1981b, Effenberger 1981;
Török 1990; Severin 1993; Török 1998.—Effenberger 1996 35 misunderstands my
view concerning the stylistic plurality of 4th-cent. sculpture (in which Kitzinger’s
“soft” and “hard” styles exist side-by-side, for detailed arguments, see Török 1990)
when he mentions it in the same breath with the erroneously supposed homogeneity
of the sculptures from the “south church” at Bawit.
120
33
at the same time, extremely heterogeneous material of the great
1963–1964 exhibitions. Their method was greatly promoted by
Beckwith’s attempt124 at an investigation of the connections between
Egyptian sculpture and the great artistic centres of the late antique
Mediterranean as well as by the re-discovery of Kitzinger’s work.
It is to be regretted that in its time Kitzinger’s 1938 article could
not bring about the necessary change in the course of the research
concerning the art and architecture of Egypt in the late antique and
early medieval periods. The standards of the sporadic archaeological work at late antique and early medieval sites remained unsatisfactory until the post-Second World War years. As a consequence
of the speculative, aprioristic, and frequently dilettantistic art historical theories built upon objects whose contexts and dates were unknown
or uncertain, Egyptian late antique and early Byzantine art continued to be a “museum art”125 and its monuments played a peripheral role or were completely ignored in the unfolding research on
the late antique culture of the Mediterranean world. It cannot be
accidental that, while maintaining the view he had formed earlier
of what he termed “sub-antique” art on the basis of his investigation of Egyptian scupture,126 in his great 1977 treatment of third- to
seventh-century Mediterranean art127 Kitzinger would not discuss, or
illustrate, objects from Egypt, also leaving unconsidered the question
whether the porphyry sculptures were made in Egypt or not (cf.
Chapter VII.1).
John Beckwith discussed, albeit hesitatingly, several porphyry sculptures as monuments of Egyptian late antique art, without establishing,
however, links between them and the wider context of contemporary
Egyptian art. His stylistic analyses place a series of important monuments into the context of the late antique art of the Mediterranean.128
His reconstruction of stylistic developments is undermined, however,
at several points by uncertain information received from Coptological
research, as, e.g., in the case of the wooden lintel with the scenes
of the Entry into Jerusalem and the Ascension from the “Hanging
Church” (Church of al-Mo"allaqa) in Old Cairo (see Epilogue with
figs 168–176).
124
125
126
127
128
Beckwith 1963.
Brune 1999 27–36.
Kitzinger 1938 203 ff.—For the issue cf. Trilling 1987.
Kitzinger 1977.
Cf., however, Torp 1965a 367 ff.
34
chapter two
The decisive change in the course of Coptic art history which
could not be brought about by Kitzinger’s 1938 study and the necessity of which was not realised by the catalogue authors of the great
1963–1964 exhibitions, either, was initiated by Beckwith’s style analyses and it occurred finally with Hjalmar Torp’s article “Leda Christiana.
The Problem of the Interpretation of Coptic Sculpture with Mythological Motifs”, published in 1969.129
Except for the issue of chronology, in the twelve printed pages of
“Leda Christiana” Torp addressed all essential problems connected
with the research on Egyptian late antique sculpture. He presented
arguments not only against the association of the mythological reliefs
from Heracleopolis Magna with Naville’s “church” but also pointed
out that the latter edifice was in fact a funerary chapel built for
Christians. This chapel was erected in an originally pagan necropolis where, from some time in the second half of the fourth century
onwards, Christian funerary edifices were also built which were decorated with figural and ornamental carvings (made by the same masters who were also responsible for the decoration of the contemporary
pagan funerary chapels). The mythological reliefs from Heracleopolis
Magna originate from fourth- and fifth-century pagan funerary chapels.
The rich architectural carving material discovered by Petrie130 and
Breccia131 at Oxyrhynchos is interpreted by Torp similarly as coming
from a late antique necropolis consisting of pagan as well as Christian
funerary edifices. The architectural/functional context and the iconography of the mythological reliefs mutually corroborate each other
since the iconography of the mythological reliefs from Heracleopolis
Magna, Oxyrhynchos, and other Egyptian late antique sites
is most readily explained when studied from the view-point of sepulchral art. On the whole, the best parallels to the representations of
the Coptic pieces are found in this sphere of art of Late Antiquity.132
Torp demonstrates this by analysing a series of mythological reliefs
vis-à-vis a series of Greek and Roman iconographic analogues coming from sepulchral contexts and also including in a most illumi-
129
130
131
132
Torp 1969.
Petrie 1925 16 ff., Pls 40–44.
Breccia 1932 60 ff., Pls 39–51; 1933 36 ff., Pls 27–47.
Torp 1969 106.
35
nating manner monuments from Alexandria and Hermopolis Magna
as well as the figural niche heads in Mausoleum H (tomb of the
Valerii) of the Vatican necropolis.133
“Leda Christiana” dispels the confusion caused by the fatal and
stubborn misinterpretation of Naville’s Heracleopolis Magna finds
and, by placing the bulk of Egyptian late antique architectural sculpture into its proper context, it creates the prerequisites for a radical
change in the course of Egyptian art history from speculative definitions
based on a de-contextualised material to modern research placed
within the context of Mediterranean late antiquity. The perspectives
of the new course of research would be formulated more explicitly
and in more general terms in a somewhat later study on the architectural sculpture from the so-called “south church” at Bawit:134
Attempts have been made to elevate to the rank of principles of art
history sharply drawn, ethnic-religious distinctions between Copts,
Greeks, and Latins. But this has not been without disastrous effects
upon the study of Coptic art history. It is well to remember that at
Sohag, both in the Red Monastery from about AD 500 and in the
earlier, White Monastery of Shenuti, the Greco-Roman language of
form rises to a magnificent climax just in the trifoil chancel, the architectural and spiritual centre of the buildings. Undoubtedly, the ‘Roman’
chancel of the great patriot Shenuti teaches that the alleged contrast
between Mediterranean art forms and anti-Roman and anti-Byzantine
sentiments of the Copts, cannot be but the fruit of modern art-historical speculation. Seven or eight centuries after Alexander’s conquest,
the vocabulary of classical architecture with its rich, plastic articulation surely was felt by the Copts to be part of the legacy of their land,
a legacy sanctified by its association with the great sanctuaries of their
new creed, in the Holy Land, in Alexandria, and along the Nile.
How far has research got on the way indicated in Hjalmar Torp’s
1969 paper? A seminal study such as “Leda Christiana” would doubtless deserve to be taken as a point of departure and a standard for
a comprehensive survey of the course of the history of Egyptian late
antique art in the last thirty-three years. A detailed Forschungsbericht
would, however, exceed the limits of this book. The retrospective
133
Torp 1969 107–111, with Pls I–X. For Mausoleum H of the Vatican necropolis, see now Mielsch–v. Hesberg 1995 143–208.
134
Torp 1971 41.—For the building and its decoration, see Chapter IX.2.2.
36
chapter two
presented so far has followed the threads leading directly to “Leda
Christiana”. In the following I shall only touch upon features of post“Leda Christiana” research which I consider significant and for the
appraisal of which the compass is provided again, directly or indirectly, by “Leda Christiana”.
CHAPTER THREE
ON METHODS
Leafing through the many fine reproductions in
this beautiful book of art from Coptic Egypt, one
begins to suspect that the prerequisite for identifying a work as Coptic, “im eigentlichen Sinne”, was
mediocre quality.1
1. Function, chronology, and style
Renewed archaeological work at Saqqara2 and a revision of the photographic and graphic documentation from the early-twentieth-century excavations conducted at Ahnas (Heracleopolis Magna), Bawit,
Saqqara, and Bahnasa (Oxyrhynchos)3 very soon demonstrated the
correctness of Torp’s thesis concerning the sepulchral function of the
edifices from which the Heracleopolis Magna and Oxyrhynchos carvings originated. By defining the sepulchral context of a siginificant
part of fourth- and fifth-century Egyptian figural and ornamental
sculpture, “Leda Christiana” also indicated, however indirectly, the
necessity as well as the possibility of the investigation and definition
of the different social and cultural contexts in which the monuments
of Egyptian late antique art and architecture were created and in
which they functioned.
As ought to have seemed obvious, but was, for the time being,
not realised, the funerary chapel types identified by Peter Grossmann
and Hans-Georg Severin belonged to the fourth- to sixth-century
urban elite (cf. Chapter V.3.1). Comparison of the figural and ornamental decoration associated with richly decorated elite burial edifices
1
Torp 1965a 375, on Wessel 1963. For fairness’ sake, it must be added that the
quotation continues thus: “This, surely, was not the author’s intention; Wessel
takes . . . an exceedingly positive attitude towards things Coptic.”
2
Grossmann 1971, 1972a, 1972b, 1980; Grossmann – Severin 1982.
3
Severin 1977b, 1981a; Grossmann – Severin 1982.
38
chapter three
with the textual evidence concerning the education, outlook, and
social display of the provincial Greek and Hellenised Egyptian aristocracy, which was in a good position to maintain contacts with the
intellectual and artistic centres of the contemporary Mediterranean
world—especially with Alexandria, and through Alexandria with
Rome and later with Constantinople—was also postponed. The first
studies in which the significance of “Leda Christiana” was realised
were devoted instead to problems of chronology and style, issues the
importance of which became fully obvious for a number of art historians when they compared the uncoordinated mass of monuments
shown at the great exhibitions of 1963–1964 with the theories and
hypotheses presented in the literature since Gayet and Strzygowski.4
The archaeological reassessment of the “main church” and the socalled “tomb church” (building 1823)5 at Saqqara and the revision
of the early twentieth-century evidence concerning the “south church”
at Bawit resulted in a chronology of some architectural sculptures
carved for the Christian buildings of the monasteries as well as in
a dating of some of the spolia originating from the fourth- and fifthcentury necropoleis whose area was occupied by these monasteries.
The datings seemed to be consistent with the fourth- and fifth-century datings resulting from the stylistic analysis of figural sculptures
and architectural carvings (mainly capitals) from Heracleopolis Magna
and other sites that was carried out within an Empire-wide context.6
The great exhibition of late antique art held in 1977–1978 in the
Metropolitan Museum7 confirmed some of the results and encouraged further research.
The optimism of the studies published on the style-critical dating
of fourth- and fifth-century Egyptian sculpture in the 1970s and early
1980s by Severin, Effenberger and the present writer faded somewhat, it seems, in the subsequent one and a half decades. In view
of the fact that “there is no evidence to date precisely the figurative
reliefs and architectural decoration from the period before the Arab
See first of all Torp 1965a and cf. Török 1970; Severin 1977a, 1977b.
For the building cf. Quibell 1912 9 ff., Pls XVII, XVIII; for its interpretation,
see Grossmann – Severin 1982; Severin 1998b 100 f.
6
Török 1970, 1977; Severin 1977a, 1981a, 1981b; Grossmann – Severin 1982.
For the reception of the chronology suggested in Török 1970, see Severin 1977a,
250 (nos 278/a, c); Effenberger 1981, 74–78.
7
See Age of Spirituality.
4
5
on methods
39
Conquest”,8 special significance was attributed to three complexes as
the only exceptions:9 namely, to the carvings made for the basilica
at Hermopolis Magna/Ashmunein around the middle of the fifth
century,10 the architectural decoration made around 440 for the
church Deir Anbâ Shinûda11 (the so-called “White Monastery” at
Sohag); and the decoration of the triconch of the Deir Anbâ Bishûy
(the so-called “Red Monastery” at Sohag) from the second half of
the fifth century (cf. Chapters VI.2, VII).12 In the 1980s Hans-Georg
Severin altered the fourth-century dating of the earliest reused material from the so-called “south church” at Bawit into a dating to the
second half of the fifth century, and changed the earlier sixth-century dating of the Christian re-building of the “south church” to a
late sixth-early seventh-century dating.13 It may be supposed that
Severin’s undetailed arguments for the modified chronology of the
late antique spolia were influenced by the hypothetical reconstruction
of a trend of changes in foliage types that would lead to the dated
Sohag capitals and cornices.14 The subsequent re-dating of Heracleopolis
Magna and Oxyrhynchos niche heads and other architectural carvings15 which were dated formerly to the period between the midthird and the fifth century disregards the stylistic analysis of their
figural decoration. When referring to eventual typological connections between foliage types occurring on niche heads and on the
fifth-century carvings in the Sohag “White” and “Red Monasteries”,
it is always the latter that are regarded as models of the former,
though this direction of derivation16 is clearly contradicted by all
8
Severin 1991 2117.
Severin 1991 2117.
10
Wace – Megaw – Skeat 1959 Pls 24/1, 4, 6, 27/8, 10.
11
Cf. McKenzie 1996b 137: according to Judith McKenzie, the modillion cornices and the niche heads of the church were made around 440 for the original
building and are contemporary with the inscribed lintel of the church, cf. Monneret
de Villard 1925 18 ff.
12
Cf., with earlier literature, Severin 1998a 311–318.
13
Severin 1986 101 ff. with note 4.
14
Late datings are generally preferred in Severin 1986 104 where he dates the
Christian re-building of the predecessor building(s) of the “south church” to the 8th
cent. on the basis of the existence of a ¢urus (i.e., a transversal room dividing the
church nave from the sanctuary room[s]) while adding in note 24 that a ¢urus
already occurs around the middle of the 7th cent. in the “main church” at Saqqara
(cf. Grossmann – Severin 1982 159 ff.).
15
Severin 1993 77 ff.
16
Severin 1993 81.
9
40
chapter three
fifth-century niche architecture types occurring at Sohag (cf. Chapter
V.3.1).
2. Chronology and the stratification of artistic production
The notion of Volkskunst gave way in the 1990s to a comparison of
“Bauwerke und Statuen, die als Stiftungen römischer bzw. spätantiker Kaiser ganz auf der Höhe der Zeit stehen” with “Werke einheimischer Künstler, deren provinzieller Charakter nicht zu übersehen
ist”.17 The so-far-neglected comparison of artistic production with the
textual evidence concerning the culture of the fourth- and fifth-century Egyptian elite was finally attempted in relation to the sculptural
decoration of elite funerary edifices.18 An investigation of the sociocultural context and stratification of Egyptian late antique-early
Byzantine art in broader terms was not initiated, however, although
the terrain had now been prepared by a number of masterful historical studies.19
Without sensitivity to the different levels on which art is created
and used20 and especially without a consensus concerning the criteria
of great art under imperial, ecclesiastical, and aristocratic patronage,
the origins and processes of stylistic changes cannot be properly understood. As an unfulfilled desideratum the following was formulated:
Eine klar gegliederte Darstellung der spätantiken und frühmittelalterlichen Bildenden Kunst Ägyptens, in der die einzelnen Gattungen systematisch und womöglich nach Hauptwerken geordnet vorgeführt werden,
liegt zur Zeit . . . nicht im Bereich des Möglichen. Zu belastend sind
noch die Fehler und Versäumnisse der älteren Forschung, zu hinderlich die insgesamt geringe Kenntnis der Monumente und die von unausgewogenen Schwerpunkten bestimmte Forschungslage.21
It is especially the disregard of the nature of differences in artistic
and workshop quality and the neglect or ignorance of monuments
beyond “minor arts” that mislead art historians looking at Egypt
17
A. Effenberger in: Effenberger – Severin 1992 50.
Thomas 1989, 1990, 1992, 2000; Török 1998 51 ff.
19
First of all, see Wipszycka 1965, 1972, 1986, 1988; Bowman 1986; Bowersock
1990; Bagnall 1993.
20
Elsner 1998a 740 ff.; 1998b 53 ff. and see also Beard – Henderson 2001 147 ff.
21
Severin 1998a 295 (my Italics).
18
on methods
41
from the broader perspective of the ancient Mediterranean. To illustrate the general bias in the selection of what would be regarded the
representative monuments of “Coptic” art, let me quote here a summary statement from John Boardman’s The Diffusion of Classical Art
in Antiquity:
Coptic art is homogeneous, mainly dependent on Egypt’s Hellenistic
traditions; not oblivious to the arts of the Greek world now dominated
by Byzantium but in no respect provincial Byzantine. While figure and
floral decoration remain the principal themes they have lost all claim
to monumentality. The overall appearance is very much that of a ‘folk
art’, except that the quaintness does not seem arbitrary, and it is
expressed as deliberately in stone relief as in textile or painting. There
is something inescapably comic about it to modern eyes, but it is not
a comicality achieved through incompetence.22
The question of stratification is the more significant in that the distinction official imperial art versus provincial art does not solve all
problems associated with the quality of art objects. The intricate relationship between quality, style, and dating23 was not sufficiently realised
in earlier research and also remains unexplained in more recent
works.24 As a notable exception, however, the issue of quality emerges
in the recent discussion concerning the dating of the latest period
of mummy portrait painting. Arguing against H. Drerup’s25 and Klaus
Parlasca’s26 late, i.e., fourth-century datings, Barbara Borg notes that
both scholars seem to rely
on the concept of a general development of style . . . The fact that they
make no clear distinction between style and quality is another problem. Some things that have been passed off as stylistic characteristics
are in fact poor-quality painting.27
Understandably, the uncertainty concerning quality contributed decisively to the credulity displayed towards the “Sheikh Ibada group”
22
Boardman 1994 178.
For the case of Roman portrait sculpture cf. Bergmann 1999 11 f., with literature. Bergmann (ibid. 67) also warns that close stylistic correspondences between
two works of art originating from the same “Kunstkreis” such as that of the workshops
of Aphrodisias, are not necessarily contemporaneous: “Die Langlebigkeit von Formeln,
wie man sie in Aphrodisias beobachten kann, widerlegt . . . diese Auffassung”.
24
E.g., Thomas 2000 25 discusses quality only from the viewpoint of technical
execution.
25
H. Drerup: Die Datierung der Mumienporträts. Paderborn 1933.
26
Parlasca 1966, 1969, 1977, 1980.
27
B. Borg in: Doxiadis 2000 233.
23
42
chapter three
(Chapter II.4). The generally assumed stylistic and iconographic “conservatism” of Egyptian art, especially in the post-Conquest period,
is frequently argued for on the basis of works of art which are separated from each other by their different quality rather than by a
long period of time during which style would have become (cyclically) “degenerated”, and certain iconographic types “meaningless”
or “half-understood repetitions”—or, just on the opposite, new impetuses would revive declining genres.28
In 1981 Hans-Georg Severin discussed the well-known Berlin orans
stelae of Rhodia (fig. 3)29 and Theodora (fig. 4)30 from the viewpoint
of quality. While the figures and their draperies are rendered on the
two stelae in radically different manners, Severin argued convincingly for their contemporaneity on the basis of the analogous type
and execution of the niche architecture framing the figures on the
two stelae and suggested the same fifth-century dating for both carvings. His fine analysis of the models of the miniature column capitals occurring on the two Berlin stelae, on the one hand, and of the
slightly, but significantly different capital type occurring on the splendid stela with an orans and an archangel in Copenhagen (fig. 144,
cf. Chapter IX.2.2) on the other, not only supports the dating of
the former to the fifth, and the latter to the early sixth century, but
also warns that the clumsy, curiously graphic rendering of Rhodia’s
figure indicates nothing more than the incapacity of its master.31 Yet
it also follows from this observation that the stylistic differences
28
The “late” dating of poor quality works is, of course, a more general problem. See, e.g., on the various datings of the sarcophagus fronts from Taskasap and
Çapa (Istanbul): Grabar 1963 37 f., 41, Pls IX/1, 2, XIII/3.
29
30
31
The style of the Rhodia stela was commented on thus by Wessel 1963 104:
“Die griechischen Fajum-Stelen sind schwache, späte und provinzielle Randprodukte
der antiken Kultur, die Stele der Rhodia hingegen ist ein Werk eines echten und
frühen Archaismus”. Effenberger 1975 171 suggets that “[h]ier ist ein Formwille
am Werk, der die Bedeutung der einzelnen Elemente nicht nach ihrer realen
Erscheinung, sondern nach einer eigenen Wertskala bestimmt und ordnet . . . Der
Steinmetz, der eine solche Architektur zu meisseln verstand, war sicher auch in der
Lage, einen ‘richtigen’ Menschen zu bilden. Für ihn bestand aber eine innere
Notwendigkeit, die Figur so und nicht anders darzustellen. Damit verstärkt dieses
Relief Stiltendenzen, die auch in anderen koptischen Zentren unter weniger stark
abstrahierenden Werken einhergehen und die das eigentliche Anliegen des koptischen Kunstschaffens dieser frühen Periode kennzeichnen: das Abgehen von dem
Stilzwang des spätantiken Formenerbes.”
on methods
43
between the far-less-unskilled rendering of Theodora’s figure and the
superb rendering of the figures on the Copenhagen carving are of
a different nature: they also describe two different stylistic backgrounds. The stela of Theodora was carved in an average (late?)
fifth-century provincial workshop, the Copenhagen relief in an early
sixth-century urban workshop employing a master who was not less
skilled than the master of the splendid “Paris Pilaster” with the figures
of an apostle and an archangel (figs 146, 147, see Chapter IX.2.2)
and who was acquainted with grand Byzantine models (cf. Chapter
V.3.1).
Further examples from among sculptures in stone or ivory and
bone32 could be cited in abundance (cf. Chapter VIII.5). Instead, I
refer here to two sets of tunic decorations with Dionysiac scenes in
a Swiss private collection. Stylistically, they are close and are probably approximately contemporary. One set is, however, of excellent
quality (fig. 93),33 and is dated by its publisher to the fourth-fifth
centuries. The second set (fig. 5)34 is of poor quality and is dated to
the sixth century. The reason for the difference in the dating is obviously in the traditional assumption of the stylistic-formal “degeneration” of late antique art (fig. 6).35
Misleading in another sense is our vague knowledge of the archaizing
trends in post-Conquest art, as is frequently demonstrated by the
failure to distinguish third- and fourth-century textile insets with geometric patterns formed by the flying shuttle from the archaizing revival of their motifs and, to an extent, their style in the Fatimid period36
32
See, e.g., the style critical arguments for interpreting and dating mediocre late
antique bone carvings to the “proto-Coptic”/“Coptic” periods in Marangou 1976
81 (ad her no. 25 and Pl. 61/d).
33
Stauffer 1991 Cat. 27.
34
35
Stauffer 1991 Cat. 41, a 4th-cent. textile fragment dated to the 5th–6th cent.
presumably on account of the clumsy rendering of the animal figure in it; further,
see Martiniani-Reber et al. 1991 Cat. 109 and 256, two analogous 8th-cent. textiles (for the dating cf. Török 1993 II Cat. 79), dated three to four centuries apart,
presumably on account of their different technical quality. In a similar manner,
6th-cent. textiles are dated to the 9th cent., Martiniani-Reber et al. 1991 Cat. 263
f., 340 (?).
36
Cf., e.g., Trilling 1982 Cat. 86, 89 (dated to the mid-5th cent.), 91 (late 5thearly 6th cent. ?) 92–96 (6th cent.); Stauffer 1991 Cat. 11 (dated to the 6th cent.),
18 (dated to the 5th cent.); but, see also Baginski – Tidhar 1980 Cat. 255, dated
to the 11th–12th centuries.
44
chapter three
(fig. 7).37 Late antique figural patterns are frequently confused with
their Umayyad period variants (fig. 8)38 and post-Conquest textiles
with Dionysiac figures are often dated to the late antique period.39
It must be admitted that it is frequently very difficult indeed to distinguish contemporary poor quality imitations of luxury textiles40 from
their copies made in much later periods.41
3. The limits of the investigation
Until quite recently, Egyptian works of art were treated in scholarly
studies on late antique and Byzantine culture, if at all, as occasional
illustrations for provincial trends. In his magisterial Byzantine Art in
the Making, Ernst Kitzinger mentions Egypt only to define “the socalled Coptic style” as the most characteristic of the regional idioms
that evolved in the fifth-century Mediterranean and, contra Charles
Rufus Morey and his followers,42 to deny the survival of stylistic elements of Alexandrian Hellenistic art in late antique times43 (see
Chapters V and VII). Except for the Venice (fig. 37) and Vatican
group portraits in porphyry, Kitzinger does not illustrate any Egyptian
work of art and these are also discussed by him as sculptures “made
in the Eastern parts of the Empire”,44 without considering their possible stylistic connections with contemporary Egyptian sculptures in
other materials.
It was a change of considerable significance when in 1971 Ranuccio
Bianchi Bandinelli published his Rome: The Late Empire45 with a chap37
Stauffer 1991 Cat. 11.—For the distinction cf. du Bourguet 1953; Peter 1976.
Stauffer 1991 Cat. 45, dated to the 5th–6th cent., but, see Thompson 1971
70 f. See also Stauffer 1991 Cat. 46.
39
E.g., Baginski – Tidhar 1980 Cat. 83, with a far too early dating to the 6th–7th
cent.; Trilling 1982 Cat. 23 (dated tentatively to the 6th cent.), 59, 60, 61, 74, 76,
77 (dated to the 6th cent. [?]); Cat. Hamm Cat. 310 (dated to the 6th–7th cent.),
366 (dated to the 4th–6th cent.), 372 (dated to the 6th–8th cent.). Stauffer 1991
Cat. 99 is dated to the 6th–7th or 9th–10th cent.
40
Even expensive Egyptian copies of Byzantine silks may be of an inferior quality as to the rendering of the human figures, see, e.g., Washington, The Textile
Museum 11.18: Rutschowscaya 1990 ill. p. 143.
41
E.g., Baginski – Tidhar 1980 Cat. 191; Cat. Hamm 369: copies of Byzantine
silks in “Sassanian” style.
42
Morey 1942.
43
Kitzinger 1977 45, 114; and see already Kitzinger 1938 210 ff.
44
Kitzinger 1977 9, 12.
45
Bianchi Bandinelli 1971, also published in Italian, German, and French. I shall
refer in this book to the page numbers of the German edition.
38
on methods
45
ter on Egypt, discussing Egyptian objects in the general context of
late Roman art. In the same year Peter Brown illustrated twelve
Egyptian works of art in his epoch-making World of Late Antiquity46
indicating thus the actual place of Egypt within the social and cultural changes of the contemporary world. However, in his book
Brown treated art as historical documentation47 in a similar manner
as had Rostovtzeff before him.48 Nevertheless, the art historian’s
broadening perspective owes much to Peter Brown’s universal view,
as is indicated by the, however reluctant, inclusion of Egyptian evidence into more recent scholarly syntheses such as, e.g., the splendid volume edited recently by Glen Bowersock, Peter Brown and
Oleg Grabar on Late Antiquity49 as well as into more specialised art
historical studies. For instance, in his Art and the Roman Viewer50 and
The Art of the Roman Empire AD 100–450,51 Ja≤ Elsner fits the paintings of the temple of the imperial cult in Luxor Temple (fig. 27, see
Chapter VI.1), the apse mosaic of the Monastery of St Catherine at
Mount Sinai (fig. 124 and cf. Chapter IX.2.1),52 and the Dionysos
hanging of the Abegg Stiftung (Pl. XII and Chapter VIII.2.2) into
the context of general processes in late antique art.53 The proportionate presence of the Egyptian evidence in the study of late antiquity
depends, however, on the competence with which it is made available by specialists of Egyptian history, archaeology, and art history.
The majority of the general histories of Egyptian late antique art
published in the 1960s and 1970s presented the image of a land
exploited by a succession of foreign conquerors whose elite culture
46
I.e., c. 10 % of the works of art reproduced in his book. Among the illustrated
Egyptian monuments there are also, however, two modern carvings (Brown 1971/1989
figs 8, 70).
47
Cf. the comments by G.W. Bowersock and H. Torp in: Brown et al. 1997
31–33, 59–65.
48
Rostovtzeff 1926.
49
Bowersock – Brown – Grabar (eds) 1999.
50
Elsner 1995.
51
Elsner 1998b.
52
K. Weitzmann: The Mosaic in St. Catherine’s Monastery on Mount Sinai.
Proceedings of the American Philological Society 110 (1966) 392–405; id. in: Forsyth –
Weitzmann 1973 11–16; id.: Studies in the Arts at Sinai. Princeton 1982 5–18; Elsner
1995 99–123.
53
Cormack 2000b discusses and illustrates four icons kept in in the Monastery
of St Catherine and the apse mosaic of the church of the Monastery. It is generally supposed, however, that most of the Sinai icons were imported to Egypt, and
the mosaic is missing from the surveys of Egyptian late antique and early Byzantine
art (cf. recently Severin 1998a 324 ff.).
46
chapter three
was rejected by the suppressed masses as an act of national opposition. Owing to biased principles of selection, the objects shown in
the great exhibitions of the 1960s provided further arguments for
the postulate of Egypt’s political, social, ethnic, religious, and cultural dichotomy—while it remained unnoticed that a constantly
increasing number of detail studies, published mostly by Classical
archaeologists or historians of the arts of other late antique areas,
continued to present counter-arguments to the uniqueness of Egypt.54
Now both spells seem to have been more or less broken: while
the perspective of the historians of the post-Classical world begins
to encompass Egyptian works of art, students of Egyptian late antiquity make succesful attempts at dismantling the fences which were
raised by earlier scholarship to demarcate the borders between a
supposedly self-contained culture and the rest of the contemporary
world. We have seen in Chapter II how historians of Egyptian art
built fences around “Coptic” art and how more recent students of
late antiquity tried to remove these. Let us now cast a glance at the
wider context of these processes in the study of late antiquity.
According to A.H.M. Jones,
[f ]or about fifty years in the middle of the third century monumental building virtually ceased in the provinces, and was greatly reduced
at Rome itself. At the same time the demand for statues abruptly
ceased . . . stone and wood carvers, sculptors and architects, went out
of business, and so did the higher grade of painters and mosaicists.
By the time that monumental building was revived under Diocletian
and Constantine, mainly in the capitals and the other great cities of
the empire, architects and skilled craftsmen were very hard to find . . .
In carving the result can be seen in the arch of Constantine at
Rome, where the sculptured panels are either old pieces, filched from
classical monuments, or the crude productions of monumental masons
ordered to execute large and elaborate scenes. The masons produced
what can only be called child or peasant art, with rigid frontal figures
arranged in symmetrical rows . . .
The apparent disaster proved a blessing in disguise. Freed from a
tradition which ran dry, artists were able to develop a new style and,
as their skill increased, to refine it. Statuary in the round never recovered its vogue, but in bas-relief, painting and mosaic the formal, frontal
and symmetrical designs of the simple masons, painters and mosaicists
of Constantine’s day evidently pleased contemporary taste and caught
54
E.g., Grube 1962; Weitzmann 1964; Torp 1965b; Castiglione 1967; Simon
1970.
on methods
47
the imagination of artists. Henceforth there were two streams in design which sometimes commingled . . . The old traditions of Hellenistic
and Roman art, with its use of perspective and shading, did not die
out; no doubt some few schools or families of artists maintained their
hereditary traditions, and there were always old works or pattern books
to copy. Some mosaics in the fifth and sixth centuries, those for instance
of the floors of the imperial palace at Constantinople, are highly skilled
work in the full Hellenistic tradition. But for the most part mosaicists,
particularly in wall and vault mosaics, preferred hieratic figures in formal rows or symmetrical groups, and flat masses in colour . . .
Textiles survive only in Egypt. They are of course provincial work
and somewhat unsophisticated, but many are beautiful pieces. Many
are still in the Hellenistic tradition, but the figures are rather childish . . . From Egypt too comes the only surviving furniture. The more
elaborate pieces are inlaid with Hellenistic mytholgical figures, but
the drawing is crude.55
Formulated with their author’s “habitual unassuming, inspired common sense”,56 the above sentences cited from the popular version of
A.H.M. Jones’ The Later Roman Empire,57 published under the meaningful title The Decline of the Ancient World, provide a seemingly matter-of-fact sketch of the circumstances among which post-Classical
art took shape: a picture which apparently follows from the wellbalanced historical analyses presented in the previous chapters of the
same book. In reality, however, the condescending characterization
of late antique art as a whole repeats commonplaces borrowed from
the current discourse on the great crisis of the third century, the
decline of Classical art and the emergence of the art of the Christian
middle ages as the result of radical political, social, and intellectual
changes and as a manifestation of discontinuity in form, style, and
technique. The traditional image of the decline of Classical art and
the “triumph” of Christian art58 owes much to the late nineteenthcentury perception of Gibbon’s monumental historical vision59 and
55
Jones 1964b 357–360.
P. Brown in: Brown et al. 1997 13.
57
Jones 1964a.
58
A notion still present. See Mathews’ thesis (1993/1999 4) according to which
“Art historians have been slow to address the power of images, but the fourth century witnessed an unparalleled war of images and it was the strength and energy
of the winning images that determined the outcome.”
59
E. Gibbon: The History of the Decline and Fall of the Roman Empire I–VII. London
1776–1788 (6th edn. ed. J.B. Bury, London 1913). For the impact of Gibbon’s work
and the nineteenth-century discourse on Rome’s decline, see A. Momigliano: After
Gibbon’s Decline and Fall. in: Weitzmann (ed.) 1980 7–16.
56
48
chapter three
then to Rostovtzeff ’s apocalyptic vision of the third-century “social
revolution” and the “Decay of Ancient Civilization”.60
As long as art historians accepted unquestioningly the historian’s
view of decline, historians did not take advantage of the independent information that was inherent in the art historical and archaeological evidence offered to them as an obliging illustration of their
conclusions. Yet, by the time when Jones was completing his monumental Later Roman Empire also diverging formulations of the social
and cultural metamorphoses in the post-Classical world had begun
to take shape:61 first of all, Hans Peter L’Orange’s seminal Art Forms
and Civic Life must be mentioned here.62 To a considerable extent,
the new approach resulted from the emancipation of archaeologists
and art historians, who displayed a radically decreasing willingness,
to subordinate their discoveries to the historian’s traditional image
of late antiquity. As Garth Fowden wrote in 1997,63
students of late antiquity have in the past twenty-five years become
accustomed to archaeologists and art-historians both posing them major
questions which they never have thought of on their own, and proposing solutions to problems that arise from the deficiencies of the traditional historical narratives, as well as from the field of archaeology
narrowly defined.
In view of the significance of the Arch of Constantine for the twentieth-century perception of late antique art, one of the first major
questions to be posed was, of course, about the correctness of
Berenson’s crushing verdict (also echoed in Jones’ above-quoted sentences) on the Constantinian reliefs of this monument.64 The revision of the traditional view on the decline of Classical art was started
by Hans Peter L’Orange. It set out from the comparison of tetrarchic political ideology and social order with contemporary art forms.65
60
Title of the concluding chapter of Rostovtzeff 1926.
For the emerging alternative images of late antiquity in the 1960s, see P. Brown
in: Brown et al. 1997 10 ff.
62
L’Orange 1965, published first in Norwegian as Fra Principat til Dominat. Oslo
1958.
63
In: Brown et al. 1997 47.
64
Berenson 1954. See also Kitzinger 1977 7 ff.: “no monument embodies the
demise of classical art more dramatically than the great triumphal arch in Rome
dedicated to the emperor Constantine by the Roman Senate in A.D. 315”. Classical
archaeologists, too, continue to “sympathize with Berenson’s purism” (Spivey 1996
12, see below).
65
H.P. L’Orange – A. v. Gerkan: Der spätantike Bildschmuck des Konstantinsbogens.
Berlin 1939; L’Orange 1965 3 ff., 69 ff., 89 ff.
61
on methods
49
L’Orange’s suggestions were greatly reinforced by the study of the
intellectual backgrounds of the conscious re-use of ancient sculptures
and architectural carvings (spolia), i.e., by the study of a special aspect
of the relationship of late antique culture with its ancient past.66 By
identifying the actual intellectual motivation of changes in art forms
that were thought to have been the consequence of an outer-directed
decline of standards and skills, the study of the juxtaposition of recut
Trajanic, Hadrianic, and Aurelian spolia with Constantinian reliefs67
removed heavy obstacles from the path of stylistic analysis of late
antique art. The discovery that in their new context the re-used
sculptures and architectural carvings possessed a new, timely meaning opened new perspectives. It was shown that the recut spolia built
into the Arch of Constantine not only established a telling connection with the great monuments of Rome’s imperial past,68 but also
presented a new image of Constantine as heir of the great emperors and placed his principate in the context of the divinely sanctified
regency of his prototypes Trajan, Hadrian, and Marcus Aurelius.69
Albeit still integrating Constantine’s co-emperor Licinius70 into the
iconographic programme, the reliefs of the Arch of Constantine were
66
Deichmann 1975; id.: Il materiale di spoglio nell’architettura tardoantica. Corsi
di cultura sull’arte ravennate e bizantina Ravenna 1976. Faenza 1976 131–146; B. Brenk:
Spolia from Constantine to Charlemagne: Aesthetics versus Ideology. DOP 41 (1987)
103–109; J. Alchermes: Spolia in Roman Cities of the Late Empire: Legislative
Rationales and Architectural Reuse. DOP 48 (1994) 167–178; cf. also Elsner 1998a
742 ff.; H.-R. Meier: Christian Emperors and the Legacy of Imperial Art. Acta IRN
15 (2001) 63–75 63 ff.
67
For recent investigations and literature, see P. Barceló: Una nuova interpretazione dell’arco di Costantino. in: G. Bonamente – F. Fusco (eds): Costantino il
grande dall’antichità all’umanesimo. Colloquio Macerata 1990. Macerata 1992–1993 105–114;
A. Melucco Vaccaro – A.M. Ferroni: Chi costruì l’arco di Costantino? Un interrogativo ancora attuale. Rendiconti 66 (1993–1994) 1–60; D. Cirone: I risultati delle
indagini stratigrafiche all’arco di Costantino. ibid. 61–76; Engemann 1997 45 ff.;
Rohmann 1998.
68
A similarly motivated reuse of earlier reliefs occurred on a triumphal arch
erected by Diocletian in Rome, cf. H.P. Laubscher: Arcus Novus und Arcus Claudii,
zwei Triumphbögen an der Via Lata in Rom. Nachrichten der Akademie der Wissenschaften
in Göttingen. Göttingen 1976 9–108; B. Ward-Perkins: Re-Using the Architectural
Legacy of the Past, entre idéologie et pragmatisme. in: G.P. Brogiolo – B. Ward-Perkins
(eds): The Idea and Ideal of the Town between Late Antiquity and the Early Middle Ages.
Leiden-Boston-Köln 1999.
69
P. Pierce: The Arch of Constantine: Propaganda and Ideology in Late Roman
Art. Art History 12 (1989) 387–418; Elsner 1998a 745; Elsner 1998b 16 ff., 187 ff.;
Rohmann 1998 278 ff.
70
For the identification of the other emperor represented in the reliefs of the
Arch, see the convincing arguments presented by Rohmann 1998 261 ff.
50
chapter three
designed to articulate the individual features of Constantine’s principate instead of the symmetry of the tetrarchic system.
By illuminating a paradigmatic example of the concurrent preservation and transformation of the Classical tradition in late antiquity,
the ongoing study of the Arch of Constantine continues to provide
support to the art historian in his/her attempts to supply the student of late antique history with useful observations in the manner
indicated by Fowden.71 If we believe the authors of the general histories of Egyptian late antique art published in the 1960s and 1970s
and accept the picture suggested by the great exhibitions organised
in the 1960s,72 Egypt presents little to directly corroborate the lessons
drawn from the revision of the Berensonian verdict on the Arch of
Constantine. The belief in the separation of Egyptian late antique
art depends greatly, however, on the optic angle from which its student makes his/her observations. As we shall see in Chapter VI.2
(cf. also Chapter II.3), Shenoute’s famous church, the so-called Deir
Anbâ Shinûda or Deir el Abiad, may be regarded as an example
for the continuity of pharaonic architectural forms. It may also be
looked at, however, from the same stance from which one looks at
the Arch of Constantine, and be analysed similarly as a paradigmatic late antique synthesis of “modern”73 forms with re-interpreted
ancient ones that were used in order to give a monumental propagandistic visual expression of the re-writing of the past by Shenoute
and his movement.
71
From the perspective of the classical archaeologist, however, the Arch may still
appear as a key document of the inglorious end of Classical sculpture. E.g., Spivey
1996 11 f. argues, in my view with inconsiderate partiality, as follows: “This monument is a hotch-potch: cannibalized tondo-reliefs from earlier imperial arches are
dumped on top of the hieratic registers of diminutive minions themselves compressed into obeisance to Constantine and his colleague Licinius . . . ‘Design’ has
been replaced by ‘chance’ . . . There is some evidence that the eclecticism of the
Arch of Constantine was dictated by a lack of skilled workmen. Scholars on
Constantine’s side argue that his choice of earlier monuments to incorporate was
sensitive and selective . . . But this cannot gloss over the obvious aesthetic disjunction we see on the Arch”.
72
And also suggested, more or less openly, by exhibitions mounted in more recent
years.
73
The term modernus appears in the Latin usage of the Late Antiquity first in letters of Pope Gelasius I (492–496), see H.-R. Meier: Der Begriff des Modernen und
das Ende der Antike. Ein neuer Blick auf die materiellen Zeugen des Altertums.
in: Bauer – Zimmermann (eds) 2001 67–74.
CHAPTER FOUR
HISTORY, SOCIETY, AND ART IN LATE ROMAN AND
EARLY BYZANTINE EGYPT
1. Images of social identity
Our sorrow and our love move into a foreign
language.
Pour your Egyptian feeling into the Greek you use.1
Looking at Egyptian late antique art from the particular stance indicated at the end of the previous chapter, we may easily find further
monuments which encourage the student of Egyptian art to interpret his/her subject in the wider framework of late antique history.
Reserving the monuments of the Egyptian late antique elite’s selfidentification with mythological figures for a more detailed discussion in later chapters of this book (Chapters VII, VIII), let me
illustrate here one of the possibilities inherent in the comparison of
Egyptian works of art with monuments from other regions of the
late antique world. In the following pages I shall discuss three iconographic formulae which, although developed for the representation
of elite status under the influence of models from outside Egypt, nevertheless display unmistakeably Egyptian features.2
Some time in the second half of the fourth century a painted wooden
coffin was made for the burial of a boy called Ammonios (fig. 9).3
The front side of the simple chest-shaped coffin4 was decorated with
1
Constantine Cavafy: For Ammonis, who died at 29, in 610. in: Collected Poems
trans. E. Keeley and P. Sherrard, ed. G. Savidis. Princeton 1992 71.
2
For the general difficulties of associating the types of funerary art with concrete social strata cf. C. Riggs: Facing the Dead: Recent Research on the Funerary
Art of Ptolemaic and Roman Egypt. AJA 106 (2002) 85–101 98.
3
Malibu, J. Paul Getty Museum 82.AP.75, K. Parlasca: Mumienporträts: Neue
Funde und Erkenntnisse in: Bailey (ed.) 1996 187–190 188 f., fig. 2; Parlasca 1996
155 ff., figs 1/a–f.
4
For the expensive workmanship of the coffin made from Lebanese cedar (Cedrus
libanii), see, however, Parlasca 1996 157 ff.; M. Elston – J. Maish: Technical Investigation of a Painted Romano-Egyptian Sarcophagus from the Fourth Century A.D.
52
chapter four
the reclining image of the adolescent5 Ammonios.6 The pattern of
the textile covering the back of the cline forms a square halo painted
green around his head.7 The luxuriously dressed boy holds a drinking bowl in his right hand and a papyrus scroll bearing his name
inscribed in Greek in his left hand.8 His sleeved tunic seems to follow a fourth-century Constantinopolitan fashion.9 He wears a heavy
torques around his neck.10 Ammonios is attended by three pages.
Two of them are standing to the left, the third to the right of his
cline. The pages to the left are represented frontally. They are flanking
a table composed of a large missorium with a decorated rim resting on a tripod with legs ending in lion’s claws. Behind the table
four amphorae are placed in upright positions. The pages to the left
of the table are dressed in short, belted, sleeved tunics decorated
with orbiculi,11 clavi,12 and sleeve bands. The page to the left wears a
torques with bulla, the page to the right seems to wear a torques
Studia Varia from the J. Paul Getty Museum 2 (Occasional Papers on Antiquities 10). Los
Angeles 2001 153–166. The removable lid of the coffin was made in the manner
of a pencil-box. This is also an indication of the mummification of Ammonios’ body
and it conforms with remarks made by Roman authors on the custom of keeping
mummies in the house or some accessible cultic space for a considerable period of
time before they were buried. Cf. W.M.F. Petrie: Roman Portraits and Memphis IV.
London 1911; W.R. Dawson: References to Mummification by Greek and Latin
Authors. Aegyptus 9 (1928) 109–112. For further examples of removable coffin lids
or side panels, see Parlasca 1996 163. For the issue, see also below, Chapter IX.1.3.
5
For the iconographic types of pre-adolescent, adolescent (age about 10–14
years), and post-adolescent (age from 14 to the early twenties) males in the mummy
portraiture of the Roman period cf. Montserrat 1993.
6
The name derives from the Egyptian god Amûn (Ammon), but in this period
the Egyptian and Greek theophoric names no longer signal the ethnicity of their
owners. Cf. Bagnall 1993 232 f.
7
Cf. the similar halos on shrouds from Antinoopolis, e.g., Walker – Bierbrier
et al. (eds) 1997 nos 180, 181; Doxiadis 2000 nos 13, 14.
8
For the rendering of the scroll cf. the mummy shroud from Saqqara, Moscow,
Pushkin Museum I 1a 5749, Doxiadis 2000 no. 14.
9
This type of sleeved tunic is known from finds as well as representations (e.g.,
on the tapestry hanging with tribute bearers Riggisberg, Abegg Stiftung inv. no.
1638, Schrenk 1998 fig. 13) from Egypt. Cf. E.R. Knauer: Ex oriente vestimenta.
Trachtgeschichtliche Beobachtungen zu Ärmelmantel und Ärmeljacke. in: ANRW
II.12.3. Berlin-New York 1985 578–741 638 ff.
10
Of the type without a bulla, however, that occurs in the representation of girls,
cf., e.g., on a shroud from Antinoopolis, Manchester Museum inv. no. 11309,
Doxiadis 2000 no. 93.
11
Orbiculus: round tunic ornament.
12
Clavus: vertical stripe running from the shoulder downward. The clavi do not
reach the seam of the tunic.
history, society, and art
53
similar to that of Ammonios. In his left hand the page to the left
of the table extends towards his master a drinking bowl13 which he
has filled with wine with the help of a ladle (kyathos) in his right
hand from an amphora that stands in front of him. The page to
the right of the table is fanning Ammonios.14 The figure of a third
page, who is shown to the right of the cline’s head end, is badly
damaged. He is represented in three-quarter view and seems to be
dressed similarly to the other pages. He arrives hastily from the left
and brings a papyrus scroll and a casket (?)15 to Ammonios.
The painting repeats the well-known iconographic type of the
deceased resting on a mortuary bed and receiving mortuary offering(s)
as it appears on relief stelae produced during the first to third centuries and found at the necropolis of the Lower Egyptian Terenuthis
(Kom Abu Billou).16 The type is, however, extended and reinterpreted on Ammonios’ coffin. By the presence and activities of the
three pages the traditional mortuary offering scene is turned into a
scene of aristocratic “good life”, a scene designed to present a precise visual description of Ammonios’ social status. The rich dress of
the attendant preparing his master’s drink and of the page refreshing him with his fan indicates the rank of the house of Ammonios
similarly, e.g., to the costumes of the attendants in the paintings of
fourth-century tomb chambers at Silistra (Bulgaria),17 Thessalonica
13
This is of course the same bowl which we see, as if in a next episode of a
narrative representation, in the hand of Ammonios.
14
For the fan made of palm fibre cf. a Fayum find in Berkeley (Phoebe A.
Hearst Museum of Anthropology inv. no. 6–20548) published by Parlasca 1996 161
with fig. 2 and see the fan of the Domina in the upper register of the much illustrated late 4th-cent. Dominus Julius mosaic from Carthage, Dunbabin 1978 119 ff.;
Dunbabin 1999 118 f., fig. 122. For a similar fan, see also the personification of
the month August in the 6th-cent. mosaic of Months in the Villa of the Falconer,
Argos, G. Åkerström-Hougen: The Calendar and Hunting Mosaics of the Villa of the
Falconer at Argos. A Study in Early Byzantine Iconography. Stockholm 1974; Bianchi
Bandinelli 1971 fig. 313.
15
Parlasca 1996 161: a polypthych (?).
16
F.A. Hooper: Funerary Stelae from Kom Abou Billou. Ann Arbor 1961; K. Parlasca:
Zur Stellung der Terenuthis-Stelen. Eine Gruppe römischer Grabreliefs aus Ägypten
in Berlin. MDAIK 26 (1970) 173–198; S.A.A. el-Nassery – G. Wagner: Nouvelles stèles
de Kom Abu Bellou. BIFAO 78 (1978) 231–258; Abd el-Hafeez Abd el-Al – J.-C.
Grenier – G. Wagner: Stèles funéraires de Kom Abu Bellou. Paris 1985; A. Abdalla:
Graeco-Roman Funerary Stelae from Upper Egypt. Liverpool 1992.—For a unique indication
of the rank of the deceased in the inscription (gymnasiarch) and in the relief (diadem),
see CM TS 1430, Abd el-Hafeez Abd el-Al et al. op. cit. 32 f. Cat. 142, Pl. 36.
17
A. Frova: Pittura romana in Bulgaria. Roma 1943; Bianchi Bandinelli 1971 fig.
306.
54
chapter four
(Greece),18 Gargaresh (Tripolitania),19 or in the contemporary painting from a house on the Caelius in Rome,20 or, to quote a fine
Egyptian example, in the scenes on the bone inlays decorating a fine
fourth-century toilet casket in the Coptic Museum21 (see figs 73–75
and Chapter VIII.2.1).
While the papyrus scroll in the hand of Ammonios symbolizes his
education,22 the scroll delivered by the third page alludes to an office
held by him. Placed here in an extended “narrative” setting, the
document delivered to Ammonios has a similar significance as the
codicilli (document cases) held by the boy Eucherius on the Monza
diptych,23 the boy depicted on one of the sarcophagus fronts (after
415) discovered in a tomb chamber at Silivri Kapi24 in Constantinople
(fig. 10),25 and the boy represented on a lost glass vessel from Rome.26
These late fourth–early fifth-century monuments present an iconographic formulation of the status of pre-adolescent and adolescent
boys as owners of honorary offices. In these images, however, the
status of boys possessing documents of appointment is defined in the
context of their parents’ status: the boys represented in the company
18
Tomb of Eustorgios, S. Pelekanidis: Die Malerei der konstantinischen Zeit.
Akten des VII. Internationalen Kongresses für christliche Archäologie. Studi di Antichità Cristiana
27 (1969) 215–235 figs 25 ff.
19
Tomb of Aelia Arisuth, Bianchi Bandinelli 1971 figs 87, 242.
20
Now Naples, Museo Nazionale, Bianchi Bandinelli 1971 fig. 86.
21
CM 9060–9063 Strzygowski 1904 172–175 nos 7060–7064, Pls XI–XIII.
22
For adjectives in mummy portrait inscriptions praising the learning of the
deceased, see D. Montserrat: ‘Your Name Will Reach the Hall of the Western
Mountains’: Some Aspects of Mummy Portrait Inscriptions. in: Bailey (ed.) 1996
177–185 178 f.—The social status of the schoolboy commemorated on the frequently quoted 3rd-cent. painted miniature wooden aedicula in the Egyptian Museum
(inv. no. CG. 33269) is also clearly indicated. The boy’s nude torso and his attributes, viz., a writing tablet, a papyrus scroll and a stylus, as well as other motifs
painted on the “ceiling” of the aedicula (a Dionysos mask on top of a column, strigili, an oil flask) belong to the portrayal of an ephebos educated in a gymnasium
(see Ch. IV.2.2 below). For the Cairo aedicula: M. Laubenberger in: Seipel (ed.)
1998 176 f. Cat. 58; Cribiore 2001 155 f.
23
Volbach 1976 no. 63; Kiilerich – Torp 1989 351 ff.
24
Deckers – Serdaroglu 1993 Pls 6/d, 7/a, b; Warland 1994 178 ff., Pl. 71/3;
Koch 2000 408; for the hypogeum, see also M.I. Tunay: Byzantine Archaeological
Findings in Istanbul during the Last Decade. in: Necipoglu (ed.) 2001 217–231 217
ff.—Dating to after 415: J.G. Deckers: Vom Denker zum Diener. Bemerkungen zu
den Folgen der Konstantinischen Wende im Spiegel der Sarkophagplastik. in: Brenk
(ed.) 1996 137–184.
25
Warland 1994 Pl. 71/3.
26
Warland 1994 179 ff., fig. 2.
55
of their parents visualize a significant feature of late fourth-century
society, namely, that the aristocratic cursus honorum started in one’s
infancy and, as far as circumstances permitted, repeated the career
of one’s father.27
Like these monuments, the painting on Ammonios’ coffin presents
a pictorial formulation of an aristocratic adolescent’s status who was
already appointed into an (honorary?) office in his infancy. The
Egyptian representation differs at two points, however, from the
iconographic formula of the Monza diptych, the Silivri Kapi relief,
or the drawing on the glass vessel from Rome. Firstly, instead of a
static image the meaning of which is conveyed by the family context and the attributes of the figures, the Egyptian painting presents
a “narrative” scene in which the status of the central figure is articulated through the actions of his attendants and through their relationship with him. Secondly, it does not visually relate Ammonios’
status to the status of his parents.28
Both differences seem to follow from the fact that, while intending to articulate a kind of status the formation of which was greatly
influenced by the assimilation of the Egyptian elite to the imperial
elite, the painting on Ammonios’ coffin was nevertheless modelled
on a traditional Hellenistic Egyptian type of mortuary iconography.
The adherence to the iconography of the pagan “funerary banquet”
was probably motivated by religious considerations.29 The iconography of the “funerary banquet” was flexible insofar as there was place
in it for attendants whose actions (interactions with the deceased)
could present a more precise pictorial description of the status of
the deceased. Indeed, by the third century the traditional iconographic type of the “funerary banquet”, which represented the deceased
resting on his/her mortuary bed without adding clear iconographic
markers of his/her social status, begun to be complemented with
attendant figures in order to provide visual information about the
27
Warland 1994 182 ff.—For Egyptian evidence cf. papyri referred to by Keenan
2000 624 note 48; generally cf. C.Th. VII.22.2 (331).
28
It is likely, however, that references to Ammonios’ family status were duly presented elsewhere, viz., in the text(s) and perhaps in other representations associated
with his burial.
29
Referring to the lack of any direct hint at Ammonios’ religious affiliation in
the painting, Parlasca 1996 163 ff. suggests that he was Christian. This is highly
unlikely on account of the removable lid of the coffin, which indicates that pagan
mortuary cult rites were performed before the thus displayed mummy of Ammonios.
56
chapter four
place that the deceased had occupied in the social hierarchy. E.g.,
Parlasca illustrates a third-century (?) painting on wood from a coffin
(?) representing a woman resting on a cline and attended by a servant dressed in a decorated tunic and holding a ladle and a wine
jug, further by a naked Nubian double-pipe player.30 This painting
indicates the forming of a, however abbreviated, “narrative” type of
representation of the “good life” in Egyptian mortuary iconography
of the Roman period.
It is thus rather likely that the “narrative” extension of the “funerary banquet” type on Ammonios’ coffin had predecessors in Egyptian
mortuary iconography. Models for the form of status description
employed in it were, however, also found in iconographic types created outside Egypt, as is suggested by the paintings from Silistra and
Thessalonica. Yet, as is indicated by the relationship of the figures
in the painting, Ammonios’ coffin also bears the imprint of more
general developments in fourth-century art. Instead of presenting
clues for the space in which the actions occur, the figures are ordered
in two registers, with Ammonios’ larger reclining figure in a lower,
“front”, register and the smaller figures of the pages in a “back”
register placed on a higher level.31 This manner of dissolving the
perspectival representation of a group of figures into separate layers
of mechanically arranged figures points to the influence of the nonnaturalistic trend formulated in a monumental form for the first time
in the adlocutio and largitio reliefs of the Arch of Constantine (cf.
Chapters III.3, VII.1).
Close connections between forms of status display in Egypt and
other parts of the Empire are indicated by several other monuments
as well. Leaving the evidence provided by the great woven or painted
hangings and other visual testimonies of aristocratic display for discussion in later chapters of this book (Chapters VIII.2, 4), let me
mention here two funerary monuments, the first a limestone carving, the second a wall painting. The first monument is the mortuary stela of a lady in the Coptic Museum (fig. 11).32 The stela, which
30
Parlasca 1996 fig. 4.—A servant filling a bowl with a ladle from an amphora
also occurs “in front” of the kline of the deceased on a stela from Terenuthis, now
in Cairo, CM 2237, illustrated in a drawing in Z.A. Hawwass: Preliminary Report
on the Excavations at Kom Abu Bellou. SAK 7 (1979) 75–87 fig. 2.
31
The four amphorae “behind” the two pages in the left half of the painting
are placed in a third register.
32
CM 8004, Duthuit 1931 56, Pl. LXV/b; Severin 1977a 251 no. 281; Cat.
Paris-Agde Cat. 101.
57
was carved in the early 400s, represents a richly dressed woman
standing in orans gesture either in front of a ciborium or, more
probably, the arcaded sanctuary screen of a church. While the orans
type is a general feature of Christian mortuary iconography, the
actual form of the representation of the ciborium or sanctuary screen
with the openwork banister dividing the sanctuary apse from the
church nave points more concretely in the direction of Constantinopolitan models such as, e.g., the above-quoted Silivri Kapi sarcophagus front (fig. 10). The family commemorated in this latter relief
is placed in front of a tripartite column-screen dividing the nave of
a church from its sanctuary: the father stands in front of the proper
right side arcade, the mother and the son stand in front of the proper
left side arcade, while under the central arcade, standing “behind”
an openwork screen similar to the one represented on the Cairo
stela, the altar cross of the church is represented. The Cairo stela
follows the same formula for the representation of the deceased. It
shows her in the setting of the liminal area between the nave and
the sanctuary of the church: i.e., between the world of the living and
Paradise.
Early Christian art in the West created a pictorial formula for the
theological concept of the intercession of the saints in personal salvation, namely, the iconographic type of the deceased being led by
(a) saint(s) into the Paradise.33 An Egyptian rendering of the type is
represented by a painting filling the interior of the arcosolium in a
tomb chamber at Antinoopolis/Antinoe (Pl. XVII).34 It represents
Theodosia, a girl who died at the age of 15 years, being led by St
Collouthos and St Mary into Paradise. The spandrels in the top corners of the arcosolium wall are filled with the figures of peacocks.35
33
Zimmermann 2001 125 on the representation of Veneranda in Cubiculum 15
of the catacomb of Domitilla.
34
M. Salmi: I dipinti paleocristiani di Antinoe. in: Scritti dedicati alla memoria di
Ippolito Rosellini. Firenze 1945 159–169; for the watercolour copy published by Salmi,
see also Del Francia Barocas (ed.) 1998 29 ff. Cat. 1; Cat. Paris-Agde fig. p. 107;
for the present state of the burial chamber of Theodosia cf. the photographs in
M. Rassart-Debergh: Textiles d’Antinoé (Égypte) en Haute-Alsace. Donation É. Guimet.
Colmar 1997 figs 56–61.—Dated by the excavators between the late 4th (E. Breccia:
Le prime ricerche italiane ad Antinoe. Aegyptus 18 [1938] 285–310 293) and the
6th century (Salmi op. cit. 161 f.). In the more recent literature it is dated usually
to around 600.
35
Cf., e.g., with the peacocks painted on the head end of the lid of a painted
wooden coffin from Karara, Heidelberg, Ägyptologisches Institut der Universität
inv. no. 500, C. Nauerth: Karara und El-Hibe (Studien zur Archäologie und Geschichte
Altägyptens 15). Heidelberg 1996 132; Cat. Paris-Agde Cat. 100. It is suggested that
58
chapter four
Though Theodosia died young, she is shown wearing the decorated
belted tunic, mantle, veil, and rich jewelry36 of an upper-class matron.37
In the original models of this iconographic type, the peacocks flanking
the scene were adopted from the repertory of traditional symbols
associated with the consecratio of Roman empresses.38 The associations
between elite mortuary iconography and imperial display are obvious in other cases as well. The representation of the family in front
of a column-screen in the Silivri Kapi relief (fig. 10), i.e., the iconographic type of the above-discussed Cairo stela, already appropriated a traditional setting for imperial representation.39
Several other examples of elite self-representation will be quoted
in the pages of the next chapters. Instead of listing further images
of social identity, it is now time to speak about the underlying political/social processes in late antique-early Byzantine Egypt.
2. History and society in late antique and early Byzantine Egypt
. . . my city’s the greatest preceptor, queen of the
Greek world, genius of all knowledge, of every art.40
2.1. The conquest of Ptolemaic Egypt
The mortuary monuments discussed in the previous chapter are voluble documents of the assimilation of Egyptian elite culture into the
the coffin contained remains of a male costume. The coffin was made, however,
for the burial of a woman, as is indicated by the peacocks as well as by the scroll
with roses decorating the sides of the coffin.—For the figure of the peacock in a
late (?) 4th-cent. niche pediment decoration, see CM 3808 (from Heracleopolis
Magna?), Severin 1993 fig. 11.
36
Especially noteworthy is her incompletely preserved pectoral with encolpion,
which seems to have repeated the type of the splendid pair of jewels from Assiut
(now Berlin, Antikensammlung and New York, Metropolitan Museum+Washington,
Freer Gallery), cf. Age of Spirituality Cat. 295–296; Cat. Hamm Cat. 206 (the Berlin jewel).
37
Though it is possible that the 15-years-old Theodosia was a married woman,
it is equally likely that her attire and jewelry reflect the same inclusion of children
into élite display as the Monza diptych, the Silivri Kapi sarcophagus front, or the
6th-century representation of the 2 year and 10 month old girl Nonosa who appers
in the attire of a matron with her parents in a painting of the S. Gennaro catacomb in Naples, cf. Warland 1994 183 f.
38
Zimmermann 2001 123.
39
S. de Blaauw: Imperial Connotations in Roman Church Interiors. The Significance
and Effect of the Lateran Fastigium. Acta IRN 15 (2001) 137–146 142.
40
Constantine Cavafy: The glory of the Ptolemies. in: Collected Poems trans.
E. Keeley and P. Sherrard, ed. G. Savidis. Princeton 1992 35.
59
supranational world of Late Antiquity. The adoption of foreign iconographic models was co-determined by social processes that were similar to the developments in other provinces of the late Roman Empire.
The actual process of assimilation was, however, more complex, less
passive, and less even than it appears in these examples.
In order to better understand Egypt’s place in late antique culture, it is necessary to present here a brief history of Egyptian society in the Roman and early Byzantine periods. The following survey
is based mainly on the historical and socio-historical studies published by Alan Bowman in 198641 and Roger Bagnall in 1993.42 I
shall discuss here, however, only events and developments which
seem relevant from the special viewpoint of an art historical study.
No attempt will be made at a complete history of events and no
detailed discussion of the administration, economic, and military history or of individual social/occupational milieus will be offered. For
these topics and for the history of Egyptian Christianity the reader
is referred to pioneering special investigations published in the last
decades.43
The land annexed to the Roman Empire by Augustus on 1 or 3
August 30 BC as province of Aegyptus44 was part of the Hellenistic
world since its occupation by Alexander the Great in 332 BC.
Throughout the three centuries of Ptolemaic rule, the Egyptian/Greek
dichotomy remained a decisive factor of social, political, and cultural developments. Pre-Second World War historians of Ptolemaic
Egypt presented the picture of a mixed Egyptian-Greek society and
culture. More recent scholarly opinion45 has moved from a radical
denial of the existence of social and cultural processes that may have
resulted in a convergence of the Egyptian and Greek ethnicities and
their cultures towards a more balanced and less generalizing assessment
41
Bowman 1986.
Bagnall 1993.
43
Bagnall – Frier 1994; Keenan 2000; Krüger 1990; Lewis 1983; Wilfong 2002;
Wipszycka 1972 (history and/or society); Alston 1995 (army); Bowman 1971; Alston
2002 (city, administration); Frankfurter 1998; Kákosy 1995; Martin 1996a; Rousseau
1985; Trombley 1993, 1994; Wipszycka 1986, 1988 (paganism, conversion, church
history); Cribiore 2001 (education). For the international context, see the essays in
CAH XIII and XIV.
44
For the evidence: Bowman 1986 34 ff.; Hölbl 2001 239 ff.; Huss 2001 731 ff.
45
C. Préaux: Le monde hellénistique. La Gréce et l’Orient de la mort d’Alexandre à la conquête romaine de la Gréce (323–146 av. J.-C.) II. Paris 1987 543 ff.
42
60
chapter four
of the changes in Egyptian-Greek interaction and in ethnicity/status
relations. The preconceived denial of the impact of Hellenistic culture on traditional Egyptian culture on the one hand,46 and of traditional Egyptian culture on Hellenistic Egyptian culture, on the
other, has now been replaced by historical case studies which corroborate the results of more recent studies on the complex interaction between the Greek and Egyptian elements of society and between
Greek and Egyptian conceptions in kingship ideology, religion, and
the arts.47
According to Roger Bagnall,48 the mass of peasants remained basically unaffected by Hellenism (though they were indeed affected by
the unfolding of a Greek-style market economy and by transformations of the local administration49) while the identity of propertied
Egyptians and Greeks was determined increasingly by status and culture rather than ethnicity. The three Greek cities, i.e., Alexandria,50
Ptolemais, and Naukratis, had magistrates, councils, citizen assemblies and gymnasia and their Greek citizens enjoyed a status and
privileges which differed markedly from other towns.51 Yet the population of the other towns of Egypt also had a substantial Greek element, and Egyptian as well as Greek deities and cults were mutually
present both in Egyptian and Greek milieus. While Egyptian tem-
46
Bianchi 1988. For a convincing criticism of Bianchi’s views, see H. Maehler’s
review of Bianchi et al. 1988 in: BiOr 49 (1992) 422–428.
47
Cf. first of all ESLP; D.B. Thompson: Ptolemaic Oinochoai and Portraits in Faience:
Aspects of the Ruler-Cult. Oxford 1973; Himmelmann 1983; Thompson 1988 212 ff.;
Bagnall 1988; R.R.R. Smith: Ptolemaic Portraits: Alexandrian Types, Egyptian
Versions. in: Alexandria 203–213; Bothmer 1996; Pfrommer 1999; Stanwick 2002;
Stephens 2003.
48
Bagnall 1988; cf. also J. Bingen’s somewhat biased notes on the lack of political structure in the peasantry: Grecs et Égyptiens d’après PSI 502. Proceedings of the
XII. International Congress of Papyrologists. Toronto 1970 35–40.
49
W. Peremans: Sur l’identification des Égyptiens et des étrangers dans l’Égypte
des Lagides. Anc. Soc. 1 (1970) 25–38; id.: Egyptiens et étrangers dans l’administration civile et financière de l’Égypte Ptolémaïque. Anc. Soc. 2 (1971) 33–45; J. Bingen:
Economie grecque et société égyptienne au IIIe siècle. in: Maehler – Strocka (eds)
1978 211–219; Bowman 1986 99 ff.; M.R. Falivene: Government, Management,
Literacy. Aspects of Ptolemaic Administration in the Early Hellenistic Period. Anc.
Soc. 22 (1991) 203–227.
50
For the history and culture of Alexandria in the Hellenistic period, see P.M.
Frazer’s monumental Ptolemaic Alexandria I–III. Oxford 1972.
51
C. Préaux: Les grecs en Égypte d’après les archives de Zénon. Bruxelles 1947; N.
Lewis: Greeks in Ptolemaic Egypt: Case Studies in the Social History of the Hellenistic World.
Oxford 1986; Bowman 1986 124 f.; Hölbl 2001 26 f.
61
ple cults remained largely closed to Greek influence, the temples
fulfilled their role in the legitimation of royal power.52 The Serapis
cult emerging in the early Ptolemaic period was a successful official
attempt at binding together the peoples of the land by the creation
of an amalgam of Egyptian and Greek religious traditions.53 Moreover,
Hellenized Egyptian deities were worshipped not only in the Greek
cities but also in the towns and villages of the rest of the land.54 In
the course of time, Greeks and Greek language increasingly penetrated the Egyptian temples,55 whose priesthood frequently developed
a double identity similarly to the military and the lower officials of
Egyptian or mixed Egyptian-Greek origins.56 They appeared in their
official capacity with Greek names and in the possession of a Greek
culture; in their private life (and, most significantly, in their afterlife)
with Egyptian names and as Egyptians.57
52
J.-C. Goyon: Ptolemaic Egypt: Priests and the Traditional Religion. in: Bianchi
et al. 1988 29–39; J. Quagebeur: Cleopatra VII and the Cults of the Ptolemaic
Queens. ibid. 41–54; Hölbl 2001 162 ff., 257 ff.—Cf. also Assmann 1996 418 ff.
53
L. Castiglione: La statue du culte hellénistique du Sarapieion d’Alexandrie.
BullBAHongr 12 (1958) 17–39; J.E. Stambaugh: Sarapis under the Early Ptolemies. Leiden
1972; W. Hornbostel: Sarapis: Studien zur Überlieferungsgeschichte, den Erscheinungsformen
und Wandlungen der Gestalt eines Gottes. Leiden 1973; Bowman 1986 175 ff.; Thompson
1988; Huss 1994 58 ff.; G. Clerc – J. Leclant: Sarapis. LIMC VII (1994) 666–692;
Hölbl 2001 98 ff.—See also J. Bergman: Ich bin Isis. Studien zum memphitischen Hintergrund
der griechischen Isisaretalogien. Uppsala 1968.
54
For the evidence, see, e.g., W.J.R. Rübsam: Götter und Kulte im Faijum während
der griechisch-römisch-byzantinischen Zeit. Diss. Marburg 1974; Kákosy 1995 2898 ff.—
The literature on the Greek reception of Egyptian religion, and, in broader terms,
culture is large: for recent syntheses, see, e.g., A. Bernand: Leçon de civilisation. Paris
1994; S.M. Burstein: Graeco-Africana. Studies in the History of Greek Relations with Egypt
and Nubia. New Rochelle-Athens-Moscow 1995; Burstein 1996 597 ff.; R. Merkelbach:
Isis regina – Zeus Sarapis. Die griechisch-ägyptische Religion nach den Quellen dargestellt.
Stuttgart 1995; J. Assmann: Weisheit und Mysterium. Das Bild der Griechen von Ägypten.
München 2000.
55
For arguments against the conventional assumption of the Egyptian priesthood’s hostility to Ptolemaic rule, see J. Johnson: Is the Demotic Chronicle an AntiGreek Tract? in: H.-J. Thissen – K.-T. Zauzich (eds): Grammata Demotika: Festschrift
für Erich Lüddeckens zum 15. Juni 1983. Würzburg 1984 107–124; on the prosperity
of the native priests: J. Johnson: The Role of the Egyptian Priesthood in Ptolemaic
Egypt. in: L. Lesko (ed.): Egyptological Studies in Honor of Richard A. Parker. Presented on
the Occasion of His 78th Birthday, December 10, 1983. Hanover-New Hampshire-London
1986 70–84.—For the evidence, see also the fundamental work of Otto 1905–1908.
56
W. Clarysse: Greeks and Egyptians in the Ptolemaic Army and Administration.
Aegyptus 65 (1985) 57–66.
57
Bagnall 1988 24 f.—Cf. also J. Quaegebeur: Greco-Egyptian Double Names
as a Feature of a Bi-Cultural Society: The Case of Cosneuw o kai Triadelfow. in:
Johnson (ed.) 1992 265–272.
62
chapter four
Thanks to Egypt’s richness, to its role in maritime trade,58 and to
favourable political circumstances, Alexandria, capital of Egypt from
the late fourth century BC, rapidly became
the first city of the civilised world, certainly far ahead of all the rest
in elegance and extent and riches and luxury.59
While the nature and significance of Alexandria’s contribution to
Hellenistic art has been debated ever since Theodor Schreiber first
postulated the existence of an “Alexandrian Style” in sculpture in
1885,60 scholars have traditionally regarded the city’s culture as purely
Hellenistic and, hence, an isolated element in the Nile valley.61 The
spectacular finds from the ongoing underwater research in the harbour of Alexandria clearly suggest, however, that architectural members and statuary were transferred from pharaonic buildings at
Heliopolis (and perhaps elsewhere) from the early Ptolemaic period
onward to adorn monumental edifices in the city, in order to connect the royal display of the Hellenistic capital with the land’s distant past and to legitimize thus the seat of the new rulers as residence
of the pharaohs’ successors.62 From the third century BC, Greek
mortuary cult and funerary architecture also absorbed traditional
Egyptian conceptions and forms.63
The political, administrative, economic, and cultural impact of
Alexandria on the rest of the land has been judged more positively
For a summary treatment, see Huzar 1988b 646 ff.
Diodorus, 17.52.5 (Loeb edn.).
60
AM 10 (1885) 380–400; cf. also T. Schreiber: Die alexandrinische Toreutik. Leipzig
1894; F. Drexel in: BJb 118 (1909) 176 ff. For the history of research cf. Himmelmann
1983 19 ff.; Stewart 1996; A.P. Kozloff: Is There an Alexandrian Style—What Is
Egyptian about It? Alexandria 247–260.
61
Grimm 1998.—For the evidence, see A. Adriani: Repertorio d’arte dell’Egitto grecoromano Serie C (Topografia e Architettura) I–II. Palermo 1966; Pensabene 1993.
62
N. Grimal – J.-Y. Empereur: Les fouilles sous-marines sur le site du phare d’Alexandrie.
Comptes-rendus de l’Academie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres. Paris 1997; J.-Y. Empereur:
Alexandria Rediscovered. London 1998; id.: Alexandria Rising. in: C. Jacob – F. de
Polignac (eds): Alexandria, Third Century BC. The Knowledge of the World in a Single City.
Alexandria 2000 188–205 and cf. Cat. Petit Palais; J.-P. Corteggiani: Les Aegyptiaka
de la fouille sous-marine de Qaït-bay. BSFE 142 (1998) 25–40; J.-Y. Empereur:
Travaux récents dans la capitale des Ptolémées. in: Colloque Alexandrie 25–39 and cf.
Pfrommer 1999 13 ff.—For the documents of the Greek and Egyptian forms of
Ptolemaic dynastic- and ruler cult cf. Huss 1994 passim; Hölbl 2001 77 ff., 160 ff.,
257 ff.; Huss 2001 324 f., 337 f., 379 f., 452 f., 529 ff., 595 f., 623 f., 639 ff., 661
f., 755 f.
63
W.A. Daszewski: Les nécropoles d’Alexandrie. in: Cat. Petit Palais 250–253;
Venit 2002.
58
59
63
in the research of the last decades.64 There have also been changes
in the scholarly opinion concerning the influence of Hellenistic art
forms and style on the production of, e.g., provincial architects’ and
masons’ workshops or local pottery manufactures.65 The statement
remains valid, however, that the interaction between the various levels of the Egyptian and Greek elements of the society66 resulted in
differently proportioned social and cultural contexts in the cities (primarily in the three Greek poleis) and regions inhabited mainly by
Greeks and Hellenized natives (primarily the Fayum) and in the settlements inhabited mainly by Egyptians in Middle and Upper Egypt.67
The Ptolemies not only continued the pharaonic tradition of maintaining the cults of the gods of the land. The Ptolemaic period also
witnessed temple building actions on a grand scale68 and an impressive increase of the power and social impact of the Egyptian priesthood. The priesthood’s national organisation was an important means
of royal control over local communities69 and of the preservation and
64
Hölbl 2001 passim; Huss 2001 passim.
The Hellenistic or Hellenizing architectural monuments of the countryside
remain to be discovered and/or systematically assessed. For 2nd–1st-cent. BC
Hellenistic capitals of Alexandrian types from the Horus temple at Edfu, see Török
1984 fig. 12; Pensabene 1993 356 no. 196; see also McKenzie 1996b 130, figs 1/f,
1/g (Edfu), 1/h (Dendera); for a Roman basilica in Syene/Aswan with Alexandriantype architectural members, see H. Jaritz: Ein Bau der römischen Kaiserzeit in
Syene. in: Krause – Schaten (eds) 1998 155–168.—For the Hellenizing elements in
the decoration of pottery wares from manufactures in the Theban region cf. L.
Török: Upper Egyptian Pottery Wares with Hellenistic Decoration and Their Impact
on Meroitic Vase Painting. in: C. Berger et al. (eds): Hommages à Jean Leclant II.
Paris 1994 377–387. For a monographic study of these wares, see now G. Schreiber:
Late Dynastic and Ptolemaic Painted Pottery from Thebes. Budapest 2003 and cf. id.: Pottery
of “Lotus-Flower and Crosslined-Band” Style. A Marl-Based Ware Group. in: Bács
(ed.) 2002 405–420.
66
Cf. especially H. Braunert: Die Binnenwanderung. Studien zur Sozialgeschichte Ägyptens
in der Ptolemäer- und Kaiserzeit. Bonn 1964 29–110, esp. 99 ff.—For the relationship
between Greek and Egyptian law and law courts and the development of a sort of
common law, see Huzar 1988a 359 f.—Cf. also Stephens 2003.
67
J. Bingen: Les tensions structurelles de la société ptolémaïque. Atti del XVII congresso internazionale di papirologia III. Napoli 1984 921–937; Bowman 1986 122 ff.;
Bagnall 1988; Thompson 1988 212–265.
68
R.B. Finnestad: Temples of the Ptolemaic and Roman Periods: Ancient Traditions
in New Contexts. in: B.E. Shafer (ed.): Temples of Ancient Egypt. Ithaca 1997 185–237,
302–317; Arnold 1999.
69
W. Huss: Gedanken zum Thema ‘Staat’ und ‘Kirche’ im ptolemäischen Ägypten.
in: J. Seibert (ed.): Hellenistische Studien. Gedenkschrift für H. Bengtson. München 1991
55–60; id.: Die in ptolemäischer Zeit verfassten Synodal-Dekrete der ägyptischen
Priester. ZPE 88 (1991) 189–208; Huss 1994 passim.
65
64
chapter four
monumental re-formulation of the traditional Egyptian world-view.70
The systematic re-articulation of “national” cultural traditions also
included the preservation of concepts of pre-Ptolemaic kingship. It
also inspired the emergence of a propagandistic popular discourse
on political legitimacy.71 With their manifest anti-Macedonian tendency, literary works such as the Demotic Chronicle or the Oracle of the
Potter72 gave expression to the same political, social, and economic
tensions which were also manifested in the revolts against the central power between 206–186, then in the 160s, in 131–130, in 88,
and again in 63 BC.73 The contribution of these internal conflicts
to the fall of the Ptolemaic dynasty was, however, not decisive. The
key factor was Rome’s impact on the fate of the Mediterranean
kingdoms.
2.2. Roman Egypt from Augustus to the late third century
In Alan Bowman’s words,74
The coming of the new [i.e., the Roman] age is presented to us very
much through the eyes and the languages of the Greeks and Romans,
but the passing of Ptolemaic rule was probably unmourned, perhaps
even largely unnoticed, by the majority of the inhabitants of the Nile
valley for whom the replacement of a Macedonian monarch by a
Roman emperor heralded no obvious or dramatic change. But there
were changes and important ones at that.
While the immediate reaction of the native population remains in
fact unrecorded, it is rather unlikely that the end of the house of
Ptolemy and the advent of a new regime would have remained unnoticed, the more so that not only the continuities but also the changes
were fairly obvious from the very outset75—the most conspicuous
change being that, instead of a ruler crowned and residing in the
land, Egypt was now governed by a viceregal governor with the title
Assmann 1996 407 ff.
A.B. Lloyd: Nationalist Propaganda in Ptolemaic Egypt. Historia 31 (1982)
33–55.
72
For the documents of Egyptian intellectual opposition and political Messianism,
see Huss 1994 129–180 and cf. R. Meyer: Die eschatologische Wende des politischen Messianismus im Ägypten der Spätzeit. Saeculum 48 (1997) 177–212.
73
For the evidence cf. Hölbl 2001 306 ff.
74
Bowman 1986 37.
75
Huzar 1988a.
70
71
65
of Prefect of Egypt76 ( praefectus Aegypti, after AD 380 praefectus Augustalis).
The new Roman province received a special status insofar as it
was governed by a dignitary of equestrian rank, unlike the rest of
the provinces, which were governed by members of the senate who
were appointed by the senate or the emperor and who were responsible through the emperor to the senate. Senators and leading equestrians could enter Egypt only with the emperor’s special permission.
The Prefect of Egypt was appointed by, and always responsible to,
the emperor. He was in charge of the civil administration and the
military.77 Although he inhabited the palace of the Ptolemies in
Alexandria, the prefect and his staff did not replace a ruler and his
court. The prefects were usually outsiders78 and served rather short
tenures (three or four years), yet they were experts in Roman administration and controlled a hierarchy of officials who were trained in
the Egyptian structure.79 The revenues received by the Ptolemies remained in Egypt. While the taxes collected in the land do not seem
to have gone outside of Egypt,80 now the land had to supply the
Empire with an amount of grain sufficient to feed the city of Rome
for four months of the year.81
The Roman administration of other eastern provinces adopted
political structures developed in Hellenistic city-states. The complex
governmental structure found by the Roman conqueror in Egypt was
based on different traditions.82 Its transformation,83 by gradually introducing institutions of local government that were based on traditions
76
A. Stein: Die Präfekten von Ägypten in der römischen Kaiserzeit. Bern 1950; R. Katzoff:
Sources of Law in Roman Egypt: The Role of the Prefect. in: ANRW II.13. BerlinNew York 1980 810–819; Geraci 1988; Montevecchi 1988.
77
For the Roman army in Egypt, see Alston 1995; for the late Roman-early
Byzantine army cf. also W. Treadgold: Byzantium and Its Army 284–1081. Stanford
1995 54 ff.; J.-M. Carrié: Séparation ou cumul? Pouvoir civil et autorité militaire
dans les provinces d’Égypte de Gallien à la conquête arabe. AnTard 6 (1998) 105–121.
78
With exceptions such as, e.g., Tiberius Julius Alexander (66–70) who originated from a wealthy Alexandrian Jewish family which also included the philosopher Philo. Cf. A. Barzanò: Tiberio Giulio Alessandro, Prefetto d’Egitto (66/70).
in: ANRW II.10.1. Berlin-New York 1988 518–580.
79
Bowman 1986 66 ff.
80
Oates 1988 804 ff.
81
For the literary evidence on and the various estimates of the amount of the
grain transported to Rome, see Huzar 1988b 651, according to whom Egypt exported
a quarter million tons of grain. For a more realistic estimate, see Ch. IV.2.3, below.
82
Bowman 1986 56 ff.
83
N. Lewis: The Romanity of Roman Egypt: A Growing Consensus. Atti del XVII
Congresso Internazionale di Papirologia. Napoli 1984 1077–1084; Alston 1995 156 ff.
66
chapter four
of the Hellenistic Greek poleis was started at the moment of the conquest of the land.84
Egypt was divided into four regions headed by epistrategoi (the
Thebaid, the Heptanomia including Middle Egypt, the East and the
West Delta).85 Each region consisted of several nomes of varying size,
which were identical with the territorial units existing since time
immemorial. The nomes were subordinate first to the nome strategos, a Graeco-Egyptian official appointed from outside the nome;
then from 307/8 the logistes (curator civitatis), the chief official of the
nome capital. The logistes was appointed from inside the nome.86 The
co-operation of town and village officials with the central government was secured by the nome strategos.
In the nome capitals (metropoleis) first executive magistrates were
elected and various public services, viz., the liturgies, were introduced (the liturgies meant “in practice compulsory exaction of personal service or financial contribution, based upon property qualification
and spreading all the way down the social and economic scale”87).
In the nome capitals the creation of city councils (boule) with members elected for life was allowed by Septimius Severus in 200/201,
whereby the local landed class was made responsible for city government and the complete collection of the taxes throughout the
land.88 In this way, the local propertied classes, descendants of the
privileged Greek and Hellenized Egyptian stratum of the Ptolemaic
period, shared the duties and risks of Egypt’s administration with
the central government. While the unfolding of self-governing local
urban communities was a positive change from the Ptolemaic period,
the burden of governmental duties proved increasingly heavy for the
bouleutic class, except for its richest stratum.89 As a result of the
84
Geraci 1988 387 ff.—Continuity over change is stressed by C. Préaux: Les
continuités dans l’Égypte gréco-romaine. Actes du Xe Congrès international de Papyrologues.
Varsovie 1961 231–248, yet important changes were already pointed out by
A. Stein: Untersuchungen zur Geschichte und Verwaltung Ägyptens unter römischer Herrschaft.
Stuttgart 1915 80, 123 ff.
85
For the following, see Bowman 1986 66 ff.; Montevecchi 1988; Alston 2002
186 ff.
86
J. Whitehorne: Recent Research on the strategi of Roman Egypt (to 1985). in:
ANRW II.10.1. Berlin-New York 1988 598–617; Bagnall 1993 62 ff.
87
Bowman 1986 69; cf. F. Oertel: Die Liturgie. Studien zur ptolemäischen und kaiserlichen Verwaltung Ägyptens. Leipzig 1917, reprint edn. Aalen 1965.
88
Bowman 1971; Alston 2002.
89
Bowman 1986 70 ff.
67
municipalization of the nome capitals started by Augustus, however,
self-governing cities emerged by the Julio-Claudian period which
closely corresponded with the model adopted in other provinces of
the empire.90 The levels of hierarchy were carefully construed and
the cooperation between the central government and the local levels was generally efficient.
The emperor, the prefect, and the prefect’s senior officials91 “imposed
their will by issuing decrees and edicts, writing letters, responding to
requests and petitions”.92 Though the emperor did not reside in the
land, he was not less present in Egypt than in any other Roman
province. Long imperial visits, as, e.g., Septimius Severus’ and his
family’s stay between September 199 and April 200 in Alexandria
and the emperor’s journey along the Nile as far south as the EgyptianMeroitic frontier,93 had, of course, great impact on the government
and the culture of the land. From the special aspect of this study,
the cult of the emperor in the Egyptian temples94 and the presence
of his Roman-type cult in the towns and villages of the land are
equally significant.95 As to the prominent presence of a Roman-type
ruler cult, we learn from the papyrological evidence that, e.g., a
golden image of Claudius (41–54) was carried about in procession
in Alexandria once a month96 and painted (?) images of Septimius
Severus (193–211), Caracalla (198–217), and Iulia Domna were
90
Bowman – Rathbone 1992; R.S. Bagnall: Reading Papyri, Writing Ancient History.
London-New York 1995 64 ff.
91
P.A. Brunt: The Administrators of Roman Egypt. JRS 65 (1975) 124–147.
92
Bowman 1986 65, and cf. 66 ff.—Cf. also R. Taubenschlag: The Law of GrecoRoman Egypt. Warsaw 1955; M. Humbert: La jurisdiction du préfet d’Égypte d’Auguste à
Dioclétien. Paris 1964; U. Montevecchi: La papirologia. Milano 1973 190; R. Katzoff:
Sources of Law in Roman Egypt: The Role of the Prefect. in: ANRW II.13. BerlinNew York 1980 807–844; for the petitions to the prefect in particular, see T.
Mullins: Petitions as Literary Form. Novum Testamentum 5 (1962) 46–54; J.L. White:
The Form and Structure of the Official Petition: A Study in Greek Epistolography. Montana
1972; Millar 1977 203 ff.; T. Hauken: Petition and Response. An Epigraphic Study of
Petitions to Roman Emperors 181–249. Bergen 1998 258 ff.
93
A.R. Birley: The African Emperor, Septimius Severus. 2nd. edn. London 1988
135 ff.
94
Hölbl 2000 116 f.
95
For Oxyrhynchos, see below.—The integration of the Roman emperor into
the Egyptian temple cult and the development of an “abstract” divine ruler figure
in Egyptian temples cannot be discussed here.
96
P. Lond. 1912 lines 34–40, H.I. Bell: Jews and Christians in Egypt. London 1924
1 ff.; Haas 1997 83 f.
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chapter four
exhibited in villages.97 These cases are not exceptions: on the contrary, they obviously represent the rule. The worship of the emperor
continued in the late Roman and early Byzantine periods (cf. Chapter
IX.1.3). The evidence98 indicating the display and ceremonial procession of statues and images of contemporary (Theodosius, 379–395
and Maximus, 383–388)99 and past emperors100 in Alexandria and
other towns of Egypt corresponds well with what Gregory of Nazianzus
formulated thus for the whole of the empire:101
It is an axiom of royal practice . . . that the rulers should be publicly
honoured by their statues. Neither their crowns and diadems and bright
purple, nor the number of their bodyguards, nor the multitude of their
subjects is sufficient to establish their sovereignty; but they need also
adoration in order to seem more supreme: not only the adoration
directed to them personally, but also that made to their images and
portraits, in order that a greater and more perfect honor be rendered
to them.
An important aspect of late antique ruler worship is added in a
Coptic homily attributed to the Patriarch Theophilus102 (385–412)
mentioning imperial images
painted and set up in the midst of the marketplace, becoming a protection to the whole city.
The imperial image was approached with the same ceremony and
reverence as the living emperor and the announcement of imperial
edicts, read out frequently in the theatre, was listened to by the public as if it were performed in the presence of the emperor himself
(cf. Chapter IX.1.3).103
Citizenship in the Greek cities, i.e., Alexandria,104 Naukratis, and
Ptolemais, to which Antinoopolis, the creation of Hadrian,105 was
97
Krüger 1990 56 f.
See Haas 1997 83 f.
99
Zosimus, 4.37.
100
Annual festival described by the 7th-cent. writer Sophronius, Vita Cyri et Iohannis.
PG 87.3 cols 3685 ff.
101
Oration 4.80, quoted after Maas 2000 8.
102
Theophilus, Homily on the Virgin 90 cols 1 f., H. Worrell: The Coptic Manuscripts
in the Freer Collection. New York 1923 308 f., 375; Haas 1997 83 f.—Marketplace:
the agora of Alexandria is meant.
103
For the evidence, see Kelly 1998 143.
104
It is worth noting that the boule of Alexandria was abolished by Augustus and
reestablished only by Septimius Severus (Bowman 1971 13 f.). For the government
of Alexandria, see Huzar 1988b 656 ff.
105
Zahrnt 1988.
98
69
added in 130, secured similar hereditary privileges as in the Ptolemaic
period. The process in which the identity of the bouleutic class was
increasingly determined by status and culture rather than ethnicity
continued nevertheless in the first centuries of Roman rule and also
embraced the mixed Greek/Egyptian and Hellenized Egyptian propertied class of the nome capitals. Social and legal distinctions were,
however, maintained between Greeks, Egyptians, and Jews, between
Romans and Alexandrians, between members of the “gymnasial
class”, the inhabitants of the metropoleis, and inhabitants of the villages.106 The gymnasia and the schools of advanced education
(didaskaleia)107 provided physical and mental education for the youth
of the privileged “gymnasial class” and were the centres and instruments of Hellenization and local self-administration. The gymnasium
could be entered through the ephebate. Admission to the ephebate,
i.e., the group of youths selected at the age of thirteen or fourteen
for education in the gymnasium,108 had become hereditary by the
first century. In the Roman interpretation, “the gymnasial group was
meant to comprise the descendants of the original Greek military
settlers (katoikoi ) of the Ptolemies, whose culture centered on the Greek
and urban-centered institution of the gymnasium”.109 While the original accent was thus on ethnic identity and the exclusion of the nonmetropolitan native Egyptians of the countryside, by the third century
the hereditary identity of the “Hellenes” of the “gymnasial class”
became “self-perpetuating and cultural, not . . . ethnic”.110
Roman citizenship, which secured a number of privileges, was
granted to increasingly wide circles of Egyptians, until finally the
Constitutio Antoniniana, introduced in 212 by Caracalla, granted Roman
citizenship to all free subjects of the Empire.111 With the spread of
Roman citizenship the contours of the Greek/Egyptian dichotomy
106
Bowman – Rathbone 1992 113; on the control of social distinctions with the
help of census declarations, birth and death registrations, see now Bagnall – Frier
1994 passim and esp. 28 ff.
107
B. Legras: Néotês: Recherches sur les jeunes grecs dans l’Égypte ptolémaïque et romaine.
Genève 1999; Cribiore 2001 18 ff., 34 ff.
108
For the public status declaration which affirmed the boy’s lineage and his
belonging into a group possessing fiscal etc. privileges, see C.A. Nelson: Status
Declarations in Roman Egypt. Amsterdam 1979; for the iconography of the male age
classes in Roman Egypt, see Montserrat 1993 and cf. above, Ch. IV.1.
109
Bowman – Rathbone 1992 121.
110
Bagnall 1993 100 note 359.
111
For the Constitutio cf. Alföldy 1984 92 f.; P.A. Kuhlmann: Die Giessener literarischen Papyri und die Caracalla-Erlasse. Giessen 1994 217 ff.
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became even more blurred. The individual status groups within the
upper and lower classes, i.e., the honestiores (“The More Honourable”)
and the humiliores (“The More Lowly”), were defined increasingly in
terms of birth, (inherited) occupation, and wealth.112
In later chapters of this book we shall discuss aspects of urban
culture in more detail. Here it must be advanced that it was the
social and cultural Romanization of the urban settlements113 that created the bases of late antique Hellenism in Egypt. The papyrological evidence from the—archaeologically unfortunately unexplored—city
of Oxyrhynchos describes the development of a metropolis (capital
of the province Arcadia in the early Byzantine period114) which may
be considered typical for other Egyptian metropoleis as well. Roman
and early Byzantine Oxyrhynchos had about 15,000–25,000 inhabitants.115 In the fourth century, Ammianus Marcellinus mentions
Oxyrhynchos among Egypt’s largest cities.116 The town with its agora,
two stoas, tetrastyle, colonnaded streets, temples dedicated to Egyptian
and to Greek/Roman gods117 and deified rulers,118 a gymnasium,
theatre, hippodrome, and baths119 displayed the features of a Hellenistic
city which incorporated organically monumental buildings in traditional Egyptian style as well.120 The Egyptian cult temples121 also
112
Bowman 1986 128 f.
Bagnall 1993 55 ff.
114
Keenan 2000 612 ff.
115
Krüger 1990 9.—According to I.F. Fichman: Die Bevölkerungszahl von
Oxyrhynchos in byzantinischer Zeit. AfP 21 (1971) 111–120 there were 20,000
inhabitants in the Roman and 30,000 in the Byzantine period.
116
Ammianus Marcellinus, 22.16.6.
117
Whitehorne 1995 3058 ff. lists mentions of the temple cults of Achilles (3rd
cent.), Apollo (AD 213–217), Ares (81–96), Atargatis (2nd–3rd cent.), Cleopatra III
as Aphrodite (3rd cent.), Demeter (2nd–3rd cent.), Dionysos (199, late 3rd cent.),
Dioscuri (1st cent.), Hera (336), Heracles (3rd cent. ?), Hermes (early 3rd cent.),
Heron (3rd cent.), Kore (325), Nemesis (3rd cent.), Neotera (213–217), Zeus (2nd–3rd
cent.). For the temple of Jupiter Capitolinus cf. Pensabene 1993 8.
118
For the Hadrianeion attested until the 4th cent., the Kaisareion and the
Sebasteion attested between c. 197 and 318, see Krüger 1990 104; Whitehorne
1995 3071 ff.
119
For the evidence, see Krüger 1990 101 ff. For the topography, administrative districts and social stratification of the city cf. Alston 2002 137 ff., 153 ff.
120
Krüger 1990 17 ff.; for the c. 30 Egyptian temples and their Egyptian-type
dromoses cf. also Whitehorne 1995 3053.—For the papyrological evidence concerning the topography of the Roman period city, see P. Oxy. I 43 verso (c. AD
300), P. Oxy. LXIV 4441 (AD 316); Alston 2002 262 ff.
121
Krüger 1990 101 ff. lists the papyrolgical evidence for a monumental Serapeum
in the city centre (the building is attested until the 6th cent.), three Thoeris shrines,
113
71
indicate the presence of educated Egyptian priests. The festivals, processions, and oracles of native deities were central to the life of
the city.
The education and outlook of the Greek and Hellenized Egyptian
elite is demonstrated by the quality and quantity of the literary papyri
discovered at Oxyrhynchos.122 The Greek education of the elite is
also attested by the evidence relating to the gymnasium,123 schools,124
and theatre125 and by private foundations such as, e.g., that made
in 202 by Aurelius Horion from which the annual ephebic games
continued to be financed until the late fourth century.126 There were
Hellenistic institutions of urban life, too, which were also available
to the wider masses of inhabitants, such as the hippodrome.127 A
characteristic episode of the life of the Roman city and an indication of its status within the whole of the empire was, e.g., the arrangement in 275/6 of the “iso-capitolia”, i.e., the international Capitoline
games, in Oxyrhynchos128 as well as the annual ephebic games and
the quadrennial Capitoline games in Oxyrhynchos and Antinoopolis,
when poetry competitions also took place.129
Third-century evidence attests a textile production which may be
compared quantitatively to the late medieval production of certain
north European cities:130 about sixty percent of the working population of Oxyrhynchos was involved in it.131 The textile industry was,
however, specialized. Certain luxury wares had to be ordered from
further sanctuaries of Isis and Osiris. Whitehorne 1995 3060 ff. also lists papyrological evidence for the temple cults of Apis, Neotera (= Hathor-Aphrodite, Bastet?),
a falcon god, further Harsiese, Harpebekis, Imouthes-Asclepius.
122
Krüger 1990 144 ff. For a chronological overview, see 227 ff.
123
The buildings of the gymnasium are attested between AD 50–392, Krüger
1990 107.
124
Cribiore 2001 passim.
125
For its remains, see Petrie 1925; attested in papyri until the 4th cent. (?), cf.
Krüger 1990 125 ff.
126
Krüger 1990 12.
127
Attested between the 1st cent. and the early Byzantine period, Krüger 1990
107.
128
For the evidence, see J.R. Rea: Notes on Some IIIrd and IVth Century
Documents. CdE 46 (1971) 142–157; Krüger 1990 13; Bowman 1992 496.
129
F. Perpillou-Thomas: La panégyrie au gymnase d’Oxyrhynchos. CdE 61 (1986)
303–312; Cribiore 2001 240 ff.
130
Bagnall 1993 314 f.
131
P. van Minnen: The Volume of the Oxyrhynchite Textile Trade. Münstersche
Beiträge zur antiken Handelsgeschichte 5 (1986) 88–95; Bagnall 1993 82 f.
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other places, as shown by a papyrus of AD 325 recording the purchase, by order of the Prefect of Egypt, of 150 gold-embroidered
silk chitons, each one costing 65,000 denarii,132 by the councillors of
the city.133 In addition to the papyrological evidence, archeological
finds also contribute to the portrayal of the city’s Hellenized late
antique elite. Carvings from the elite necropolis of Oxyrhynchos will
be discussed later (Chapter VII.1.3). Here I mention an inscribed
fifth-century basis from the eastern stoa (?) commemorating the erection of a statue donated by a certain Phocaios, “very pious master
of his household”134 and a pillar dedicated to the Emperor Phocas
(602–610) standing at the end (?) of a colonnaded street.135 Public
buildings and institutions of urban life are richly attested in other
cities as well.136
As shown by the Oxyrhynchos papyri, and as opposed to the traditional view of Roman rule over Egypt, the centuries following the
conquest by Augustus were not an age of misery, ruthless exploitation, economic and intellectual decline.137 While Egypt was integrated
economically and culturally into the Mediterranean world, it was
spared, unlike other parts of the Empire, the effects of wars—even
though revolts against the government138 and intercommunal conflicts
of a violent nature repeatedly occurred139 and various groups of the
population became victims of the misuse of power140 or, from the
middle of the third century, religious persecution.
132
C. 15 gold solidi, cf. Jones 1974 202 f.
P. Oxy. LIV 3758; Garnsey – Whittaker 1998 336.
134
Petrie 1925 13, Pl. XXXV/2.
135
Petrie 1925 12 ff.
136
For the papyrological evidence, see Lukaszewicz 1986; and cf. the review
article on Lukaszewicz’s work: Bowman 1992.
137
See first of all Bowman 1986 38 ff., 92 ff.; Oates 1988; for the late Roman
period: Heinen 1998a 36.—Huzar 1988a 370 ff. paints a more negative picture.
138
Their significance is overestimated by D. Foraboschi: Movimenti e tensioni
sociali nell’Egitto romano. in: ANRW II.10.1. Berlin-New York 1988 807–840 809
ff. The list of “anti-government revolts” compiled by Foraboschi also includes intercommunal conflicts.
139
Bowman 1986 41 ff.
140
On the massacre of the youth of Alexandria ordered by Caracalla, see Cassius
Dio, 77.23; Braunert 1964 171 ff.
133
73
2.3. Late Roman Egypt
Christ Jesus, I try each day
in my every thought, word, and deed
to keep the commandments
of your most holy Church; and I abhor
all who deny you. But now I mourn:
I grieve, O Christ, for my father
even though he was—terrible as it is to say it—
priest at that cursed Serapeion.141
According to Bowman,142 Roman Egypt’s prosperity was influenced
by the following factors:
. . . state ownership of land was considerably reduced, government
supervision of private enterprise was relaxed and the amount of tax
collected in cash greatly increased. Three interrelated aspects of these
developments need emphasis: first, the overall level of taxation appears
to have been fairly low; second, the system of administration and collection which devolved largely upon the local communities was cheap;
third, there were greatly increased opportunities for private enrichment . . . [A] characteristic development of the Roman period was
the ownership of land and other property by individual towns and
villages. This is of a piece with the increase of autonomy in local
government . . .
Temple land in the Ptolemaic period was land conceded by the
crown, but income from the sacred land and other revenues sufficed
to secure the maintenance of the cults of the native deities, their
buildings and priesthood. The rulers also financed the building of
monumental new sanctuaries. The priests paid taxes, however, and
the state strictly controlled the economic activities of the temples.143
The temple properties came under complete state authority at the
beginning of the Roman period. The temples could choose between
a state subsidy (syntaxis) and the renting of government land; they
could draw income from commercial activities and also could receive
141
Constantine Cavafy: Priest at the Serapeion. in: Collected Poems trans. E. Keeley
and P. Sherrard, ed. G. Savidis. Princeton 1992 140.
142
Bowman 1986 93, 96.—For Eleanor Huzar the negative aspect of Roman
economic and fiscal policy far outweigh the positive aspect emphasized by Bowman:
she concludes rhetorically that “ . . . following Augustus’ policies to their logical ends,
Egypt must suffer, to feed Rome and to enrich the empire” (Huzar 1988a 382).
143
Otto 1905–1908 I 262 ff., II 46 ff.; C. Préaux: L’économie royale des Lagides.
Bruxelles 1939 403 ff.; Thompson 1988 109; Huss 1994 58, 69.
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pious donations. Temple administration was controlled from Hadrian’s
reign (117–138) by a civil official with the title “High Priest of
Alexandria and All Egypt”.144
It is a topos in the literature that hardly any temple building activity is attested after Augustus. It is also stressed as a convention that
the last hieroglyphic inscription at the temples of Thebes dates from
Domitian’s reign (81–96), and at Diospolis Parva from Hadrian’s
reign (117–138); the last cartouches indicating repairs at Philae and
Ombos were carved in the reign of Caracalla (198–217), and the
latest hieroglyphic inscriptions referring to a Roman emperor date
from the reign of Decius (249–251).145 Indeed, no large new temples
were built for the cult of native gods under the Roman emperors.
In his recent book on the temple architecture of the Late and GrecoRoman periods, Dieter Arnold shows,146 however, that between the
reigns of Augustus and Marcus Aurelius about forty smaller temples,
chapels, and kiosks were erected in the traditional Egyptian style for
the cult of Egyptian deities—alongside hundreds of sanctuaries built
for non-Egyptian deities in the Classical style.147 The Egyptian-style
sacral buildings represent a distinct, and in some respects remarkably innovative, period in the history of Egyptian temple architecture.
Likewise, Egyptian religious thinking, literature, and iconography
was far from being stagnant.148 The Egyptian cults show little decline
144
E. Seckel – W. Schubart: Der Gnomon des Idios Logos. Berlin 1919; J.G. Milne:
A History of Egypt under Roman Rule. 3rd edn. London 1924 [repr. edn. Chicago 1992]
180 ff., 286 ff; Lewis 1983 90 ff.; Bowman 1986 165 ff.
145
J.-C. Grenier: Les titulatures des empereurs romains dans les documents en langue égyptienne. Bruxelles 1989; Bagnall 1993 262. Decius’ inscriptions are in the temple of
Esna. For a realistic assessment of the evidence, see Alston 2002 202 ff.; for 3rd
and 4th-century imperial titles in hieroglyphics, see Grenier op. cit. and Alston 2002
206 Table 5.2.3.
146
Arnold 1999 225–273.
147
Pensabene 1993 6 ff.
148
For the rich evidence cf., e.g., D. Kurth: Der Sarg der Teüris. Eine Studie zum
Totenglauben im römerzeitlichen Ägypten. Mainz 1990; L. Pantalacci – C. Traunecker: Le
temple d’el-Qal’a. Relevés des scènes et des texts I. Le Caire 1990; Borg 1996; C. Traunecker:
Lessons from the Upper Egyptian Temple of el-Qal’a. in: S. Quirke (ed.): The Temple
in Ancient Egypt. New Discoveries and Recent Research. London 1997 168–178; J. Baines:
Temples as Symbols, Guarantors, and Participants in Egyptian Civilization. ibid.
216–241 227 ff.; Hölbl 2000 passim (with further literature); see also H.-J. Thissen:
Graeko-ägyptische Literatur. LÄ II (1972) 873–878; W.J. Tait: Demotic Literature:
Forms and Genres. in: Loprieno (ed.) 1996 175–187.—For the combination of traditional Egyptian and Hellenistic-Roman mortuary religion and iconography in elite
burials of the Roman period, see also the monuments catalogued in Kaplan 1999.—
75
before the middle of the third century. From the early third century, the temples depended economically on the local administration, which caused the ruin of many sanctuaries. Nevertheless, a
number of temples managed to survive the economic crisis of the
second half of the third century.149 In his recent study on Egyptian
religion in the late Roman period, David Frankfurter presents an
illuminating survey of the activities and social functions of the surviving local temples in the fourth and fifth centuries150 and quotes
impressive data illustrating the social status and prestige of their
priesthood.151 Frankfurter also points out that with the decline of the
great cult temples
the axis of religious practice spins out at two levels: (1) to regional
prophets who embraced a broader and more absolutist ideology of
piety than local cults required or encompassed . . . and (2) centrifugally
from the main national or regional temples, first to the village and its
dynamic interplay of shrine and village society, and finally to the
household, the mainstay cross-culturally of traditional practice, festival
observance, the miniaturized vision of cult and its dramas, and resistance to the trends and pressures of the public space . . . As Egyptian
Christianity accomodates these indigenous religious dynamics, it also
becomes assimilated by them.152
In his Roman History, finished around 230, Cassius Dio looked back
at the death of the Emperor Marcus Aurelius in 180 as a turning
point which marked the end of a Golden Age and the onset of an
age of iron and rust.153 Indeed, the lability of and changes in the
political structure (caused first of all by the increase of the army’s
power and demands, and by the concurrent general failure of economic production) generated a feeling of crisis which became general by the second third of the third century all over the empire. It
was further aggravated by barbarian attacks along the frontiers.
By the 260s, the fate of the empire, tormented by barbarians and
For an excellent survey of the evidence relating to the temples in the AD 1st century, see Alston 2002 196 ff.
149
Otto 1905–1908 I 403 ff.
150
Frankfurter 1998 37 ff. See also Alston 2002 272 f.
151
Frankfurter 1998 198 ff. For Upper Egyptian priests in the 4th–5th cent. cf.
also FHN III Nos 306, 310, 315.
152
Frankfurter 1998 30.
153
Cassius Dio, Roman History 71.36.4; on the dramatic changes in the social
order 80.7.2.
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destabilized by a long series of usurpations, seemed to have been
sealed.154
In this turbulent world Egypt was, however, spared external and
internal wars. Although the penetration of the Meroitic kingdom into
Egypt’s southern frontier zone in the second half of the third century and the subsequent conflicts with the Blemmyans of the Eastern
Desert155 repeated patterns that also occurred in other frontier regions
of the empire,156 the impact of the events at Egypt’s southern periphery was far less destructive. Third-century papyrological evidence
attests plenty of public building in the cities as well as the proper
functioning of the magistrates.157 Yet Egypt too was affected by the
devaluation of money, inflation, fluctuating prices, the decrease of
production and increase of taxes—especially after the governmental
reforms started by Diocletian in 293158 abolished Egypt’s special
administrative and economic status within the empire. With the
currency reform introduced in 296,159 Egypt ceased to be an isolated
currency zone with special coinage and was thus completely integrated into the monetary economy of the empire. The mint of Alexandria started to issue standard imperial coin types. Nevertheless,
the process of municipalization which had started under Augustus
was not reversed by the structural alterations in the territorial administration160 which aimed successfully at a more effective centralised
government and a better control of resources.161 In 300/1 the coinage
154
For the still only insufficiently understood reasons of the crisis, see G. Walser –
T. Pekáry: Die Krise des römischen Reiches. Bericht über die Forschungen zur Geschichte des
3. Jahrhunderts. Berlin 1962; A. Alföldi: Studien zur Geschichte der Weltkrise des 3. Jahrhunderts
nach Christus. Darmstadt 1967; R. MacMullen: Roman Government’s Response to Crisis,
A.D. 235–337. New Haven 1976; Alföldy 1984 133 ff.; R. MacMullen: Corruption
and the Decline of Rome. New Haven-London 1988; for the various theories on the
crisis cf. also K. Christ (ed.): Der Untergang des römischen Reiches. Darmstadt 1970.
155
Török 1997 476 ff.
156
C.R. Whittaker: Frontiers of the Roman Empire. A Social and Economic Study.
Baltimore-London 1994 132 ff.
157
Lukaszewicz 1986 passim; Bowman 1992 496 ff. Alston 2002 259 summarizes
thus his detailed survey of the evidence (249 ff.): “The cities may have had problems during the third century, but the century was not one of sustained crisis for
the city or for the urban elites, but one of increasing power and confidence”.
158
Lallemand 1965; Alston 2002 277 ff.
159
L.C. West – A.C. Johnson: Currency in Roman and Byzantine Egypt. Princeton 1944;
Jones 1974 198 ff.; M. Hendy: Studies in the Byzantine Monetary Economy, c. 300–1450.
Cambridge 1985.
160
Lallemand 1964 41 ff.; Keenan 2000 612 f.
161
77
was revaluated and maximum prices were fixed for all services and
goods.162
Egypt’s economy163 continued to rest on agricultural production,
primarily grain. According to Roger Bagnall,164 besides the imperial
house and, from the second third of the fourth century, the Church,
six major groups of landowners can be identified: (1) A small group
of urban residents with large holdings (greater than 100 arouras165),
probably no more than a hundred families in most nomes; their land
was usually spread over multiple locations. (2) Urban residents with
holdings sufficient to provide a livelihood from their rents, but not so
great as to make the owner wealthy enough to hold his own in the
city council; of these there were perhaps three to four times as many
as of the wealthy. (3) Urban residents with small holdings, less than
10 arouras, which cannot have been their principal source of income.
These, another 500 families or so per city, must have been partly supported by some other employment or business. (4) Rich villagers, the
top 10 percent of the village population, with holdings larger than
about 70 arouras. (5) A broad middle range of village owners, with
enough land to support a family (10 arouras and up), amounting to
three-quarters of the landowners. (6) Village smallholders, less than 10
arouras, who must either have earned part of their living by other
means or leased land from others to supplement what they owned.
Bagnall also adds that the concentration of landed wealth does not
seem to increase markedly from the fourth to the sixth century. The
Egyptian evidence is not, however, sufficient and the general trend
in the Empire was anyhow the contrary.166 The size of the large
estates167 may be estimated on the basis of the archives of the Apion
family:168 by the sixth century, the family’s holdings amounted to
162
Lauffer 1971.
R.S. Bagnall et al.: The Kellis Agricultural Account Book (P.Kell. IV Gr. 96). Oxford
1997, and see the survey of J.-M. Carrié: Économie et société de l’Égypte romanobyzantine (IVe–VIIe siècle). A propos de quelques publications récentes. AnTard 7
(1999) 331–352.
164
Bagnall 1993 310.
165
10 arouras = 2.75 ha.
166
C.R. Whittaker – P. Garnsey: Rural Life in the Later Roman Empire. in:
CAH XIII 277–311 299 ff.; Garnsey – Whittaker 1998 322 ff.; Banaji 1999.—See
also A.K. Bowman: Landholding in the Hermopolite Nome in the Fourth Century
A.D. JRS 75 (1985) 137–163 and Bagnall 1992.
167
For a third-century example, see now D. Rathbone: Economic Rationalism and
Rural Society in Third-Century A.D. Egypt: The Heroninos Archive and the Appianus Estate.
Cambridge 1991; Bagnall 1993 152. See also Gascou 1985.
168
For the evidence, see P. Oxy. VI and XVI and cf. Krüger 1990 13 f.; Alston
2002 108 f., 313 ff.
163
78
chapter four
112,000 arouras or 75,000 acres in the Oxyrhynchite and Cynopolite
nomes out of a total available 280,000 arouras,169 and the house also
possessed estates scattered through other nomes (cf. also Chapter
IV.2.5).
It is traditionally assumed that compulsory services, i.e., the liturgies or munera, increasingly ruined the propertied classes. Indeed,
many members of the urban elite tried to escape these services by
building up alternative careers in the army, the imperial government, or the Church. Nevertheless, the burden of munera was no
heavier in Egypt than in the other provinces of the Empire. From
the late fourth century, salaried governmental officials took over tasks
which were formerly liturgical ones.170 The institutions of self-government continued nevertheless to function in the cities and villages.
Literary sources analysed in Christopher Haas’ magisterial work
describe Alexandria’s urban landscape, the topography of its social
stratification, its prosperous and complex industries, and its economic
interaction with the Egyptian hinterland in the fourth and fifth centuries.171 Alexandria’s most important economic activity and its source
of prosperity in Late Antiquity was the grain trade:172
Of all the diverse economic activities joining late Roman Alexandria
with the Egyptian countryside, none was greater than the vast network of supply and transport which embraced Alexandria’s grain
trade . . . Although this copious supply of grain could be shipped from
Alexandria to various corners of the empire in times of special
need . . . the grain trade primarily was organized to supply in an efficient
manner the requirements of the late empire’s great cities—including
Alexandria itself . . . During the height of the empire, Rome received
upward of 13 million modii or 83,000 tons of grain per year from
Egypt alone. Under the late empire, when Egypt bore the responsibility for provisioning the rapidly growing population of Constantinople,
36 million modii or approximately 220,000 tons of grain were sent
annually to the new capital. This comes to roughly 5.5 million sackfuls, which would require 647 average-sized grain ships to sail annually from Alexandria’s harbors. Factoring in the Egyptian harvest period
Hardy 1931 25 ff.; Keenan 2000 625 ff.
C. Drecoll: Die Liturgien im römischen Kaiserreich des 3. und 4. Jh. n. Chr. Untersuchungen
über Zugang, Inhalt, und wirtschaftliche Bedeutung der öffentlichen Zwangsdienste in Ägypten und
anderen Provinzen. Stuttgart 1997; Heinen 1998a 48.
171
Haas 1997 33 ff.; cf. Alston 2002 157 ff.
172
Haas 1997 41 ff.; cf. J.L. Teall: The Grain Supply of the Byzantine Empire
330–1025. DOP 13 (1959) 87–190.
169
170
79
and the sailing season for these cumbersome grain ships, over thirtytwo fully loaded vessels would have sailed weekly from Alexandria over
a period of four and a half months.
The patterns of the social organization of the Alexandrian population of c. 200,000173 may well be compared with other great cities
of the Empire. In the late empire, the society of Alexandria and the
cities of the chora, too, was two-tiered with a small number of honestiores and a large number of humiliores (cf. Chapter IV.2.2). The background of the governing municipal elite of Alexandria and the rest
of the cities of Egypt was landholding.
The elite who enjoyed the privilege of Classical education until
the late fourth century174 was intellectually and socially closely associated with the elite of the empire, as is exemplified, e.g., by the
career of Claudius Claudianus.175 Born in Alexandria around 370
and receiving a traditional Greek education, he went to Rome in
394. Between 395 and 404 he published Latin panegyrics for the
consulates of Honorius and Stilicho, an epithalamium (nuptial hymn)
to the marriage of Stilicho’s daughter Maria to Honorius, and a
series of other works in various genres.176 He identified himself completely with the intellectual and political traditions of Rome and his
verse belongs, in its technical accomplishment, to the best achievments of late Latin poetry. While Augustine speaks about him as a
pagan,177 Claudian wrote for a Christian emperor and his poem De
Salvatore is Christian in content.
The cities of Egypt also maintained contacts with the cities of
other provinces by sending athletes to contests and panhellenic games.
At home, they continued the tradition of officially supporting dramatic and musical performances in the theatres, which were attended
by wide circles of the population, even by Christians.178 The high
173
For the estimate, see Haas 1997 45 ff. Cf. also D.W. Rathbone: The Ancient
Economy and Graeco-Roman Egypt. in: Criscuolo – Geraci (eds) 1989 159–176.
174
Heinen 1998a 52 f.; Cribiore 2001 18 ff.
175
Cameron, Alan: Claudian. Poetry and Propaganda at the Court of Honorius. Oxford
1970.
176
Ed. with a translation by M. Platnauer, London-Cambridge 1922 (Loeb
Classical Library).
177
Augustine, De civ. Dei 5.26.
178
For Egypt, see Bagnall 1993 99 ff.; in general, see J. Blansdorf (ed.): Theater
und Gesellschaft im Imperium Romanum. Tübingen 1990; R. Lim: Consensus and Dissensus
in Public Spectacles in Early Byzantium. Byzantinische Forschungen 24 (1997) 159–179;
id.: Theater. in: Bowersock – Brown – Grabar (eds) 1999 719–721.
80
chapter four
level of literary education and taste in the literate circles of the
metropoleis is reflected, e.g., in the papyri from Oxyrhynchos (see
Chapter IV.2.2) and Antinoopolis.179
The humiliores of the Egyptian towns possessed a “cumulative political importance”.180 Late antique authors frequently characterized the
Alexandrian plebs as “lawless”, “an irritable race, excited to sedition”
and the city as “half-crazed with the riots of her frantic populace”.181
We also see, however, that the lower social orders maintained a
great variety of associations, collegia or synadoi, ranging from athletic
clubs through trade associations to drinking clubs. Most of these associations developed a hierarchy and were recognized, regulated, and
politically used (or manipulated) by the government and, increasingly, the Church.182 Similarly to other cities in the empire and in
Egypt, the theatre and the hippodrome were highly important “multiclass and multicommunal” foci of civic life also in Alexandria.183
The existence of circus factions is amply attested in Alexandria184 as
well as in other cities, so, e.g., in Oxyrhynchos.185 The adherence to
one of the factions in the fourth to sixth century was a similarly
important definition of social identity as in contemporary Constantinople.186 Manuscript illustrations (figs 12, 13)187 and textile decorations (Pl. XVIII)188 indicate the popularity of literary works describing
179
C.H. Roberts (ed.): The Antinoopolis Papyri I. London 1950; J.W.B. Barns –
H. Zilliacus (eds): The Antinoopolis Papyri II, III. London 1960, 1967. For a chronological overview, see G. Menci: I papiri letterari ‘sacri’ e ‘profani’ di Antinoe. in:
Del Francia Barocas (ed.) 1998 49–55.
180
Haas 1997 57.
181
For the quotations from Julian, Ep. 21; Socrates, Historia ecclesiastica 4.20; Ausonius, Ordo Urbium Nobilium 4.4–5, see Haas 1997 381 note 32.
182
Haas 1997 57 ff.
183
Haas 1997 62 ff.
184
For the evidence, see Z. Borkowski: Inscriptions des factions à Alexandrie. Warsaw
1981; Haas 1997 65 ff.—For a critical review of Borkowski’s work, see Cameron,
Alan – R.S. Bagnall, BASP 20 (1983) 75–84.
185
For P. Oxy. I 145 from 552 and P. Oxy. I 138 from 610/11, see Krüger 1990
9; for the Phocas inscription inscribed on an earlier honorific column, see Cameron,
Alan 1976 148 and cf. Bailey 1996 161.
186
Cameron, Alan 1976; Liebeschuetz 2000 224 ff.
187
Fragment of papyrus codex from Antinoopolis with illustration of five charioteers, London, The Egypt Exploration Society, around 500; Weitzmann 1977 Pl.
6; Age of Spirituality Cat. 93; papyrus fragment with arena scene with bear and part
of the figure of a somersaulting venator, London, The British Library Board pap.
3053, ibid. Cat. 86.
188
Wrestlers in the decoration of a tapestry hanging, 5th cent., Cat. Hamm Cat.
341/a.
81
the races, the arena, and the circus. A fine early sixth-century (?)
ivory comb with a theatre scene in à jour carved relief is inscribed
“Hail to the fortune of Helladia and of the Blues. Amen” (fig. 14).189
It was probably a prize won by Helladia, a Christian lady, at a
drama contest.
From the second third of the third century, Christianity played a
key role in the transformation of Egyptian society. The beginnings
of Christianity in Egypt were connected in all probability with the
powerful Jewish community of Alexandria, which played a central
role in the forming of Christian thought in the first century.190 The
violent suppression of the Jewish revolt of 115–117191 brought about
the extermination of Alexandria’s Hellenized Jewish intelligentsia.
Greek philosophical traditions continued nevertheless to influence the
surviving Christian community, about the life of which we know,
however, only very little in the second and third centuries.192 The
spread of Christianity is indicated indirectly by the evidence relating to the official persecutions under Decius in 249–251193 while the
development of church organisation is indicated by the fiscal measurements of Valerian (253–260) directed at the confiscation of church
properties.194 An edict of Gallienus (253–268) issued in 260 suspended
persecution, restored church property, and introduced a period of
growth. In the late third century there were two churches at Oxyrhynchos. According to Rufinus, around 370
neither the gates themselves, nor the towers of the city, nor any corner at all is empty of monastic housing, and thus through all parts of
the city, day and night, hymns and praise are offered to God, as if
they have made the city one Church of God. For none is found there
189
Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des Antiquités Égyptiennes E 11874,
Cat. Paris-Agde Cat. 277; Santrot et al. (eds) 2001 Cat. 59 (M.-H. Rutschowscaya);
M.-H. Rutschowscaya: La peigne d’Helladia. in: Études coptes VII. Cahiers de la
Bibliothèque copte 12. Paris-Louvain 2000 235–244.
190
Müller 1981 321 f.; Martin 1981; Martin 1996b; cf. also G. Dorival: Les
débuts du christianisme à Alexandrie. in: Colloque Alexandrie 157–174.
191
Haas 1997 99 ff.
192
G. Tibiletti: Tra paganesimo e cristianesimo: L’Egitto nel III secolo. in: Egitto
e società antica. Milano 1985 247–269.—For the earliest fragment of the Greek Gospel
of St John from the first half of the 2nd cent. (P.Ryl. 457), see H.I. Bell: Cults and
Creeds in Graeco-Roman Egypt. Liverpool 1957 80.
193
W.H.C. Frend: Decius. CE III 889–891.
194
For the evidence, see M. Krause: Christenverfolgungen in Ägypten. in: Christentum
am Nil 60–64; Bowman 1986 191 f.
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chapter four
who is a heretic or pagan but are all Catholic so that it does makes
no difference whether the bishop delivers his sermon on the square or
in the church.195
Rufinus seems to have exaggerated. Yet in 535/6,196 there were thirtyseven churches and twenty monasteries (including two nunneries) in
the city.197 In Alexandria, the catechetical school founded by Clement
(d. before 215) and Origen (d. before 253/4) continued to promote
the spread of Christianity and the development of Christian theology.198 Clement’s and Origen’s work unfolded under the influence
of Platonic thought and was part of the renaissance of Alexandrian
intellectual life.199
By 303, the beginning of the Great Persecution of Diocletian,200
there were bishops in most nome capitals and the translation of the
Holy Scriptures into the (dialects of the) Coptic language had been
started on a large scale.201 Galerius’ Edict of Toleration of 311 called
off the persecution of Christians and Constantine’s and Licinius’ Edict
of Milan of 313 declared toleration for all religions in the empire.202
The recognition of Christianity as a legal religion, the restitution of
church properties and the subsequent regulations concerning the status of clergy and believers opened a new era characterized by new
forms of the coexistence of and conflicts between polytheism and
Christianity. What is equally important, it also opened the door to
195
Rufinus, History of the Monks of Egypt 5, quoted by Alston 2002 293.
Calendar of places where the bishop of Oxyrhynchos officiated, P. Oxy. XI
1357, for a translation, see Lee 2000b 242; cf. A. Papaconstantinou: La liturgie stationnale à Oxyrhynchos dans la première moitié du 6e siècle: Réédition et commentaire du P.Oxy. XI 1357. REB 54 (1996) 135–159 and Alston 2002 302.
197
For the evidence, see Krüger 1990 101 ff. For the papyrological evidence concerning the churches in the Oxyrhynchite nome in the 6th–7th centuries, see Alston
2002 295 f. Table 5.7; for the churches and monasteries in the Hermopolite nome
ibid. 297 f. Tables 5.8, 5.9.
198
A.M. Ritter: Das frühchristliche Alexandrien im Spannungsfeld zwischen
Judenchristentum, “Frühkatholizismus” und Gnosis—zur Ortsbestimmung clementinisch-alexandrinischer Theologie. in: A.M. Ritter: Charisma und Caritas. Göttingen
1993 117–136; Markschies 1997 18 ff.; H. Chadwick: Philosophical Tradition and
the Self. in: Bowersock – Brown – Grabar (eds) 1999 60–81 74 ff.
199
For philosophy in 3rd-cent. Alexandria cf. Bowersock 1996 264 f.
200
The persecution was so traumatic that the Christians of Egypt dated the beginning of the Christian era from Diocletian’s accession in 284.
201
P. Weigandt: Zur Geschichte der koptischen Bibelübersetzungen. Biblica 50
(1969) 80–95; B.M. Metzger: The Early Versions of the New Testament: Their Origin, Transmission and Limitations. Oxford 1977; Bagnall 1993 278 ff.; Orlandi 1998 120 f.
202
Cameron, Averil 1993a 43 ff.
196
83
violent Christian anti-paganism and, within Christianity, a quickly
escalating conflict between orthodoxy and heresy.203
The stereotypical stories of conversion repeated all through the
centuries of Late Antiquity provide little information about the actual
process of the spread of Christianity in Egypt,204 especially about the
range of individual motivations for conversion.205 We know that urban
Christianity was supported by the elite206 and that important agents
were local charismatic persons, holy men and ascetics, who fascinated the community with their thaumaturgical power and sacred
texts.207 According to Richard Alston’s acute observation,
[t]housands of private transitions to Christianity would eventually have
public effect with the Christianization of civic culture.208
In 269 or 270, in lull between the two most terrible attacks directed
by the polytheist state against Christianity, Antony, a young Christian
born in a village near Heracleopolis, went one day
into the church . . . and just then it happened that the Gospel was
being read, and he heard the Lord saying to the rich man, “If you
would be perfect, go, sell what you possess and give to the poor, and
you will have treasure in heaven”.209 . . . Immediately Antony went out
from the Lord’s house and gave to the townspeople the possessions he
had from his forebears (three hundred fertile and very beautiful parcels
of land) . . . But when, entering the Lord’s house once more, he heard
in the Gospel the Lord saying, “Do not be anxious about tomorrow”,
203
H. Chadwick: Orthodoxy and Heresy from the Death of Constantine to the
Eve of the First Council of Ephesos. in: CAH XIII 561–600; Brown 1998a.
204
According to Bagnall (1993 280 f.; 1995 85 ff.), in c. 313 20 per cent of the
population was Christian; 40 per cent by 324; the majority was Christian by 337,
over 80 per cent by the end of the century. A slower spread of Christianity is
assumed in Wipszycka 1986 and 1988.
205
For this issue cf. Markschies 1997 53 ff.; Brown 1998a. For the Coptic martyrologies cf. Smith 1998 729 f.
206
For the revision of the view that early Christianity was a popular movement,
see J. Gager: Kingdom and Community: The Social World of Early Christianity. Englewood
Cliffs 1975; J.H. Schutz (ed.): The Social Setting of Pauline Christianity. Philadephia
1982; W. Meeks: The First Urban Christians: The Social World of the Apostle Paul. New
Haven 1983.
207
P. Brown: The Rise and Function of the Holy Man in Late Antiquity. JRS
61 (1971) 80–101; P. Rousseau: Ascetics, Authority and the Church. Oxford 1978; cf.
A. Lukaszewicz: Einige Bemerkungen zu den Asketen in den griechischen urkundlichen Papyri. in: Godlewski (ed.) 1990 219–223; Frankfurter 1998 31 f.
208
Alston 2002 285.
209
Matt. 19.21.
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he could not remain any longer, but going out he gave those remaining possessions also to the needy . . . he devoted himself from then on
to the discipline rather than the household, giving heed to himself and
patiently training himself.210
Antony lived first near other anchorites211 in a tomb outside his village, then, around 285, i.e., shortly after Diocletian’s ascension to
the throne, he moved across the Nile into an abandoned military
fort on the fringe of the desert. Hidden as a hermit, he spent some
twenty years there. From 305, however, disciples started to join him
but he decided to move to the solitude of the inner desert. He died
in 356 at the age of about 105 in the desert at the foot of a mountain in the Wadi Araba 40 km from the Red Sea.
The Life of Antony212 published by the Patriarch Athanasius shortly
after Antony’s death describes him highly tendentiously as a charismatic illiterate whose ascetic life was a constant embittered war with
demons. This image of Antony, which had an enormous impact on
his contemporaries as well as on later generations, is just as untrue
as the tradition according to which he had first invented the eremitic
life. In fact, his letters, written originally in Coptic but surviving in
translations, reflect an educated, literate man who regarded the ascetic
life as a means of acquiring knowledge of God and the self and
transforming the body so that God might fill it and work through
it.213 On the other hand, the énaxvrhs¤w, withdrawal into the desert,
as a path to moral perfection was choosen independently by many
contemporaries of Antony. The example of hermits settling alone or
in groups in the Libyan desert (Nitria, Kellia, Scetis) and at many
210
Athanasius, Life of Antony 2–3. Trans. R.C. Gregg. New York 1980; Maas
2000 106.—According to E. Wipszycka: La conversion de saint Antoine. Remarques
sur les chapitres 2 et 3 du prologue de la Vita Antonii d’Athanase. in: Fluck –
Langener et al. (eds) 1995 337–348 the church in which Antony made his decision
could only have been in a city since the first village churches were built only towards
the end of the 3rd century.—Cf. also Y. de Andia: Antoine le Grand, YEODIDAKTOS. in: Rassart-Debergh – Ries (eds) 1992 28–40.
211
From Greek anachoreuein, “to withdraw out of the chora (country)”.
212
J.-P. Migne: Patrologiae cursus completus, Series Graeca 26. Paris 1857; H. Hoppenbrouwers: La plus ancienne version latine de la vie de S. Antoine par S. Athanase. Nijmegen
1960; G. Garitte: S. Antonii vitae versio sahidica. Louvain 1949.
213
S. Rubenson: The Letters of St. Antony. Origenist Theology, Monastic Tradition and
the Making of a Saint. Lund 1990; and cf. T. Hägg: Socrates and St. Antony. A
Short Cut through Ancient Biography. in: R. Skarsten – E. Johansen Kleppe –
R.B. Finnestad (eds): Understanding and History in Arts and Sciences [Fs. Richard Holton
Pierce]. Oslo 1991 81–87.
85
other places outside the Nile valley214 from the early fourth century
and making thus “the desert a city”215 attracted extraordinary attention in various social milieus, also including the urban intelligentsia.216
Pachomius, a contemporary of Antony, after practicing asceticism
for some years with a hermit, founded a monastic community at
Tabennese in the Tentyrite nome (Upper Egypt) around 320.217 By
the time of his death in 346, seven large monasteries for men and
two for woman had been built under his command between Latopolis and Panopolis in the Thebaid. The Pachomian monasteries
were strictly and efficiently organized communities of a new type,218
living in walled complexes consisting of the cells of the monks or nuns,
churches, refectories, kitchens, bakeries, workshops, stables, and cemeteries. Besides manufactures of various sorts operated within the
walls of the monasteries, the communities also owned and cultivated
a significant amount of land219 and conducted various lucrative
financial activities.220 Although the passage in Pachomius’ Rule, which
demands that the monks entering his community learn to read if
they could not already, postdates Pachomius,221 Pachomius’ letters as
well as the Rule222 clearly indicate that there were indeed educated
monks in the Pachomian monasteries who played a key role in
the creation of Coptic literature.223 In the course of the subsequent
For a survey, see Grossmann 2002 245 ff.
Athanasius, Vita Antonii 14, R. Draguet (ed.): La vie primitive de S. Antoine conservée en syriaque. Louvain 1980.
216
P. Brown: Asceticism: Pagan and Christian. in: CAH XIII 601–631.
217
Rousseau 1985.
218
Early monasticism was of the coenobitic type, i.e., of communities of men or
women living near a holy man and teacher.
219
Rousseau 1985; J.E. Goehring: The Letter of Ammon and Pachomian Monasticism. BerlinNew York 1986; J. Gascou: Economic Activities of Monasteries. CE V 1639–1645.
220
On the fleet of the Pachomian monastery “of the Metanoia”, active in the
transport of the grain taxes to Alexandria, see R. Rémondon: Le monastère alexandrin de la Metanoia était-il bénéficiaire du fisc ou à son service? in: Studi in onore
di Edoardo Volterra V. Milano 1971 769–781; J.-L. Fournet – J. Gascou: Moines
pachômiens et batellerie. in: Décobert (ed.) 2002 23–45.
221
According to Rousseau 1985 48 ff. and Smith 1998 727, all surviving versions of the Rule were composed after Pachomius’ death.—Cf. also T. Baumeister:
Der aktuelle Forschungsstand zu den Pachomiusregeln. in: Godlewski (ed.) 1990
49–54; E. Wipszycka: Une nouvelle Règle monastique égyptienne. ibid. 499–503.
222
A. Boon: Pachomiana latina. Règle et épitres de S. Pachome. Appendice: L.T. Lefort:
La règle de S. Pachome. Fragments coptes et excerpta grecs. Louvain 1932; H. Quecke: Die
Briefe Pachoms. Regensburg 1975.
223
Smith 1998 727 ff.; Orlandi 1998 129 ff.—For education in the monasteries,
see also Cribiore 2001 24 f., 177.
214
215
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centuries the monasteries and their monks exerted a decisive influence
on the religious, political, social, economic, and cultural life of
Egypt224—but monks also played a prominent, and frequently uncontrollably violent, role in the Christian-polytheist and Christian-Christian
controversies.225
2.4. Christians and polytheists
The second half of the fourth century witnessed the beginnings of
the accumulation of properties by the Church226 (initially, its economic power was, however, equally dependent on imperial donations and the wealth of individual clergymen) and saw the growing
prominence of the Church and the clergy first in the cities and then
in the countryside. The emergence of Christianity as a social force
and the forming of an “alternative, institutionalized elite . . . in the
persons of Christian bishops”227 also significantly changed the political and social structure of Egypt. Though Christian intellectuals
propagated the ascetic’s total renunciation of the world,228 the patriarch of Alexandria229 and the bishops, with their seats in the metropoleis,
i.e., the nome capitals, usually descended from wealthy and wellconnected aristocratic families,230 and were leaders of an organisation which had begun to play a central role in civic life. This is
especially well-attested in the case of the patriarchs of Alexandria,
many of whom were trained from childhood by their predecessors—
to whom they were frequently related.231
224
For the evidence cf. Bagnall 1993 190, 300 f.; M. Krause: Das Mönchtum
in Ägypten. in: Krause (ed.) 1998 149–174; in general, see Rousseau 2000.
225
Cf. in general A. de Voguë: Histoire littéraire du mouvement monastique dans l’antiquité I–III. Paris 1991–1996.
226
Wipszycka 1972; Bagnall 1993 289 ff.
227
Cameron, Averil 1991 30; cf. G. Bowersock: From Emperor to Bishop: The
Self-Conscious Transformation of Political Power in the Fourth Century A.D. Classical
Philology 81 (1986) 298–307.
228
Haas 1997 229 f.
229
The Council of Nicaea in 325 determined the cities and their territory as the
fundamental units of ecclesiastical organization under an autonomous bishop: in
Egypt equivalent to the nomos capitals (metropoleis) and the nomes. Civil government was also mirrored in that the bishops of Alexandria, Rome, Antioch and,
from 381, Constantinople (as “new Rome) were granted supremacy: the bishop of
Alexandria was placed as patriarch above all bishops of Egypt. Cf. Canon 4 of the
Council of Nicaea; F. Dvornik: Byzantium and the Roman Primacy. New York 1966
31 f.; Hunt 1998b 240 ff.; Maas 2000 114.
230
Haas 1997 217 ff., 232.
231
From as early as Peter I, bishop of Alexandria between 300–311, cf. Haas
1997 217 ff.
87
By the fifth century the clergy functioned as a protector of the
poor and the powerless in the cities as well as in the countryside
and acted as mediator between the local communities and the central government232—a role which many bishops and priests performed
as a traditionally class-specific, i.e., aristocratic function.233
The conversion of the major pagan temples began to radically
alter Egyptian cityscapes and Christianity. Christian institutions started
to appropriate topographical sites of symbolic significance. In
Alexandria,234 this process started under the episcopate of Alexander
(312–328) with the enlargement of the church of Theonas.235 It served
as episcopal church and residence and was situated inside the western city gate at the Via Canopica, i.e., the city’s main east-west
street. It continued with the conversion of the temple of Kronos (or
Saturn) in the eastern part of the city centre and its dedication to
St Michael. The conversion of the Kronos temple was followed by
the donation of the Caesarion or Sebasteion to the Church by
Constantius II and its transformation into the Great Church or
Patriarchal Cathedral under the Arian Bishop Gregory (339–345) in
a period when Athanasius (328–373) was exiled.236 Occupying the
Caesarion erected by Cleopatra VII and used for centuries as a temple for the cult of the emperor,237 the episcopal cathedral thus moved
from the western city gate into the centre of Alexandria—a highly
significant topographical shift not achieved in all centres of Christianity.238 It was now the Patriarchal Cathedral that received the
Bagnall 1993 217, 285 ff.; and, in general, Hunt 1998b 269 ff.
Haas 1997 232 ff.—For the aristocratic display of rank among the high clergy
cf. also D. Janes: God and Gold in Late Antiquity. Cambridge 1998 160 f.
234
For the textual evidence concerning early Christian Alexandria, see Gascou
1998. The very limited archaeological evidence is surveyed by B. Tkaczow:
Archaeological Sources for the Earliest Churches in Alexandria. in: Godlewski (ed.)
1990 431–435. See also A. Martin: Les premiers siècles du christianisme à Alexandrie.
Essai de topographie religieuse (IIIe–IVe siècles). Revue des études augustiniennes 30 (1984)
211–225. Cf. also Alston 2002 285 ff. and J. McKenzie: Glimpsing Alexandria from
Archaeological Evidence. JRA 16 (2003) 35–63.
235
Athanasius, Apol. ad Const. 15 (Szymusiak p. 104).—Theonas was bishop of
Alexandria in 282–300. The church was dedicated to the Virgin Mary. It is supposed that the mosque of Gamaa el-Gharbi (“of thousend columns”) in the district
of Minet el Bassal was built some time in the 9th–10th century on its site and from
its reused building material. The mosque was destroyed after the Napoleonic occupation of the city, Martin 1996b 165 note 29; cf. Tkaczow 1993 58 f.
236
Martin 1996b 165 f.
237
For the ancient descriptions of the building, see Adriani 1966 214 ff.; Pensabene
1993 5 f.; Pfrommer 1999 135 f.
238
It was not achieved in Rome but was done, e.g., in Aphrodisias, see R. Cormack:
232
233
88
chapter four
seafarer arriving in the Eastern Harbor. Yet pagan cult practice continued in the city: the Description of the Entire World written around
359–360 describes239
. . . a very great city, famous for her arrangement . . . [where] the gods
are devoutly worshipped, and the Temple of Serapis is there, the
unique and wonderful spectacle of the whole world; nowhere on earth
is to be found such a building or such symmetry of the temple or
such rites of worship. It seems that first place is adjugated to this temple in all countries.
The importance of paganism in fourth-century Alexandria is indicated by the statistical data preserved in the writings of the twelfthcentury patriarch of Antioch, Michael bar Elias.240 The Syriac Notitia
Urbis Alexandrinae lists the buildings of the five principal districts of
the city: in Quarter Alpha, 308 temples, 1,655 courts, 5,058 houses,
108 baths, 237 taverns, 112 porticoes; in Quarter Beta 110 temples,
1,002 courts, 5,990 houses, 145 baths, 107 taverns; in Quarter Gamma
855 temples, 955 courts, 2,140 houses, 205 taverns, 78 porticoes; in
Quarter Delta 800 temples, 1,120 courts, 5,515 houses, 118 baths,
178 taverns, 98 porticoes, and in Quarter Epsilon 405 temples, 1,420
courts, 5,593 houses, 118 taverns, and 56 porticoes.241 The 2,478
temples—enumerated, unfortunately, without any further specification—
in all probability also include small neighbourhood shrines as well
as private chapels.242 Continuing the tradition of the latter, private
shrines would also be established by Alexandrian Christians. E.g.,
one of the walls of the east-west oriented courtyard of House D in
the late antique habitation quarter excavated at the Kom el-Dikka
Byzantine Aphrodisias: Changing the Symbolic Map of a City. Proceedings of the
Cambridge Philological Society 216 (1990) 26–41; Haas 1997 210 f.—For the shift from
imperial fora and monuments to the churches as foci of ideologized urban space
in Constantinople, see F.A. Bauer: Urban Space and Ritual: Constantinople in Late
Antiquity. Acta IRN 15 (2001) 27–61.
239
J. Rougé (ed.): Expositio totius mundi et gentium. Paris 1966 35–37; Maas 2000
38 (trans. A.A. Vasiliev).—The view of P.M. Fraser: Byzantine Alexandria: Decline
and Fall. BSAA 45 (1993) 91–106 that intercommunal conflicts and Christian violence from the 3rd century contributed to a rapid “process of decay and change
by which the pagan city was gradually and painfully being transformed into ±
filÒxristow pÒliw” is contested, with good reason, by Heinen 1998b 60 ff.
240
P.M. Fraser: A Syriac Notitia Urbis Alexandrinae. JEA 37 (1951) 103–108; Haas
1997 140 ff.; Alston 2002 160 f.
241
Haas 1997 425 note 17; Alston 2002 161 Table 4.8.
242
Haas 1997 141.
89
was decorated in the first half (?) of the sixth century with a wall
painting representing the enthroned Virgin Mary with the Child, an
archangel and a patron (?).243
As in other great urban centres, Christian-polytheist and ChristianChristian coexistence was of a complex nature in Alexandria too.
Christian-polytheist relations were, of course, co-determined by the
course of changes in imperial religious policy from Julian to Theodosius
I as well as by conflicts within the Christian community.244 Shortly
after the accession of Julian the Apostate in 361, Alexandria’s pagan
mob captured Constantius II’s protegé the Arian Bishop George of
Cappadocia (356–361) together with the comes (army officer) Diodorus
and the praepositus monetae (director of the mint) Dracontius, tied ropes
to their feet and dragged them through Alexandria’s streets until
they died, and then, placing them on camels, carried the bodies to
the shore, burned them, and cast the ashes to the sea. The terrible
procedure was a traditional ritual of civic purgation.245 The murdering of George, who was the first church leader to direct an organized campaign against the polytheists of the city, was seemingly
condemned, yet actually left unpunished, by the Emperor Julian.246
The contemporary historian Ammianus Marcellinus247 clearly discerned the Arian-Orthodox controversy in the background of the
polytheist-Christian conflict.248 This controversy continued to dominate Alexandria’s political and religious scene during the reigns of
Constantius II, Julian, Jovian, and Valens and the episcopates of the
243
Rodziewicz 1984 194 ff., figs 226–236; for an impressive sociological analysis
of House D, see Haas 1997 189 ff.
244
Hunt 1998a; Hunt 1998b; Curran 1998.—For a survey of the evidence relating to religious violence in 4th–5th century Alexandria, see also Alston 2002
286 ff.
245
Haas 1997 291 ff.
246
Before George’s appointment as bishop of Alexandria (replacing Athanasius),
Julian used his famous library containing Christian writings as well as works of classical philosophy and oratory, and acquired it after George was killed in Alexandria,
see Julian, Epp. (Bidez) 106 f.; Hunt 1998a 45.
247
Ammianus Marcellinus, 22.11.
248
The controversy started when Arius, an Alexandrian presbyter (c. 250–336)
challenged the ecclesiastical authority of the Patriarch Alexander (312–328) around
318, widely publishing afterwards the points of their controversy and his doctrine
denying the concept of the Holy Trinity and Christ’s divinity. Cf. R.C. Hanson:
The Search for the Christian Doctrine of God: The Arian Controversy 318–381. Edinburgh
1988; M.R. Barnes – D.H. Williams (eds): Arianism after Arius: Essays on the Development
of the Fourth Century Trinitarian Conflicts. Edinburgh 1993.
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chapter four
Arian Gregory (339–345), George (356–361) and Lucius (367 and
373–378) and the Orthodox Athanasius (328–373) and Peter II
(373–380).249 Behind the mob which lynched George, Diodorus, and
Dracontius, however, also stood a united polytheist urban elite that
tried to defend the traditional status of the bouleutic class against
the growing influence of the patriarchs.
The next episode of Alexandria’s conversion represents an important milestone on the road of the Christianization of the entire polytheist world. After decades of toleration, on his accession in 380 the
Emperor Theodosius I issued an edict in which he defined orthodoxy as
the form of religion handed down by the apostle Peter to the Romans
and now followed by bishop Damasus [of Rome] and Peter of
Alexandria.250
From 384, Theodosius’ praetorian prefect of the Orient, Maternus
Cynegius, ordered the closing of several temples in the provinces
under his prefecture as a concerted action, also including Egypt,
which he visited twice (in 385 and 388).251 The destruction of the
temple of Serapis in 391252 under the patriarchate of Theophilus
(385–412), the successor of Peter II (373–380) who had been named
in Theodosius’ edict, demonstrated most dramatically that, against
all pagan fears and warnings, Egypt would not be annihilated if the
old gods ceased to be worshipped (cf. Chapter II.3).253 The downfall of the Serapeum (fig. 15)254 and the erection of a martyrium ded-
249
Athanasius was deposed on five (or more?) occasions by councils of eastern
bishops (in 335, 338, 339, 349, 351). He spent the years between 335–337 and
339–346 in exile in the west and between 356–363 in the Egyptian countryside.
For the eventful history of his episcopate and its political context, see T.D. Barnes:
Athanasius and Constantius: Theology and Politics in the Constantinian Empire. Cambridge,
Mass. 1993; Martin 1996a.
250
C.Th. XVI.1.2.
251
Zosimus, 4.37.3; Fowden 1978; Haas 1997 160 f.; Curran 1998 106.
252
Following the edict of June 16 391 of Theodosius, C.Th. XV.10, 11 addressed
to the Augustal Prefect Evagrius and the Count of Egypt, Romanus and prohibiting the access to the pagan temples.
253
Cf. Fowden 1993 44 f.; Haas 1997 159 ff.
254
Illustration from the Alexandrian World Chronicle, Moscow, Pushkin Museum,
Papyrus Goleniscev fol. 6v. A. Bauer – J. Strzygowski: Eine Aexandrinische Weltchronik.
Wien 1905 122, Pl. VI.—For the problems of the dating of the manuscript cf. O.
Kung: The Date of the Alexandrian World Chronicle. in: Kunsthistorische Forschungen
Otto Pächt zu seinem 70 Geburtstag. Salzburg 1972 17–22.
91
icated to St John the Baptist and a church above its ruins255 gave
impetus to the anti-pagan movement throughout the land. In Alexandria, Theophilus built nine churches in the town centre.256 The
destruction of the world-famous sanctuary not only marked the end
of official temple cults in Alexandria but also strengthened many local
bishops in their efforts directed at the closing of the temples in
their own bishoprics. The destruction of the “idols” heightened the
enthusiasm of the Christian masses, who were always ready for
violence in this period. Nevertheless, contrary to what was implied
in Rufinus’ rhetorical question257
After the fall of Serapis, could the sanctuaries of any other demon
remain standing?
polytheism and pagan cult practices were far from being completely
eradicated.258 The lifelong crusade of Shenoute—a contemporary of
St Augustine—against local cults, private worship259 and pagan religious practices provides ample evidence for the vitality of traditional
religiosity in fifth-century local communities.260 As already mentioned
in Chapter II.3, Shenoute was abbot of a famous monastery at Sohag
and the leader of a coenobitic community counting around 4,000
souls between the 380s and his death in 466.261 Describing the interactions of his monks with the local communities, his splendid sermons262 also depict the emergence of a new, Christian type of patron
who filled the gap caused by the decline and loss of the institutions
For the evidence, see Martin 1996b 169; Gascou 1998 33 ff.
Cf. Haas 1997 206 ff.
257
Rufinus, Hist. eccl. 2.28, quoted after Haas 1997 169.
258
Some papyrological data from Oxyrhynchos: the guards of a Thoeris shrine
were paid by the city council in 342, the latest mention of the Isis temple is from
the early Byzantine period, of the Hermaion from 328; the priests of Zeus are mentioned in 336, the Nemesis sanctuary in the 4th cent.; the Caesareum was converted around 406; the Capitolium is mentioned in the 4th cent. For references,
see Krüger 1990 101 ff.
259
On the evidence for private worship in Egypt and elsewhere in the 5th–6th
cent. cf. MacMullen 1997 61 f. with notes 98, 99; Frankfurter 1998 passim.
260
Frankfurter 1998 passim; and cf. also the different interpretations of Shenoute’s
activity by Trombley 1994 205 ff.; van der Vliet 1993 99 ff.
261
For the date cf. D.T. Frankfurter: Shenoute. in: Bowersock – Brown – Grabar
(eds) 1999 690 f.—L.P. Kirwan: Prelude to Nubian Christianity. in: Mélanges offerts
à Kazimierz Michalowski. Varsovie 1966 121–128 (reprinted in Kirwan 2002 Ch.
XVIII) 125, and, following him, Cruz-Uribe 2002 165 date Shenoute’s death to
c. 450–451.
262
Amélineau 1907–1914; van der Vliet 1993 99 ff.
255
256
92
chapter four
of traditional religion263—and they also illustrate the excesses of popular Christian anti-polytheism and the cruelty of anti-heresy.
As demonstrated by the philosophers’ community around the charismatic Alexandrian Neoplatonist teacher Hypatia (c. 355–415), the
style of pagan-Christian coexistence was not quite the same in more
elevated social and intellectual milieus. Hypatia was the daughter of
the mathematician Theon, the last attested member of the Museum.264
She attracted aristocratic pupils not only from Egypt but also from
other regions of the Mediterranean. Most of them were Christians:
two of them, the brothers Synesius and Evoptius, became bishops.
Synesius (c. 370–413)265—who studied with her between c. 393–395
or 398 and was a man who spoke “as a Christian in public but a
philospher in private”266—wrote a number of eloquent letters during
his short bishopric at Ptolemais (411 [?]–413) which not only attest
his lifelong admiration for Hypatia, whom he calls “mother, sister,
teacher, and withal benefactress” and “the true guide who presides
over the secret rites of philosophy” (!).267 The letters also portray a
pagan philosopher of extraordinary reputation who played an active
role in the civic life of Alexandria, “appeared in public in presence
of the magistrates”,268 acted as an influential patroness of her pupils,
and received civic honors. In the view of ancient as well as modern writers, it was Hypatia’s status and her influence on the elite
that provoked the jealousy of the Patriarch Cyril (412–444) whose
bishopric was characterised, with some simplification of the matter,
by the fifth-century church historian Socrates Scholasticus in these
words:269
. . . Cyril came into the possession of the episcopate with greater
power than Theophilus [his uncle and predecessor] had ever exercised.
Cf. Bagnall 1993 261 ff.
M. Dzielska: Hypatia of Alexandria. Cambridge, Mass. 1995.—For the Museum
in the Roman period, see Millar 1977 504 ff.
265
For Synesius of Cyrene, see D. Roques: Synésios de Cyrène et la Cyrénaïque du
Bas-Empire. Paris 1987; id.: Etudes sur la correspondance de Synésios de Cyrène. Bruxelles
1989 and cf. Bregman 1982; J.H.W.G. Liebeschuetz: Why Did Synesius Become
Bishop of Ptolemais? Byzantion 56 (1986) 180–195; Cameron, Averil 1991 127 ff.;
Hunt 1998b 269 f.
266
Bregman 1982 155; Cameron, Averil 1991 128.
267
Synesius, Epp. 16, 137, trans. A. Fitzgerald. Oxford 1926; for the citations,
see Haas 1997 309 f.
268
Socrates, Historia Ecclesiastica 7.15.
269
Socrates, Historia Ecclesiastica 7.7, quoted by Haas 1997 297. Cf. also Martin
1996b 164.
263
264
93
From that time the bishopric of Alexandria went beyond the limits of
sacerdotal functions, and assumed the administration of secular matters.
Hypatia as key figure of a party formed from polytheist and Christian
members of the Alexandrian elite was a powerful supporter of Orestes,
the Prefect of Egypt (attested around 413–415) in his attempts at
curbing the patriarchs’ increasing encroachment upon the authority
of the emperor and his provincial administration. This process proved
irreversible, however. By this time the patriarch had become the
most powerful person in Egypt. After the Council of Nicaea in 325,
he appointed the bishops not only in his patriarchate but also in
Libya and the Pentapolis (Cyrenaica), and his rank was equivalent
to that of the vicarii, i.e., the governors of the fourteen dioceses or
groups of provinces270—and inferior only to that of the praetorian
prefects,271 i.e., the highest officials of the Empire.272 In the early fifth
century his contemporaries were speaking of the patriarch of Alexandria
as the “new Pharaoh”.273
Led by a magistrate, the parabalani 274 of Cyril attacked Hypatia on
the street on a fateful day in 415. They dragged her to the Patriarchal
Cathedral where they tortured and killed her. Hypatia’s mutilated
body was burnt on a pyre and her ashes were thrown into the sea:275
the Christian fanatics repeated the same pagan rites of civic purgation which were performed in 361 by the murderers of Bishop
George. The prefect was helpless, and the minimal sanctions ordered
by the emperor after the terrible murder which
brought considerable reproach, not only upon Cyril, but also upon the
whole Alexandrian church276
and the subsequent rescinding of the sanctions signalled equally the
advent of a new age in which it was “the virtues of orthodox Christian
270
Cf. Kelly 1998 166.
Cf. Barnish – Lee – Whitby 2000 174 f.
272
Bowman 1986 48.
273
Isidorus of Pelusium, Ep. 1,152; Leo the Great, Ep. 120.2; quoted by Haas
1997 10.
274
Originally lay brethren, ecclesiastical hospital orderlies who frequently acted
by this time, however, as a sort of paramilitary force.
275
For the evidence and its interpretation, see Haas 1997 307 ff.; C. Zuckerman:
Comtes et ducs en Égypte autour de l’an 400 et la date de la Notitia Dignitatum
Orientis. Antiquité Tardive 6 (1998) 137–147 141 f.
276
Socrates, Historia Ecclesiastica 7.15, quoted by Haas 1997 314.
271
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chapter four
piety” that were considered “the guarantors of the safety and prosperity of the state”.277
Cyril not only succeeded in striking a tremendous, though still not
final, blow at Alexandrian polytheism but also shattered the structure of elite patronage uniting pagans and Christians. The murder
of Hypatia made it definitely clear that now “the balance of power
in Alexandria had shifted to the Christian community”.278 In more
general terms, it was also a significant episode of the process observed
in the cities of the East as well as the West from the early fifth century,279 viz., the decline of the bodies of self-government and the
concentration of power in the hands of groups of powerful notables
for whom, as absentee landlords, the landed estates were run by
agents and stewards.280 The power of the patriarch of Alexandria in
municipal administration is well-attested. By contrast, other bishops
occur only rarely in connection with civic affairs.281 The relative
silence of the papyri is compensated to an extent by other types of
evidence such as, e.g., the architectural remains of the episcopal complex at Hermopolis Magna, which present a useful illustration of the
power, wealth, and civic role of fifth-century Egyptian bishops (see
Chapter VI.3).
Strongholds of religious and intellectual polytheism continued to
exist in the countryside, however, as it is impressively demonstrated,
e.g., by fifth-century Panopolis (modern Akhmim). The same kind
of polytheist-Christian intellectual coexistence which we have seen
in the case of Hypatia’s school is indicated by the work of Nonnos
of Panopolis282 who, besides his monumental Dionysiaca, written in
277
R.C. Blockley: The Dynasty of Theodosius. in: CAH XIII 111–137 134.
Haas 1997 316. For Alexandrian polytheism in the remaining part of the 5th
cent., see ibid. 327 ff.
279
Liebeschuetz 2000 207 ff.
280
Gascou 1985; Liebeschuetz 2000 222 ff.; Keenan 2000 622 ff.
281
Liebeschuetz 2000 217 ff.—For the changes in the structure of the Egyptian
province—the division of Aegyptus into Aegyptus and Thebais, and then Aegyptus,
Thebais, and Libya; the subsequent division into Augustamnica consisting of the
eastern Delta and the old Heptanomia, Aegyptus including the western Delta and
Alexandria, Libya consisting of Pentapolis and Libya Inferior (2nd third of the 4th
cent.); the creation of six provinces, viz., Libya Superior, Libya Inferior, Thebaid,
Aegyptus, Arcadia, Augustamnica (turn of the 4th cent.)—and for changes in the
administrative structure, see B. Palme: Praesides und correctores der Augustamniaca. AnTard
6 (1998) 123–135; Keenan 2000 612 ff.
282
Bowersock 1990 41 ff.
278
95
neo-Homeric hexameters,283 also published a verse paraphrase of the
gospel according to St John in the middle decades of the fifth century.284 Another remarkable son of fifth-century Panopolis was the
poet Pamprepius, a pupil of Proclus, the celebrated Athenian Neoplatonist. As a boy, he may well have encountered the great enemy of
paganism, the charismatic abbot Shenoute on the streets of his native
Panopolis.285 A zealous pagan, Pamprepius nevertheless had a distinguished diplomatic career and became a courtier of Zeno in
Constantinople before he became involved in 484 in the conspiracy
of Illus against the emperor.286
In contrast, the contemporary Panopolitan poet Cyrus was a
Christian. He wrote poetry using motifs drawn from Homer and
Virgil, served from 439 as praetorian prefect and prefect of Constantinople, and became bishop of Cotyaeum in Phrygia.287 Many
other fifth-century Egyptian poets and philosophers with Nonnos’
and Pamprepius’ education, intellectual profile and social connections could be mentioned,288 among them the members of the remarkable group identified by Alan Cameron as “wandering Egyptian
poets”.289 Their popularity in Egypt (it seems that Egyptians were
still “mad on poetry”290) indicates the adherence to elements of
Classical education which is of course not necessarily equal to an
adherence to polytheist religion.291 While almost all these poets were
polytheists, they worked in various parts of the Empire for and praising Christians, and their work exerted a considerable influence on
the development of Christian literature.292
283
W.H.D. Rouse: Nonnos Dionysiaca I–III. London-Cambridge/Mass. 1956–1963;
for the new Budé edition, see F. Vian – P. Chauvin et al.: Nonnos de Panopolis Les
Dionysiaques I–X. Paris 1976–1997. For Nonnos, see Bowersock 1990 41 ff.; J. Sirinelli:
Les enfants d’Alexandre. La littérature et la pensée grecques (331 av. J.-C.–519 ap. J.-C.).
Paris 1993 538 ff.
284
E. Livrea (ed.): Nonno di Panopoli, Parafrasi del Vangelo di S. Giovanni, Canto XVIII.
Napoli 1989. Against Nonnos’ authorship: L.F. Sherry, Byzantion 66 (1996) 409–430.
285
Van der Vliet 1993 100.
286
For Proclus and Pamprepius, see Sheppard 2000 837 ff.
287
For his work, see Cameron, Alan 1982; Bowersock 1990 63 ff.; Sheppard
2000 850.
288
Sheppard 2000 843 ff.
289
Cameron, Alan: Wandering Poets: A Literary Movement in Byzantine Egypt.
Historia 14 (1965) 470–509.
290
Thus Eunapius (347–c. 414) in his Lives of Philosophers and Sophists, quoted by
Bowersock 1990 61.
291
Cameron, Alan 1982 287.
292
Bowersock 1990 61 ff.
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chapter four
The Horapollon family, which, similarly to Nonnos and Pamprepius,
originated from the Panopolite nome deserves special mention here.293
One of the sons of the elder Horapollon, Asclepiades, was priest of
an Egyptian temple, the other, Heraiscus, a philosopher in Alexandria.
Heraiscus was a devotee of the Egyptian and Hellenic gods and
when he died as a young man in the late 480s he was buried by
his brother Asclepiades according to what Asclepiades considered
traditional Egyptian rites.294 The intense interest of the brothers in
Egyptian cults and sacred texts was also inherited by Asclepiades’
son, the younger Horapollon, author of the famous Hieroglyphica.295
Horapollon’s pathetic incompetence in the interpretation of the hieroglyphic signs highlights a characteristic aspect of late antique Hellenism, viz., the manner in which local, “national”, traditions were
reemphasized as a consequence of intellectual conflicts in a mixed
polytheist-Christian milieu and incorporated into the supra-national
Hellenistic tradition at a point of time when their original meaning
already had become blurred and irrelevant.296
The mid-fifth century not only witnessed the struggle between
polytheists and Christians, between partisans of traditional administration and supporters of the power of the bishop in civic matters,
but also saw the violent fight for supremacy in the eastern church
between the Patriarchs Theophilus, Cyril, and Dioscorus of Alexandria
on the one side and Chrysostom and Nestorius of Constantinople,
on the other. Nestorius’ adversary Cyril appeared at the First Council
of Ephesos in 431 with his parabalani and other rowdy supporters
and intimidated the participants of the council and Nestorius’ supporters so much so that the council accepted the Monophysite doc-
293
For the evidence concerning the family and for illuminating analyses of the
work of its members, see Bowersock 1990 56 ff. and Haas 1997 128 ff., 171 f.
294
Damascius, fr. 174 (Zintzen); Fowden 1986/1993 184 ff.; for the burial, see
also Wrede 1981 31 f.
295
Horapollon, Hieroglyphica. Ed. F. Sbordone. Napoli 1940; G. Boas (trans.): The
Hieroglyphics of Horapollo. Princeton 1993. For the afterlife of Horapollo’s work, see
J. Assmann: Moses the Egyptian. The Memory of Egypt in Western Monotheism. Cambridge,
Mass.-London 1997.
296
For the case of the hieroglyphic writing cf. H. Sternberg-el Hotabi: Der
Untergang der Hieroglyphenschrift. Schriftverfall und Schrifttod in Ägypten der
griechisch-römischen Welt. CdE 69 (1994) 218–248.—For Demotic cf. N. Lewis:
The Demise of the Demotic Document: When and Why. JEA 79 (1993) 276–281.
Cruz-Uribe 2002 explains the end of the use of Demotic as a consequence of the
closing of the temple of Philae between the middle of 535 and late 537.
97
trine of Christ’s one nature, understanding Christ’s humanity as absorbed
after his birth into his divinity.297 The result was a schism between
the patriarchates of Alexandria and Antioch. The Second Council
of Ephesos in 449—called “the Robber Council” by Pope Leo the
Great—chaired by the Alexandrian Patriarch Dioscorus (444–451),
approved Cyril’s doctrine in a simplified yet extreme form which
was based on the teaching of the influential Constantinopolitan archimandrite Eutyches, enemy of Nestorius and supporter of Cyril.298
However, the Council of Chalcedon,299 which was called together by
the Emperor Marcian one year after the death of Theodosius II
(who initially supported Nestorius and then Eutyches300), on October
25, 451 declared the doctrine of Christ’s two natures inviolably united
in one person without confusion, division, separation or change
(“Dyophysitism”).301 Under tumultuous circumstances, the Council
condemned the Christological doctrine declared at the two Councils
of Ephesos, and deposed Dioscorus.302
2.5. Early Byzantine Egypt
As to its political, social and cultural consequences, the significance
of the Monophysite versus Chalcedonian/Orthodox (Dyophysite) controversy is usually overestimated in the literature. The traditional
view according to which Egyptian society was divided along a line
of disjuncture between Greeks = Dyophysites representing the interests of a “foreign” government and Egyptians (Copts) = Monophysites
representing “nationalist” interests and a “national” culture cannot
be justified, either303 (cf. Chapter II.1–4). Monophysitism in the East
297
J.A. McGuckin: Cyril of Alexandria. The Christological Controversy: Its History, Theology,
and Texts. Leiden 1994; D.W. Winkler: Monophysites. in: Bowersock – Brown –
Grabar (eds) 1999 586–588; Allen 2000 811 ff.
298
J.M. Gaddis: Eutyches. in: Bowersock – Brown – Grabar (eds) 1999 438 f.;
Allen 2000 812 ff.
299
A. Grillmeier – H. Bacht (eds): Das Konzil von Chalkedon I–II. Würzburg 1953;
Allen 2000 814.
300
Lee 2000a 37 ff.
301
For the text of the doctrine (Definition of the Faith, Council of Chalcedon),
see R.A. Norris (ed. trans.): The Christological Controversy. Philadelphia 1980 156 f.;
Maas 2000 128 f.
302
For the political background of Dioscorus’ deposition, see Haas 1997 316 f.
303
See first of all Bowman 1986 50 ff.; E. Wipszycka: Le nationalisme a-t-il existé
dans l’Égypte byzantine? Journal of Juristic Papyrology 22 (1992) 83–128; Bagnall 1993
250 ff.; Martin 1996a; Heinen 1998a 51 f.
98
chapter four
was not restricted to Egypt, and it received quasi-official support
from the Empress Theodora in the reign of Justinian I (527–565).304
Of course, Egypt’s contacts with imperial authority were maintained
most unproblematically through the Chalcedonian/Orthodox community, yet the existence of the Monophysite church and the growth
of the social and economic importance of the Monophysite monasteries was not violently restricted. It is worth noting that by the 540s
there were about forty churches in the city of Oxyrhynchos305 and
about forty monasteries in and around the village of Aphrodito in
Upper Egypt (see below).
Between 452 and 457 the see of Alexandria was occupied by a
Chalcedonian patriarch (Proterius) who was murdered when the news
of Marcian’s death reached Alexandria. He was replaced by a
Monophysite (Timothy II Aelurus [457–477]). Between 457 and 538
it was only possible to impose two Chalcedonian patriarchs with the
help of military force (Timothy Salophacialos 460–482, John Talaia
482), who occupied the see parallelly with a Monophysite patriarch.
It was only from 538 until the Arab conquest that separate Monophysite and Orthodox (Dyophisite) patriarchates existed.306
After Chalcedon, imperial religious policy worked towards restoring harmony.307 In order to consolidate his hold on the East, the
Emperor Zeno (474–491) sought to eliminate the controversy between
Monophysites and Chalcedonians by supporting the theological formula of union known as the Henotikon.308 Interpreting the Henotikon
propagandistically as an anti-Chalcedonian formula, the Monophysite
patriarch of Alexandria, Peter III Mongus (477–490), succeeded in
uniting the Alexandrian church temporarily.309
The destruction of the pagan cult at Menouthis near Alexandria310
by the same patriarch in 484311 was directed against paganism just
304
305
59 f.
Allen 2000 822 ff.—For Monophysitism, see especially Frend 1972.
Timm 1984–1992 I 287 ff.; Krüger 1990 14, in the Oxyrhynchite nome:
Müller 1981 327 ff.
Allen 2000 815 ff.; Lee 2000a 51 f.
308
Evagrius, Historia Ecclesiastica 111.14; Frend 1972 360 ff.; Lee 2000a 50 ff.;
and cf. R. Lim: Christian Triumph and Controversy. in: Bowersock – Brown –
Grabar 1999 196–218 207 f.
309
Haas 1997 322 ff.; Lee 2000a 50 ff.; Hall 2000 733 f.
310
R. Herzog: Der Kampf um den Kult von Menuthis. in: Pisciculi. Festschrift
F. J. Dölger. Münster 1939 117–124; Frankfurter 1998 40 f., 162 ff.
311
Wipszycka 1988 138 ff.
306
307
99
as much as against the remaining political power of the polytheist
elite in Alexandria. The destruction of the pilgrimage centre at the
Isis temple of Menouthis312 and the burning in the marketplace of
the “idols” and cult objects captured there triggered the collection
of pagan cult images from public baths and private houses in
Alexandria and their public destruction.313 It took, however, another
fifty years until the last stronghold of paganism, the temple of Isis
at Philae in the remote southern frontier region of Egypt, could
finally be closed on the order of Justinian.314
Apart from the survival of magical practices and popular beliefs
(cf. Chapter IX.1.1), 315 Egypt could now be regarded as fully
Christianized. The urban as well as the rural landscape was dominated everywhere by the churches and monasteries built in the course
of the fifth and sixth centuries.316 We have already touched upon
the changes in Alexandria’s urban landscape. Here I also mention
the case of Hermopolis Magna (Ashmunein) where by the second
half of the fifth century the city centre was dominated by the monumental episcopal basilica complex erected on the site of pagan sanctuaries which were closed only shortly before the building of the
Christian shrine (cf. Chapter VI.3).317
The Monophysite and Orthodox patriarchs of Alexandria competed with each other in asceticism and holiness: at the same time,
however, equally important criteria for the nomination to the patriarchate were the protection of and eventually the family relationship
with the predecessor and the social status and wealth of the candidate’s
312
For the highly remarkable replacement of the healing shrine of Isis by the
church of the martyrs SS Cyrus and John which had similar functions, see Cyril’s
orations, Cyril. Alex., Oratiunculae tres 2, 3 (PG 77 1102Bf, 1105A); MacMullen 1997
123 ff.; D. Montserrat: Pilgrimage to the Shrine of SS Cyrus and John at Menouthis
in Late Antiquity. in: Frankfurter (ed.) 1998 257–279.
313
Zachariah of Mytilene, Vita Sev. 33; Haas 1997 328 f., 475 f. note 118.
314
At some time between the middle of 535 and late 537: Procopius, Wars
1.19.36; for the date, see P. Nautin: La conversion du temple de Philae en église
chrétienne. Cah. Arch. 17 (1967) 1–43. For the historical context cf. FHN III 1179
ff. and cf. Kákosy 1995 2944 ff.
315
Cf., e.g., A.M. Kropp: Ausgewählte koptische Zaubertexte I–III. Bruxelles 1930;
L. Kákosy: Survivals of Ancient Egyptian Gods in Coptic and Islamic Egypt. in:
Godlewski (ed.) 1990 175 – 177; Buschhausen – Horak – Harrauer 1995 51 ff.
316
For the integration of the monasteries with the life of the cities cf. J. Seiber:
Early Byzantine Urban Saints (British Archaeological Reports Supplementary Series 37). Oxford
1977.
317
Wace – Megaw – Skeat 1959; Grossmann 1998a 216 f.
100
chapter four
family. The patriarchs commanded enormous financial resources
already as early as the early fifth century.318 E.g., at the First Council
of Ephesos Cyril distributed gifts totalling half a ton of gold, 117
luxurious rugs, 32 ivory chairs and stools (for the list of Cyril’s bribes
see Chapter VIII.5). By the late sixth century, the Monophysite
patriarchs of Alexandria belonged to the wealthiest men of the
empire.319 The early seventh-century Patriarchs Anastasius (605–616)
and Andronicus (616–622) came from aristocratic families associated
with civic government. Anastasius was himself a former member of
the boule of Alexandria. The famous Chalcedonian Patriarch John
the Almsgiver (609–619) came from a Cypriote landowner’s family
and was nominated to the patriarchate by his half-brother, a patricius and dux, governor of Egypt.320
Though it remains so far archaeologically unattested, textual evidence from the sixth century indicates a process that is also prominent in other provinces of the East, viz., the emergence of large
villages with institutions of self-government.321 The remarkable features of such a village322 are reflected in the evidence concerning
Aphrodito, once a nome capital, in the nome of Antaiopolis in the
Thebaid. The place is known from the documents preserved in the
archives of the lawyer and poet Flavius Dioscorus (b. around 520,
d. after 585).323 Descendant of an Egyptian family,324 son of Apollos,
318
Haas 1997 247 ff.—For the financial position of the patriarch and the economic activities of the Church from the late 4th cent., see Hardy 1931 44 ff., A.C.
Johnson – L. West: Byzantine Egypt: Economic Studies. Princeton 1949 66 ff.; Martin
1996b 163; Wipszycka 1972; E. Wipszycka: L’économie du patriarcat alexandrin à
travers les vies de saint Jean l’Aumônier. in: Décobert (ed.) 2002 61–81 and cf.
G.R. Monks: The Church of Alexandria and the Economic Life of the City in the
Sixth Century. Speculum 28 (1953) 349–362; M.J. Hollerich: The Alexandrian Bishop
and the Grain Trade: Ecclesiastical Commerce in Late Roman Egypt. JESHO 25
(1983) 187–207.
319
On the enormous amount of gold found in the bishop’s residence by John
the Almsgiver on his accession, see Life of John the Almsgiver 45 in: E. Dawes – N.H.
Baynes: Three Byzantine Saints. London-Oxford 1948.
320
Haas 1997 218 f.
321
Bagnall 1993 290 ff., 300 ff.; Liebeschuetz 2000 216 f.
322
For a description of the village and its surroundings on the basis of Dioscorus’
archive, see Keenan 2000 635 f.
323
For the evidence, see J.G. Keenan: The Aphrodito Papyri and Village Life
in Byzantine Egypt. BSAC 26 (1984) 51–63; MacCoull 1988 5 ff.
324
His earliest attested ancestor was in the mid-5th cent. the “old man Psimanobet”
whose name means “son of the gooseherd”, P. Lond. V 1691.15–16, cf. MacCoull
1988 1 ff.
101
a wealthy landowner and protokometes (village headman) of Aphrodito,
Dioscorus was educated in philosophy, rhetoric, and law. Before his
death, Apollos founded a monastery in 547 and appointed his son
Dioscorus as its lay curator (frontistÆw). Apollos’ monastery of “HolyChrist-Bearing-Apostles” was one of the many similar foundations
that played a significant role in the life of the land.325 By 543 Dioscorus
appears as scholasticus, using thus a title referring both to his legal
qualification and eloquence.326 From 547 he held the former office
of his father in which role he appeared at the imperial court in 511
to defend the right of Aphrodito to the self-collection of taxes (autopragia).327 Dioscorus’ library included works of Homer, Aristophanes,
Menander, and Anacreon.328 His own writings—which include legal
documents, business contracts, a Greek-Coptic glossary and Greek
poems, mainly epithalamia or nuptial poems329—reflect the education
of a bilingual intellectual who combined Hellenic and Christian literary traditions and motifs in an autonomous manner. They do not
leave any doubt, however, that Dioscorus was a good Christian, in
all probability a Monophysite.330 It is highly significant, however, that
one cannot find hints at the confessional position even in such a
rich documentation associated with a person of an outstanding civic
activity.331 In view of the education of these intellectuals and the
continuity of Hellenism in the arts and architecture of the subsequent
centuries, as it will be demonstrated in later chapters of this book
325
J.P. Thomas: Private Religious Foundations in the Byzantine Empire. Washington
1987 64, 73; Keenan 2000 634.—For Apollos’ monastery as an Eastern variant of
the early medieval Western Eigenkloster, see Ward-Perkins 2000 338 f.
326
Barnish – Lee – Whitby 2000 178.
327
For the papyrological evidence, see Keenan 2000 634.
328
For these papyri, see Keenan 2000 635.
329
For the reevaluation of the poems, which were characterised earlier as the
worst ever Greek poems, see now MacCoull 1988 57 ff.; Bowersock 1990 66 f.; C.
Kuehn: Channels of Imperishable Fire: The Beginnings of Christian Mystical Poetry and Dioscorus
of Aphrodito. New York 1995; J.-L. Fournet: Un nouvel épithalame de Dioscore
d’Aphrodité adressé à un gouverneur civil de Thébaïde. AnTard 6 (1998) 65–82;
Keenan 2000 635.
330
His confession may also be indicated indirectly by the fact that Aphrodito
enjoyed the special protection of the “divine house” of the empress Theodora, cf.
Keenan 2000 635 with note 119.
331
MacCoull 1988 151; Bagnall 1993 305 f.—For the issue cf. also C.D.G. Müller:
Die koptische Kirche zwischen Chalkedon und dem Arabereinmarsch. Zeitschrift für
Kirchengeschichte 85 (1964) 271–308; M.P. Roncaglia: La chiesa copta dopo il Concilio
di Chalcedonia: monofisismo nominale? Rendiconti Ist. Lomb. 102 (1968) 493–514.
102
chapter four
(see Chapters VI, VIII, IX), the dichotomy “Hellenism/Christianity”
as formulated, e.g., by Richard Alston, seems quite unjustified:
Hellenism as a mass cultural movement came to an end, as did the
institutional infrastructure that had supported the Roman city. Pagan
Hellenism became more and more the preserve of a narrow intellectual elite and Christianity triumphed as an integrating and genuinely
popular social movement.332
Dioscorus’ documents reveal that there were about forty monasteries in and around Aphrodito by the middle of the sixth century,
including also Apollos’ foundation.333 Such a dominant monastic presence may well have been characteristic for the whole country. Many
of the monasteries possessed libraries and scriptoria.334 Before the
mid-fifth century, in the first great period of Coptic literature, the
texts studied in the monasteries—the Bible and Apocrypha, patristic and homiletic works, monastic literature; texts written for use in
liturgy, public worship and private devotion, instruction; further magical texts—had been translations from Greek and other languages.335
The period after the Council of Chalcedon saw the emergence of
an original Coptic literature. The creation of the Coptic literary tradition owes much to the great monastic leader Shenoute, whose
Coptic sermons follow, paradoxically, the rules of Greek rhetoric.336
Yet the basic fact should not be ignored that Coptic literacy and
Coptic literature were created in a bilingual, Greek and Coptic, elite
intellectual milieu.337 It must also be realized that bilingualism was
332
Alston 2002 285.
MacCoull 1988 7.
334
M. Krause: Libraries. CE V 1447–1450; Krause 1998b 172 f.; for the papyri
from the library of the Pachomian monastery at Pabau (Coptic Phbow, modern
Faww Qibli), also including mss. of Homer, Iliad Books 5, 6; Menander, Samia,
Dyskolos, Aspis; Cicero, Ad Catilinam etc., see the series Papyrus Bodmer I–XXIX. KölnGenève 1954–1984; J.M. Robinson: The First Christian Monastic Library. in:
Godlewski (ed.) 1990 371–378.
335
See Smith 1998. For education in the monasteries cf. Cribiore 2001 24 f.,
177.
336
For the character of Shenoute’s literary work, see first of all van der Vliet
1993 and Smith 1998 728 f.
337
Bagnall 1993 321 ff.—For another late 6th–early 7th-cent. aristocrat of Hellenic
education, see the documents of Flavius Strategius (“pseudo-Strategius III”), from
a collateral line of the Apion family, an honorary consul and patrician, pagarch of
the Arsinoite and Theodosiopolite pagarchy: cf. B. Palme: Die domus gloriosa des
Flavius Strategius Paneuphemos. Chiron 27 (1997) 95–125; Heinen 1998a 54; Keenan
2000 628.
333
103
common not only in educated urban milieus but also in rural areas.338
Many of the authors of Coptic church histories, theological works,
monastic histories and vitae composed in the sixth and seventh centuries lived in wealthy monasteries in and around Alexandria and
in Upper Egypt.339 An important aspect of the learning accumulated
in some monasteries is highlighted, e.g., by the copying of Homer
in the truly humble buildings of the Monastery of Epiphanios at
Thebes.340 The History of the Monks in Egypt341 and other sources
describe large and prosperous monastic communities running great
landed estates and manufactures, securing employment for the local
peasantry, acting as patrons of the local communities, offering charity and mediating in intercommunal conflicts.342
The immovable and movable properties of the congregational
churches should neither be underestimated.343 Some preserved inventories attest the existence of church libraries: a fifth- or sixth-century
Greek inventory summarily mentions twenty-one books on parchment and three books on papyrus owned by a church in the village
of Ibion in the Apollonopolite nome.344 The inventory is worth quoting
in its entirety:
Silver cups 3[ ,] silver jug 1[ ,] curtains 2[ ,] iron rod 1[ ,] small one
of the same 1[ ,] marble tabletop 1[,] bronze tripod for the tabletop
1[ ,] linen cloths for the table 23[ ,] woollen cloths 5[ ,] door curtains
6[ ,] old one of the same 1[ ,] woollen hanging 1[ ,] cloth hanging
1[ ,] bronze lampstands 4[ ,] iron lampstands 2[ ,] bronze altar 1[ ,]
bronze altar 1[ ,]bronze basin 1[ ,] bronze flask 1[ ,] bronze baptismal
fonts 2[ ,] lamps 6[ ,] wicks 6[ ,] bronze boat-shaped lamps 4[ ,] wicks
4[ ,] parchment books 21[ ,] papyrus books 3[ ,] cup 1[ ,] ladle 1[ ,]
knife 1[ ,] bier 1[ ,] wooden table 1[ ,] leather cushions 2[ ,] censer
C.D.G. Müller: Die alte koptische Predigt. Darmstadt 1954; id.: Die Engellehre der
koptischen Kirche. Wiesbaden 1959; Müller 1981 329 f.; Orlandi 1998 133 ff.
340
K. Treu: Antike Literatur im byzantinischen Ägypten im Lichte der Papyri.
Byzantinoslavica 47 (1986) 1–7 3. For the monastery and its finds, see Winlock –
Crum 1926–1933/1973.
341
A.-J. Festugière (ed.): Historia Monachorum in Aegypto. Bruxelles 1961; B. Ward –
N. Russell (trans.): The Lives of the Desert Fathers. The History of the Monks in Egypt.
London-Kalamazoo 1981.
342
Bowman 1986 129; Rousseau 2000 760 ff.
343
For their real estate, see Wipszycka 1972.
344
P.Grenf. 2.111, B.P. Grenfell – A.S. Hunt: New Classical Fragments and Other Greek
and Latin Papyri. Oxford 1897 no. 111; A.S. Hunt – C.C. Edgar: Select Papyri I.
London-New York 1932 no. 192; cf. van Minnen 1992 228 f.
338
339
104
chapter four
1[ ,] wooden chairs 3[ ,] benches 2[ ,] triple weaving web 1[ ,] cupboard 1[ ,] bronze vessel 1.345
An incompletely preserved Greek inventory from the seventh or
eighth century presents the more detailed catalogue of a library kept
in an episcopal (?) church.346 Among Biblical, hagiographical, and
theological works, further collections of the “sayings of the fathers”
(Apophtegmata) and sermons, we also find there a rather surprising secular title, namely, the biography of the empress Galla Placidia “during her reign” (425–450).
It was pointed out by James Keenan347 that the “vitality, activity
and variety” characterizing the social and economic life of sixth-century Aphrodito as it appears in the documents from Dioscorus’ archive
is also prevalent in other contemporary communities such as, e.g.,
Hermopolis and Syene (modern Aswan).348 Keenan also adds the
important detail that, as shown by an eighth-century archive from
Aphrodito containing the correspondence between the district pagarch
(headman of a nome subdistrict) Flavius Basilius and the Arab governor of Egypt, Greek literacy was maintained on a good level by
the elite of the village until it had to give way to Arabic as the
official language of administration.349
As opposed to earlier interpretations of the textual and archaeological evidence concerning the social and economic situation of
Egypt’s cities and villages, the early Byzantine period was not a
period of general decline.350 It seems now that, e.g., the large village of Karanis in the Fayum, a settlement well-known from the
345
Lee 2000b 233 f.
Van Minnen 1992 228 ff.
347
Keenan 2000 636 f.
348
For the archives of Taurinus and Patermuthis, see the literature in Keenan
2000 636 note 125.
349
N. Abbott: The Kurrah Papyri from Aphrodito in the Oriental Institute. Chicago 1938;
T.G. Wilfong: The Non-Muslim Communities: The Christians. in: C.F. Petry (ed.):
The Cambridge History of Egypt I. Islamic Egypt: From the Arab Invasion to the Ottoman
Conquest (641–1517). Cambridge 1998 175–197.
350
For the context of this issue, see recently M. Whittow: Ruling the Late Roman
and Early Byzantine City: A Continuous History. Past and Present 129 (1990) 3–29;
L. Lavan (ed.): Recent Research in Late-Antique Urbanism ( JRA Supplementary Series 42).
Portsmouth, Rhode Island 2001, see esp. L. Lavan: The Late-Antique City: A
Bibliographic Essay 9–26; The Uses and Abuses of the Concept of ‘Decline’ in
Later Roman History or, Was Gibbon Politically Incorrect 233–245 (with responses
by Averil Cameron, B. Ward-Perkins, M. Whittow, L. Lavan).
346
105
publication of the University of Michigan excavations conducted
there,351 was not abandoned in the fifth century, as believed earlier,
but remained prosperous well into the sixth century, as it is shown
by imported fine pottery wares and amphorae from the site.352 While
papyrological evidence indicates that urban life at Oxyrhynchos preserved some of its Hellenistic-Byzantine features in the early seventh
century,353 by this time the principal scene of civic life definitely
shifted everywhere from the agora to the church:354
The church had become the locus of more informal, commonplace
contacts among members of the same ethno-religious community. The
easygoing manner in which these Alexandrian Christians355 drifted in
and out of church services in order to catch up on a gossip, meet a
friend, or consummate a business deal resembles patterns of Mediterranean worship common alike to classical pagan sanctuaries and to
modern expressions of Mediterranean Christianity and Judaism.
Sixth- and early seventh-century documents also show that the large
estates owned by the “pious houses”, i.e., the ecclesiastical institutions and the “glorious houses”, i.e., the great aristocratic families,
continued to function as
to a considerable degree public, rather than private, entities. The cities
allocated to wealthy landowners a share of the responsibility for collecting the taxes owed not merely on their own land but on much
else; this represented a permanent institutionalization of the liturgical
role that these families played in the fourth century. They collected
taxes, paid expenses, and transmitted the amount due to the government. They performed various compulsory services on behalf of the
city and, in effect, were departments of the city government.356
The Church as well as the landholding elite with their estates scattered
through several nomes were motors that drove a vertical integration
in the land. The process is summarized thus by Roger Bagnall:357
351
E.M. Husselman: Karanis Excavations of the University of Michigan in Egypt 1928–1935.
Topography and Architecture. Ann Arbor 1979.
352
N. Pollard: The Chronology and Economic Condition of Late Roman Karanis:
An Archaeological Reassessment. JARCE 35 (1998) 147–162.
353
Krüger 1990 143.
354
Haas 1997 227 f.
355
I.e., Alexandrians described in the Life of John the Almsgiver as “leaving the
church as soon as the Gospel had been read to spend their time in idle talk instead
of prayer”, Leont., V. Jo. Eleem. 42.
356
Bagnall 1993 159 f.; cf. Gascou 1985.
357
Bagnall 1993 316 ff.; cf. also J. Banaji: Agrarian History and the Labour
106
chapter four
. . . the [local] clergy . . . had a direct link to outside power, being the
direct subordinates of and appointees of the bishop of the metropolis . . . Because bishops were themselves appointed by the bishop of
Alexandria, a village priest had only one intermediate step between
himself and one of the great notables of the country . . . The patriarch,
as he sought to mold the behavior of the population after the teachings of the church, had powerful machinery at his disposal, of a kind
never before seen in Egypt . . . A second kind of vertical integration
was perhaps equally important, the influence in villages of large landowners who lived most of the time in the city . . . And yet they were a
presence, physically represented often by their epoikia [hamlets] and
legally by their business agents . . . The entire apparatus linked the villagers to the seat of wealth . . . Both longstanding Roman ideology and
the teachings of the church pushed the notables to use their power
for the benefit of their dependents . . . The integration of the villages
into the city economy and society certainly contributed to the dynamic
and diverse character the latter possessed, and it conformed Egypt
much more closely to the prevailing mode of social and economic
organization of the eastern empire.
From the aspect of Egypt’s culture in the early Byzantine period,
the “horizontal integration” of the large landlords into the governing elite of the empire was equally significant. A splendid illustration is provided by the Apion family.358 The earliest attested member
of the family is recorded to have enlarged his estates in the midfifth century through moneylending, which he practiced similarly to
many high-ranking office-holders in the Empire, who were able to
accumulate cash reserves thanks to the high level of extraction of
revenues in gold from their landed estates.359 Under Anastasius’ reign
(491–518) Apion I (attested 497–533 [?])360 participated in the Persian
campaign of 503 in the role of “quartermaster-general”. After years
of disfavour, he was appointed Praetorian Prefect of the Orient in
518 by the new Emperor Justin I (518–527). Apion I’s son Strategius
I (attested 497–538) appears in 497 as comes devotionum domesticorum,
Count of the Devoted Domestics; and around 523 as Prefect of
Egypt. In 532 he presided over a synod of Orthodox and Monophysite
Organization of Byzantine Large Estates. in: A. Bowman – E. Rogan (eds): Land,
Settlement and Agriculture in Egypt from Pharaonic to Modern Times. London 1997; WardPerkins 2000 336 ff.
358
For the papyrological evidence, see Hardy 1931; Krüger 1990 13 f.; Keenan
2000 626 ff.
359
Hardy 1931 100 ff.; Banaji 1999 432.
360
For the following, see Keenan 625 ff.
107
bishops in Constantinople. The apex of his, and his family’s, career
was his subsequent appointment by Justinian I (527–565) to the post
of the Empire’s chief financial official, the comes sacrorum largitionum,
Count of the Sacred Largesses. In this role, Strategius I was responsible for the financing of the construction of St Sophia. His son,
Flavius Apion II (attested 539–577/9) appears first as defensor civitatis
in Oxyrhynchos, i.e., he held the most important civic function
assigned to “glorious houses”, which Justinian ordered the notables
to hold in turn.361 He also received the ordinary consulship in 539.362
In 549–550 he appears as Duke of the Thebaid; subsequently, he
served as pagarch in the pagarchy of the Arsinoites and the Theodosiopolites where the family had estates. Towards the end of his
life he was appointed “first patrician”, i.e., president of the senate
in Constantinople.363 His heirs were Strategius II’s wife or sister Flavia
Praeiecta and her sons Apion III and George, both honorary consuls. From 593 Apion III appears as sole owner of the family’s estates.
He married Eusebia, daughter of a Roman aristocratic family. Eusebia
and her mother are repeatedly mentioned as close friends in the letters of Pope Gregory the Great.364 Apion III held the patriciate until
his death in 619 or early 620. The “glorious house” of the Apions
disappears from the record after 621 when the family estates were
taken over by the Persian invaders.365
For more than a century, the Apion family united elevated and
glorious offices in Constantinople with high offices in the government of Egypt and, what is no less significant, civic duties at
Oxyrhynchos and at other places in the Arsinoite and Heracleopolite
nomes where their house possessed large holdings. The intricately
construed and efficient management of the “glorious house” functioned as an organic part of Egyptian provincial administration, on
the whole, in harmony with the imperial government. The evidence
361
Liebeschuetz 2000 220, 223 f.
For his preserved consular diptych, see K. Schefold: Ein Bildnismedallion der
Zeit Justinians. Museum Helveticum 2 (1945) 48–53.
363
Keenan 2000 627 does not exclude, however, that it was a posthumous honour.—A marble pilaster fragment with the monogram of Apion II, presumably from
the palace of the family at the hippodrom in Constantinople, is now in Berlin,
364
Cameron, Averil: A Nativity Poem of the Sixth Century A.D. Classical Philology
74 (1979) 222–232 225 ff.
365
Cf. P. Oxy. LVIII 3960; Alston 2002 313.
362
108
chapter four
seems to contradict the traditional suggestion that large estates such
as those of the Apion house were in conflict with the central government. As James Keenan notes,366
if private interests in Egypt had not . . . assumed the upkeep and repair
of the irrigation works, the economy would have collapsed and the
imperial capital itself would have become vulnerable to famine.
Referring to the supposed conflict between the interests of the imperial government and the large estates and to the status of the agricultural workers (coloni) tied to the land, it has also been frequently
assumed that late antique Egypt as a whole was “feudal”. Indeed,
the law made little distinction between the status of the slave and
the colonus adscriptus,367 or, as he appears in the written agreements
between the Apion house and its agricultural workers, the §napÒgrafow
gevrgÒw.368 The dominance of the coloni in the great estates appears,
however, to have been balanced by the presence of a free peasantry
in the villages of Egypt.369 The evidence gives the impression of a
flexible range of possible arrangements between landlord and small
tenant. In Averil Cameron’s view,370
it seems doubtful whether conditions for the lower classes had in practice significantly deteriorated since the early empire . . . There had
indeed been over the imperial period a progressive intensification of
penalties applied to those convicted under the law, with an ever-widening division between the treatment of the rich and powerful and the
cruel treatment . . . meted out to the poor. But the same process coincided . . . with a new consciousness of ‘the poor’ as a class, no doubt
inspired by Christian teaching . . .
[ T ]hough comparisons with medieval feudalism are tempting . . .
they can be very misleading: there was no simple chronological transition from late Roman coloni to medieval serfs . . . It would also be a
mistake to suppose that peasants in earlier centuries had had much
possibility or inclination de facto to move away from their area, or
Keenan 2000 631 ff.
See C.Th. V.17.1 (332), XII.1.23 (342); C.Just. XI.53.1 (371), XI.52.1 (393:
“slaves of the land”), XI.48.19 (Anastasius, distinguishing free coloni paying their
taxes and adscripticii whose property belonged to the landlord), XI.50.2 (530). For
colonate in the late empire and the early Byzantine period, see M. Mirkovic: The
Later Roman Colonate and Freedom. Philadelphia 1997; C.R. Whittaker: Colonate. in:
Bowersock – Brown – Grabar (eds) 1999 385–386.
368
Keenan 2000 630.
369
Ward-Perkins 2000 336 ff.
370
Cameron, Averil 1993b 87 f.
366
367
109
that they had not been dependent before; terms like ‘serf ’ are liable
to carry value judgements with them.
The capture of Alexandria by the Persians in 618 and of the rest
of the land in 619 was preceded by the arrival of refugees from
Syria and Palestine fleeing the advance of the Persians and arriving
with the news of anti-Christian hostilities.371 Persian rule cut off Egypt
from the Byzantine Empire. The fears of Egypt’s Christians were
justified by the experience of violence and persecution during the
years of the occupation, which ended in 628 with a peace treaty
and Persian withdrawal.372 Shortly after the Persian withdrawal, however, the Emperor Heraclius (610–641) appointed the militant Chalcedonian Bishop Cyrus (631–642) to the see of Alexandria—he did
so at a time when there were about five million Monophysites
and only about 200,000 “Dyophysites” living in Egypt.373 Cyrus met
with the embittered resistance of the supporters of the Monophysite
Patriarch Benjamin who was, however, forced into exile, which was
the easier to achieve because, revoltingly, the hated Cyrus was also
appointed Prefect of Egypt.
While the land still suffered from the consequences of the Persian
occupation and society was occupied with the deep irritation caused
by the emperor’s unfortunate religious policy, changes were already
on the way which were to tear Egypt from the Byzantine Empire
for good and put her into a radically different political and cultural
context. In 622 Mohammed departed from Mecca to Medina
(Mohammed’s hijra or “flight”) where he began to lay the foundations of a political state on a religious basis. In 632 he declared a
“holy war” against Byzantium.374 Omar, the second caliph of the
371
A.J. Butler: The Arab Conquest of Egypt and the Last Thirty Years of the Roman
Dominion. Ed. with an additional bibliography by P.M. Fraser. Oxford 1978; F.
Winkelmann: Ägypten und Byzanz vor der arabischen Eroberung. Byzantinoslavica
40 (1979) 161–182; Heinen 1998a 54 ff.
372
L.S.B. MacCoull: Coptic Egypt during the Persian Occupation. The Papyrological
Evidence. Studi classici e orientali 36 (1986) 307–313; R. Altheim-Stiehl: The Sasanians
in Egypt—Some Evidence of Historical Interest. BSAC 31 (1992) 87–96; ead.: Wurde
Alexandreia im Juni 619 durch die Perser erobert? Bemerkungen zur zeitlichen
Bestimmung der sasanidischen Besetzung Ägyptens unter Chosrau II. Parwez. Tyche.
Beiträge zur Alten Geschichte, Papyrologie und Epigraphik 6 (1991) 3–16.
373
Müller 1981 330.
374
For the course of the military events cf. J. Maspero: Organisation militaire de
l’Égypte byzantine. Paris 1912 119 ff.; Heinen 1998a 55.
110
chapter four
Islamic state took Bosra beyond the Jordan in 634, and Damascus
in 635. In 636 the entire province of Syria fell.
Meanwhile, the short-sighted official religious policy and Cyrus’
anti-Monophysitism further aggravated the anti-governmental sentiments of the majority of the Egyptian population. After occupying
Jerusalem and conquering Mesopotamia and Persia in 637–638, the
Arab general 'Amr ibn al-'As appeared on Egypt’s eastern border
in 639 and took the frontier fortress of Pelusium. Next he continued his march towards Alexandria. In his march through the Delta
he met the opposition of the Byzantine army stationed in Egypt.
The resistance was, however, insufficient because of the poor quality of the forces. Still, ‘Amr was not able to enter Alexandria before
the death of Heraclius in 641. According to tradition, it was the
Orthodox Patriarch Cyrus who betrayed the city to ‘Amr’s troops;
the story about the traitor “Al Mukaukas” (= Cyrus)375 reflects in any
case the fateful impact of the anti-Monophysite measures of the previous period. On November 8, 641 Cyrus signed a treaty of surrender; and in September 642, after an eleven-months armistice, the
last units of the Byzantine army left the country and the Byzantine
fleet sailed from the harbor of Alexandria, also taking large numbers of Greeks to Constantinople.376
In Alan Bowman’s words,377
politically speaking, domination by the theocratic Islamic Caliphate
was more strikingly different than anything that had happened in Egypt
since the arrival of Alexander the Great almost a thousand years earlier.
It must be added, nevertheless, that the Muslim conquest was not
particularly destructive and, initially, the conquerors left the institutions of local administration intact. Greek as the official language of
administration continued to be in use into the eighth century. The
structure, economic position, and way of life of the old landowning
elite did not change at once with the arrival of a new elite in
Alexandria nor in the cities of the countryside.378 Alexandria main-
375
A. Alcock: Cyrus the Mukaukas and Melkite Patriarch of Alexandria: Un
trafiquant de cher blanche? Le Muséon 86 (1973) 73–74.
376
John of Nikiu, Chron. 120.17–21, trans. R.H. Charles, London 1916 193 ff.
377
Bowman 1986 53.
378
For the issue in a broader perspective, see the essays in Cameron, Averil (ed.):
The Byzantine and Early Islamic Near East III. States, Resources and Armies. Princeton
1995.
111
tained its contacts with the Christian world not only through international trade379 but also through the masses of pilgrims crossing the
city on their journey to the shrine of St Menas.380 The Monophysite
church was instrumental in the maintenance of Coptic literacy and
it presented a framework for the preservation of the ethnic, social,
and cultural identity of the Egyptian Christians—which also included
elements of the literature, iconography, and art forms of the early
Byzantine period. The late seventh-century Chronicle of John of Nikiu
describes, however, the Arabic invasions of the century in apocalyptic terms and sees in them the catastrophical consequence of the
Chalcedonian dogma of Christ’s two natures.381
379
For the evidence, see Haas 1997 346 f.
P. Grossmann: Abu Mina. A Guide to the Ancient Pilgrimage Center. Cairo 1986
9 f.; M. Martin: Pilgrims and Travelers in Christian Egypt. CE VI 1975–1977; cf.
Grossmann 1998b 274 f.
381
A. Carile: Giovanni di Nikius, cronista bizantino-copto del VII secolo. Felix
Ravenna 4 (1981) 103–155.
380
CHAPTER FIVE
CONTINUITY AND CHANGE 1:
THE SURVIVAL OF FORMS OF
ALEXANDRIAN HELLENISTIC ARCHITECTURE
It goes on being Alexandria still. Just walk a bit
along the straight road that ends at the Hippodrome
and you’ll see palaces and monuments that will
amaze you.1
1. The limits of the evidence
From the centuries of Egyptian Late Antiquity a rich corpus of architectural carvings including capitals, entablatures, cornices, column and
pilaster bases, jambs, lintels, niche pediments, etc. has survived. These
monuments fall into three classes. The first contains architectural
members carved in Egypt from local stones (limestone, sandstone,
Egyptian hardstones). The second consists of imported half-finished
capitals and some other architectural members (friezes and entablatures) made of marble and finished in Egypt; the third, marble capitals imported in a finished form. The pieces of the latter two categories
probably arrived in Egypt during the late antique and early Byzantine
periods from Constantinople as ballast of the ships returning to
Alexandria after they had delivered their cargo of wheat destined
for the capital of the empire2 (cf. Chapters IV.2.2, 2.3). In this chapter we shall discuss only types from the first-named class.
A considerable number of the carvings of all three classes were
removed from their original architectural context and reused in the
course of the centuries as spolia or simply as building material.
Architectural carvings exhibited in the museums of Egypt and other
countries with labels such as “from Oxyrhynchos/Bahnasa” or “from
Heracleopolis Magna/Ahnas” come from unknown contexts. Even
less is known about the architectural carvings which found their way
1
Constantine Cavafy: Exiles. in: Collected Poems trans. E. Keeley and P. Sherrard,
ed. G. Savidis. Princeton 1992 200.
2
Suggestion made by Severin – Severin 1987 20; cf. Severin 1998b 96.
114
chapter five
from clandestine excavations to museums and private collections in
Egypt and abroad. Again, other carvings come from buildings in the
monasteries at Saqqara and Bawit.3 They are displayed as parts of
more or less ideal reconstructions of buildings in the Coptic Museum
(columns, capitals, niches, an ambo from Saqqara)4 and in the Louvre
(carvings in stone and wood from the “south church” at Bawit).5
The buildings at Saqqara and Bawit were excavated in the early
twentieth century in a manner which renders the understanding of
their individual construction periods and the art historical investigation of their decoration tantalizingly difficult. A recent reassessment
of the original records from the excavations of the “south church”
at Bawit, originally a non-sacral late antique edifice rebuilt in the
sixth century as a church (cf. Chapters II.1, III.1, IX.2.2), has shown
that the sculptured architectural members from this building actually belong to four different categories. These are: 1. carvings made
for the original late antique edifice and found in situ; 2. carvings
removed from their original context in the original late antique edifice
and reused in its sixth-century rebuilding as a church; 3. spolia
removed from other, unknown, late antique buildings and reused in
the sixth-century shrine; and 4. architectural members carved for the
sixth-century rebuilding (see Chapter IX.2.2).6 Finally, exceptional
cases such as Shenoute’s Deir Anbâ Shinûda (“White Monastery”,
cf. Chapters II.3, VI.2, VII.1.4), in which architectural members
carved for the original building may still be studied in situ, await a
modern investigation.7
Considering these difficulties, it is no wonder that no comprehensive
history of Egyptian late antique architecture has been written so far.
3
Quibell – Lacau 1908; Quibell 1909, 1912; Leclercq 1913; Clédat 1904–1906,
1916, 1999; Chassinat 1911; Maspero – Drioton 1931–1943 I, II.
4
Saqqara Hall, for a view, see Gabra – Alcock 1993 ill. p. 62.
5
For the new reconstruction in the third Salle Copte of the Louvre and its predecessors, see Torp 1971; H. Torp: Le monastère copte de Baouît. Quelques notes
d’introduction. Acta IRN 9 (1981) 1–8; M.-H. Rutschowscaya: Les futures salles coptes
dans le Grand-Louvre. in: T. Orlandi – D.W. Johnson (eds): Acts of the Fifth International
Congress of Coptic Studies. Washington 12–15 August 1992 II. Roma 1993 391–400;
C. Giroire: Une église égyptienne ressuscitée au musée du Louvre. Revue du Louvre
5/6 (1997) 95–102; Bénazeth 1998; D. Bénazeth: Baouît: une église copte au Louvre.
Paris 2002.
6
Severin 1977b 120 f.; Severin 1981a 310 f.
7
Until today, the illustration in Monneret de Villard 1925 is our main source;
the drawings of Akerman 1976 are far too schematic to be used for style-critical
studies.
survival of alexandrian architecture
115
Besides church architecture, the modern study of which is the personal achievement of Peter Grossmann,8 scholarly attention turned
instead to detail problems such as the chronology of the imported
column capitals and their impact on local production9 or to the topic
discussed in the next chapter, namely, the typology and dating
of the niche heads with or without figural decoration found at
Oxyrhynchos, Heracleopolis Magna, and other late antique sites.10
2. Hellenistic and late antique illusionism: the niche pediments and their
architectural and cult context
The niche heads deserve indeed our attention. Most of them come,
as was shown by Hjalmar Torp and Hans-Georg Severin (cf. Chapter
II.5), from pagan and Christian elite funerary edifices. While it is
fairly obvious that they constituted the architectural, iconographic,
and cultic foci of these buildings,11 their actual architectural context
remains largely unknown.12 The documentation of the funerary edifices
8
See first of all P. Grossmann: Frühchristliche Baukunst in Ägypten. in: Brenk
(ed.) 1977 234–243; id.: Elephantine II. Kirche und spätantike Hausanlagen im Chnumtempelhof.
Mainz 1980; id.: Esempi d’architettura paleocristiana in Egitto dal V al VII secolo.
in: XXVIII Corso di cultura sull’arte Ravennate e Bizantina. Ravenna 1981 149–176; id.:
Mittelalterliche Langhauskuppelkirchen und verwandte Typen in Oberägypten. Glückstadt 1982;
id.: Abû Mînâ I. Die Gruftkirche und die Gruft. Mainz 1989; id.: The Triconchoi in
Early Christian Churches of Egypt and their Origins in the Architecture of Classical
Rome. in: Roma e l’Egitto nell’antichità classica. Atti del I Congresso Internazionale ItaloEgiziano, Cairo 6–9 Febbraio 1989. Roma 1992 181–190; Grossmann 1993; id.:
Kirchenbau in Ägypten. in: Cat. Hamm 43–57; id.: Zur Datierung der ersten
Kirchenbauten in der Sketis. BZ 90 (1997) 367–395; Grossmann 1998a; Grossmann
1998b; Grossmann 2002.
9
Kautzsch 1936; Severin – Severin 1987; Severin 1989; Pensabene 1993; Severin
1998b; cf. also H. Niemeyer: Wiederverwendete spätantike Kapitelle in der UlmasMoschee zu Kairo. MDAIK 18 (1962) 133–145; Pralong 2000.
10
Török 1970, 1977, 1993, 1998; Severin 1981a, 1993; Bergmann 1988; Thomas
1990, 2000; McKenzie 1996b; Krumeich 2003.
11
Thomas 1990; Török 1998; Thomas 2000.
12
Severin 1998a 296 note 5 warns that “die charakteristischen Nischenbekrönungen
[waren] nur Einzelbestandteile des jeweiligen Ensembles der Baudekoration; ihr ehemaliger Kontext ist uns aber fast ausnahmslos unbekannt, und so entfällt die
Möglichkeit, diese Werkstücke im Verein mit den zugehörigen Basen, Kapitellen,
Friesen, Gesimsen usw. zu analysieren: dies wäre die einzig sichere Methode, um
zu verlässlichen Einsichten zu gelangen.” While the latter statement cannot be
disputed, in the absence of appropriate archaeological evidence and without the
publication of the most important collections of late antique-early medieval architectural carvings in the Coptic Museum and the Graeco-Roman Museum, students
of “Coptic” art have no other choice than to trust that the investigation of detail
116
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found by Naville at Heracleopolis Magna13 and Petrie14 and Breccia15
at Oxyrhynchos is depressingly poor. Thanks to Hans-Georg Severin’s
analysis of the excavation photographs and the surviving architectural decoration (cf. Chapters III.1, IX.2.2), we have a somewhat
more detailed picture of two elite mortuary edifices, viz., the “south
church” at Bawit (fig. 128)16 and edifice 1823 (the “tomb church”)
at Saqqara.17 The late fourth-century door pilasters and decorated
door jambs with Corinthian capitals and the cornices from the “south
church”18 and the early fifth-century carvings (column capitals, pilaster
capitals and bases) from the “tomb church”19 display reduced late
antique forms. The architecture of fourth-century elite funerary edifices
was influenced by funerary edifices outside Egypt, as is also indicated by the sculptural decoration of the niche heads (see below).
Another, however indirect, indication is presented by finds from Abu
Mena. Namely, among the marble carvings imported from Constantinople or finished in Alexandria pilaster capitals were also
identified which belonged to wall revetments of types occurring in
other regions of late antique architecture. Fourth and early fifth
century exemplars20 reused in one of the churches of the pilgrimage
centre may have come from elite funerary edifices.21
Niches of types deriving from those associated with late antique
mortuary architecture also continued to be used in ecclesiastical architecture. Niches in churches range from the niches carved around
440 for Shenoute’s Deir Anbâ Shinûda (Chapter VI.2) and the niche
reused in the “south church” at Bawit22 through the niches carved
problems of style, chronology, social context, etc. has the same perspectives in Egypt
as in other eastern territories of late antique and early medieval art. Or further
work should be altogether abandoned.—For the stand of the unfortunately uncompleted works of the Catalogue Général du Musée Copte, see Buschhausen 1992 and Gabra
1992 (Vol. 1, Bénazeth’s catalogue of the metal objects, appeared in 2001). According
to Buschhausen, almost 2000 from the c. 2500 stone carvings in the collection of
the Coptic Museum were documented for publication as early as 1988.
13
Naville 1894 fig. p. 33.
14
Petrie 1925 Pls XLI–XLVI.
15
Breccia 1933 37, fig. 7; for the reconstruction of the original edifice, see Severin
1981a fig. 3.
16
Severin 1977b; 1981a 309 ff.
17
H.-G. Severin in Grossmann – Severin 1982 170–183; Severin 1981a 312 ff.
18
Grossmann – Severin 1982 Pls 33–38.
19
H.-G. Severin in Grossmann – Severin 1982 170 ff.
20
Severin – Severin 1987 nos 10, 11, figs 35–37.
21
Cf. Kramer 1994 65 ff.
22
J. Clédat: Recherches sur le kôm de Baouit. CRAIBL 30 (1902) 545–546 with
117
for, or, more probably, reused around the middle of the fifth century in the basilica of Hermopolis Magna/Ashmunein (cf. Chapter
VI.3)23 to the sculptured niches carved for the church built in the
second half of the sixth century in the temenos of the Hathor temple at Dendera24 or, to quote a more provincial example, the niches
of the fifth- or sixth-century rock sanctuary at Deir al-Genadla south
of Assiut.25
Within their two basic types, viz., the semicircular (fig. 16)26 and
the broken pediment (figs 17, 39, 65, 68, 69), the Egyptian niche
heads display a broad typological, stylistic, and qualitative variety.
In both basic types the niche head may be framed with simple vegetal and/or ornamental friezes as well as more elaborate entablatures containing modillion cornices,27 egg-and-dart and astragal
members, simple or multiple ornamental/vegetal friezes, acanthus or
peopled scroll friezes. The class of broken pediments includes halfpediments with figures in the centre (fig. 22) and other subtypes in
which the centre of the pediment is triangular (figs 50, 68, 69) or
curved (figs 17, 39, 65). In both basic types and in all subtypes the
interior of the niche head may be coffered,28 decorated with a shell
(fig. 16)29 and/or vegetal motifs and symbols,30 and/or figures and
figural scenes in high or low relief. Broken pediments may be complemented with wreaths enclosing symbols (a cross) or heads, or animal
(dolphin) and human figures at the two sides of the pediment (fig. 17).31
Pl. 4; Rutschowscaya 1998 292 f., fig. 13, Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département
des Antiquités Egyptiennes E 16971.
23
Wace – Megaw – Skeat 1959 Pl. 25/4.
24
Grossmann 1998a 220 f.
25
H. Buschhausen – Fathih Mohammed Khorshid: Die Malerei zu Deir alGenadla. in: Krause – Schaten (eds) 1998 55–67 figs 1–3.
26
CM 7011, Strzygowski 1904 39 f. no. 7295; Monneret de Villard 1923 fig. 2;
Török 1990 fig. 20.
27
For an early 4th-cent. niche pediment with hollow and flat grooved modillion
cornice, see CM 6547, Severin 1993 67, fig. 2.
28
E.g., BM inv. no. unknown, from Petrie’s excavations at Heracleopolis Magna,
Thomas 2000 fig. 35; CM 4424, unknown provenance, Török 1990 fig. 68; GRM
inv. no. unknown, from Oxyrhynchos, Breccia 1933 XLVII/122, 124; present whereabouts unknown, from Hermopolis Magna, Wace – Megaw – Skeat 1959 Pl. 25/2.
29
See also GRM 23641, from Oxyrhynchos, Breccia 1932 Pl. XLIV/156; Thomas
2000 fig. 82; present whereabouts unknown, from Hermopolis Magna, Wace –
Megaw – Skeat 1959 Pl. 25/1, 4.
30
E.g., GRM 23388, from Oxyrhynchos, Thomas 2000 fig. 83.
31
CM 7004, from Heracleopolis Magna, Strzygowski 1904 29 ff. no. 7286, fig.
35—See also CM 3556, 4301, unknown provenance, unpublished.
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The models of the niche head type with broken pediment were
first sought in the architecture of the eastern Roman provinces.32
More recently, it has been suggested that the broken pediment types
as well as other distinctive forms in eastern Hellenistic and Roman
architecture—including the distinctive semicircular niche head with
or without a coffered conch33—evolved under the influence of Hellenistic Alexandria.34 Such a lineage could be suggested more concretely after limestone architectural fragments35 in the Graeco-Roman
Museum in Alexandria (fig. 18)36 had been identified as fragments
of late Hellenistic (late second- early first-century BC) broken pediments of small (“miniature”) size.37
The significance of these carvings was fully realized on the basis
of Hans Lauter’s pioneering study38 on the Alexandrian roots of the
architecture of the Palazzo delle Colonne at Ptolemais in Libya, a
paradigmatic “baroque”39 building outside Egypt. He identified the
32
Strzygowski 1904 27 f.; du Bourguet 1967 125; Török 1970.
Round niches built for statues of divinities in the early Ptolemaic Tychaion of
Alexandria are mentioned by Libanius, cf. Lauter 1971 167 with note 89.
34
Lauter 1971; Lyttelton 1974.—On Alexandrian architecture, see also H. v.
Hesberg: Zur Entwicklung der griechischen Architektur im ptolemäischen Reich.
in: Maehler – Strocka (eds) 1978 137–143.
35
GRM 3790, 3785. GRM 3790 was first published by Hesberg 1981 fig. 35;
both pieces: Pensabene 1983 figs 3–5, 7–9 (without a comment); Pensabene 1993
nos 888, 916.—Note that by the 1970s GRM 3790 was in a considerably worse
state of preservation than in the 1920s when the photograph recording a group of
exhibits in Room XV of the Graeco-Roman Museum was taken, see Pensabene
1993 Pl. 115/5. In the photograph a part of the triangular tympanon in the centre of the pediment is still visible, in later photographs (Hesberg 1981 fig. 35; Török
1990 figs 2–4) and drawings (Pensabene 1993 Pl. 132, top) this part of the carving had already been completely broken off.
36
GRM 3790.
37
The pediment fragments were discussed (with slightly different conclusions)
independently in a lecture delivered at the 1984 International Coptic Congress,
published as Török 1990, and in Bergmann 1988. McKenzie 1996a 116 ff. and
1996b 134 ff. also discusses GRM 3790 and comes to similar conclusions as the
present writer, but she ignores Bergmann 1988 as well as Török 1970 and 1990.—
I am no longer fully convinced that GRM 3795 comes from a niche head. I tried
to check my identification in 2001 and again in 2002 in the Graeco-Roman Museum
but could not get access to the piece, which is no longer on exhibit.
38
Lauter 1971.
39
For the term (which was already used in the days of Strzygowski) cf. Lyttelton
1974.—Together with other monuments displaying “baroque” forms, the Palazzo
delle Colonne was also dated by several authors to the Roman imperial period. Its
excavator G. Pesce and Lauter argued more convincingly, however, for a late
Hellenistic dating and their dating is also supported by comprehensive studies on
Hellenistic and Roman “baroque” forms such as Lyttelton 1974; McKenzie 1990.
33
119
Alexandrian models of several architectural forms occurring at
Ptolemais, such as special variants of the Corinthian capital,40 modillion cornices,41 arched entablatures, entablatures broken forward,
segmental pediments, coffered soffits and niche heads,42 and acanthus column bases.43 Lauter also suggested that the miniature broken
pediment type of the Palazzo delle Colonne44 descended from
Alexandrian forms. In the wake of Lauter’s work, the present writer,45
Marianne Bergmann,46 and Judith McKenzie47 extended the lineage
of the Hellenistic broken pediment in the other direction, too, i.e.,
to the architecture of late antique and early Byzantine Egypt. Judith
McKenzie also pointed out the Hellenistic ancestry of the hollow
and/or flat grooved modillion cornices found at Egyptian late antique
sites.48 It may be added here that the Hellenistic acanthus base type,
too, remained part of the repertory of Egyptian late antique and
early Byzantine architecture.49
Until the early 1990s, the continuity of the broken pediment
between the second-first centuries BC and the early fourth century
AD remained a hypothesis that was not supported by actual monuments.50 This situation changed with the discoveries made at the
Hellenistic and Roman period seaside town and cemetery site of
Marina el Alamein, situated c. 100 km west of Alexandria.51 Niches
found there in houses dated to the first to third centuries display
various types of broken pediments with modillion cornices and shell
40
See also K. Ronczewski: Les chapiteaux corinthiens et variés du musée grécoromain d’Alexandrie. BSAAA Suppl. of 22 (1927) 3–36; Pensabene 1993 109 ff.
41
See also H. von Hesberg: Konsolengeisa des Hellenismus und der frühen Kaiserzeit.
Mainz 1980 87 ff.; Pensabene 1993 100 ff.
42
Lauter 1971 137 f.
43
See also E. Makowiecka: Acanthus-base. Alexandrian Form of Architectural
Decoration at Ptolemaic and Roman Period. ÉtTrav 3 (1969) 115–131.
44
For the reconstruction of the architecture of the aedicula front of the Palazzo
cf. G. Pesce: Il ‘Palazzo delle Colonne’ in Tolemaide di Cirenaica. Roma 1950.
45
Török 1977 143 f., 1990 440.
46
Bergmann 1988.
47
McKenzie 1990, 1996a, 1996b.
48
McKenzie 1996b; cf., e.g., Chassinat 1911 Pls LXXVIII, LXXIX; Metropolitan
Museum of Art, Rogers Fund, 07.228.39, Friedman (ed.) 1989 Cat. 144.
49
See, e.g., the 6th-cent. engaged column from Saqqara, Quibell 1912 Pl.
XXXVII/1; Pensabene 1993 no. 797.
50
Severin 1993 70.
51
Daszewski et al. 1991; for annual preliminary excavation reports by W.A.
Daszewski, see PAM 2 (1991) 31 ff., 3 (1992) 29 ff., 4 (1993) 28 ff., 8 (1997) 37 ff.,
10 (1999) 43 ff., 11 (2000) 39 ff.; 12 (2001) 47 ff.
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decoration in the niche head.52 Some of them are flanked by halfcolumns with capitals which may similarly be regarded as descendants of distinctive Alexandrian Hellenistic types (fig. 19).53
While the continuity of the Egyptian semicircular and broken niche
pediment forms between the Hellenistic and the late antique periods seems thus highly probable, their decoration with figures in high
relief cannot be explained from Alexandria’s Hellenistic architecture.
Neither do niche heads with sculptural decoration occur in the late
Hellenistic and Roman architecture of the regions which were traditionally influenced by Alexandria. The figural decoration of the
interior of niche heads seems to have been invented outside Egypt.
The earliest known examples of niche heads with sculptural decoration were found in Rome. In Mausoleum H (Mausoleum of the
Valerii) of the Vatican necropolis, dated to the period around AD
160, the conchs of thirty niches (with ash-urns sunk in their floors)
were decorated with stucco reliefs representing deities and mythological figures. In twenty smaller niches there were high relief representations of the figures of the Dionysiac thiasos.54
Most of the iconographic themes occurring on Egyptian niche
heads follow models taken from Roman mortuary iconography.55
The impact of decorative/iconographic programmes represented by
the Mausoleum of the Valerii is indicated, however indirectly, by
the fact that in Egypt the figural relief decoration of niche heads
52
Daszewski et al. 1991 23 ff., fig. 11 (broken pediment with arched centre);
W. Bentkowski: The Polish-Egyptian Preservation Mission at Marina-el Alamein in
1989. ASAE 73 (1998) 35–44 fig. 5, Pl. V/a (broken pediment with arched centre);
S. Medeksza: Marina el-Alamein. Conservation Work, 1999. PAM 11 (2000) 47–57
50 ff., figs 5, 6 (triangular pediment with encroached lintel supported by half-columns
with Nabatean-type capitals); Medeksza 2001 fig. 10; S. Medeksza et al.: Marina elAlamein. The Conservation Season in 2002. PAM 14 (2003) 85–98 fig. 2.
53
House 9, Daszewski et al. 1991, front cover.
54
A. Ferrua: Lavori e scoperte nelle Grotte di San Pietro. Bull. della Commissione
Archaeologica del Governorato di Roma 70 (1942) 103 f., fig. 8; B.M. Apollonj Ghetti et
al.: Esplorazioni sotto la confessione di San Pietro in Vaticano (1940–44). Città del Vaticano
1951 31 f., 40 f., 61 f., 83 f.; J.M.C. Toynbee – J.B. Ward Perkins: The Shrine of
St. Peter and the Vatican Excavations. London 1958 82 ff.; J. Ruysschaert: Necropoli
Vaticane. in: EAA VI 865 ff.; S. de Marinis: Stucco. in: EAA VII 527 f., figs
630–632; Torp 1969 110 f.; Mielsch – v. Hesberg 1995 143–208; cf. also
E. Kirschbaum: Die Gräber der Apostelfürsten St. Peter und St. Paul in Rom. Leipzig 1974
fig. 2.—Thomas 1990 I 196 ff. and 197 note 227 ignores Mauseoleum H with its
sculptural decoration and argues for the Egyptian origin of the niche head type
with figures in high relief.
55
Torp 1969 107 ff.
121
remained associated with funerary architecture. Yet it is no less obvious that the form and style of the Roman model(s) was not directly
imitated: it was the idea of relief decoration applied in the conch of
a niche, and its conceptual context, that were taken over. In Egypt,
the figural relief decoration was applied not only in semicircular
niches but also in other niche types which belonged to the repertory of traditional Alexandrian architectural forms. The interpretation of the figured late antique niche heads remains, of course, biased
without fitting it into the intellectual and stylistic context of contemporary Egyptian art. The prominence of mythological themes in
the decoration of the pediments was not only determined by the
concepts associated with the mortuary realm. A profound interest
towards mythology continued to play an essential role in the formation of the cultural outlook and collective self-identity of the late
antique empire’s elite and to influence the production in all artistic
media.56
The autonomy of the Egyptian reception of a Roman niche decoration type is also demonstrated by a significant stylistic difference.
The plastic articulation of the figures in the conchs of the Mausoleum
of the Valerii remains within the limits of Classical surface decoration. By contrast, the deep reliefs of the Egyptian niche heads break
their architectural frame in an illusionistic manner. They give the
impression of sculptures in the round, standing in front of the conch
of a niche or seen through an opening in an ornamental architecture. The extravagant sculptural idiom is that of Hellenistic relief
sculpture as it was revived in the second-third centuries and then
reinterpreted Empire-wide in the fourth century.57 Yet the illusionism of the sculptures applied on the niche heads was also conceptually determined.
56
For mythological imagery in 4th–6th-century elite houses cf. Muth 2001
passim and esp. 98 ff.
57
We may quote examples from Aphrodisias, Rome, Silahtaraga (Istanbul),
Chiragan, Saint Georges de Montagne, or Valdetorres de Jarama. For Chiragan:
Hannestad 1994 127 ff.; Elsner 1998b 109 f., 186 f.; Bergmann 1999 26 ff.; for
related finds: Bergmann 199914–25, 44 ff. For the Constantinopolitan workshops
uniting the sculptural traditions of Aphrodisias and Dokimeion, see ibid. 58 ff. For
Silahtaraga, see N. de Chaisemartin – E. Örgen: Les documents sculptés de Silahtaraga.
Paris 1984; Kiilerich – Torp 1994; for Aphrodisias M. Floriani Squarcapino: La
scuola di Afrodisia. Roma 1943; C. Roueché: Aphrodisias in Late Antiquity. Ann Arbor
1989; for the find from the Esquiline in Rome, see Moltesen 1990; Bergmann 1999
14–17. Cf. also E.K. Gazda: Mythological Marbles in Late Antiquity: The Artistic
Circle of Ahrodisias. JRA 15 (2002) 660–665 (review of Bergmann 1999).
122
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Before turning to the style of the fourth-century and later niche
heads, let us thus consider briefly two earlier groups of monuments,
viz., the arcosolium-type niches found in Roman period tombs
in Egypt, and the aedicula-type figural mortuary stelae found at
Oxyrhynchos and other sites. Both the arcosolia and the aediculatype stelae played a significant role in the invention of the niche
head with relief decoration as a central element of elite mortuary
architecture.
In several Roman period tombs58 in Alexandria59—such as, e.g.,
the main tomb of the Kôm esh-Shugafa cemetery60—and at Hermopolis
West (Tuna el Gebel),61 the burial was placed in a rectangular niche
in the main axis of the tomb chapel.62 The show wall of the niche
in the Kôm esh-Shugafa main tomb was decorated with an Egyptian
offering scene.63 In funerary chapels at Hermopolis West—among
them the famous tomb of Isidora64—the rectangular niches enclosed
a walled “shelf ” consisting of the burial and painted with the representation of a lion-footed funerary couch (occupying the place of
the sarcophagus in Alexandrian tombs). The niches were flanked by
semicolumns and crowned with moulded shells.65 The “show walls”
of the niches were decorated with wall paintings. In Chapel 10 the
painting represented flying Geniuses upholding a medallion originally
containing the image of the person buried in the chapel.66 In Chapel
3 the niche wall was decorated with the scene of the Rape of
Persephone.67
58
For the mortuary architecture of the Roman period, see now the survey presented in Kaplan 1999.
59
Kaplan 1999 129 ff.
60
Th. Schreiber: Die Nekropole von Kôm-Esch-Schukâfa (Expedition Ernst von Sieglin I).
Leipzig 1908 103, fig. 57; Kaplan 1999 129 ff.
61
Gabra – Drioton et al. 1941; Gabra – Drioton 1954; Kaplan 1999 159 ff.
62
Burials in stone sarcophagi also occurred at Oxyrhynchos, as is indicated by
a lid found lying on the surface at a now unidentifiable part of the site, Breccia
1933 Pl. XIV/48.
63
The scene shows a king before the Apis bull. Its iconographical model was
taken from temple ritual and not from the mortuary cult (cf. Kákosy 1995 3021),
which further supports the view in which the funerary niche had a cultic significance
that went beyond the traditional boundaries of a private mortuary cult.
64
Maison funéraire 1, Gabra – Drioton et al. 1941 67–72, Pl. XXXII; Torp 1969
107, Pl. II/a.
65
Gabra – Drioton et al. 1941 90–94, Pls XXXV–XXXVII.
66
67
Gabra – Drioton 1954 Pl. 14; Kaplan 1999 Pl. 11/a.—Relief representing the
Rape of Persephone from the Roman period cemetery of Terenuthis/Kom Abu
Billou: Kaplan 1999 Pl. 11/b.
123
As was correctly suggested by Thelma Thomas,
the niche and its architectural decoration formed a sanctuary for the
deceased, much as temples formed sanctuaries for gods.68
The conceptual and architectural association of the deified dead with
the niche remained meaningful in late antique funerary chapels as
well, even though there the central niches were no longer destined
to receive burials.69 This is also indicated by the aedicula-type figural
mortuary stelae. As to their form, the aedicula-type mortuary stelae
were abbreviated versions of the above-discussed monumental mortuary edifices of the Roman period. In a stela of the Coptic Museum70
the figure of the deceased occupies the centre of a semicircular niche
flanked by semicolumns. The opening of the semicircular niche head
is framed by an arched bracketed cornice and its ceiling is decorated with a shell. Another stela in the same collection (fig. 20)71
displays a combination of the niche front with the abbreviated representation of a Classical temple façade with an entablature consisting of a floral scroll frieze and a modillion cornice as well as a
tympanon with acroteria. In the tympanon field we see the high
relief representation of a male figure emerging from a clipeus (?). His
round head and military haircut suggest a late third or early fourth
century dating for the stela. The small figure may be interpreted as
an image of the deified deceased, indicating thus that the stela was
a symbolic “representation” of the tomb as mortuary cult sanctuary.
At the same time, these stelae also repeat the common Greek and
Roman type of funerary aedicula and present the abbreviated image
of a temple (Greek naìskos, Latin aedicula72) with the image of the
deified deceased in its interior.
68
Thomas 1992 320.
The relationship between the niches and the burials in the Roman period
tombs discovered recently in the Dakhla Oasis requires further investigation, cf. S.
Yamani: Roman Monumental Tombs in Ezbet Bashendi. BIFAO 101 (2001) 393–414.
70
CM 8029, Török 1998 fig. 16.
71
CM 8026, Török 1990 fig. 6; 1998 fig. 17. I have photographed the stela in
1978. It was transferred subsequently to a storage area outside the museum and
my later attempts to study it remained unsuccessful. According to Kamel 1987 58
note 1 attempts undertaken in 1979 at the preservation of the fully decayed carving remained unsuccessful.
72
G. Bendinelli: Edicola (aedicula). In: EAA III (1960) 214–216; for the significance
of the niche in Roman architectural symbolism, see G. Hornbostel-Hüttner: Studien
zur römischen Nischenarchitektur. Leiden 1979 esp. 66 ff.—For Alexandrian late Ptolemaic
and Roman period funerary aediculae uniting traditional Egyptian and Hellenistic
architectural elements, see Pensabene 1983.
69
124
chapter five
In a study on Alexandrian architectural forms, Marianne Bergmann
suggested that the Hellenistic ancestors of the late antique niche pediments may be understood “als . . . in Stein umgesetzte perspektivische
Malerei”.73 Indeed, as I noted in an earlier paper, the “perspectivelike” rendering of the cornices and the slant (both vertical and horizontal) of the “half-pediments” framing the centre figures or arched/
triangular centre pediments have the character of
“representations” [of the monumental broken pediment type of the
Miletos city gate]. They are not simply reduced, proportionate imitations—copies of the original motive for the purpose of niche frames—
but almost entirely plane projections of the visual experience with
central perspective . . . The representation of perspectivic character is
rendered by the representation of the pediment cornice and the row
of consoles as looked at from below, and by the oblique line of the
pediment sections turning inside and downwards.74
The late second–early first-century BC pediment type represented
by the fragment in the Graeco-Roman Museum (fig. 18) as well as
the AD first- to third-century pediment types discovered at Marina
el-Alamein lack these perspective-like, i.e., illusionistically rendered
details. Illusionistically distorted curved and triangular modillion cornices appear, in turn, on the aedicula-type figural mortuary stela
type dated to the period between the early third and the early fourth
centuries. A fine, though somewhat reworked, stela in Kansas City
(fig. 21)75 displays an illusionistic “representation” of a semicircular
modillion cornice. The survival of the tradition of this modillion cornice type among the aedicula-type grave stelae of the fourth and
fifth centuries76 probably follows from the survival of the concept in
which the aedicula-type mortuary stela was the representation of the
tomb arcosolium (or even of the whole tomb) as shrine of the mortuary cult of the deceased.
73
Bergmann 1988 59.
Török 1970 170.
75
Kansas City, Nelson-Atkins Museum of Art, Parlasca 1966 Pl. 62/2; Thomas
2000 figs 68, 71.
76
For a fine 4th-cent. example, see the stela fragment W.E. Crum: Coptic Monuments.
Catalogue général des antiquités égyptiennes du musée du Caire, Nos 8001–8741. Le Caire
1902 no. 8688; Monneret de Villard 1923 63, fig. 97. For the decorated shafts of
the semi-columns of the stela cf. the reused 4th-cent. door jambs of the “south
church” at Bawit, Severin 1977b Pls 35, 38/a.
74
125
It was already noted above that the high relief figure of the
deceased in the aedicula-type stela is rendered in a manner that
gives the impression of a sculpture in the round.77 The cult-statue
aspect of the image of the deceased is further reinforced by the perforation occurring on several stelae behind the deeply undercut
head of the figure.78 The opening in the back “wall” of the aedicula may have secured symbolically, and perhaps also physically, a
“communication” between the realms of the dead and the living.
The image of the deceased played the role of the intermediary in
this communication.
The figural elements of the tomb arcosolia and aedicula-type stelae, be they two- or three-dimensional, were determined by the elite
mortuary cult of the Roman period: a mortuary cult in which traditional Egyptian concepts were united with elements of Roman mortuary religion and iconography. The figural decoration of the niche
heads refer in iconographic terms that were absolutely clear for the
contemporaries79 to the deification of the dead buried in the actual
tomb.80 There are no iconographic themes among the carvings from
Heracleopolis and Oxyrhynchos which would not fit into such a
funerary context—or, to formulate it somewhat more cautiously, we
do not find themes which would exclude such an interpretation. In
his study of Greek funerary epigrams from Hellenistic and Roman
Egypt, Étienne Bernand noted the association of the Nile and the
Earth with married adults, Heracles and Dionysos with young men,
and the Nymphs with women who died young.81 Thelma Thomas
77
It is not accidental that many Oxyrhynchos stelae of the aedicula type were
altered by clandestine excavators and art dealers into “sculptures in the round” by
cutting them out of their niche frames. See, e.g., Thomas 2000 fig. 74 and cf. Ch.
II.4 above.
78
E.g., Thomas 2000 figs 71, 73 and see Birmingham City Museum 215.72, S.P.
Ellis: Graeco-Roman Egypt (Shire Egyptology Series 17). Princes Risborough 1992 fig. 35.
79
Though we ignore the chapels themselves from which the niche heads and
other figural carvings originate it is likely that the persons buried in them were not
only commemorated in mortuary inscriptions but also “portrayed” on mortuary stelae and perhaps on wall paintings as well.—An Egyptian-Spanish archaeological
mission discovered recently a late antique chapel with Christian wall paintings in
the “Upper Necropolis” at Oxyrhynchos (the removed wall paintings were first
exhibited in the Egyptian Museum, Cairo, in January-February 2003, then transferred to the Graeco-Roman Museum, Alexandria).
80
Wrede 1981 passim and esp. 31 ff.
81
É. Bernand: Les inscriptions métriques de l’Égypte gréco-romaine. Recherches sur la poésie
epigrammatique des grecs en Égypte. Paris 1969.
126
chapter five
suggests that associations of this kind must also have influenced the
iconographic programme of the late antique tombs with sculptural
decoration.82
Let us turn here to the question of style. In the centre of the
much-illustrated Christian niche head from Heracleopolis Magna (fig.
22)83 there are two almost completely undercut figures of Genii carrying a cross in a wreath. The figures are flanked by two half-pediments. The size and plasticity of the Genii as well as small but
cleverly calculated details such as the left foot of the left-hand Genius
placed in front of the pediment frieze give the illusionistic impression that the figures emerge from a space behind the niche through
the opening between the half-pediments. Other pieces, as, e.g., the
niche head with Pan and a Maenad in the Coptic Museum (fig.
23)84 use the illusionistic device in a still bolder manner, reminding
the modern viewer of the “interaction” of painted and sculpted motifs
on European baroque ceilings: the figures transgress their architectural frame and there is no clear optical limit between what is twodimensional and three-dimensional in the pediment.85
The famous Second Style wall painting from the Casa di Labirinto
at Pompeii (c. 40–30 BC)86 presents the view of a round temple
standing in the centre of a peristyle and visible through the narrow
opening between the half-pediments of the monumental columned
gate of the peristyle. Behind the luxurious architecture of the painting—which also “interacts” illusionistically with the architecture of
the actual columned room on the wall of which it is to be seen—
one may well infer the inspiration of Hellenistic palace architecture.
It is similarly likely that the sacral motifs placed in the centre of
Second Style illusionistic architectures reflect the sacral character of
Ptolemaic royal palaces and the divine features of their inhabitants.87
Thomas 1990 211 ff.
CM 7030, Strzygowski 1904 28 f. no. 7285, fig. 34.
84
CM 7044, Strzygowski 1904 37 no. 7292/b, Pl. III/2.
85
For undercutting and latticework-like composition in late antique marble sculpture cf. Hannestad 1994 154 f.
86
Pompeii VI 11,10, Oecus 43, now Museo Nazionale, Naples, Engemann 1967
134 ff., Pls 39–41.—For further Second Style representations similar to the painting in the Casa di Labirinto cf. Schmid 2000 486 ff.
87
M. Pfrommer: Fassade und Heiligtum. Betrachtungen zur architektonischen
Repräsentation des vierten Ptolemäers, in: W. Hoepfner – G. Brands (eds): Basileia.
Die Paläste der hellenistischen Könige. Internationales Symposion in Berlin vom 16.–20 12. 1992.
Berlin 1996 97–108; Pfrommer 1999 138 ff.—Engemann 1967 suggested that the
82
83
127
In the Casa di Labirinto, the tympanum is torn into two halves in
order to free the view of the round temple behind. For the viewer
entering the room, the axial perspective of the painting gave a convincing illusion of the spatial relations represented. At Petra, in the
upper level of the spectacular front of the Nabatean rock tomb
Khaznet il-Firaun (“Palace of the King”),88 the same theme is rendered in a sort of trompe l’oeil architecture presenting the abbreviation of three sides of a peristyle courtyard with a round temple in
its centre. The spatial relationship between the peristyle and the tholos in its centre is articulated here partly illusionistically and partly
in a realistic manner by slightly pushing back the tholos from the
plane of the tomb façade and by differentiating its “back” columns
from the columns of the peristyle wing “behind” the tholos. Between
the columns (in reality semicolumns) of the peristyle and the tholos
there are illusionistic high relief representations of divine statues standing “behind” the colonnade fronts of the peristyle and “in” the tholos.
Needless to say, both the Pompeian painting and the Nabatean
tomb were quoted as indirect evidence pointing towards a common
source region, namely, the style and forms of Alexandrian Hellenistic
architecture. Considering the painting and the tomb façade in the
light of what we have stated about the connections between the mortuary cult and architectural iconography in the case of tomb arcosolia and aedicula-type stelae, they further verify the suggestion made
above: namely, that the illusionistic architectural details of the aedicula-stelae were “representations” which can be explained from the
concepts of the tomb as a shrine of the deified dead, on the one
hand, and the aedicula-stela as a “representation” of such a shrine,
on the other.
The illusionistic reinterpretation of the Alexandrian Hellenistic
semicircular and broken pediments may be understood, as also sug-
Second Style was developed in Italy; later studies preferred the theory according
to which Second Style painters imitated the materials and forms of Hellenistic palace
architecture, see first of all K. Fittschen: Zur Herkunft und Entstehung des 2. Stils—
Probleme und Argumente. in: P. Zanker (ed.): Hellenismus in Mittelitalien. Kolloquium
Göttingen 1974. Abhandlungen der Akademie der Wissenschaften in Göttingen 97 (1976) 539–563.
88
Third quarter of the 1st cent. BC. R.E. Brünnow – A. v. Domaszewski: Die
Provincia Arabia auf Grund zweier in den Jahren 1897 und 1898 unternommener Reisen und
der Berichte früherer Reisender I. Strassburg 1904 179 ff., 233 ff. no. 62; Pfrommer 1999
fig. 109 (after D. Roberts: The Holy Land etc. London 1842–1849). For the dating
cf. Schmid 2000 492.
128
chapter five
gested by Marianne Bergmann,89 as the creation of “representations”:
these “representations” may, however, be best understood in the context of an illusionism evolving in mortuary architecture. The beginnings of this illusionism may be identified in the perspectivally distorted
portal frames of the court front of Hypogeum I at the Mustafa Pasha
necropolis in Alexandria90 dating from the second half of the third
century BC.91 For a later phase of the development let me cite a
painting from the Roman period tomb called “Maison Dionysiaque”
at Hermopolis West/Tuna el Gebel (fig. 24).92 It was found on the
walled “shelf ” containing the burial and enclosed by the arcosolium.
It imitates the relief-kline of Alexandrian late Ptolemaic tombs93 and
represents a funerary couch. Between the legs of the couch there
appears the representation of a masonry wall decorated with three
niches: in the centre a rectangular niche flanked by Corinthian halfcolumns and crowned with a horizontal modillion cornice, to the
left and the right round (?) niches with semicircular heads. This is
clearly a strange place for such a representation. It cannot be excluded
that the painted aedicula front at Hermopolis derives from real niches
occurring in some Alexandrian tombs of the late Ptolemaic-early
Roman period above the kline-sarcophagus on the back wall of the
arcosolium. At Hermopolis the niche front may have been transferred to the walled shelf because the back wall of the arcosolium
was reserved for other types of representations that had evolved
under a different (Classical) influence. The niches repeat elements of
Egyptian mortuary architecture in the above-mentioned Alexandrian
tombs, viz., the Fort Saleh Tomb I, the Ghirghis Tomb, and the
Stagni Tomb, all in the Western Necropolis at Gabbari. In the
Ghirghis Tomb94 the central niche represents an Egyptian naiskos
with three concentric doorways. The door of the innermost one is
shown closed. In the Forth Saleh Tomb I95 the central niche encloses
89
Bergmann 1988.
Adriani 1966 130 ff. no. 84; Venit 2002 54, fig. 41.—For the manipulation
of perspective, see also Anfushy Tomb II, south side of court, doorway with jambs
carved at an oblique angle, ibid. fig. 63; Stagni Tomb, façade, ibid. 160.
91
On illusionistically rendered architecture in the Alexandrian tombs, see Pensabene
1993 135 ff.
92
93
Kaplan 1999 110 f.
94
Venit 2002 92 f., 1st cent. BC.
95
Venit 2002 93 f., 1st cent. BC.
90
129
the painted representation of Osiris, and in the Stagni Tomb96 that
of the mummified (!) Isis-Aphrodite. These figures may be interpreted
as images of the tomb owner “Becoming-Osiris” and “BecomingIsis”, respectively. The painted niche front in the “Maison Dionysiaque”
presents a paraphrase of the architectural symbolism of the tomb as
a shrine of the deified dead. This is also supported by a telling detail
which summarizes all that has been said above about the evolution
of the distinctive Egyptian pediment forms: namely, the architectural
frame of all of the three niches is rendered illusionistically.97
In sum, the survival and transformation of the Alexandrian niche
pediment types was motivated by their ideological connotations, also
including their association with royal display. The use of Egyptian
hardstones in the representative architecture of the Roman period98
similarly indicates the continuity of a tradition of Ptolemaic royal
display. It is in this tradition that the columns supporting the throne
(?) baldachin in the tetrarchic imperial cult shrine in the temple of
Amûn at Luxor (Chapter VI.1) had black granite (diorite) Corinthian
capitals of an Alexandrian type.99 Earlier Roman period hardstone
capitals were reused, e.g., in Shenoute’s “White Monastery” (Chapter
VI.2).100 The polychromy of Ptolemaic representative buildings101
remained characteristic for late antique and early Byzantine monumental architecture as well, not only because the limestone architectural members were painted102 but also because of the reuse of
monolithic grey and red granite and porphyry column shafts which
were removed from buildings erected by the pharaohs and their
Ptolemaic and Roman successors.103
96
M.S. Venit: The Stagni Painted Tomb: Cultural Interchange and Gender
Differentiation in Roman Alexandria. AJA 103 (1999) 641–669; Venit 2002 159 ff.:
dated in general terms to the Roman period.
97
Unframed niches with shadows indicating axial perspective: Gabra – Drioton
1954 Pl. 23, right.
98
For fragments of hardstone (Aswan granite and diorite) Alexandrian Corinthian
capitals, cornices, heart-shaped angle columns, Attic column and pillar bases from
a 2nd (?) cent. basilica at Syene/Aswan, see H. Jaritz: Ein Bau der römischen
Kaiserzeit in Syene. in: Krause – Schaten (eds) 1998 155–168.
99
Pensabene 1993 nos 252–254.
100
McKenzie 1996b fig. 3/d.
101
Gans 1994 448 ff.
102
Thomas 2000 26 f., 53 f.
103
For Alexandria cf. Gans 445 f.
130
chapter five
3. Further glimpses of late antique Alexandria
While Theodor Schreiber’s impressive picture of Alexandria as a
major cosmopolitan centre of Hellenistic art (cf. Chapter IV.2.1)104
continued to attract followers during the late nineteenth and the
twentieth centuries, it was also repeatedly challenged. In hindsight,
A.W. Lawrence’s passionate attack105 directed in 1925 against the
“pan-Alexandrianism” emerging in the wake of Schreiber’s studies
on what he identified as Alexandrian motifs in Romano-Campanian
architecture, painting and sculpture, Hellenistic and Roman landscape reliefs, embossed metalwork etc.,106 appeared irrelevant in the
light of the rich material presented in Achille Adriani’s Repertorio d’arte
dell’Egitto greco-romano published in 1963–1966.107 From the 1970s the
study of Ptolemaic ruler portraits,108 grotesque sculpture,109 mosaics,110
metalwork and jewelry111 provided further support for the hypothesis of Alexandrian local styles. Students of Ptolemaic art also turned
with growing interest towards the monuments of traditional “native”
culture in Hellenistic Egypt. This interest was not always impartial
and sometimes led to extreme suggestions. Robert Bianchi argued
in an impressive essay that Hellenistic Alexandria entirely lacked
artistic creativity and exerted no influence at all on the vigorous traditional culture of the Egyptian Hinterland:
[The] demonstrable lack of independent artistic initiative on the part
of the Hellenistic Greek and the Crown in Alexandria stands in stark
contrast to the innovations of the native Egyptian clerics during the
104
AM 10 (1885) 380–400.
A.W. Lawrence: Greek Sculpture in Ptolemaic Egypt. JEA 11 (1925) 179–190,
esp. note 1.
106
For a bibliography cf. Stewart 1996 244 note 8.
107
A. Adriani: Repertorio d’arte dell’Egitto greco-romano Ser. A I, II. Sculture. Palermo
1961; Adriani 1963–1966; cf. also A. Adriani: Arte, alessandrina. EAA I (1958)
232–235; id.: Divagazioni intorno ad una coppa paesistica del Museo di Alessandria. Roma
1959.
108
H. Kyrieleis: Die Bildnisse der Ptolemäer. Berlin 1975.
109
Himmelmann 1983; cf. also C. Ewigleben – J. v. Grumbkow (eds): Götter,
Gräber und Grotesken. Tonfiguren aus dem Alltagsleben im römischen Ägypten. Museum für Kunst
und Gewerbe Hamburg. Hamburg 1991; Török 1995a 20 ff. and passim; J. Fischer: Der
Zwerg, der Phallos und der Buckel. Groteskfiguren aus dem ptolemäischen Ägypten.
CdE 73 (1998) 327–361.
110
Daszewski 1985; cf. Dunbabin 1999 22 ff.
111
M. Pfrommer: Untersuchungen zur Chronologie früh- und hochhellenistischen Goldschmucks.
Berlin 1990; cf. Pfrommer 1999.
105
131
same period . . . This creativity, which has neither parallels in nor interfaces with the artistic milieu of Hellenistic Alexandria, is the most glaring condemnation of any theory regarding foreign influence on the
native arts of the period. The pendulum of scholarship has indeed
swung fully in the other direction. Just as in Egyptian society of
Ptolemaic Egypt, so too in art, the “Greeks and the Egyptians led parallel rather than converging lives” and “their cultures coexisted rather
than blended”.112
However, if viewed in their broader art historical context—primarily the architecture of Alexandria’s elite tombs113 and some outstanding monuments known from literary descriptions as, e.g., Ptolemy
II’s tent or Ptolemy IV’s palace boat (the thalamegos)114—the architectural forms discussed in the foregoing present sufficient evidence
for the existence of distinctive Alexandrian forms and stylistic trends.
The survival and further development of Hellenistic forms in the
Roman and late antique periods in Alexandria and other urban centres also seems to contradict the view that late antique Alexandria
was “a derivative rather than a creative site”.115 The issue of the
impact of Hellenistic Alexandria on the traditional arts of Egypt in
the Ptolemaic period cannot be discussed here.116 It suffices to recall
the pharaonic statuary and architectural carvings discovered in
Alexandria’s harbour area (cf. Chapter IV.2.1). If the suggestion is
not mistaken that they were transported to Alexandria in order to
be incorporated into the architecture of Hellenistic-style royal palaces
and representative public buildings of the Ptolemaic city, they may
be interpreted in the same manner as we interpret the reuse of
112
Bianchi 1988 78. His quotations are from Bagnall 1988. Bagnall, however,
argued in his paper against the theses formulated in the actual quotations.
113
H. Thiersch: Zwei antike Grabanlagen bei Alexandria. Berlin 1904; R. Pagenstecher:
Nekropolis – Untersuchungen über Gestalt und Entwicklung der alexandrinischen Grabanlagen und
ihrer Malerei. Leipzig 1919; A. Adriani: Annuaire du Musée Gréco-Romain (1933–34–
1934 –35). La Nécropole de Moustafa Pacha. Alexandrie 1936; id.: Annuaire du Musée
Gréco-Romain (1935–1939). Alexandrie 1940; id.: Annuaire du Musée Gréco-Romain
1940–1950. Alexandrie 1952; Adriani 1963–1966; Pensabene 1993; Venit 2002.
114
Athenaeus, Deipnosophistai 5.196a–203b (trans. C.B. Gulick, London-Cambridge,
Mass. 1961); Pfrommer 1999 69 ff., 93 ff.
115
Kiilerich 1993 215.—According to Beckwith 1963 7, “at no time after the
death of Cleopatra is there any suggestion that Alexandria was a style-creative city”.
116
See ESLP; Bothmer 1996. For the intellectual background cf. L. Koenen: Die
Adaptation ägyptischer Königsideologie am Ptolemäerhof. in: E. Van ’t Dack –
P. Van Dessel – W. Van Gucht (eds): Egypt and the Hellenistic World. Proceedings of the
International Colloquium Leuven 24–26 May 1982. Leuven 1983 143–190.
132
chapter five
ancient architectural ornaments in late antique architecture or be
regarded, to take a significant individual case, in the same light
as the display of Classical statues and architectural carvings in
Constantinople.117 It is tempting to suppose that spolia in Classical
style (e.g., the architectural members found in the “theatre” at Kom
el-Dikka118) were reused in the public buildings of late Roman
Alexandria, too, side-by-side with spolia in pharaonic style. The quotation and appropriation of the glorious past of Alexandria may well
have meant the quotation and appropriation of both the Hellenistic
and the traditional-Egyptian realms of monumental display. The cultural attitude of stylistic eclecticism was still vigorously alive in the
Roman period as it is splendidly demonstrated by the architecture
and iconography of elite tombs in Alexandria and the provincial
metropoleis.
Let us turn here for a moment to smaller architectural details.
David Bailey’s illuminating paper on Roman architecture in Egypt119
and Patrizio Pensabene’s monumental repertory of Elementi architettonici di Alessandria e di altri siti Egiziani120 present rich materials for
the study of the various levels of production of architectural sculpture and for the reception of Constantinopolitan models. Besides
architectural members imported in finished form, some of the imported
marble capitals, cornices, friezes, wall revetments, etc. were finished
in Egypt, probably in Alexandria. The pieces finished in Egypt display interventions of various kinds in the Classical repertory. A characteristic intervention is the Christianization of traditional forms,
mainly the late antique Corinthian column and pilaster capital, by
the addition of the sign of the cross inscribed in a laurel wreath.121
On capitals, the cross was placed in the centre of the abacus. In
this form, the abacus cross appears only on capitals finished or carved
in Egypt.122 Besides the symbolic reinterpretation of the late antique
Corinthian capital, the Egyptian sculptors also undertook other interventions in the repertory of the Classical orders. These interventions
For the evidence cf. Spivey 1996 7 ff.
Tkaczow 1993 85 ff.
119
Bailey 1990.
120
Pensabene 1993.
121
Pensabene 1993 432, no. 542: marble pilaster capital; Severin – Severin 1987
34, fig. 28: marble door lintel and 41, fig. 37: marble pilaster capital from Abu
Mena.
122
Severin – Severin 1987 34.
117
118
133
are characterized by a free rendering of the details of the base,
column, capital, and entablature. The omission or multiplication of
canonical elements reveals that they had lost their traditional structural significance and were regarded more and more as ornaments
and treated as constituents of a new type of visual display.
Cornices with narrow, flat grooved and hollow modillions which
occurred separately or together (cf. fig. 16)123 were distinctive elements of second- and first-century BC Alexandrian buildings. Modillion
cornices are also characteristic for Hellenistic-style Egyptian architecture outside Alexandria as well as for buildings in regions abroad
that were influenced by Alexandrian architecture.124 Egyptian modillion cornices were also complemented with meander and rhombus
patterns,125 rosettes,126 and figural motifs.127 Cornices of these kinds
remained fashionable in the architecture of the Roman,128 late antique,
and early Byzantine periods as well (cf. Chapters VII.1.3, IX.2.3).129
Cornices with flat grooved modillions, complemented with rosettes
and other ornamental motifs between the modillions also occur in
a flamboyant richness on late antique and early Byzantine niche pediments130 (cf. figs 68, 69). Niches and cornices with modillions were
carved for Shenoute’s “White Monastery” (fig. 29)131 and for later
ecclesiastical buildings at Sohag (fig. 70), Bawit, Saqqara, Luxor,
Dendera, and elsewhere. A similarly free rendering of canonical forms
may also be observed in the case of other architectural forms such
as the monumental door lintel type evolving from Alexandrian late
Hellenistic models through variants in late Hellenistic and Roman
period funerary chapels at Hermopolis Magna/Tuna el Gebel to the
late antique-early Byzantine portals of the episcopal complex at
Hermopolis Magna—in the case of the latter the continuity of local
traditions is also obvious.132
123
Lauter 1971 157.
125
126
Pensabene 1993 no. 924, from Theadelphia/Betn Herit, 1st cent. BC.
127
Pensabene 1993 no. 937, from Theadelphia/Betn Herit, 2nd–3rd cent.
128
Cornice with flat and hollow modillion: Serapeum, Mons Porphyrites, AD
117–119, Pensabene 1993 13 f., fig. 13; nos 86–88.
129
McKenzie 1996b 137.
130
E.g., Breccia 1933 Pls XXXIV, XXXV; Pensabene 1993 no. 1002 (Oxyrhynchos); Pensabene 1993 no. 1006 (Hermopolis, basilica). See also the painted niche
architecture in Bawit Chapel LV, with bird figures, Clédat 1999 photo 132.
131
Akerman 1976.
132
Pensabene 1993 530 f., ad nos 999, 1000.
124
134
chapter five
Continuity and change in architectural display may also be illustrated with a rather peripheral yet not quite insignificant example,
viz., the case of the tower-like multistoried dwelling house. Tower
houses (the pÊrgoi of the papyri133) of the type known, e.g., from the
Palestrina mosaic134 were already described by Herodotus (2.95) as
characteristic features of Egyptian settlements. Tower houses continued to be built of mud brick and wood in the villages in the
Ptolemaic and Roman periods and more solidly built tower houses
were erected in the cities.135 It may be supposed that, like other
regions of the Hellenistic and Roman world,136 the number of tower
houses was also an index of wealth in Egyptian cities.137 Julius Caesar
mentions Alexandria’s “lofty towers”.138 The iconographic context
of the tower houses represented in the Palestrina mosaic as well
as house models139 indicate indeed that tower houses built in the
metropoleis or in the precincts of Egyptian cult temples were prestigious buildings. The carrier of a third-century papyrus letter is
directed for information about the way to the dwelling place of the
addressee in the city centre of Hermopolis to the door keeper of a
seven-storied tower house with a statue of Tyche (Fortuna) standing
on the top of its portico.140
The representative connotations of the Egyptian tower house survived in the realm of ecclesiastical architecture. Tower houses or, as
they are traditionally termed, keeps, are attested archeologically as
well as textually in Egyptian monasteries.141 They are usually inter133
G. Husson: Oikia: La vocabulaire de la maison privée en Égypte d’après les papyrus
grecs. Paris 1983 248 ff.
134
Meyboom 1995 28 ff.
135
Cf. F. Arnold: Elephantine XXX. Die Nachnutzung des Chnumtempelbezirks. Wohnbebauung
der Spätantike und des Frühmittelalters. Mit Beiträgen von G. Haeny und S. Schaten. Mainz
2003 172 ff., 186 ff.
136
P. Grimal: Les maisons à tour hellénistiques et romaines. MEFRA 56 (1939)
28–59; M. Nowicka: A propos d’oikia DIPURGIA dans le monde grec. Archaeologia
Polona 14 (1973) 175–178.
137
Cf. R. Alston – R.D. Alston: Urbanism and the Urban Community in Roman
Egypt. JEA 83 (1997) 199–216.
138
Caesar, De bello Alexandrino 18, quoted by Stanwick 2002 16.
139
For a stone model of an urban tower house, Cairo 56352, see Meyboom 1995
fig. 37.
140
P. Oxy. XXXIV 2719, Krüger 1990 99; Alston 2002 262.
141
Winlock – Crum 1926–1933/1973 I 32 ff.; P. Grossmann: Keep. CE V 1395–
1396; for a tower-like structure in the monastic complex of Shenoute’s Deir Anbâ
Shinûda, see P. Grossmann – M.A. Mohamed: On the Recently Excavated Monastic
Buildings in Dayr Anba Shinuda. Archaeological Report. BSAC 30 (1991) 53–63;
Krause 1998b 160.
135
preted as refugia used in times of danger. Indeed, stories about barbarian attacks directed against monasteries in Upper Egypt and the
Sinai142 frequently mention keeps in which the monks find refugium.
Georges Descœudres convincingly argues, however, that these towers were built originally as dwellings which also could be used as
refugiums. According to Descœudres, the earliest ones of the c. one
hundred towers identified in the Kellia in the Libyan desert143 were
erected in the ecclesiastical centres of the sixth century coenobitic
settlement as dwellings for the leaders of the two initial coenobitic
communities, i.e., for the leaders of the Monophysites and the
Chalcedonians. The towers erected in the individual hermitages from
the seventh century onwards were permanent dwelling places of hermits. Their type, which revives the Roman-period tower house built
for wealthier urban citizens, as well as the excellent quality of their
execution is an index of the growing prestige of the coenobitic communities and illustrates the changes in their social status.144 The growing social prestige of the coenobitic communities is also indicated by
the higher quality of the decoration in their hermitages (cf. Chapter
IX.2.3).
The postulate thus seems mistaken that late antique Alexandria
with its colonnaded streets, agora and monumental Tetrapylon, luxurious palaces, public buildings and houses, statues, urban villas and
lush orchards “in the midst of the city belonging to great persons”,145
baths, theatres, temples and churches146 did not differ in its architectural appearance from the other great metropoleis of the Eastern
Mediterranean.147 On the contrary: the passionate outbursts of Christian
writers against the demonic presence of pagan temples and “idols”
142
For the evidence cf. Evelyn-White 1926–1933 II 13 ff.; J. Leipoldt: Ein Kloster
lindert Kriegsnot. Schenutes Bericht über die Tätigkeit des Weissen Klosters bei
Sohag während eines Einfalls der Kuschiten. in: Festschrift für Ernst Barnikol zum 70.
Geburtstag. Berlin 1964 52–56; L. Regnault: The Day-to-Day Life of the Desert Fathers
in Fourth-Century Egypt. Petersham 1999 48 ff.
143
Descœudres 1989.
144
Descœudres 1998 and cf. id.: Die Mönchsiedlung Kellia: Archäologische
Erkenntnisse als Quellen zur Spiritualität der Wüstenväter. Erbe und Auftrag 73 (1997)
102–118.
145
John Moschus, Pratum Spirituale 207, quoted by C. Haas: John Moschus and
Late Antique Alexandria. in: Décobert (ed.) 2002 47–59 51 f.
146
The literary evidence is discussed in Haas 1997 24 ff., 368 f. notes 27–34.
Haas also suggests that the Tetrapylon may have been of the same type as the
arch of Galerius at Thessalonica.
147
Rodziewicz 1984 313 ff.; Haas 1997 passim.
136
chapter five
in Alexandria—among them Egyptian cult shrines and “idols” of
Egyptian gods—depict a cityscape interspersed with visual allusions
to the timeless traditions of the native Hinterland.
The presence of relics of the Egyptian past is also reflected in the
stories around the pagan Isidore,148 Heraiscus, Asclepiades, and
Horapollon149 and the Christian Severus, Monophysite patriarch of
Antioch.150 In 484, the zealous anti-pagan Severus, who studied philosophy and rhetoric in Alexandria, in the company of some militant friends, destroyed an Isis sanctuary at Menouthis near Alexandria
(cf. Chapter IV.2.5). According to Severus’ biographer Zacharias
Scholasticus of Mytilene,151 the walls of the sanctuary were
completely covered with pagan [i.e., hieroglyphic] inscriptions. In one
corner there was built a double wall. The idols were hidden behind
this wall. A narrow entrance in the shape of a window led there, and
it was by these means that the priest got inside to perform the sacrifices.
These inscriptions had changed their original nature, however; they
were no longer texts to be read but symbols to be contemplated.
The last dated hieroglyphic inscription was written on the wall of
Hadrian’s Gate at Philae in August 394.152 By the late fifth century,
when Severus and his friends destroyed the walls of the Isis sanctuary at Menouthis—while, not far from Menouthis, Horapollon was
working on his Hieroglyphica—the meaning of the hieroglyphs as signs
of a writing system was completely forgotten. They possessed, instead,
magical power as freely interpreted pictograms and were venerated
by polytheists as carriers of “complete thoughts”, letters of a heavenly book.153 Hieroglyphic writing functioned as a visual medium of
148
For Isidore, see Damascius, Life of Isidore (ed. Zintzen). Cf. Sheppard 2000 840 f.
For the latter, see Chapter IV.2.4.
150
Zacharias Scholasticus, Life of Severus (ed. Kugener). Cf. R. Browning: Education
in the Roman Empire. in: CAH XIV 855–883 866.
151
Vita Sev. 33.
152
F.Ll. Griffith: Catalogue of the Demotic Graffiti of the Dodecaschoenus. Oxford 1937
no. Ph. 436. It perpetuates the obeisance before the Nubian god Mandulis of EsmetAkhom, son of Esmet, second prophet of Isis. Hadrian’s Gate and the adjoining
corridor led to the hypaethral court of the Isis temple and was passed by the pilgrims leaving for or returning by boat from the temple of Abaton on the neighbouring island of Biga. Hence, many of the great official and private graffiti of the
Nubian dignitaries visiting Philae were inscribed on the walls of Hadrian’s Gate
and the corridor.
153
H.-J. Thissen: Horapollonis Hieroglyphika Prolegomena. in: M. Mina –
J. Zeidler (eds): Aspekte spätägyptischer Kultur. Festschrift Erich Winter. Mainz 1994 255–263;
Burstein 1996 603 f.; Frankfurter 1998 250 ff.
149
137
traditional Egyptian polytheist identity. The significance attributed to
the hieroglyphs covering the temple walls by fifth-century polytheists who tried to save the holiness of their land154 is also visible behind
the scornful and disparaging rhetoric of Shenoute’s sermon in which
he recounts the conversion of a local temple:155
At the site of a shrine to an unclean spirit, it will henceforth be a
shrine to the Holy Spirit . . . If previously it is prescriptions for murdering man’s soul that are in there, written with blood and not with
ink alone—[indeed], there is nothing else portrayed . . . except the likeness of snakes and scorpions, the dogs and cats, the crocodiles and
frogs, . . . the likeness of the sun and moon . . .—where these are, it is
the soul-saving scriptures of life that will henceforth come to be in
there . . . and His son Jesus Christ and all His angels, righteous men
and saints [will be portrayed on these walls].
The stories of Severus and Shenoute illustrate the final phase of a
long process of transformation. The great turning point, i.e., the end
of a pagan cult in a temple and its conversion, is demonstrated by
many examples. The conversion of the temples of the Mediterranean
world, also including Egypt, has been amply discussed in the scholarly literature from the viewpoint of religious transition.156 Less attention has been paid to changes of a special kind that occurred in the
life of the cult temples during the last decades of polytheism: namely,
to the functional and symbolic changes which also brought about
changes in their architecture and decoration. Let us turn now to a
remarkable example presented by the architectural history of the
Amûn temple of Luxor in the late third-early fourth century.
154
According to the 3rd-cent. Hermetic tractate Asclepius “Egypt is the image of
heaven or, to put it better, the place where everything that is directed and superintended in heaven is transferred and comes down to earth. Indeed, if we are to
tell the full truth, our land is the temple of the whole world.” Ascl. 24 (ed. trans.
W. Scott).
155
Michigan ms. 158, Young 1981 353 f., also quoted by Frankfurter 1998 265.
156
J. Vaes: Christliche Wiederverwendung antiker Bauten. Ancient Society 15–17
(1984–1986) 305–443; J.P. Caillet: La transformation en églises d’édifices publics et
des temples à la fin de l’antiquité. in: C. Lepelley (ed.): La fin de la cité antique et le
début de la cité médievale. Bari 1996 191–211.
CHAPTER SIX
CONTINUITY AND CHANGE 2:
NEW PATTERNS OF MONUMENTALITY
Ashes the idol: dirt to be swept away.1
1. The imperial cult sanctuary of the Tetrarchs
in the Amûn temple of Luxor
Two serious revolts in the 290s prompted the military reorganisation of Egypt. The first revolt was suppressed in 293/4 by the
Emperor Galerius at Coptos (Upper Egypt). The second was led by
the usurper Lucius Domitius Domitianus, who controlled the land
for almost a year: it was crushed by Diocletian in summer 298.2
After Alexandria was taken from the rebels, Diocletian travelled in
summer or autumn 2983 to Egypt’s southern frontier which he decided
to withdraw to Philae from Hiera Sycaminos in Lower Nubia.4 Philae
was re-fortified as a frontier post.5 The reorganisation of the frontier garrison was part of a larger scheme that was motivated mainly
by concerns about internal security.6 The stationing of two legions
1
Constantine Cavafy: On the outskirts of Antioch. in: Collected Poems trans. E.
Keeley and P. Sherrard, ed. G. Savidis. Princeton 1992 207.
2
J.D. Thomas: The Date of the Revolt of L. Domitius Domitianus. ZPE 22
(1976) 253–279; id.: A Family Dispute from Karanis and the Revolt of Domitius
Domitianus. ZPE 24 (1977) 233–240; C. Zuckerman: Les campagnes des tétrarques,
296–298. Notes de chronologie. AnTard 2 (1994) 65–70 68 ff.
3
For the date, see L. Castiglione: Diocletianus und die Blemmyes. ZÄS 96 (1970)
90–103 96 with note 17; A.K. Bowman: Papyri and Roman Imperial History. JRS
66 (1976) 153–173 159; FHN III Nos 280, 328.
4
For the history of the frontier between Egypt and Meroe from the Ptolemaic
period cf. Speidel 1988; L. Török: Augustus and Meroe. Orientalia Suecana 38–39
(1989–1990) 171–190; FHN II Nos (70), (77), (83), (129), (131), III 188, 210, 220,
230, 240, 278, 292.
5
The fortified camp was not on the island but on the east bank at Shellal and
was connected with the camp at Syene/Aswan by a wall, cf. Speidel 1988 773.
Diocletian’s “Gate” on the island of Philae, which was built in front of the temple
of Augustus at the head of stairs leading to the Nile, was in fact a triumphal arch.
There were no fortification walls on Philae before the 5th century. Cf. G. Haeny:
A Short Architectural History of Philae. BIFAO 85 (1985) 197–233 231 f.
6
A.D. Lee: The Army. in: CAH XIII 211–237 217 ff.
140
chapter six
at Thebes also belonged to the scheme. It was decided that the temple of Amûn at Luxor would be turned into a castrum for the Theban
garrison.
If this decision—which was probably made by the emperor when
he passed Thebes on his way to the frontier7—was influenced at all
by practical considerations, it could only have been the topographical situation of the temple in the south part of the city that could
speak in favour of such a choice, not its architecture. The temple,
which was erected by Amenhotep III, enlarged by Tutankhamûn,
Horemheb, and Ramesses II, and complemented with a barque sanctuary by Alexander the Great,8 was architecturally completely unsuitable for being transformed into barracks or a fortification. Its
transformation into a camp was motivated rather by ideological considerations—and this camp was a strange building indeed.
An enormous fortification, enclosing an area of c. 210 × 260 m,
with quadrangular towers at its four corners and numerous U-shaped
towers along its sides, was built of mud-bricks so that its main northsouth axis was occupied by the temple (fig. 25).9 While the pylon
front of the temple was incorporated into the camp’s north wall, its
south end wall became part of the camp’s south wall. The interior
of the castrum was thus divided into two separate halves by the massive block of the temple. There was no main east-west street running from a fortified east gate to a fortified west gate: the two castrum
halves could communicate with each other only by means of the
original side entrances of the temple that opened into the Ramesside
Court (from the east and the west) and the Colonnade of Amenhotep
III/Tutankhamûn (from the east only). The lack of an east-west main
axis, i.e., a decumanus, is explained by the layout of the castrum halves.
7
M. Reddé in: El-Saghir et al. 1986 21 suggests that Diocletian decided the
building of the camp during his stay in Egypt in late 301–early 302 and connects
the dedication of the West Tetrastylon in 301/2 (see below) with the beginning
of the construction (?) yet also supposes that the building was completed long before
the dedication of the East Tetrastylon in 308/9. I prefer a chronology according
to which the building of the camp was started after the emperor’s visit in 289/90,
reached an advanced stage in 301/2, and was completed by 308/9.
8
R.A. Schwaller de Lubicz: Le temple de l’homme: L’Apet du sud à Louxor I–III. Paris
1957; PM II 301–337; P. Barguet: Luxor. LÄ III (1979) 1103–1107.
9
El-Saghir et al. 1986; J.-C. Golvin – M. Reddé: L’enceinte du camp militaire
romain de Louqsor. Studien zu den Militärgrenzen Roms III. 13. Int. Limeskongress Aalen
1983. Stuttgart 1986 594–599.
new patterns of monumentality
141
Namely, each half has in itself the structure of a complete castrum.
In each half, the barracks were arranged along a colonnaded main
street, i.e., the cardo (maximus) running from a fortified north gate to
a fortified south gate. In each half, a colonnaded cross-street, i.e.,
the decumanus ran east-west. As already mentioned above, these crossstreets were not coordinated and did not communicate with each
other. In the east castrum half the decumanus connected a fortified gate,
which opened in the centre of the east castrum wall towards the town,
with a small entrance near the north-east corner of the forecourt of
Amenhotep III in a highly awkward manner. In the western half of
the camp the colonnaded decumanus run from a fortified west gate
opening towards a Nilometer and a landing place close to the northwest corner of the castrum to the west processional gate of the temple’s first, Ramesside, court. In each half c. 16 m high tetrastyla were
erected at the crossing of the cardo and the decumanus.10 The west
tetrastylon was dedicated in 301/2 to the Tetrarchs Diocletian,
Maximian, Galerius, and Constantius Clorus; the east tetrastylon in
308/9 to Galerius, Maximian, Licinius and Constantine.11 It has been
inferred that the camp of Luxor was a double castrum erected for
two legions, each legion occupying its own camp but sharing a common legionary sanctuary (see below). The name of the place indeed
occurs in the form Castra in the plural—whence the modern name
al-Uqsur, i.e., the plural of qasr, Arabic castrum.12 No other legion is
attested at Thebes, however, than the legio IIIa Diocletiana, and the
camp territory is not sufficient for barracks for two legions—it is
actually not even sufficient for one legion.13
As noted above, the first pylon of the temple was incorporated
into the north wall of the fortress. The monumental pylon towers,
flanked by U-shaped bastions, dominated the north castrum front with
obelisks and the six colossal statues of Ramesses II standing in front
10
For the tetrastyla cf. W. Thiel: Tetrakionia. Überlegungen zu einem Denkmaltypus
tetrarchischer Zeit im Osten des Römischen Reiches. AnTard 10 (2002) 299–326
318 ff.
11
Lacau 1934.
12
P. Barguet: Luxor. LÄ III (1979) 1103–1107 1104. Already Lacau 1934 43 f.
suggested that the camp of Luxor was named castra in the plural because it housed
two legions.
13
According to M. Reddé in: el-Saghir et al. 1986 23 f. the area of the camp
could not accomodate two legions and Diocletian erected the camp for only a part
of the legio IIIa Diocletiana.
142
chapter six
of them. As opposed to the gates leading into the two castrum halves,
the pylon gate itself remained unfortified and, turning towards it,
communicated with the city of Thebes by means of the ancient processional avenue that connected the great Amûn temple of Karnak
with the Luxor temple. In the spatial structure composed of the two
camp halves and the ancient temple, it was the latter’s north-south
monumental processional axis to which the north-south and eastwest running main colonnaded streets of the former were subordinated. The hierarchy of the three architectural units was also clearly
articulated by their respective heights and masses, as is also obvious
from Jean-Claude Golvin’s fine reconstruction drawing (fig. 26).14
Entering the temple gate, the fourth-century visitor—be participant in a solemn procession of dignitaries and officers, or a pious
polytheist paying homage to the divine emperors and other gods
worshipped in the temple in those days—arrived in the great Ramesside
Court. The monumental double colonnade of the Court, with the
colossi of Ramesses II standing in the intercolumnia of the southeast, south, and southwest sides, was largely intact, similarly to the
architecture and decoration of the processional Colonnade of Amenhotep III/Tutankhamûn and the Court of Amenhotep III which the
ceremonial processions and the individual pilgrims passed on their
way towards Amenhotep III’s Hypostyle. In front of the four columns
flanking the central, i.e., entrance intercolumnium of the north front
of the Hypostyle, stood monumental statues of the Tetrarchs, with
images of the Augusti on the two sides of the main axis.15
The aim of the visitor was the hall16 opening from the Hypostyle
on the main temple axis.17 As part of the tetrarchic castrum building
14
El-Saghir et al. 1986 Pl. XX.—It is worth noting that the camp apparently
“reconstructed” basic features of the layout and spatial arrangement of the New
Kingdom temple+enclosure complex, cf. S. Aufrère – J.-C. Golvin – J.-C. Goyon:
L’Égypte restituée I. Sites et temples de Haute Égypte. Paris 1997 front cover, and reconstructions on pp. 72–73, 82–83.
15
The arrangement of the images of the Augusti and the Caesars is clearly indicated by the different materials of the preserved statue bases: the “inner” bases
were carved from red (purple) granite and thus supported the images of the Augusti;
the “outer” bases were erected from reused limestone blocks and were thus prepared for the Caesars, see el-Sahgir et al. 1986 16 f.
16
PM II 320 f.: “First Antechamber”; Bell 1985: “Roman Vestibule”; Bell 1997:
“Chamber of the Divine King”.
17
The original Amenhotep III hall was a three-naved transversal room with the
roof supported by 2 × 4 columns.
143
programme, this transversal hall was transformed into the sacellum,
i.e., the legionary sanctuary of the double castrum. Alterations were
also made in the Hypostyle which indicate that the two chapels
flanking the hall similarly received a new cult function (see below).
The columns of the hall were removed and its floor was raised using
drums of columns from the Twenty-Fifth Dynasty portico that once
stood in front of the temple.18 Since the walls received fresco decoration it must be supposed, however, that the hall was now covered
with a wooden roof. The c. 3 m wide south door, which opened
originally into the Offering Vestibule in front of the Barque Sanctuary
with Alexander’s shrine, was walled up in a manner that gave it the
shape of an apse. The apse was flanked by granite columns with
Corinthian-type capitals19 supporting an arched entablature and it
was divided from the hall by a low screen or banister.20
The interior of the apse and the walls of the hall were decorated
with wall paintings. The iconographic programme of these paintings
can be reconstructed, however incompletely, on the basis of the preserved remains21 and J. Gardner Wilkinson’s watercolours made in
or before 1856.22 In the apse the standing figures of Diocletian,
Maximian,23 Galerius, and Constantius Clorus, the Augusti and the
Caesars of the first Tetrarchy, were depicted, with the bust of Jupiter24
18
PM II 302 (4), Shabaqo.—For the surviving blocks and the hypothetical reconstruction of the building as a portico, see C.C. Van Sieclen: Amenhotep II, Shabako,
and the Roman Camp at Luxor (Review Article) [review of el-Saghir et al. 1986].
VA 3 (1987) 157–165; for a reconstruction of the kiosk: C. Loeben: A New Kiosk
of the 25th Dynasty at Thebes. Unpubl. paper, Eighth International Conference
for Meroitic Studies, 8–13 September 1996, London.
19
Pensabene 1993 369 f. nos 252, 253. U. Monneret de Villard, who identified
the late antique hall as a sanctuary of the cult of the Tetrarchs in his The Temple
of the Imperial Cult at Luxor. Archaeologia 95 (1953) 85–105, suggested that the two
columns remained from a four-columned ciborium. Referring to Kalavrezou-Maxeiner
1975 and Monneret de Villard’s above-quoted paper, Kelly 1998 169 suggests that
the hall was an imperial audience hall with a raised platform in front of the apse
with a ciborium “over the emperor’s throne itself ”. Remains of a raised platform
or a ciborium could, however, not be verified archaeologically, see Deckers 1979
615 f.—Ignoring Monneret de Villard’s paper, PM II 320 repeats the suggestion
made in the early 20th century that the hall was “used as Coptic church”, cf.
Grossmann 1973 167.
20
Deckers 1979 614 and reconstruction in fig. 34.
21
Deckers 1979.
22
Bianchi Bandinelli 1971 fig. 266; Deckers 1979 figs 12–15, 17–19, 24, 25, 27;
Elsner 1995 fig. 23.
23
After Maximian’s damnatio memoriae in 312, his figure was erased.
24
Deckers 1979 644, fig. 34.
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chapter six
between the Augusti, crowned by the eagle of Jupiter with a jewelled wreath or corona. The apse painting is regarded as a forerunner of Christian apse decoration programmes.25
The apse was flanked by two symmetrical scenes of monumental
composition and dimensions (height c. 7.50 m) on the south wall
(fig. 27).26 The better-preserved eastern scene represented two enthroned
figures, obviously one of the Augusti with with one of the Caesars
at his side receiving honour from officers and high dignitaries. Judging
by its preserved fragments, the western scene represented the other
Augustus and the other Caesar in a similar adlocutio scene. In both
scenes the figure of the Augustus was probably placed closer to the
apse, conforming to the placement of the statues of the Augusti and
the Caesars standing in front of the Hypostyle (see above).
Along the east and west walls, arranged in two registers, soldiers
were shown moving towards the great scenes of the south wall; their
context was probably the scene of the adventus domini, the triumphal
entry of the emperor.27 The processions probably started on the east
and west halves of the north wall. The direction of the movement
towards the centre of the room’s main wall and the scene sequence
thus followed the Egyptian “grammar of the temple”, i.e., the decoration was composed according to the rules of the interrelations
between the relief scenes in an Egyptian temple room.28 The figures
of the soldiers with their horses and chariots were placed in a threedimensional space. On the whole, the illusionistic space and the naturalistic rendering of the figures and their movements are in marked
contrast to the hierarchically tiered and symmetrical composition of
the two large scenes on the south wall and especially to the apse
composition.
25
J. Deckers: Constantin und Christus. Das Bildprogramm in Kaiserkulträumen
und Kirchen. in: D. Stutzinger (ed.): Spätantike und frühes Christentum. Ausstellung Liebighaus
Museum alter Plastik Frankfurt am Main 16. 12. 1983–11. 3. 1984. Frankfurt 1983
267–283; Elsner 1995 173 ff.; Severin 1998a 326.
26
Deckers 1979 fig. 34.
27
Kalavrezou-Maxeiner 1975.
28
For the “grammar” of the Egyptian temple scenes, see P. Derchain: Un manuel
de géographie liturgique à Edfu. CdE 37 (1962) 31–63; L. Pantalacci – C. Traunecker:
Le temple d’el-Qal’a. Relevés des scènes et des texts I. Le Caire 1990; D. Kurth: Die
Dekoration der Säulen im Pronaos des Tempels von Edfu. Wiesbaden 1983; id.: Treffpunkt
der Götter. Inschriften aus dem Tempel des Horus von Edfu. München 1994; and cf. L. Török:
The Image of the Ordered World in Ancient Nubian Art. The Construction of the Kushite Mind
800 BC–300 AD. Leiden-Boston-Köln 2002 40–258.
145
The composition of the south wall scenes29 is, however, not as
hieratic as it appears at first sight. They were divided hierarchically
into two superimposed registers, like, e.g., the adlocutio and largitio
reliefs of the Arch of Constantine in Rome and the reliefs of
Theodosius’ obelisk base in Constantinople.30 Unlike these reliefs,
however, in the Luxor wall paintings there is a marked difference
in the composition of the two scene registers. The upper register,
representing the enthroned emperors surrounded by guards (the figure
of the Augustus placed closer to the apse and probably slightly larger
than that of the Caesar), was symmetrical and static. In contrast,
the dignitaries and officers in the lower register were represented in
different stances and movements, some of them shown frontally and
some of them in three-quarter view (Pl. I).31 The scene axis was offcentre, being probably coordinated with the enthroned figure of the
Augustus above.32 What is even more significant, there is no common base line for the figures: moving and/or turning towards the
scene axis, they formed an illusionistically rendered circle around the
jewelled steps of the imperial throne and were seen from slighthly
above.
The scenes painted on the south wall of the imperial cult shrine
at Luxor around 300 represent a particularly interesting point of the
process leading from the Classical “naturalism” of the emperor’s
iconography to the symbolic scene composition of Late Antiquity.33
At Luxor, the four figures in the apse painting and the emperors in
the great “court” scenes flanking the apse were cult images formulated as a result of the sacralization of the living tetrarchs, who considered themselves dis geniti and deorum creatores to whom their subjects
owed adoratio.34 Fifteen years or so later, what was in Luxor the spatial illusionism of the lower scene half representing the wordly realm
For these, see Kiilerich 1998.
31
32
In the reconstruction of Deckers (1979 fig. 34) the smaller enthroned figure,
i.e., the Caesar is closer to the wall centre. According to the traditional iconographic rules vindicated in the procession scenes, this should be the place of the
larger enthroned Augustus figure. This is also supported by the location of the scene
axis in the lower register: it is under the enthroned figure which is closer to the
apse.
33
See also Elsner 1995 173 ff.
34
MacCormack 1981 107, 128; B. Caseau: Sacred Landscapes. in: Bowersock –
Brown – Grabar (eds) 1999 21–59 26.
29
30
146
chapter six
of the subjects as contrasted with the hieratic symmetry and immobility of the upper half representing the divine realm of the emperors, would be reduced to two identically flattened isocephalous rows
of figures in the adlocutio relief of the Arch of Constantine, rows of
figures standing more or less frontally and turning their heads in a
rather mechanical rythm towards each other or the emperor who
dominates the centre of the scene.
The Luxor castra were built and the wall paintings completed in
the years of the great persecution in which masses of Egyptian
Christians suffered the deaths of martyrs for refusing sacrifices to the
divine emperors. The sanctuary of the imperial cult had a twofold
function. As a cult temple, it turned towards the city of Thebes. At
the same time, it also fulfilled the function of a legionary sacellum.
Equally significant is a further association: namely, the association
of one of the greatest and most sacred temples of Egypt with military power and imperial cult. The sanctity of these temples must
have been vividly remembered and their physical magnificence was
largely intact in the early years of the fourth century. The building
of the new monumental garrison complex incorporating the ancient
temple at Luxor was part of the large-scale reorganisation of the
provinces of Egypt. It had a clear message: the Roman rulers are
legitimate successors of Egypt’s ancient kings and their Egyptian
regency is built upon Egypt’s timeless traditions and sanctity. The
view of the formidable fortress towering above the city of Thebes
could not be separated from the view of the ancient temple which
was now protected and “presented” by the fortress. Or was the case
just the opposite? The temple building with its enormous mass towered high above the fortification walls. It was not less meaningful
that, entering the pylon gate in order to offer sacrifice to the divine
Roman emperors, the fourth-century citizen found himself surrounded
by walls inscribed with sacred signs and the images of Egypt’s gods
and walked past the colossal images of the ancient kings of the land.
It is generally assumed that by 300 the cult of Amûn was extinct
at Thebes. The evidence does not support this view. With the establishment of the imperial cult shrine the rear part of the pharaonic
temple south of the imperial cult sanctuary (including Alexander’s
barque sanctuary) became a separate room complex which received
a secondary, yet architecturally accentuated, monumental pillared
entrance front giving access to the south end of the temple from the
147
east.35 The survival of the Amûn cult is indicated indirectly by the
Martyrium of Chanatomus, Sophronius, and Dalcina, according to
which, under Diocletian, sacrifices were offered in the old temple of
Amûn not only to the “genius of the Caesar” but also to the “idols
of the gods”.36 The testimony of the martyrium is directly corroborated by a Greek votive graffito inscribed at the entrance of the
Amenhotep III/Tutankhamûn colonnade in the early fourth century
by the army surgeon Ptollion: in it, Ptollion invokes the god Ammon.37
It is thus likely that around 300 priests lived in Luxor who were
attached to the cult of Amûn, which remained housed in the southern rooms of Luxor temple, and who still possessed some knowledge
of the original ritual functions of the rooms of the pharaonic temple. It must of course remain a hypothesis that the choice of the
transversal hall opening from the Hypostyle for the imperial cult
shrine was actually determined by this knowledge. In his analysis of
the original relief programme of the hall in question,38 Egyptologist
Lanny Bell suggested that during the New Kingdom it was the scene
of the rites of the king’s purification, introduction to Amûn, and the
repetition of his coronation at the Opet festival.39 Bell also concluded
that
The Romans’ selection of this part of the temple for the worship
of the divine emperors was surely deliberate, motivated by awareness
of the 1500-year-long tradition with the cult of the divine king.40
Indeed, the architectural relationship of the sanctuary of the imperial cult with the Amûn sanctuary on the other side of its southern wall,
El-Saghir et al. 1986 18, fig. 33.—On the basis of the secondary entrance, Bell
1985 274 note 117 assumes that the blocked-off rooms were reserved for “the continuance of some Amun rituals”.—It is worth noting that the Tetrarchs in the apse
painting of the imperial cult temple were crowned by the eagle of Zeus, identified
in Graeco-Roman Egypt with Amûn.
36
G. Legrain: Louqsour sans les Pharaons. Bruxelles-Paris 1914 9 ff.; M. Reddé in:
el-Saghir et al. 1986 21 ff.
37
G. Wagner in: El-Saghir et al. 1986 115 no. 37.
38
Bell 1985 263 ff.; cf. Bell 1997 173.
39
For the Opet festival rites performed in the temple, see also W.J. Murnane:
False Doors and Cult Practices inside Luxor Temple. in: Mélanges Gamel Eddin Mokhtar II
(BdE 97/2). Le Caire 1985 135–148; id.: Luxor, temple of. in: K.A. Bard – S. Blake
Shubart (eds): Encyclopedia of the Archaeology of Ancient Egypt. London-New York 1999
449–453.
40
Bell 1985 274. Bell’s suggestion is also accepted by M. Reddé in: el-Saghir
et al. 1986 31.
35
148
chapter six
behind the apse painted with the image of Zeus-Jupiter, whose identity with Amûn was a known fact of great significance for contemporary people strongly supports Bell’s hypothesis. Everything speaks
of a conscious association of the imperial cult with the cult of Amûn—
and for intellectual cooperation between the priests of the latter cult
and the architects of the castrum.
There is another hypothesis to be discussed in connection with
the Luxor castrum. It seems that there are remarkable typological and
conceptual links between the architectural context into which the
imperial cult shrine was inserted at Luxor and Diocletian’s palace
at Spalato/Split near Salonae on the Dalmatian coast.41
The building of the palace was started in all probability before
Diocletian’s journey to Egypt’s southern frontier in 298 and the
beginning of the construction of the Luxor castra. It was completed
(?) by 305 when, on his abdication, the emperor withdrew to his
palace near Salonae, where he lived until his death in 311 or 312.
It is traditionally repeated in the literature that the rectangular ground
plan of the palace, covering c. 7.5 acres, was modelled on the architectural type of the late Roman castrum divided into four quadrants
by colonnaded north-south and east-west main streets intersecting at
right angles.42 While its seaward side was formed as a galleried façade
of the imperial residence which took up the entire southern half of
the two southern quadrants, the north, east, and west fronts were
formed as fortification walls with fortified gates and towers standing
at the corners and between the corner towers and gates.
If we consider the ground plan alone, the fortification walls with
their fortified gates and towers and the columned “streets” dividing
the interior into quadrants indeed give the impression that Diocletian’s
palace followed the type of the late Roman legionary camp. The
palace, however, no longer appears as a variant of the castrum type
if we consider its individual elements as three-dimensional buildings
and real spaces.
The columned street running from the fortified north gate towards
the south is the beginning of a ceremonial avenue leading to the
41
For the palace, see J. Marasovic – T. Marasovic: Le ricerche nel Palazzo di
Diocleziano a Split negli ultimi 30 anni (1964–1994). AnTard 2 (1994) 89–106;
McNally 1996, with the earlier literature.
42
According to Elsner 1998b 73 the palace “resembles a cross between a fortress
and a city”.
149
imperial residence which was a palatium sacrum, sanctuary of the divine
emperor. The sacral character of the ceremonial axis was articulated
architecturally by the ascending order of monumentality through the
route’s sections. The columned street leads into the Peristyle, a large
courtyard flanked at the west and the east by open colonnades (six
columns between antae supporting seven arches) of monumental
dimensions. The floor of the Peristyle was sunk in order to further
emphasize the importance of the buildings surrounding it on the
east, west, and south. Behind the eastern and western colonnades
there were temenos areas. The western temenos contained the Temple
of Jupiter, and the eastern the Mausoleum of Diocletian, the son of
Jupiter. The Peristyle held sculptures, among them c. ten sphinxes
brought from Egypt.43 The architecture of the Peristyle culminates
on the south in the three-bay, four-columned front of the porch from
which the domed circular Vestibule and, behind it, the throne room
opens. The four red granite (!) columns of the porch—likewise brought
from Egypt—stand on a raised platform approached by stairs from
the Peristyle and they support an entablature running straight over
the outer intercolumniations and curving over the central one. The
porch was the liminal area between the public space of the palace
and the residence in which the emperor lived: he appeared before
the court as a living god under the monumental gabled pediment
of the porch.44 Behind the pediment towered the dome of the
Vestibule.45 The hierarchy of the individual building parts approached
from the Peristyle is carefully articulated and it illustrates the radically altered emperor image of the Tetrarchs in a clear visual language: although they stand on platforms elevated above the Peristyle,
the Temple of Jupiter and the Mausoleum of Diocletian Jovius are
subordinated by their east-west axis to the northwest residence axis.
Moreover, the residence stands on a level elevated high above the
platforms of the temple and the mausoleum.46
43
S. McNally: Introduction: State of Scholarship. in: Diocletian’s Palace: AmericanYugoslav Joint Excavations V. Dubuque 1989 3–36 30.
44
Cf. the architecture framing the emperor on the missorium of Theodosius I
from 388, Kiilerich 1993 19 ff., figs 1, 2; and cf. also the architecture framing the
figure of the high official on the diptych leaf of the Lampadii, c. 410–420, ibid.
143 f., fig. 81.
45
For an impressive discussion of the palace’s architectural symbolism, see L’Orange
1965 70 ff.
46
On the axes, see L’Orange 1965 75 f.
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Differences in elevation, emphasized by steps, also prevail in Luxor
between the Court of Amenhotep III, the Hypostyle, and the sanctuary of the imperial cult. The level difference between the Court
and the Hypostyle existed as early as the New Kingdom, but the
floor level of the imperial cult sanctuary was raised in the course of
Diocletian’s construction work.
From a formal point of view, the three sections of the imperial
axis following each other in an ascending order in Split are also present in the re-used and re-interpreted architecture of the Luxor temple. We disregard here the Ramesside Court as a non-sacral, public
space interconnecting the city with the castra. The actual ceremonial
route starts with the dark, narrow Colonnade of Amenhotep III/
Tutankhamûn. Its counterpart is the columned main north-south
street of the palace at Split. It is followed by the great peristyle
Court of Amenhotep III, which played a similar role as the Peristyle
of Diocletian’s palace. The Hypostyle opening from the Court was
originally built on a stone platform elevated above the Court level
and it has the architectural character of a portico, since it was divided
from the Court not by a wall but by a colonnade, the central intercolumnium of which is wider than the rest. As we have seen above,
the central intercolumnium was flanked by monumental statues of the
Augusti. The Hypostyle of the Amûn temple was the scene of the
appearance of the god’s processional image emerging from the temple interior. According to Bell, the people gathered in the Court in
front of the Hypostyle in order to adore the king during the Opet
festival.47 The Hypostyle’s functional/formal similarities with the porch
in Split are also underlined by the alterations introduced there in
the late antique period. Cutting away parts of the column bases and
thus widening the passages between the first and the second, the
fourth and the fifth, and the seventh and the eighth north-south running column rows, three processional routes were formed which led
to the entrance of the imperial cult shrine on the central axis and
to the entrances of the chapels flanking it on the east and the west,
respectively.48 In the intercolumnia of the column rows flanking the
principal processional axis screens were built and statues of emper-
Bell 1997 170 ff.
According to Bell 1985 and 1997, the western chapel was originally the barque shrine of Amûn of Karnak, the eastern that of Mut.
47
48
151
ors were erected. Preserved base inscriptions attest a statue of Galerius
as Caesar49 and three (?) statues of Constantine, one of them erected
in 324.50 With the statues of the Tetrarchs associated with the columns
of the Hypostyle front in the manner of the colossal statues of
Ramesses II in the Forecourt, and the other imperial images erected
within the Hypostyle, the columned hall before the sanctuary of
imperial cult and legionary signa became a place for a public imperial cult.
The question emerges here: was it the architecture of the palace
at Split that influenced the transformation of the Luxor temple into
a sanctuary of the imperial cult (or influenced at least its selection for
such a use), or vice versa? The first possibility is the more likely,
but the question cannot be decided for we do not know the building history of the palace. In any case, the sphinx statues and the
portico columns indicate a link with Egypt.
The architecture of some early Byzantine forts in Egypt also seems
to speak for a direction of influence from the structure of Diocletian’s
palace at Split to the re-interpreted rooms of the Luxor temple. In
the fort of Dionysias/Qasr Qarun the columned cardo leads to the
stairs of a columned portico from which the legionary sanctuary
opens. The latter room has an apse on the south.51 In the small fort
of el-Kab, the sanctuary has an apsidal end and it opens from a
columned transversal vestibule.52 In view of the chronology of these
and other forts, which postdate the building of the Luxor castra, one
may perhaps suggest that the transformation of the architecture of
the traditional principium of the Roman legionary camp into the type
encountered, e.g., at Dionysias, was influenced by Diocletian’s palace—
and not vice versa.
The transformation of the monumental room complex of the New
Kingdom Amûn temple constituted by the Colonnade of Amenhotep
49
G. Wagner in: el-Saghir et al. 1986 122.
Lacau 1934 36; Deckers 1979 607 f. with notes 19, 20.
51
J. Schwartz – H. Wild: Qasr Qarun/Dionysias 1948. Fouilles Franco-Suisses Rapports
I. Le Caire 1950; J. Schwartz et al.: Fouilles Franco-Suisses Rapports II. Qasr Qarun/Dionysias
1950. Le Caire 1969; J.-M. Carrié: Les castra Dionysiados et l’évolution de l’architecture militaire romaine tardive. MEFRA 86 (1974) 819–850.—J. Schwartz’s suggestions concerning the connections between the architecture of the principium at
Dionysias and the Christian basilica type are not accepted here.
52
A. Badawy: Fouilles d’El Kab (1945–1946). Notes architecturales. ASAE 46
(1947) 357–371. For further parallels, see Alston 1995 202 ff.
50
152
chapter six
III/Tutankhamûn, the Court of Amenhotep III, the Hypostyle, and
the hall and chapels opening from the latter into a sanctuary of the
imperial cult renewed the prestige of the ancient temple as the religious centre of the region. It is the holiness of the place and its symbolic and topographical centrality that also explain the intensity and
form of its Christianization. Between the late fifth (?)53 and seventh
centuries, four churches were built in the temple+castrum area and
two in front of the pylon towers.54 The larger one of these latter
was coordinated with the ancient processional avenue leading to the
pylon gate55 and was enclosed within a walled area.56 The church
built in the northeast corner of the Ramesside Court was coordinated with the colonnades of the Court as well as with the northsouth and east-west streets crossing it. The story does not end here:
the mosque dedicated to the local Muslim saint Abu’l-Haggag, erected
in the thirteenth century above the ruins of the church in the
Ramesside Court, continues to draw pilgrims from throughout Egypt
on the saint’s festival—and the courtyard of Amenhotep III is the
scene of the archaizing popular Festival of the Oars, a nostalgic creation of the twentieth century.57
53
The existence of the camp is attested until the Persian occupation (cf. Ch.
IV.2.5) of Thebes in 621/2. G. Wagner in: el-Saghir et al. 1986 33 suggests that
the first churches were built after the Persian occupation.
54
Grossmann 1973; P. Grossmann – D.S. Whitcomb: Excavation in the Sanctuary
of the Church in Front of Luqsûr-Temple. ASAE 72 (1992–1993) 25–34; Grossmann
1998a 224, fig. 9.—Most of them were excavated in the early 20th century and
may be dated only in general terms; the churches excavated in more recent times
are unpublished. In one of the churches west of the Ramesside Court a church
treasure was discovered in 1889 (Strzygowski 1904 340 ff. nos 7201–7210, Bénazeth
2001 375 ff. Cats 275–277, 309–315, cf. Chapter IX.2.3, below), including a vessel inscribed for Abraham, Abbot of the Monastery of Phoibammon at Thebes West
and Bishop of Hermonthis between c. 590–620, cf. Krause 1971.
55
P. Grossmann – D.S. Whitcomb: Excavation in the Sanctuary of the Church
in Front of Luqsûr-Temple. ASAE 72 (1992–1993) 25–34; Grossmann 1998a 224,
fig. 9. Note that the plan of el-Saghir et al. 1986 Pl. I is not precise in respect to
the connections between the church and the later (?) buildings around it. For the
fragment of a modillion cornice of a late (late 6th-cent.?) type from the church, see
McKenzie 1996b fig. 5/a.
56
Usually believed to have been a walled enclosure built by Nectabebos I; for
its probable Christian date, see el-Saghir et al. 1986 18 f.
57
Bell 1997 170, fig. 74.
153
2. Modernity and archaizing in Shenoute’s “White Monastery” at Sohag
He who cannot visit Jerusalem in order to prostrate himself before the cross on which Jesus the
Messiah has died should come to offer in this church
together with all the angels, and I shall pray for
the sins they have committed previously, and whoever hears me, his sins shall not be held against
him, even including the dead buried in this mountain, because I shall intercede with the Lord on
their behalf.58
So little is preserved, and known, from Egypt’s monumental architecture in Late Antiquity that it is tempting to consider every single
monument as typologically and stylistically unique. Indeed, while the
transformation of certain parts of pagan cult temples into churches
became a general practice in the fifth and sixth centuries,59 the manner in which the temple of Luxor was transformed into a sanctuary
of the imperial cult was unique.
Similarly unique was the manner in which certain traditional features of pharaonic temple architecture were associated with a “modern”60 late antique layout and architectural forms in two monumental
buildings, viz., the church of the monastery of the great abbot
Shenoute at Sohag near Panopolis (modern Akhmim), Shenoute’s
birthplace (cf. Chapters II.3, IV.2.4, 2.5), and the church of an
affiliated monastery nearby. Shenoute’s church was erected around
440 and is known under the modern names Deir Anbâ Shinûda or
Deir el Abiad, i.e., “White Monastery” (after the colour of its limestone perimeter walls).61 The church of the affiliated monastery was
built, at the latest, in the last quarter of the fifth century62 and is
known as the Deir Anbâ Bishûy or Deir el Ahmar, i.e., “Red
58
Besa, Life of Shenoute, É. Amelineau: Monuments pour servir à l’histoire de l’Égypte
chrétienne au IV e, V e, VI e, et VII e siècles. Paris 1895 392 f., quoted by Behlmer 1998
367.
59
For the 5th-cent. church inserted into the second court of the temple of Medinet
Habu, see Grossmann 1998a 221 ff., fig. 8; for the transformation of the court of
the temple at Biggeh into a church, see P. Grossmann: Überlegungen zur Gestalt
der Kirche im Tempel von Biga. in: Bács (ed.) 2002 279–287.
60
For the late antique use of the notion modernus, see Ch. III.3, note 73.
61
Grossmann 2002 61, 119 ff., 528 ff.
62
For the dating cf. Severin 1998a 314 f.; for the building: Grossmann 2002
536 ff.
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Monastery” (after the colour of its red-brick perimeter walls).63 It
represents a smaller, less luxuriously executed variant of the “White
Monastery”.
Considering its layout and interior architecture, the so-called “White
Monastery” (fig. 28)64 fits organically into the mainstream of monumental architecture in the late antique Mediterranean. At the same
time, it also displays distinctive features deriving from Egyptian
Hellenistic architecture, e.g., broken niche pediments (fig. 29).65 The
church built from dressed limestone has monumental dimensions
(36.75 × 74.60 m).66 While the builders also incorporated reused
architectural members and stone material from pharaonic, Ptolemaic
and Roman edifices,67 the architectural ornaments of the interior
walls constitute a formally and stylistically homogeneous whole and
were carved for the church building. The purpose-made architectural members included 56 niches in the “west narthex”, nave, sanctuary, baptistery, and the “south narthex”, further the entablatures
and string courses of the triconch,68 the door frames and the columns
(with capitals) of the “west narthex”, and the cornices of the nave
and the “south narthex”.69 Though spolia play a rather limited role
in the building, the reuse of marble and granite column shafts in
the monumental building reflects the unfolding tradition of monastic display which had been energetically opposed a century earlier
by Pachomius (cf. also Chapter IX.2.2).70
63
According to Severin 1998a 320 the red-brick shell enclosing the limestone
masonry church interior was the result of a later large-scale restoration work.
64
Grossmann 1998a fig. 13, wall niches numbered after Akermann 1976.
65
Severin 1998a fig. 5 (sanctuary, southern apse, upper register, niche no. 9 of
Akermann 1976).
66
Monneret de Villard 1925–1926; Grossmann 1984–1985; Grossmann 2002 528
ff.
67
Marble and granite column shafts and red granite and white marble paving
slabs; for a lintel from a Doric entablature, see Monneret de Villard 1925–1926 II
fig. 147.
68
Akermann 1976, heavily stylized drawings on pp. 18 ff. For the degree of stylization cf. the photograph of Severin 1998a fig. 6 with Akermann 1976 fig. p. 130,
niche no. 56. Besides altering the proportions and the details of the relief decoration of the niche head, Akermann also omits the cornice with an acanthus leaf
frieze on which the niche head rests.
69
For the chronological position of these carvings cf. McKenzie 1996b 137;
Severin 1998a 313.
70
See, however, the red granite columns of the church of the Pachomian monastery
at Pbow, built in the first half of the 5th century. For Pachomius’ views on the
issue of display cf. Krause 1998b 170.
155
The church had a central nave 12 m wide and two 5 m-wide
side aisles, with a “return aisle” on the west end71 and a triconch
altar room separated from the central nave by a tripartite triumphal
arch. The “return aisle” and the staircases opening from the western narthex and the northern side aisle indicate galleries above the
side aisles and the “return aisle”. The eastern annex rooms, including an octagonal baptistery,72 communicated with the lateral aisles
and the lateral conchs. Counted from the sanctuary end, two columns
stood in line with the pillars of the triumphal arch at the height of
the second column pair of the nave. These columns marked the
western end of the presbyterium which was separated by a parapet
from the nave and the lateral aisles. The church was entered from
the west through a small narthex (the “west narthex”) in which freestanding columns formed apsidal ends or exedrae on the north and
the south.
Along the south side of the church there was a long, narrow hall
with an apsidal end on the west (the “south narthex”). On the east,
a spacious square room (8 × 8 m) opened from it which also communicated with the southern annexes of the triconch and with the
southern lateral aisle of the church. The annex room to the northwest of the triconch communicated with the northern aisle. The
octagonal baptistery, with a basin for the immersion of adults, communicated with the southern aisle through an anteroom and with
the “south narthex” through the square room noted above.
The triconch and the enclosed bay in the central nave in front
of the triumphal arch constituted an area reserved for the clergy.
The triconch is the most distinctive feature of the two monastic
churches at Sohag and of the Egyptian churches influenced by their
layout (e.g., the sixth-century churches in the precinct of the Hathor
temple at Dendera73 and at Dayr Abu Matta in the Oasis of Dakhla).74
Unfortunately, the actual liturgical function(s) of the conchs remain
unknown, and this is also the case of the trichonch churches outside Egypt, with the exception of the basilica apostolorum built between
401 and 403 by Paulinus of Nola at Fundi near Naples in Italy
71
The “return aisle” is a characteristic feature of Egyptian three-naved basilicas
from the 5th century (?), cf. Grossmann 1998a 214.
72
For the architecture of the baptistery, see Grossmann 1984–1985 72 f.
73
Grossmann 1998a 220 f., fig. 6; Grossmann 2002 443 ff., fig. 63.
74
Grossmann 1998a 221, fig. 7; Grossmann 2002 120, 565 f., fig. 180.
156
chapter six
where, as we learn from the correspondence of the founder, the lateral conchs served as prothesis and diaconicon.75
As an architectural form, the triconch repeats a Roman type. The
adoption of the triconch form as a Christian cult building type was,
however, not influenced by its original functional context(s).76 The
triconch-type sanctuary was associated with a variety of church plans77
and functions: triconch churches functioned as cemetery churches,
martyria,78 monastic and community churches. A recent study of the
triconch churches built between the fourth and seventh centuries in
Egypt and North Africa, Jordan, Israel, Turkey, Greece, Armenia,
Croatia, Serbia, Italy, and France concludes that they do not reveal
common architectural and liturgical/functional roots.79 As to the earliest triconch basilica, it remains to be decided if this particular type
was invented in Sohag or perhaps in Greece (Crete) or North Africa.80
In Egyptian triconch churches, the triconch is always inscribed in
a rectangular sanctuary end. Triconchs inscribed partly or completely
in a rectangular building appear in Palestine in the first half of the
fifth century in churches of a rather modest size and execution, such
as the Memorial of Moses on Mount Nebo in Jordan81 and the
Church of St John the Baptist in Jerusalem.82 Nevertheless, the architectural type of the Egyptian triconch seems to have been influenced
by North African rather than Palestinian models. The triconch-type
martyrium erected in the early fifth century83 in the famous pil-
Paulinus, Ep. 32.10, 12, 17; cf. Lehmann 1996 315 ff.
P. Grossmann: The Triconchoi in Early Christian Churches of Egypt and
Their Origins in the Architecture of Classical Rome. Atti del I Congresso Int. It.-Egiz.
Roma 1992 181 ff. puts forward the unlikely suggestion that the layout derived
from the triconch-type Roman triclinium, associating the architectural form of the
dining room symbolically with the scene of the Christian Eucharist.
77
For a typology, see Stollmayer 1999.
78
For a trefoil martyrium built after 560 for the relics of St Martha near Antioch,
see Vita S. Marthae 415 f., Mango 1972/1986 126.
79
Stollmayer 1999 137 ff.
80
Lehmann 1996 352; cf. also Duval – Cintas 1976 917 ff.; B. Gui: Basiliques
chrétiennes de l’Afrique du Nord. Paris 1992.
81
Ras Siyaga on Mount Nebo, Stollmayer 1999 148 no. 28.
82
A. Ovadiah: Corpus of the Byzantine Churches in the Holy Land. Bonn 1970 78 f.
Here, however, only the lateral conchs are enclosed within rectangular walls.
83
For the dating cf. Duval – Cintas 1976 906.—The martyrium seems to have
been the earliest construction within a building complex consisting of the martyrium
and an adjoining basilica with forecourt, monumental porticus and atrium; further
75
76
157
grimage centre at Tebessa (Theveste) in Algeria84 displays a layout
related more closely to the sanctuary end of the “White Monastery”.85
An influence from North Africa is also indicated by the related forms
of access to the annexes at the two sides of the central conch in
another martyrium, at Tebessa Khalia,86 and in the “White Monastery”.
The Tebessa martyrium was erected on the site of an earlier chapel
dedicated to a martyr cult in a pagan necropolis which also contained the tomb of the holy martyr Crispina. It is generally assumed
that the triconch and other centralized layouts were especially associated with the cult of the martyrs.87 Knowing Shenoute’s negative
attitude concerning the burial of martyrs in congregational churches,88
however, it seems unlikely that he would have adopted the triconch
sanctuary layout if it had been especially associated with the cult of
martyrs.
In the “White Monastery” the triconch was part of a monumental building programme of a strikingly experimental kind. The programme was destined to satisfy complex practical and symbolic
functions which partly conformed with and partly differed from the
functions of the pilgrimage complex at Tebessa. It united the functions of a community church89 with the functions of a monastic
church which was associated with a regional (in some respects even
national) religious centre controlled by a great missionary, holy ascetic,
patron, and wonderworker,90 a “prophet second only to Elijah”.
During Shenoute’s lifetime, a considerable number of the visitors to
hostels and stable buildings. An epitaph dating from 508 provides an ante quem for
the completion of the whole complex. Cf. Christern 1976 75 ff.; Stollmayer 1999
143.
84
Christern 1976; Duval – Cintas 1976 905 ff.
85
From the 4th cent., in Egypt regularly (cf. Grossmann 1998a 216) and in
North Africa frequently the central apse of the basilica is inscribed within rectangular walls, cf., e.g., the basilica at El Asnam (Orléansville), A. Frazer: Architecture.
in: Age of Spirituality 640–647 641, fig. 90; or the basilica associated with the martyrium at Tebessa, ibid. fig. 95.
86
Duval – Cintas 1976 907 ff., fig. 34.
87
Grabar 1946/1972; N. Duval: Études d’architecture chrétienne nord-africaine
I. MEFRA 84 (1972) 1071–1125; Duval – Cintas 1976 897 ff.; Mundell Mango
2000 965 etc.
88
Cf. Chapter VI.3.
89
The church was open to the general populace on Saturdays and Sundays, see
E. Amélineau: Monuments pour servir à l’histoire de l’Égypte chrétienne au IV e siècle. Paris
1889 398, 433, 647.
90
Behlmer 1998.
158
chapter six
the monastery were pilgrims who came to pay “religious homage to
a recognized holy being and through that religious activity to pay
homage to or request special favor from God”.91
Of course, Shenoute’s church also contained a baptistery where
masses of adult catechumens were baptized by immersion. The “south
narthex” and the adjoining room in the southeast corner of the
church were probably the scene of catechesis, i.e., the instruction
given in preparation for baptism, and of certain rites of baptism.
High in the wall dividing the “west narthex” from the south aisle
of the church there were semicircular openings identified as acoustic
funnels.92 They may indicate that the “south narthex” also functioned as a room where the catechumens had to move from the
church before the Eucharist would be offered there at the Sunday
worship. In the course of the baptismal ceremony, the catechumens
may have congregated and professed their faith in the “south narthex”,
after which they stripped naked and were anointed in the neighbouring square room. Then they entered the baptistery through the
baptistery anteroom through which, after having been plunged into
the baptismal pool and then clothed in white garments, they moved
to the church, where they received the Eucharist for the first time.93
Stylistically, the architect(s) of the monastery churches at Sohag
united “modern” late antique models developed outside Egypt in the
early decades of the fifth century—such as the triconch and the
octagonal baptistery94—with forms such as the broken niche pedi91
L. Davidson – M. Dunn-Wood: Pilgrimage in the Middle Ages: A Research Guide.
New York-London 1993 13. For the definition of pilgrim, pilgrimage in the case
of visits to living holy men, see also Behlmer 1998 359 ff., with the literature of
the question.
92
Grossmann 1998a 231 ff.
93
V. Saxer: Les rites de l’initiation chrétienne du II e au VI e siècle: esquisse historique et
signification d’après leurs principaux témoins. Spoleto 1988; P. Rousseau: Baptism. in:
Bowersock – Brown – Grabar (eds) 1999 330–332.
94
A. Khatchatrian: Les baptistères paléochrétiens: plans, notices, et bibliographie. Paris
1962; A.J. Wharton: Baptisteries. in: Bowersock–Brown– Grabar (eds) 1999 332–334.
For the earliest octagonal baptistery, the Constantinian S. Giovanni in Fonte in the
Lateran complex, see O. Brandt: Il battistero lateranense dell’imperatore Costantino
e l’architettura contemporanea: come si crea un’architettura battesimale cristiana?
in: Fleischer – Lund – Nielsen (eds) 2001 117–144.—For the symbolism of the octagonal form and the alternating square and semicircular niches of the baptistery of
St Thecla in Milan cf. the verse attributed to St Ambrose: “Eight-niched soars this
church destined for sacred rites, eight corners has its font, which befits its gift. Meet
it was thus to build this fair baptismal hall about this sacred eight: here is our race
reborn”, CIL V.617,2, quoted by Markschies 1997 87; Wharton op. cit. 333.
159
ment that belonged to the traditional repertory of Roman architecture in Egypt, or, more concretely, to the repertory of Alexandrian
architecture (cf. Chapter V.2).95 The multi-storied columned architecture of the triconch, the alternation of square and semicircular
niches in the triconch and the nave, or the columned exedrae of
the “west narthex” in the “White Monastery” may likewise derive
from the repertory of Alexandrian architecture.
From the original decoration of the interior of the “White
Monastery” only carved architectural members—capitals and cornices—and the reliefs decorating the niches are preserved. Although
they are no more than seemingly stereotypic, repetitive, and incompletely preserved mosaics remaining from a more complex decoration programme which originally contained other elements as well
(wall paintings, textile hangings, liturgical objects), the niche heads
nevertheless give some idea of the iconographic programme of
Shenoute’s church. The niches display in a simple “readable” form
symbolic images which were destined to help the believer remember the principal aspects of the teachings that were received in the
church.
The “west narthex” is a remarkably elegant room. The columned
exedrae at its lateral ends show the impact of representative profane
architecture. E.g., transversal vestibules with exedrae at the lateral
ends play an important role in the spatial hierarchy of the rooms
of the villa at Piazza Armerina.96 The direct model may have been
Alexandrian, however, as is indicated by the (unfinished) Egyptiantype niche in the centre of the south exedra.97 The layout of the
“west narthex” was repeated in a more elaborate form in the Justinianic “transitory narthex” between the Tomb Church and the Great
Basilica at Abu Mena (fig. 121, cf. Chapter IX.2.1).98 The niches of
the narthex remained without relief decoration which may be an
95
Conforming with the milieu from which Shenoute’s powerful patrons came,
cf. U. Monneret de Villard: La fondazione del Deyr el-Abiad. Aegyptus 4 (1923)
156–162; J. Hahn: Hoher Besuch im Weissen Kloster: Flavianus, praeses Thebaidis,
bei Schenute von Atripe. ZPE 87 (1991) 248–252.
96
Vestibule (3) of the baths, with the mosaic of the Circus Races; vestibule (36)
of the Great Hunt mosaic. For the building, see A. Carandini – A. Ricci – M. de
Vos: Filosofiana. The Villa of Piazza Armerina. The Image of a Roman Aristocrat in the Time
of Constantine. Palermo 1982.
97
Akermann 1976 niche no. 49, fig. opposite p. 117.
98
Grossmann 1998a fig. 10.
160
chapter six
indication for its function as an anteroom situated between the outer
world and the sacred church interior.
In contrast, the niches of the “south narthex” were decorated in
a more meaningful manner. The doors leading into the “south
narthex” and from there into the south church aisle were monumentally accentuated by the architecture of the niches that frame
them. The conchs of these niches were filled with shells. The frieze
framing the conch of preserved niche head no. 52 displays two vases
from which grow scrolls of vine; in the centre of the frieze there is
a Christogram. The principal wall of the “south narthex” is the east
wall, with the entrance leading to the southeast corner room. The
entrance is framed in a monumental manner by an arched frieze
supported by two wall pilasters and flanked by two large semicircular niches above which there are smaller rectangular niches. The
decoration of the semicircular niches (nos 53, 55) repeats that of no.
52 with some variation; the niches above display the sign of the
cross (no. 54) and a vase from which tendrils of vine grow (no. 55,
fig. 30).99 These symbols of the saviour, source of eternal life, and
the Eucharist100 visualize the essence of the teaching probably received
by the catechumens in this hall and refer to the functions of the
rooms behind the doors, viz., the baptistery complex and the church.
Niche no. 35 of the baptistery is ruined. The rest of the niches
of the baptistery present variations on the symbol of the vine (nos
36–40), while niche no. 39 opposite the door communicating with
the altar room displays palm branches, alluding to the promise of
salvation and eternal life received with baptism. The lunette of the
door leading to the corridor communicating with the south church
aisle is filled with a large cross101 which faced the newly baptised
when s/he proceeded to the interior of the church.
The symbol of Christ as the source of eternal life also occurs in
the niches flanking the east door between the “south narthex” and
the south church aisle (nos 31 and 51). These niches are decorated
symmetrically with the sign of the cross and vine tendrils growing
from a vase and bearing grape clusters. The niches flanking the triumphal arch similarly bear symmetrical decorations. The conch of
Severin 1998a fig. 6.
“I am the vine, ye are the branches: He that abideth in me, and I in him,
the same bringeth forth much fruit: for without me ye can do nothing.” John 15,5.
101
Akermann 1976 106 f.
99
100
161
the southern niche (no. 32) is decorated with the image of the eagle,
a symbol of resurrection, inscribed in a triumphal crown with the
sign of the cross in its centre flanked by two peacocks and leafy
branches symbolizing Paradise. The pediment also bears the representation of two harts, i.e., images of the Christian neophyte, with
a tree between them.102 The badly ruined conch of the northern
niche (no. 33) was decorated with a cross enclosed by a crown and
flanked by two harts. The same image of the Christian believer
appears in the form of a reclining hart surrounded by plants (palms?)
of Paradise in niche no. 41 in the northern aisle. The figure of the
peacock, a symbol of resurrection, appears in niche no. 42. Above
the large frontally represented peacock figure the pediment also bears
the representation of two peacocks drinking the water of eternal life
from a cantharos.
The two superimposed orders of columns also enclosed niches in
the conchs of the sanctuary end: in the lower order, semicircular
niches alternated with rectangular ones, in the upper order there
were semicircular niches. The niches occupying the centre of the
central conch allude to the central functions of the church: in the
lower niche (no. 13) the cross is displayed, in the upper niche (no.
18) two harts are shown eating from a bunch of grapes. The rest
of the niches in the central conch display related symbols: in the
lower order, a vase with flowers (no. 14) and a hart among the
plants of Paradise (no. 12); in the upper order the sign of the cross
(no. 19) and a vase with vine tendrils (no. 17). The prominence of
the symbols of the eschatological Paradise also refers to the traditional spirituality of the desert fathers and Egyptian monasticism.103
The decoration of the north conch niches is restricted to variants
of the two latter-named symbols, i.e., the cross and the vase with
vine tendrils, except for niche no. 26, situated next to the central
conch in the upper order. This niche is decorated with the sign of
the cross enclosed within a jewelled crown and framed by vine tendrils. The crown is held by a hand. A similar representation, framed
this time by palm branches, occupies the head of the central niche
102
The images of harts at the cross or drinking from a vase derive from the allegory in Psalms 41,2: “the hart seeks for water as the soul seeks for God”. Mid6th-cent. chancel panels in the church of St Catherine’s Monastery on Mt. Sinai are
decorated with figures of harts, Forsyth – Weitzmann 1973 Pls LXXXIV, LXXXV.
103
Descœudres 1999 105 ff.
162
chapter six
(no. 8) in the upper order of the southern conch. Other niches of
the south conch seem to refer to the neighbouring baptistery with
their decoration: palm branches (nos 1, 3, 5, 6 [?]), vine tendril (no.
9), and, next to the central conch, a vase with vine tendrils (no. 10).
It would seem that the triumphal crown held in God’s hand in niche
no. 8 refers likewise to the sacrament of baptism. We are reminded
of a passage in Ambrose’s On the Sacraments:
We have come to the font, you have entered, you have been anointed
. . . You are anointed like an athlete of Christ, as if you are about to
engage in a contest in this world. You have committed yourself to the
exertions involved in your contest. Those who contend have what they
hope for, for where there is a contest, there is a crown. You contend
in the world, but you are crowned by Christ, and it is on account of
the struggles in the world that you are crowned.104
Two slightly earlier Western representations associating the sign of
the cross with the “prize of the cross” i.e., the crown received from
God’s (Christ’s) hand, are worth quoting here. The first is mentioned
as element of a complex symbolic representation of the parable of
the Last Judgement by Paulinus of Nola in his famous titulus describing the apse scene of his church built between 401–403 at Fundi.105
The second is preserved in the dome mosaic of the Baptistery of S.
Giovanni in Fonte at Naples from around 400. The central medallion of the mosaic represents a Christogram set against a starry sky
and crowned by God’s hand; the medallion is surrounded by a band
with birds—including peacocks—among baskets and branches of
fruit.106
The late antique architecture of the interior of Shenoute’s “White
Monastery” is hidden behind cavetto-crowned battered fronts with
pharaonic-style waterspouts and with doors crowned with cavetto
cornices. The austerity of the church fronts is further emphasized
by monotonous rows of small, unframed window openings. The traditional comparison of the outer appearance of the church to pharaonic
temple architecture is doubtless justified.107 As far as we can form a
104
Ambrose, On the sacraments 1.4, trans. Lee 2000b 248 f.
Paulinus of Nola, Ep. 32,17; for the reconstruction of the apse scene, see
Engemann 1997 88, with fig. 73.
106
G. Matthiae: Mosaici medioevali delle chiese di Roma. Roma 1967 55 ff.; Engemann
1997 79, fig. 67; Dunbabin 1999 252.
107
Deichmann 1938; P. Grossmann: Zur christlichen Baukunst in Ägypten. Enchoria
105
163
general picture of fourth- and fifth-century Egyptian church architecture,108 the Egyptianizing exterior of the Deir Anbâ Shinûda represents a rare type, its only recorded analogue being the nearby
church of Deir Anbâ Bishûy, the so-called “Red Monastery”, which
was built some decades later109 as part of the same monastic building programme. Although Egyptianizing elements occurred in the
monumental architecture of the Roman period (as is indicated, e.g.,
by the combination of traditional Egyptian and Hellenistic forms in
the case of door- and niche frames),110 it does not seem likely that
the actual formal dichotomy of Shenoute’s churches at Sohag would
have followed from a typological tradition linking the early churches
with pharaonic temples via the monumental architecture of the first
to third centuries. It is more likely that the two churches at Sohag
represent a highly significant yet idiosyncratic episode in the process
of creating monumental Christian art and architecture.
The churches of Deir Anbâ Shinûda and Deir Anbâ Bishûy were
built on the west bank at Sohag in the liminal area situated between
the inhabited fertile zone of the Nile valley and the desert, in the
realm of the demons. They were intended to dominate visually as
well as symbolically both the valley and the desert. Evidently, the
best models for the architectural solution of such a representativesymbolic function was to be found in the formidable closed, introvert blocks of the Late Period, Ptolemaic and Roman period cult
temples which in Shenoute’s day dominated the Valley in ways
besides visually. Several of them, still functioning as prominent places
of pagan worship,111 continued to play a complex role in the life of
the communities, wherefore they were targets of Shenoute’s untiring,
lifelong crusade against local religion.112 All over the country, pagan
sanctuaries were destroyed or Christianized: the more prestigious an
8 (1978) Sonderband (Internationaler Kongress für Koptologie Kairo 08–18 Dezember 1976)
89–100 90 f.
108
See recently Grossmann 1998a; 1998b; 2002.
109
In view of the close typological and stylistic affinities between the two churches,
I cannot agree with the dating of the Deir Anbâ Bishûy to the 6th cent. as suggested by P. Grossmann: Neue frühchristliche Funde aus Ägypten. Actes du XI e congrès international d’archéologie chrétienne, Lyon septembre 1986 II. Città del Vaticano 1989
1843–1908 1885.
110
Pensabene 1983.
111
Kákosy 1995 2943 ff.
112
For the evidence cf. Frankfurter 1998 77 ff., 107.
164
chapter six
Egyptian temple was the more likely was its demonstrative Christianization. Yet, as demonstrated by a sermon delivered by Shenoute at
the consecration of a chapel inside a converted pagan sanctuary, he
was fully aware of the duality inherent in the conversion of pagan
temples:113
At the site of a shrine to an unclean spirit, it will henceforth be a
shrine to the Holy Spirit. And at the site of sacrificing to Satan and
worshipping and fearing him, Christ will henceforth be served
there . . . And where there are blasphemings, it is blessings and hymns
that will henceforth be there.
The unclean spirit and its worship are replaced by the Holy Spirit
and the worship of Christ, i.e., the place is maintained and, now
housing the new religion of Christ, its function is continued in the life
of the community. The external appearance of Shenoute’s churches
articulated this dualism of elimination and continuity and visualized
the transfer of the authority of the temples of pagan gods to Christian
churches and monasteries. As was formulated by the fourth-century
rhetorician Libanius,
[t]emples are the soul of the countryside: they mark the beginning of
its settlement, and have been passed down through many generations
to the men of today. In them the farming communities rest their hopes
for husbands, wives, children, for their oxen and the soil they sow and
plant.114
The imitation of the external appearance of the old temples not only
advertised the power of the new faith and the wealth of its institutions but also demonstrated to contemporary people that the local
temple as the node of communal life had been replaced by the local
church and monastery. The walls of the churches at Sohag separated the paradisiacal world inside from the demonic outside world,
like the ancient temple walls protected the ordered world from chaos.
Yet the massive walls enclosing the churches of Shenoute’s monastery
complex also responded to the constant threat of barbarian incursions, combining thus symbolic display with the practical purpose of
defense against Blemmyan and Nubian attacks.115
113
Michigan ms. 158, Young 1981 353 f.
Or. 30.9–10, trans. Norman, Loeb Classical Library, 2 109–11; cf. Frankfurter
1998 28.
115
Behlmer 1998 342 ff., 354 ff.—For the incursions of Nubians from the post114
165
3. The episcopal complex at Hermopolis Magna
And those shameful things,
demons and idols
and defiled things made with hands
in the land of the Egyptians,
our good Saviour trampled down
all together
and set up in their place
a holy pillar.116
In Alexandria, the monumental establishment of Christianity in the
heart of the city and thus the transformation of urban life and
cityscape had reached a significant stage by the middle of the fourth
century, when the episcopal cathedral moved from the western city
gate to the Caesarion in the city centre (Chapter IV.2.4). The case
of Alexandria is exceptional, however. The transformation of the traditional cityscape took longer in other regions of the Empire117 and
in the Egyptian countryside. A relatively well-documented case is
that of Hermopolis Magna, capital of the Hermopolite nome, where
the episcopal basilica118 was built in the city centre around 450,119
Meroitic Lower Nubian kingdom beyond the southern Egyptian frontier and of the
Blemmyans from the Eastern Desert cf. Besa, Vita Sinutii, ed. J. Leipoldt, Louvain
1951 89–90; J. Leipoldt: Berichte Schenutes über Einfälle der Nubier in Ägypten.
ZÄS 40 (1903) 126–140; FHN III No. 301.
116
From the chant of the pilgrims to the basilica of Hermopolis, DeL. O’Leary:
The Difnar (Antiphonarion) of the Coptic Church Fasc. 3. London 1929 10 f., quoted by
L.S.B. McCoull: Chant in Coptic Pilgrimage. in: Frankfurter (ed.) 1998 403–413
411.
117
Ward-Perkins 1998 395 ff.
118
No textual evidence identifies the building as such, but its topographical position, architectural type, dimensions and luxury as well as the presence of the crypt
under the main apse (see below) strongly suggest that it was the church of the
bishop of Hermopolis.—Before the excavations in 1942, 1949, and 1949–1951, its
remains were identified as the Roman agora of the city, even though the site was
called by the inhabitants Kôm el Kenisa, “Kôm of the church”. Cf. E. Baraize:
L’Agora d’Hermopolis. ASAE 40 (1941) 741–745. This identification still occurs in
S. Aufrère – J.-C. Golvin: L’Égypte restituée 3. Sites, temples et pyramides de Moyenne et
Basse Égypte. De la naissance de la civilisation pharaonique à l’époque gréco-romaine. Paris
1997 213.
119
The basilica is dated traditionally to the 430s (F.W. Deichmann, RAC IV
[1959] 1262) or, in more general terms, to the first half of the fifth century with
reference to its typological features and the style of architectural carvings associated
with it, cf. Grossmann 1998a 216. Recently, small test trenches were excavated in
166
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more than one century after the Caesarion had been donated to the
Church120 and transformed from the temple of the imperial cult into
the Patriarchal Cathedral of Alexandria.
The episcopal church complex (fig. 31)121 of Hermopolis Magna
(modern Ashmunein, c. 320 km south of Cairo) was erected in the
heart of the late Roman city122 at the junction of two colonnaded
streets, viz., Antinoe Street, the main east-west road of the city, and
the Dromos of Hermes, the north-south processional avenue leading
from the southern habitation quarters to the (late) Thoth Temple.123
The crossing was embellished by a monumental tetrastylon124 which
is mentioned as “Great Tetrastylon” in P. Vindob. 12565, a papyrus
dating from AD 267.125 It was dedicated by Prefect T. Pactumeius
Magnus to the Emperors Marcus Aurelius and Commodus.126
To some extent, the Roman period topography of the area around
the tetrastylon may be reconstructed on the basis of P. Vindob.
12565 and the finds of the excavations conducted there by the British
Museum.127 In AD 267, the south-west quadrant formed by the crossing of Antinoe Street and the Dromos of Hermes was occupied by
the area of the basilica. In one of them, made in the area of the columned room
in front of the baptistery, a Ptolemaic or Roman (?) well was found which was
filled with debris when the basilica was built. The abandonment and filling of the
well is dated by (so far unpublished) coins and pottery sherds from the upper part
of the fill to the middle of the fifth century, see Baranski 1996 102.—The reasons
for a dating to the end of the 5th cent. suggested by Severin 1998b 101 remain
unexplained.
120
The legal basis was secured by a law of 407/8 empowering the bishop to
order the closing and destruction of temples, C.Th. XVI.10.19.2,3.
121
Grossmann 1998a fig. 2.—For the building, see recently Grossmann 2002 36,
441 ff.
122
G. Méautis: Hermoupolis-la-Grande. Lausanne 1918; H. Schmitz: Topographie von
Hermopolis Magna. Diss. Freiburg 1921; D. Kessler: Hermupolis magna. LÄ II (1977)
1137–1147; Roeder 1959; H. Schmitz in: Roeder 1959 101–104; Bailey 1984;
Spencer 1989; Bailey 1991; Alston 2002 131 f., 238 ff., 253 f., 260 ff.
123
H. Schmitz in: Roeder 1959 100–105.—For the papyrological record, see the
papyri quoted by Alston 2002 131 f., 261 f. and esp. SB X 10299.
124
The fragment of the plinth of one of the columns, with the dedication inscription, was found in situ by Joseph Bonomi in 1831, Bailey 1996 162 ff. The tetrastylon was probably ruined by the same earthquake which also destroyed the basilica.
The date of the earthquake is unknown, but examining the area around the street
crossing, D.M. Bailey found Egyptian Red Slip A sherds dating from the 7th century in the rubbish on which the columns of the neighbouring edifices destroyed
by the earthquake are lying, Bailey 1984 46 f.
125
C. Wessely: Corpus papyrorum hermopolitanorum. Leipzig 1905, reprint edn.
Amsterdam 1965 no. 127; Bailey 1996 162.
126
Bailey 1991 29 ff.
127
Bailey 1984; Spencer 1989; Bailey 1991.
167
the agora (?). In the north-east quadrant stood the Antonine komasterion, i.e., the building in which the processions formed, to then
move along the Dromos of Hermes north to the Thoth (Hermes)
Temple.128 The southeast quadrant, where the Christian basilica was
later erected, was occupied by a large walled enclosure.
This enclosure was built in the Ptolemaic period and remained in
use throughout the Ptolemaic and Roman periods.129 It measured
c. 60 m north-south, i.e., along the Dromos of Hermes; and more
than 130 m east-west, i.e., along Antinoe Street.130 A recent hypothesis131 identifies the Ptolemaic and Roman period building complex
enclosed by its walls as the Gymnasion and the Great Serapeum132
of Hermopolis. According to a building dedication inscribed in the
blocks of a Doric entablature and discovered in the foundations of
the Christian basilica, a sanctuary was erected here around 240 BC
by the “cavalry soldiers established in the Hermopolite Nome” and
dedicated to the cult of “King Ptolemy, son of Ptolemy and Arsinoe,
the Brother Gods and to Queen Berenice, his sister and wife, the
Benefactor Gods”, i.e., Ptolemy III and his sister-wife.133
Besides the inscribed entablature, the architectural members reused
by the builders of the Christian basilica also included elements of
splendid Doric, Ionic, and Corinthian buildings as well as architectural fragments from buildings in Egyptian style.134 Architectural elements originating from four different Ptolemaic structures were
distinguished. They do not necessarily represent four separate edifices,
but in the case that they do they may be identified hypothetically
with the Hadrianeion, Antinoeion, Sarapeion, and Neileion listed in
P.Vindob. 12565 as standing along Antinoe Street to the east of the
Dromos of Hermes.135 One of these sanctuaries was probably identical with the re-dedicated Doric sanctuary of the cult of Ptolemy
III and Berenice.136
Bailey 1984 42 ff.; Spencer 1989 92, Pl. 3.
Wace – Megaw – Skeat 1959; Baranski 1996.
130
See below.
131
Baranski 1996 104.
132
The “Great Serapeum in the Gymnasion” is mentioned in P.Brem. 46, 7–8,
AD 110, and P.Brem. 47, 5–7, AD 118: Roeder 1959 113, 127.
133
For the dedication insription on five blocks from the architrave of the Doric
sanctuary, see Wace – Megaw – Skeat 1959 4 ff., Pls 10, 11.
134
Wace – Megaw – Skeat 1959 6 ff.; Baranski 1996 103 f.
135
H. Schmitz in: Roeder 1959 101 ff.
136
Bailey 1984 43.
128
129
168
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All these architectural elements were reused in the substructure of
the basilica in remarkably fine condition,137 suggesting that the
Ptolemaic edifices in the temenos remained intact until the very
moment when they were pulled down in order to make room for
the Christian basilica which was to be built from their stones and
in their place.138 Such a close chronology is also supported by the
archaeological evidence.139
The relationship between the pagan and Christian building complexes is also remarkable in other respects. The enclosure walls and
most of the colonnades in the atrium were built precisely above the
walls of the Ptolemaic-Roman temenos. The western portico building was built above and with the partial reuse of the walls and stairs
of the Ptolemaic portico. Finally, the walls of the church complex
were built largely from the stone material of the Ptolemaic-Roman
complex. Besides the building material originating from the sanctuaries in the enclosure, a great number of monolithic hardstone column shafts and limestone column bases and capitals from other
monumental buildings140 were also reused for building the basilica.
The Hermopolis basilica stood in a walled enceinte built over the
antique temenos walls and it was part of a luxuriously executed representative building complex. Its western entrance was reached from
the Dromos of Hermes through a monumental portico in the centre of the western enceinte wall. The portico front was in line with
the street colonnade. The portico façade was formed by two columns
carrying an arcuated lintel and placed between pillared antae with
which they were joined by horizontal architraves. The central intercolumnium was larger than the distance between the antae and the
columns. The axial emphasis of the portico, i.e., the A-B-A rhythm
of the triple portico entrance,141 emphasized and also corrected the
monumental symmetry of the whole complex—the correction was
necessary because of the axial asymmetry of the basilica’s position
137
For pieces with excellently preserved painting, see Wace – Megaw – Skeat
1959 10, Pl. 1; Baranski 1996 104.
138
Wace – Megaw – Skeat 1959 4–11; Baranski 1996 100 ff.
139
For the relationship of the Ptolemaic remains and the Christian buildings, see
Baranski 1996 passim.
140
Deichmann 1975 60 ff.
141
For this “baroque” form cf. M. Wilson Jones: Principles of Roman Architecture.
New Haven-London 2000 118 f.
169
caused by the baptistery (see below). With their arcuated lintels, the
west and the north portico fronts repeat the fastigium, i.e., glorification
façade type of representative imperial architecture which was quoted
above in connection with Diocletian’s palace in Split (Chapter VI.1)
and they also follow the type of the propylon of Theodosius II’s
Hagia Sophia (consecrated 415).142
Returning to the north entrance, the steps leading up to the raised
level of the basilica complex (c. 2.5 m above the street level of the
Dromos of Hermes) started from the street front. A second pair of
columns stood in line with the enclosure wall. Here a second flight
of steps started, and there was a third flight of steps half-way into
the portico building. The inner gate of the portico opened into a
large (c. 48 × 50 m) atrium with colonnades dividing it into four
quadrants in an unusual manner that was inspired, it seems, by the
layout of the Ptolemaic predecessor building.143 A colonnade running
along the southern enceinte wall connected the atrium with a foreroom which communicated with the area behind the sanctuary of
the basilica (see below). The western narthex of the basilica opened
from the atrium.
There was another monumental portico on Antinoe Street. Its
four-columned front protruded into the street colonnade. The central intercolumnium was wider than the flanking bays and the columns
apparently carried a pediment of the same type as that of the western portico front, i.e., a pediment pierced by an arcuated lintel. A
small transversal vestibule opened into a larger T-shaped vestibule
from which the three monumental northern doorways of the basilica opened144 and it also gave access to a monumental baptistery
complex consisting of a vestibule, a columned hall which also seems
to have had an entrance from Antinoe Street,145 and the baptistery
142
Schneider 1941.
For the hypothetical reconstruction of the atrium cf. Wace – Megaw – Skeat
1959 Pl. 2; Grossmann 1998a fig. 2; Grossmann 2002 fig. 59.
144
“Let a church then be thus: with three entries in type of the Trinity”, Testamentum
Domini I.19, Mango 1972/1986 25. The Testamentum is a 5th-cent. Syrian text.
145
Marked only in the corrected ground plan of Peter Grossmann, Grossmann
1998a fig. 2. The partly reconstructed ground plans published by Wace – Megaw –
Skeat 1959 Pl. 5; Baranski 1996 figs 1, 8; and Grossmann 1998a fig. 2 differ as to
the arrangement of the baptistery complex. I accept here Grossmann’s reconstruction as the one which is most in line with the monumentality of the rest of the
basilica complex.
143
170
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itself, with a marble-lined circular baptismal tank with two flights of
steps entering it. The importance of the baptistery and the columned
room in front of it, which was probably the scene of catechesis (cf.
Chapter VI.2), is conspicuous: the basilica was shifted from the central symmetry axis of the building complex towards the south in
order to provide a larger space for the baptistery complex. The monumental symmetry of the portico-atrium-western narthex-church
entrance ensemble was thus sacrificed for the sake of a part of the
building complex which was invisible from the outside.
No excavations have been conducted in the area lying to the east
of the sanctuary end of the basilica. What can be established, however, is that the northern and southern temenos walls of the PtolemaicRoman complex continued towards the east beyond the height of
the basilica’s end wall. Consequently, it may be supposed that the
area lying to the east of the sanctuary end belonged to the PtolemaicRoman sanctuary complex and subsequently to the episcopal complex. This is confirmed by a narrow, corridor-like vestibule in the
southeast corner of the basilica. It communicated with the basilica
interior as well as with the atrium of the basilica (through the colonnade running along the southern enclosure wall) and the area lying
to the east of the basilica.146 I suppose therefore that the bishop’s
residence stood in this latter area. If so, its main entrance was probably from Antinoe Street. In this case, the episcopal residence (episkopion) of Hermopolis was located similarly to the episcopal residences
in Ephesos (St Mary’s), Salona, Philippi, and Tebessa.147 In the West,
the early fifth-century episcopal palace of Geneva was built likewise
in the area to the east of the episcopal church.148 The episcopal residence of Hermopolis, if it indeed stood next to the transept basilica, occupied a fairly large area. It is perhaps not irrelevant to note
that while the patriarch of Alexandria still resided in what appears
to have been modest upstairs apartments next to the church of St
Dionysus in the fourth century, by the mid-fifth century he occupied a palatial residence.149
146
The traces of a doorway leading to the area behind the sanctuary end were
identified by the excavators, see Wace – Megaw – Skeat 1959 45, Pls 4, 5.
147
D.I. Pallas: Episkopion. RBK II (1968) 335–371 346 ff., figs 2, 3, 14.
148
C. Bonnet: Geneva in Early Christian Times. Geneva 1986 24 ff.
149
Haas 1997 222 f.
171
The basilica of Hermopolis is one of the largest known churches
in Egypt: it is c. 65 m long, and the central nave is 14.47 m wide.150
The aisles—including the “return aisle”—are 5.62 m wide.151 The
three-naved transepts have apsidal ends and their colonnades form
curving ambulatories in the apses.152 The fourty-four monolithic red
granite columns of the nave and the transepts, and the red granite
columns of the porticoes were taken, together with most of their
limestone Corinthian capitals,153 from monumental late second- early
third-century Roman buildings.154 The limestone Corinthian capitals
of the galleries were likewise Roman spolia.155 Pilaster capitals supporting the triumphal arch of the basilica156 and the pediment of the
north portico157 were carved for the basilica.158 Late antique figural
and ornamental niche heads159 and various decorated architectural
members160 found in the area of the Christian enclosure seem to
have been spolia taken from fourth-century edifices. Their context in
the Christian building remains unknown.
There are no analogues in fifth-century Eastern or Western church
architecture for the form of the apsidal transept as it occurs in the
Hermopolis basilica. The type reoccured in Egypt in the monumental161 sixth-century (or earlier?) transept basilica at HauwarîyaMarea near the Mediterranean coast162 (fig. 32).163 It would seem
150
Alston 2002 299 ff. compares the area of the church: c. 1,195 m2, to the
2,500 m2 area of Constantine’s basilica of the Holy Sepulcher in Jerusalem and
describes it, quite misleadingly, as a building with “a simple architectural plan: a
wide nave and two narrow aisles”.
151
Of similar dimensions are. e.g., the transept basilica of Hagios Demetrios in
Thessalonica and the early 6th cent. (2nd period) Great Basilica at Abu Mena.
152
For the form cf. Krautheimer 1975 54.
153
For a capital carved for the basilica, see Deichmann 1975 61 ff.; Severin
1977a 249 no. 276/c.
154
Wace – Megaw – Skeat 1959 64 f., Pl. 24/3, 27/6; K. Ronczewski in: Roeder
1959 281 f.
155
Wace – Megaw – Skeat 1959 65, Pl. 24/2.
156
Wace – Megaw – Skeat 1959 67, Pl. 24/4, 6.
157
Wace – Megaw – Skeat 1959 67, Pl. 24/5.
158
Deichmann 1975 60 ff.
159
Wace – Megaw – Skeat 1959 68 ff., Pl. 25/1–4.
160
Wace – Megaw – Skeat 1959 Pl. 26/1–7.
161
The church was 50 m long, 45 m wide at the transepts; the nave was 13 m
wide.
162
For the town site of Marea (modern Al Mina) on the southern side of the
Lake Mareotis opposite Alexandria, see F. el-Fakharani: Recent Excavations at
Marea in Egypt. in: Grimm et al. (eds) 1983 175–186.
163
172
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that the transept basilica at Hauwarîya-Marea had its model in the
early church architecture of Alexandria.164 The rarity of this type
and its association with two churches of exceptionally large dimensions and luxurious execution may also indicate that it went back
to a model with special liturgical connotations and special prestige.
The early transept basilicas were built for the cult of martyrs in
the West165 as well as in the East.166 It is traditionally suggested
that the transept arms were designed to accomodate masses of pilgrims visiting the tombs of the martyrs, to enable them to participate
in the liturgy performed in the sanctuary area. It seems that the
episcopal basilica of Hermopolis too has features which suggest that
it united the function of a congregational church with that of a martyrium and pilgrimage centre. It is not unusual in Egyptian churches
that the apse floor was elevated above the rest of the basilica and
flights of three steps led up to the apse to the north and the south
of the presbitery. It is unique, however, that there was a crypt below
the apse on the main axis of the basilica.167 It measured 5 × 2 m and
was covered with a brick barrel vault. From this crypt a somewhat
larger, north-south oriented, similarly barrel vaulted168 side chamber
opened on the north. It measured 4 × 2.4 m. The crypt was
approached from the north through a narrow, north-south oriented
passage with a shaft at its northern end close to the apse wall. The
shaft was reached from the apse by a trap door in the apse floor
and two high steps that rendered the lowering of coffins easier.169
Though there is no text or archaeological find to prove it, there can
be little doubt that the crypt and the side chamber were destined
for burials. If we consider its place on the main axis “behind” the
altar,170 the crypt could only have been built for the burial of a martyr and not for that of the church-founder bishop, whose burial place
was more likely in the side-chamber, i.e., “by the saint” or sub altare.171
164
Grossmann 1993.
Rome, St Peter’s, St Paul Outside the Walls, cf. A. Frazer: Architecture. in:
Age of Spirituality 640–647 642 f.
166
Grabar 1946/1972 I 422 ff.
167
Wace – Megaw – Skeat 1959 23 ff., fig. 1.
168
For the vaults of crypts with burials of saints, see Grabar 1946/1972 I 521 ff.
169
Wace – Megaw – Skeat 1959 23 ff. and see Grossmann 2002 fig. 60.
170
For the archaeological remains of the presbyterium screens and the altar, see
Wace – Megaw – Skeat 1959 31 ff.
171
H. Leclercq: Ad sanctos. DACL I.1 (1908) 479 –509; F.W. Deichmann:
165
173
It was suggested in the foregoing that the architectural model of
the Hermopolis transept basilica may be found in Alexandria’s early
church architecture. The Alexandrian origin of the form of the
transept with apsidal ends and ambulatory colonnades also seems to
be indicated by the colonnaded exedra type occurring in the western narthex of Shenoute’s “White Monastery” (fig. 28 and Chapter
VI.2) and, after Hermopolis, in the Justinianic “transitory narthex”
connecting the Tomb Church with the Great Basilica at Abu Mena
(fig. 121 and Chapter IX.2.1).172 If we consider this special type of
transept in the liturgical context of the crypt, we may perhaps identify more concretely some of the models which may have influenced
the Hermopolis layout directly or through an Alexandrian mediation. As possible inspirations, we can cite the Church of the Holy
Apostles in Constantinople with the imperial mausoleum and the pilgrimage church of St John in Ephesos, built in the late fourth-early
fifth (?)-century. The former is supposed to have been built with a
cruciform layout.173 The latter was a transept basilica in which the
three-aisled transepts had straight ends. The tomb of St John—which
exuded a miraculous “manna”—was below the centre of the crossing and it was approached through a shaft with a trap door.174
Finally, we find transepts with straight end walls and colonnaded
ambulatories in the pilgrimage shrine of St Demetrios in Thessalonica.
The church was founded in 412–413, but only completed towards
the end of the century. The relic of the saint was buried in a crypt
under the crossing.175
We have seen that the gymnasium (?) and the pagan sanctuaries
mentioned in P.Vindob. 12565 as Hadrianeion, Antinoeion, Sarapeion,
Märtyrerbasilika, Martyrion, Memoria und Altargrab. RM 77 (1970) 144–168;
Kötting 1982; Y. Duval: Auprès des saints corps et âme. L’inhumation ad sanctos dans la
chrétienté d’Orient et d’Occident du III e au VII e siècle. Paris 1988; Rebillard 1993.—For
crypts in 5th-cent. basilica-type martyria cf. Grabar 1946/1972 I 430 ff., 436 ff.
For the presumed pre-Justinianian ad sanctos burials in the hypogeum under the
Crypt Basilica of Abu Mena cf. Grabar 1946/1972 I 442; see also Grossmann
1998b 284.
172
Grossmann 1998a fig. 10; Grossmann 1998b 282.
173
Completed around 370, cf. C. Mango: Le développement urbain de Constantinople
(IV e–VII e siècles). Paris 1985 23 ff.
174
For the church before its re-building by Justinian, see M. Restle: Ephesos.
RBK II (1968) 164–207 179 ff.
175
Grabar 1946/1972 I 450 ff.; P. Lemerle: Saint-Démétrius de Thessalonique
et les problèmes du martyrion et du transept. BCH 77 (1953) 660 ff.; C. Mango:
Byzantine Architecture. New York 1976 fig. 59.
174
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and Neileion (?) were probably closed down around the middle of
the fifth century and the building site on which they stood was
donated, together with the buildings themselves, to the bishop of
Hermopolis Magna. It cannot be excluded that the episcopal church
in the town centre replaced the “South Church” built in the late (?)
fourth century in the forecourt of the temple of Ramesses II.176 The
“South Church” was a three-naved basilical church with a return
aisle (fig. 33).177 To the south it was adjoined by an octagonal baptistery with an apsidal hall for the catechumens (?) and a partly subterranean chapel. A room opening from the chapel was probably
prepared for the burial of a martyr. It may have been this church
outside the gates of which the late (?) fourth century Bishop Plousianos
arbitrated publicly in a dispute.178
The closing of the pagan sanctuaries, the donation of the building site, and the erection of the episcopal complex seem to have
represented a concerted action of the imperial government, the town
council, and the bishop179 to transform the civic and symbolic centre of the city by replacing the ancient pagan cult institution(s) of
great prestige by an episcopal cathedral.180 There can be little doubt
that the maintenance of significant features of the pagan building
complex, such as the place and partly the form of the monumental
western portico or the colonnaded architecture of the atrium, were
intended to superscribe pagan cult with Christian worship. The considerations underlying the visual combination of continuity and replacement may be better understood if we recall Shenoute’s great church
at Sohag with its fronts presenting a “paraphrase” of the traditional
Egyptian temple (Chapters VI.2, 4).
If the side chamber of the crypt was indeed prepared for the burial ad sanctos of the bishop who founded the basilica, we are confronted with a remarkable case of ecclesiastical display. The case is
176
Fo the building, see D.M. Bailey – P. Grossmann: The South Church at
Hermopolis Magna (Ashmunein). A Preliminary Report. in: K. Painter (ed.): Churches
Built in Ancient Times. Recent Studies in Early Christian Archaeology. London 1994 49–71;
Grossmann 2002 437 ff.
177
Grossmann 2002 fig. 58.
178
P. Lips. I 43, cf. Alston 2002 307.
179
C.Th. XVI.10.19 of 407/8 granted bishops the authority of enforcing the law
ordering the destruction of pagan temples, cf. G. Fowden: Polytheist Religion and
Philosophy. in: CAH XIII 538–560 553 f.
180
For the larger context cf. Fowden 1978; Ward-Perkins 1998 394 ff.
175
especially significant when it is viewed from the perspective of a
competent contemporary, Abbot Shenoute. Shenoute argued in works
written towards the end of his life181 for the cult of the true martyrs
(martUros name) on their official feasts and at their topos, i.e.,
grave, stressing that the service at the topoi of the martyrs should not
differ from the service in the church. He fiercely condemned, however, the epidemic spread of the cult of spurious martyrs (martUros
Nnoyj) with their euphoric festivals and was most decidedly against
the introduction of martyr cult into the congregational church and
the incubatio at the tombs of martyrs.182 The great abbot—who visited relics of martyrs in Constantinople and Ephesos in 431183—also
says that he has not heard of a [congregational] church in Egypt
which was built over the dead body of a martyr except for one single
church in Panopolis; but, he adds, if such a thing also occurred in
other churches, it was, and remains, the greatest madness.184 Eventually,
this “madness” also occurred elsewhere in Egypt and Shenoute’s
attempts were late and without success—like similar attempts made
somewhat earlier by Augustine.185 In the last quarter of the fourth
century, Ammianus Marcellinus already writes about the burial of
martyrs in Alexandrian churches186—breaking the Eastern law of
Theodosius which prohibited the translation of martyrs’ remains from
their burial places outside city walls:
No person shall transfer a buried body to another place. No person
shall sell the relics of a martyr; no person shall traffic in them. But if
anyone of the saints has been buried in any place whatever, persons
shall have it in their power to add whatever building they may
wish in veneration of such a place, and such building must be called
a martyry.187
181
Between his visit to Constantinople and Ephesos in 431 and his death in 451.
For the dating, see Horn 1986 4 f.
182
G. Zoega: Catalogus codicum Copticorum manu scriptorum qui in museo Borgiano Velitris
adservantur (Opus posthumum). Romae 1810 [facsimile editions Leipzig 1903 and New
York 1973] 421–424, 424–427; Amélineau 1907–1914 I.2 159–224.
183
For the evidence cf. Horn 1986 1 ff. with note 28.
184
Amélineau 1907–1914 I.2 212,12–216,1; 217,10–218,3.
185
Augustine, Sermo Dolbeau 18.6–7, B. Flusin: Martyrs. in: Bowersock – Brown –
Grabar 1999 567–568 568.
186
Ammianus Marcellinus 22.11, in the description of the execution of the Arian
Bishop George of Cappadocia, cf. Ch. IV.2.4.—After the destruction of the Serapeum
a martyrium of St John the Baptist and a church were built above its ruins (ibid.).
187
C.Th. IX.17.7, trans. Maas 2000 138 f.
176
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Shenoute argued in Egypt against a practice which could not be
halted by traditionalists188 in other regions of Christianity either.189
Moreover, what he might have been worried about was not only
the entry of martyr cult into the congregational church but also its
association with the burial ad sanctos and, in more general terms, the
increasing authority of the bishops over the cult of martyrs.190 In
Egypt, the practice seems to have had deep roots. According to the
late fourth-century (?) Acts of Peter I, Bishop of Alexandria (302–311),
Peter erected a church ob martyrium coemeteria where he also prepared
his own burial place.191 From the second half of the fourth century,
there were official church regulations in the East and the West concerning the burial of presbyters in the church apse and deacons
before the apse.192 Ad sanctos burials are attested in the south church
at Pelusium, erected before 383–395, which was complemented with
a martyrium south of its sanctuary apse,193 further in a late fourthearly fifth-century church erected at Kôm al-Ahmar in Sharouna
above an earlier tomb chamber containing the burial of a saint.194
Some time in the early fifth century, the holy monk Apa Bane195
188
The sacramental celebration of the eucharist was prohibited in martyria in
the late 4th century, see the collection called the “canons of the council of Laodicea”,
quoted by Rebillard 1993 980 f. with note 40.
189
Cf. Jerome’s defense of the cult of martyrs against the early 5th-cent. writing
of Vigilantius, Jerome, Against Vigilantius, trans. Lee 2000b 293 ff. and see the story
on the conversion of the Jews on the island of Minorca (AD 418) brought about
by the deposition of the relics of St Stephen in the church of the town of Magona,
Severus of Minorca, Letter concerning the Jews 4–8, 12–14, Lee 2000b 163 ff.
190
For the rivalry between bishops and holy men and the bishop’s growing control over asceticism, cult of the martyrs and other saints, and the central role of
the bishop’s cathedral in the cult life of the congregation in the 4th-5th cent. cf.
P. Heather: State, Lordship and Community in the West (c. A.D. 400–600). in:
CAH XIV 437–468 457 f.
191
For the evidence, see Rebillard 1993 986 f.; for Peter, see also Müller 1981
322 f. note 10.
192
For the evidence, see Kötting 1982. The notable church of the priest Felix
unearthed at Kelibia in Tunisia presents a splendid illustration, see J. Cintas –
N. Duval: L’église du prêtre Felix. Région de Kélibia. Karthago 9 (1958) 157–269
esp. 235 f.; and see also the burials discovered in the martyrium at Cincari, near
Thuburbo Minus, Duval – Cintas 1976 fig. 39/a.
193
C. Bonnet – M. Abd el-Samie: Les églises de Tell el-Makhzan. Les campagnes
de fouille de 1998 et 1999. CRIPEL 21 (2000) 67–81; Grossmann 2002 475 f.,
fig. 90.
194
Grossmann 2002 428 f., fig. 50/I.
195
Apa Bane was still alive at the time of the death of Theodosius in January
395. For his vita, see M. Chaine: Les manuscrits de la version copte en dialecte sahidique
des Apophtegmata Patrum (Bibliothèque d’Études Coptes VI). Le Caire 1960 75 ff., 146 ff.,
177
was buried in the centre of the nave in his monastery church situated in modern Abu Fano a few kilometres to the northwest of
Hermopolis Magna.196 Considered a saint already in his lifetime, Apa
Bane’s tomb became before long a goal of pilgrimages, where miracles occurred.197 The monastery church containing his tomb was
enlarged in the early fifth century and privileged monks were buried
under its pavement around Apa Bane’s burial,198 a development that
Shenoute would certainly have preferred to prevent.
The splendor of the episcopal basilica of Hermopolis Magna is a
telling witness to the wealth and status of the bishop of an important see in the middle decades of the fifth century.199 The influences
and information amalgamated in its functional and artistic design
reflect, moreover, the education and outlook of a bishop sponsoring
new forms in the display of episcopal status. It is worth noting here
that two bishops of Hermopolis Magna are known to have participated in the Christological struggles of the first half of the fifth century.200 In 431, Bishop Andrew attended the First Council of Ephesos
(which Shenoute also attended) on the side of the Patriarch Cyril.
His successor Gennadius appeared at the Second Council (the “Robber
Council”) of Ephesos in 449 on the side of the Patriarch Dioscorus
(cf. Chapter IV.2.4). Both of them may be imagined to possess the
ambition, connections, wealth, and experience that enabled a fifthcentury bishop to take part actively in the creation of a new liturgical
nos 243–249; G. Gabra: Zur Vita des Bane (Abu Fano), eines Heiligen des 4./5.
Jahrhunderts. BSAC 29 (1990) 26–42; For the texts concerning Apa Bane cf. also
R.S. Bagnall: Archaeological Work on Hellenistic and Roman Egypt, 1995–2000.
AJA 105 (2001) 227–243 238 note 76.
196
For the site, see H. Buschhausen et al.: Die Ausgrabungen in Abu Fana in
Ägypten im Jahr 1988. JÖB 39 (1989) 241–259; id.: Die Ausgrabungen von Abu
Fana in Oberägypten im Jahre 1989. Äg. Lev. 2 (1991) 121–146; id.: Ausgrabungen
von Dair Abu Fana in Ägypten im Jahr 1990. Äg. Lev. 4 (1994) 95–127; id.: Die
Ausgrabungen von Dair Abu Fana in Ägypten in den Jahren 1991, 1992, und 1993.
Äg. Lev. 6 (1996) 13–73; for the saint ibid. 38 ff.; and cf. also H. Buschhausen in:
Buschhausen – Horak – Harrauer 1995 208–228.
197
For the archaeological evidence of Apa Bane’s burial, see Buschhausen 1996
62 f., fig. 3.
198
See the preliminary report on the excavations in the church, Buschhausen
1996 62 f., figs 6, 7 (inscribed memorial plaques marking monks’ tombs in the floor
paving) and cf. Grossmann 2002 517 f.
199
Liebeschuetz 2000 217 ff.
200
E. Schwartz (ed.): Acta Conciliorum Oecumenicorum I. Berlin-Leipzig 1933 7 (142),
60 (131), 81 (115), 88 (138), 116 (178), 185 (96).
178
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and architectural framework for the new role played by the bishop
in the Church and the city.201
4. Uses of the past
The devil then shouts: ‘. . . Christ is light . . . He
has destroyed the houses that I built in honor of
vanity, and everywhere he has torn down the temples of the demons. He has removed the stones
and wood that made up the temples of the idols
and used them for his buildings: he is thus mocking mine.’202
The three buildings discussed above, viz., the military camp of Luxor
and the imperial cult shrine it enclosed, the “White Monastery”, i.e.,
Shenoute’s church at Sohag, and the episcopal complex at Hermopolis
present paradigmatic examples for the use of the past and the transformation of the language of art in late antique-early Byzantine
Egypt.
The incorporation of the Amûn temple of Luxor into a military
camp and the transformation of one of its halls into a shrine of the
imperial cult represents a monumental attempt at the legitimation
of the divine tetrarchs by placing their cult in the centre of one of
Egypt’s ancient “national” sanctuaries. The monumental hybrid of
a modern fortification and an ancient temple with hieroglyph- and
image-covered walls which still sheltered gigantic images of Egypt’s
ancient rulers may have seemed ambiguous and suspect to contemporary viewers: which building protected which, which was the parasite of which? Or, on the contrary, was it a generally well-understood
and accepted articulation of the re-established unity of imperial rule
with Egypt’s glorious past at a turning-point between the end of a
period of conflict and the beginning of an age of the restoration of
traditional values (including the elimination of Chrsitianity), a renaissance of order and prosperity? Judging by the intensity of the efforts
at the Christianization of the temple and its surroundings under-
Hall 2000 731 ff.; Liebeschuetz 2000 218 f.
Jacob of Serugh, Poem about the Fall of Idols. Trans. P.S. Landersdorfer, Bibliothek
der Kirchenväter 6. Ausgewählte Schriften der syrischen Dichter. Kempten-München 1912 406
ff., quoted by Deichmann 1975 100 f., English trans. Fabricius Hansen 2001 80.
201
202
179
taken from the late fifth century (?) onwards, it would seem that the
association of the ancient temple and the gods worshipped there with
the cult of the divine emperors and with their formidable military
power was successful indeed, at least as far as it could prolong the
supremacy of polytheism in the south of Egypt.
The imposing skill of the artists who designed this special visual
formulation of charismatic imperial power is indicated by their discovery that the spatial structure of the ancient temple “repeats” that
of the new type of imperial residence that was just being built for
Diocletian near Salonae. The wall-paintings of the imperial cult shrine
likewise represent a high artistic quality. They belong to the first
great achievments of the emerging “modern” idiom of late antique
art. Representing a significant phase in the re-definition of Classical
tradition, they also demonstrate Egypt’s place splendidly within the
context of late Roman art.
In the “White Monastery”, too, the “modern” interior was concealed behind cavetto-crowned battered fronts mimicking an ancient
Egyptian temple. Here, however, the relationship between past and
present was reversed: the unification of the past with the present was
not meant as a legitimation of the latter by the former. At Sohag,
the present was not seen as a development from the past: the forms
of the past were evoked in order to manifest the great take-over carried out by Christianity. In his sermon quoted at the end of Chapter
VI.2, Shenoute gives his view on the necessity and possibility of the
conversion of pagan temples. The letter of Pope Gregory the Great
written in 601 to his missionaries working in England, provides an
insight into the psychological considerations which had probably
occurred to Shenoute too:
I have decided after long deliberation about the English people, namely
that the idol temples of that race should by no means be destroyed,
but only the idols in them. Take holy water and sprinkle it in the
shrines, build altars and place relics in them. For if the shrines are
well built, it is essential that they should be changed from the worship of devils to the service of the true God. When this people see
their shrines are not destroyed they will be able to banish error from
their hearts and be more ready to come to the places they are familiar with, but now recognizing and worshipping the true God.203
203
Preserved in Bede, Church History of the English People 1.30, trans. Lee 2000b
142 f.
180
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However, Shenoute was not merely slyly calculating the seductive
effect that the preservation of an ancient place of worship would
have on a polytheist. He was obsessed above all with images of the
dramatic victory of the true God over idols and demons. While continuing to destroy pagan shrines at some places and converting them
into churches at others, in his “White Monastery” he presented a
unique visual discourse on the triumphant replacement of the pagan
temple as dwelling place of gods, centre of power, and a social institution by the Christian church as a dwelling place of the true God
and centre of a new community united under the only true authority. The formidable exterior of Shenoute’s church is a symbol which
is as brutally direct as are the great abbot’s missionary methods: its
archaizing, which is interpreted traditionally and erroneously in a
literal sense (cf. Chapter II.3), was intended in fact to manifest discontinuity instead of continuity with the past.
The monastery of Shenoute was called “heavenly Jerusalem”, its
inhabitants “angels” by neighbours and visitors.204 Passing the doorway of the “White Monastery”, the believer arrived in a splendid
“modern” church interior: s/he was admitted to a new world, the
earthly image of heavenly Jerusalem.205 The masterfully calculated
spatial structure, the monumentality and luxury of the interior architecture were all intended to display the glory of the Church and
demonstrate the status and wealth of the monastery. Dominating a
large walled monastic complex, rising above the fields and villages
of the valley and protecting them from the evil forces of the desert,
Shenoute’s church also represented visually just as much as practically a rival of the episcopal churches of the cities.
The bishop’s church of Hermopolis Magna presents, in turn, a
significant example for the complexity of the display of episcopal
power in a fifth-century Egyptian city. Provided that the hypothetical identification of the crypt and its side chamber as the tomb of
a saint and the ad sanctos burial place of the church founder bishop
is correct, the basilica may be regarded as an illustration of the emergence in Egypt of the general trend in which episcopal power became
associated with the cult of saints—a trend fiercely opposed by ascetics
and monks (as we have seen, also including the abbot Shenoute) as
204
205
Life of Shenoute, Amélineau 1907–1914 I 92.
Eusebius, Historia ecclesiastica 10.4.
181
long as the movement of monks into the episcopacy did not alter
the situation.206 The splendid “modern” building complex articulated
a special relationship with the past: through emphatically preserving
certain features of the pagan sanctuary complex whose place it occupied, it accentuated the replacement of the past. Passing a gateway
standing at the same place and looking almost identical with the
ancient portico at the crossing of the Dromos of Hermes and Antinoe
Street, the visitor had to realize that where there used to be the
ornate shrine of false gods, now stands the glorious church of the
true God. In this respect, the motivation was similar to that of
Shenoute: the result is, however, more complex and sophisticated.
The founder of the episcopal basilica of Hermopolis was equally
concerned with the superscription of the past and the creation of a
new type of liturgical space which legitimates episcopal power, dominates the city architecturally as well as a cult centre, coordinates all
religious activities, including the great processions, and draws masses
of pilgrims from afar. Reading the account of the destruction of the
temple of Zeus Marnas and the building of the episcopal cathedral
in Gaza (Palestine) in 402–407, we have the impression that we are
reading about the actual atmosphere in which the cathedral of
Hermopolis was conceived:
After the Marneion had been completely burnt down and the city
been pacified, the blessed Bishop [Porphyry] together with the holy
clergy and the Christian people determined to build a church on the
burnt site in accordance with the revelation he had while he was at
Constantinople: it was for this purpose that he had received money
from the most pious empress Eudoxia . . . Some persons urged that it should
be built on the plan of the burnt temple . . . And while the site was being
cleared, there arrived a special courier with imperial letters of Eudoxia
of eternal memory. These letters contained greetings and a request for
prayers on behalf of herself and of the Emperors, her husband and
her son. On another sheet enclosed in the letter was the plan of the holy church
in the form of a cross . . . and the letter contained instructions that the
holy church be built according to this plan . . . Furthermore, the letter
announced the dispatch of costly columns and marbles. When the ashes had
been dug out . . . the holy Bishop ordered that the remaining debris
from the marble revetment of the Marneion—these, they said, were
206
P. Brown: The Rise and Function of the Holy Man, 1971–1997. Journal of
Early Christian Studies 6 (1998) 353–376; for the trend of the movement of monks
into the episcopacy cf. Theodoret, History of the Monks 17, trans. Lee 2000b 206 ff.
In Egypt the trend increased markedly only after Chalcedon, cf. Krause 1998b 172.
182
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sacred and pertained to a place into which access was forbidden, especially to women—would be used for paving the open space in front
of the church so that they might be trodden on not only by men, but
also by women, and dogs, and pigs, and cattle . . . The holy Bishop
had engaged the architect Rufinus from Antioch, a dependable and
expert man, and he was who completed the entire construction. He
took some chalk and marked the outline of the holy church according to the form of the plan that had been sent by the most-pious
Eudoxia. And as for the holy Bishop, he made a prayer and a
genuflexion, and commended the people to dig. Straightaway all of
them, in unison of spirit and zeal, began to dig crying out, “Christ has
won!”.207
207
Mark the Deacon, Life of Porphyry 75–78, Mango 1972/1986 30 ff.—My Italics.
CHAPTER SEVEN
IMAGES FOR MORTUARY DISPLAY
1. Sculptors, workshops and modes of representation
1.1. Porphyry sculpture and the workshop at Heracleopolis Magna
In the following we shall discuss fourth- and fifth-century figural and
ornamental sculptures in order to gain some insight into the working methods of the sculptors’ workshops at Heracleopolis Magna and
Oxyrhynchos. We shall try to form an idea of the experience of the
sculptors and craftsmen attached to these workshops. The fourthand fifth-century architectural carvings—niche heads, friezes, pilaster
capitals, pilaster bases (fig. 34)1 and other decorated architectural
members2—discussed in Chapter V attest the survival of Alexandrian
late Hellenistic types and forms. This chapter aims to examine the
impact of contemporary Alexandrian sculpture on the production of
late antique local workshops. The investigation begins by posing the
question of the influence of the imperial porphyry workshop(s).3
Porphyry was quarried at the Mons Porphyrites in the Eastern
Desert exclusively for imperial use, in which, besides the rarity of
the stone and the difficulty of working it, the symbolic value of its
purple colour also played a significant role. The hardest stone known
in antiquity, porphyry was worked exclusively, or at least mainly, by
Egyptian craftsmen and sculptors at the quarries as well as in specialized imperial porphyry workshop(s) at Alexandria.4 In the third
to fifth centuries, imperial and divine images, architectural members,
1
CM 7012, birth of Aphrodite: Monneret de Villard 1923 fig. 31; Török 1990
468, fig. 60.
2
E.g., tondo, CM 7015 (12/1/30/26), with representation of sea thiasos: Török
1990 462, figs 52, 53; Roeder 1959 304 § 5 701/VI, Pl. 71, fragment of tondo (?)
with bust (?) of emperor.
3
Török 1990 441 ff., figs 17–32; cf. Török 1998 63 ff.
4
Delbrueck 1932; W. von Sydow: Zur Kunstgeschichte des spätantiken Porträts im 4.
Jahrhundert n. Chr. Bonn 1969 135 ff.—For a finished porphyry sarcophagus lid found
in Alexandria, see Severin 1998a 304 f.
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and decorative elements for imperial edifices were carved from porphyry. Emperors and members of the imperial house were buried in
porphyry sarcophagi from Constantine (d. 337) to Marcian (d. 457).5
It is generally assumed that quarrying at the Mons Porphyrites came
to an end around the middle of the fifth century. However, production
continued after this time from reused material; the latest surviving
imperial portrait in porphyry is that of Justinian in Venice.6
Porphyry portraits of emperors were also erected in Alexandria
and other Egyptian towns; we may refer here to the well-known bust
from Athribis (fig. 35),7 the colossal enthroned emperor of the GraecoRoman Museum (fig. 36)8 and the torso of an unknown emperor in
Berlin, both found in Alexandria (see below). A fragment of the base
of the latter (or of a statue of identical type and size?) was recently
discovered near the find spot of the torso.9 The torso of an imperial figure now in the Torino Museo Archeologico (see below) was
acquired in Egypt in 1821.
Close stylistic affinities connect the Athribis bust to the Venice
(fig. 37)10 and the Vatican11 groups representing the rulers of the first
5
Vasiliev 1948; cf. F.W. Deichmann: Repertorium der christlich-antiken Sarkophage I.
Rom und Ostia. Wiesbaden 1967 108–110; Firatli et al. 1990 Cat. 79; Koch 2000
584 ff.
6
J.D. Breckenridge: Portraiture. in: Age of Spirituality 2–7 fig. 6.
7
Cairo 7257, for the attributions, see Kiss 1984 95 ff.
8
GRM 5934, Delbrueck 1932 96 ff., Pls XL, XLI. Found in 1870 at the elAttarin Mosque and transferred to the Egyptian Museum, Cairo (cf. Strzygowski
1904 3 ff. no. 7256, fig. 1, Pl. I); transferred subsequently to the Graeco-Roman
Museum.—Fragment of a stylistically closely related colossal statue from Edirne,
Turkey: Firatli et al. 1990 Cat. 6.
9
Kiss 1984 102, fig. 261; Zs. Kiss: Studien zu den Bildwerken der Frühchristlichbyzantinischen Sammlung II: Fragment einer Porphyrstatue in Alexandria. FuB 24
(1984) 107–109; id.: Sculptures des fouilles polonaises à Kôm el-Dikka 1960–1982. Varsovie
1988 51 no. 77, figs 131, 132.
10
Venice, S. Marco, Delbrueck 1932 84–91, Pls XXXI–XXXIV. The four figures
probably represent the senior emperors Diocletian and Maximian and the Caesars
Constantius Chlorus and Galerius. The missing right foot of one of the figures, with
a piece of the statue base, was discovered in 1965 in Istanbul, affirming that the
group stood originally in Constantinople at the Philadelphion west of the Forum
Tauri before it was taken to Venice in 1204. Cf. Firatli et al. 1990 Cat. 1.—For a
fragment from a small white marble variant found in Istanbul, see Firatli et al. 1990
Cat. 2.
11
Vatican Library, Delbrueck 1932 91 f., Pls XXXV–XXXVII: Diocletian,
Maximian, Constantius Chlorus, Galerius.
images for mortuary display
185
Tetrarchy (293–305), further to heads from Gamzigrad12 and Antioch,13
to a head fragment from Belgrad (Galerius?),14 and a head fragment
from Ni“.15 On the basis of the identification of the Venice and
Vatican groups with the rulers of the first Tetrarchy and of the
Gamzigrad head with Galerius (Caesar 293–305, Augustus 305–311),16
the heads from Antioch, Belgrade, and Ni“ may also be dated to
the period of the first Tetrarchy.
Stylistically distinct from this group of monuments is another fairly
homogeneous group of imperial images. It consists of the colossal
enthroned emperor in Alexandria and four torsos17 preserved in
Vienna,18 Torino,19 Ravenna20 and Berlin (fig. 38)21 (the Berlin and
Torino torsos were already mentioned above in their quality as finds
from Egypt).22 Their identification is rendered difficult or even impossible by the loss of their heads. Both the Vienna and the Torino
statues represented figures standing in contrapposto and wearing the
military dress of the emperor, rendered in a far less schematic manner than the costumes on the Venice and Vatican groups. The breastplate of the Torino emperor is modelled naturalistically. The drapery
of the enthroned emperor in Alexandria (fig. 36) is characterised by
a combination of the mannered, graphic rendering of the toga folds
12
D. Srejovic: A Porphyry Head of a Tetrarch from Romuliana (Gamzigrad).
Starinar 43–44 (1992–1993) 41–47; id.: The Representations of Tetrarchs in Romuliana.
AnTard 2 (1994) 143–152.—In his 1992–1993 paper, Srejovic discusses as genuine
piece the faked porphyry head of a Tetrarch in the British Museum, GR 1974. 12–13.1,
cf. M. Jones (ed.): Fake? The Art of Deception. London 1990 Cat. 262 (B.F. Cook).
13
Kiss 1984 96 f., figs 241, 242.
14
Kiss 1984 96, fig. 240.
15
Ni“ Museum 081, Kiss 1984 100, figs 252, 252.
16
Identified on the basis of Galerius’ portrait on the Little Arch at Thessalonica,
Calza 1972 no. 53.—Licinius: Delbrueck 1932 92 ff.; Beckwith 1963 47, no. 2.
17
The lost torso of a togatus formerly in Berlin, Altes Museum may also be associated with these, cf. Delbrueck 1932 99 ff., Pls XLII–XLIV; Calza 1972 110 no.
15, Pl. XV/41.
18
Wien, Kunsthistorisches Museum 685, Calza 1972 298 no. 209; Kiss 1984
102, fig. 258.
19
Torino, Museo Archeologico, Calza 1972 332 f. no. 238; Kiss 1984 102, fig.
259.
20
Ravenna, Museo Arcivescovile, Delbrueck 1932 111; Kollwitz 1941 92 f. no.
20, Pl. 19/1; Beckwith 1963 Pl. 6.
21
Berlin 6128, Delbrueck 1932 106, Pl. XLVII; Calza 1972 296 ff. no. 208;
22
For further small fragments of imperial statues in porphyry from Constantinople,
see Firatli et al. 1990 Cat. 7, 8.
186
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with a more Classical rendering of the folds of the chiton. The drapery, as a whole, is not independent from the body it covers. On the
Vienna statue the rib-like, widely spaced folds of the chiton repeat
the mannerism of drapery treatment observed on the statue of the
enthroned emperor. A somewhat metallic, angular rendering of the
monumentally treated drapery characterizes the torso of a chlamydatus in Ravenna. The Berlin torso (fig. 38) is closely related iconographically as well as stylistically to the Ravenna sculpture, yet its
drapery treatment is softer and more naturalistic.23
The colossal enthroned emperor in Alexandria (fig. 36)24 was
identified with Diocletian25 or Constantine.26 However strongly it
might be supported by Diocletian’s activities in Egypt (cf. Chapters
IV.2.3, VI.1), the first identification is highly unlikely in view of the
markedly different drapery style of the porphyry portraits of the rulers
of the first Tetrarchy. The identification of the splendid sculpture as
image of Constantine and the association of its dedication with one
of three dates, namely, either with Constantine’s victory over Licinius
and the acquisition of Egypt in 324, and/or with his vicennalia (twentyyear jubilee) in 325,27 or, as an even more likely alternative, with
his tricennalia (thirty-year jubilee) in 335, seems more probable.28
The Berlin sculpture represented a youth, the Vienna and Torino
figures were images of still younger boys. Delbrueck suggested that
23
The Torino, Ravenna, and Berlin torsos display the same type of imperial disk
fibula with three pearl pendants suspended on chains. The Ravenna and Berlin figures
also have the same type of sword with a hilt in the form of an eagle’s head; the now
destroyed hilt of the sword in the Torino fragment may have been of the same type.
24
A stylistically related headless porphyry statue of an enthroned emperor, reerected in the 6th cent. in the Hippodrome of Caesarea in Palestine: Calza 1972
112 no. 17, Pls XVI/43, XVII/44 (according to Calza, who identifies the Alexandria
statue with Diocletian: Diocletian or Maximinus Daia).
25
Calza 1972 110 ff.
26
Delbrueck 1932 96 ff.
27
For a statue of Constantine erected in 324 in the Luxor sanctuary of the imperial cult, see Ch. VI.1.—The emperor planned a visit to Egypt in 325, cf. Bowman
1986 45. The colossal statue may have stood in a sumptuous building in Alexandria:
as noted by Strzygowski 1904 3, the savants of the Napoleonic expedition observed
three porpyhry column shafts at the site where the statue was found.
28
The fragments of Constantine’s colossal marble statue in Rome are supposed
to have come from an enthroned figure erected at the time of the vicennalia (325)
in Maxentius’ Basilica Nova, cf. J.D. Breckenridge in Age of Spirituality Cat. 11. It
was suggested that the colossal bronze head of Constantine in the Palazzo dei
Conservatori (identification by H. Kähler, JdI 67 [1952] 22–26) is the fragment of
a statue erected either in connection with Constantine’s tricennalia or dedicated
posthumously, cf. Bianchi Bandinelli 1971 29.
187
the three sculptures were originally part of the same Constantinian
monument.29 Accordingly, the Berlin torso was identified tentatively
as Constantine II (316–340),30 the Torino torso as Constantius II
(318–361),31 and the Vienna fragment as Constans (323–350).32 If
the latter identification is correct, the Vienna torso cannot be dated
before 333, when Constans became Caesar. While Delbrueck’s suggestion remains a hypothesis, the stylistic closeness of the carvings is
obvious and speaks indeed for a dating of the three statues to 333
or the years thereafter. Such a dating is also supported by the imperial fibula type occurring on the torsos.33
Kollwitz suggested that the Ravenna statue, which could only have
been erected in or after 402, i.e., the withdrawal of the western court
from Milan to Ravenna,34 represents a fifth-century ruler. According
to Delbrueck,35 it was the reused portrait of a fourth-century emperor.
In the terms of Delbrueck’s suggestion, it may be presumed that it
was transferred to and re-erected in Ravenna some time between
402 and 476 (the end of imperial succession in the west), or perhaps
during the reign of Justinian I. However, its identification remains
problematic. The body proportions of the Ravenna torso are those
of a (young) adult. Considering its stylistic affinities with the other
three torsos, it cannot be dated much later than 333, i.e., a time
when the younger sons of Constantine could still be represented as
boys.36 It may perhaps be hypothesized that the Ravenna statue was
erected originally in connection with the accession of Constantine’s
sons as Augusti in 337 and it represented either Constantine II who
was 21, or Constantius II who was 19 years old at that time.
Delbrueck 1932 106 ff.
Kiss 1984 102.
31
Kiss ibid.
32
Kiss ibid.
33
After an early variant occurring on coins of Aurelian (for reference, see Bergmann
1999 65 note 442), the disk fibula with three pearl pendants suspended on chains
appears, e.g., on the Arch of Constantine (L’Orange – Gerkan 1939 Pls XXXIII/a,
XXXIV/b), on largitio dishes of the Licinii from 321–322 (cf. B. Overbeck: Argentum
Romanum. München 1973), then on the vicennalia dish of Constantius II from 343
(Age of Spirituality Cat. 16) and, more regularly from the 360s, on coin portraits (cf.
Bergmann 1999 65).
34
Kollwitz 1941 92 f.
35
Delbrueck 1932 111.
36
However, the 14–15 years-old Constans is portrayed as an adult man on the
silver medallion struck in Siscia to commemorate his 5-year jubilee in 337/8, Age
of Spirituality Cat. 38.
29
30
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The porphyry portraits of the emperors of the first Tetrarchy in
Venice (fig. 37) and the Vatican as well as the Athribis bust (fig. 35)
have repeatedly been interpreted as anticipating “Coptic” art.37 While
such a wide generalization remains unjustified, a number of fourthcentury limestone sculptures display features which indicate, in general terms, the influence of the artistic trend represented by the reliefs
carved for the Arch of Constantine (cf. Chapter III.3) as well as the
impact of the style of the porphyry portraits of the first Tetrarchy.
The Venice and Vatican tetrarchs present a distinctly new mode
of representing the human body and its relation with the drapery
covering it. Their treatment of the facial features also characterizes
the Athribis bust and the heads identified as representing the Emperor
Galerius. In the Vatican group, the distorted proportions of the shortlimbed figures with big, round heads, whose symmetrically built body
disappears entirely behind the geometrically treated pieces of garment,
as well as the characteristic rendering of their faces, may be interpreted as an attempt to articulate the symmetry and unity of tetrarchic regency in a simple, powerful visual language. In the focus of
the representation are the imperial faces. The faces are treated as
ideograms with schematic features, rendered graphically rather than
sculpturally, and dominated by large, staring eyes conveying concern,
concentration and fierceness. The visual language of the porphyry
groups was a consequence of the transformation of the imperial image
under the soldier emperors and it articulated a new world view:
The increasing standardization and equalization of life, the blocklike
fusion of the civic organisms, was revealed characteristically in the
increasing militarization of society—indeed in the whole way of life.
The soldier-emperors’ simplification of the government according to a
military pattern was followed by a general militarization of the civil
service and an assimilation of the civil into martial law . . . The military aspect of man, that is, exactly the aspect which binds him to rank
and file, letting him disappear as a person into a number within a
unit, into a solid block, into a sum of uniform elements . . . The identical
emperor type with its divine origin replaces the personal individuality,
just as the divine birthday replaces the personal dies natalis. The similitudo in the portraying of the emperors is thus of the same nature as
that in the portrayal of saints; a “sacred type”, tÊpow fierÒw . . . permeates all individual characteristics. It is toward this manifestation of the
37
E.g., Duthuit 1931 30 ff.; Beckwith 1963 8 f.
189
divine in the emperors and not toward their individual personality that
the eye of Late Antiquity is directed, it seeks the eternal God-Emperor
which undoubtedly was seen in the image of Diocletian.38
The tetrarchic visual language of the ideogram-face and the subordination of the body (the physical volume of which is concealed by
the incised rather than sculpturally modelled drapery) to the face as
the primary vehicle of meaning was first formulated in the Venice
and Vatican groups and adapted then to the framework of the historical relief in the adlocutio and largitio reliefs of the Arch of Constantine.
In coin portraits, it occurs first on Alexandian mints of Maximinus
Daia (309–313).39 The “tetrarchic mode” was, however, not exclusive. According to Bente Kiilerich,
[t]he hard, geometric style of the first Tetrarchy is a short intermezzo
that did not catch on; contemporary with this trend is a classicistic
style[.]40
Indeed, the classicistic tradition continued uninterrupted. Nevertheless,
the rendering of the human body, the relation between the human
anatomy and the drapery covering it, and the manneristic stylization and simplification of the latter as introduced in the plastic art
of the first Tetrarchy also caught on: they do not disappear entirely
with the unfolding of “Constantinian classicism”. Egyptian late antique
sculpture provides especially significant examples for the transformation
of the “tetrarchic mode”, created originally for the visual demonstration
of the political concepts of imperial qualities, tetrarchic rule, and ideal
social order, into a general “canon” of the representation of the human
anatomy. This does not mean, however, the existence of a posttetrarchic style that would consequently embrace composition, spatial
context, and drapery treatment alike: classicistic and non-classicistic
features mingle in Egyptian late antique sculpture in an unsystematic manner.
It is important to note here that what one may feel tempted to
identify as survival of the “tetrarchic mode” of the representation of
human anatomy is frequently nothing else than the consequence of
the sculptor’s poor skills and lack of experience. A more significant
mingling of styles is that caused by the organisation of labour in
38
39
40
L’Orange 1965 6 f., 47 ff.
Bianchi Bandinelli 1971 278 ff.
Kiilerich 1993 230.
190
chapter seven
workshops where sculptors and craftsmen trained in different styles
carried out works in cooperation and influenced each other’s practice.
In the adlocutio and largitio reliefs of the Arch of Constantine, the
figures were placed in front of a flat, airless background deliberately
abandoning the conventions of perspectival naturalism and Classical
illusionism. The case of the niche heads and reliefs from Heracleopolis
Magna and other Egyptian sites is markedly different, however, as
to the spatial context of the figures placed in their centre. As we
have seen in Chapter V, the Egyptian carvings of the fourth and
part of the fifth century maintained the conceptual and formal tradition of spatial illusionism as it had been articulated in Alexandrian
Hellenistic art.
Before turning to the production of local workshops, the reader must
be briefly reminded that the figural and ornamental limestone carvings
coming from Heracleopolis Magna (modern Ahnas) and Oxyrhynchos
(modern Bahnasa) belonged to the architecture of pagan and, to a
smaller extent, Christian funerary edifices (Chapters II.5, V) erected
for members of the educated urban elite (cf. Chapter IV.2.3, 2.4).41
The iconography, style, forms and quality of the carvings thus describe
both the outlook and intentions of the patron42 (cf. Chapter V) and
the training and skills of the artesan in a provincial centre. The evidence provided by sculptures torn from their original architectural
and conceptual (religious) context, to which building forms, inscriptions and representations in other media (mainly wall painting)
belonged as well, is tantalizingly incomplete for the art historian.
In more formalistic terms, the impact of porphyry sculpture on
the work of smaller workshops producing for elite requirements and
using limestone may be inferred on the basis of idiosyncratic mannerisms of drapery treatment such as the rigid, graphic rendering of
the stepped folds in carvings from Heracleopolis Magna (figs 23,43
34, 39,44) or the rib-like, widely spaced parallel folds in reliefs from
the same site (?) (figs 40, 41, 42).45 Both mannerisms may be rec-
41
For the social context cf. Thomas 1990 I 153–182; Török 1998 51–57; Thomas
2000 33 ff., 59 ff., 81 ff.
42
Török 1998 41 ff.; Thomas 2000 59 ff.
43
CM 7044, Strzygowski 1904 37 no. 7292/b, Török 1990 fig. 59.—Cf. also
CM 7012, Monneret de Villard fig. 17, Török 1990 fig. 60.
44
Fig. 34: CM 7012; fig. 39: CM 7055, Strzygowski 1904 31 f. no. 7287, fig.
36, from Naville’s excavation (Naville 1894 Pl. XIV), Török 1990 fig. 58.
45
Fig. 40: CM 7020, Strzygowski 1904 20 no. 7276, fig. 23, Török 1990 fig.
191
ognized in the colossal porphyry statue of the enthroned Constantine
(?) in the Graeco-Roman Museum (fig. 36). In some carvings the
metallic treatment of the drapery is associated with a more Classicizing
rendering of the face and body of the figures (fig. 41), in others with
a “non-Classical” rendering of face and body (figs 23, 39). A fragmentary niche head from Heracleopolis Magna (fig. 43)46 displays a
foliage type which may have been influenced by the foliage type
encountered on the porphyry sarcophagi of Constantine the Great47
and Constantina and Helena.48 The peopled scroll on the latter sarcophagus displays acanthus leaves with rounded lobes that may be
compared to the stylized acanthi of friezes from Heracleopolis Magna
(see below). The varied contexts of these features signal, however,
chronological differences and indicate the distance between the imperial porphyry workshop and elite workshops in provincial centres
such as Heracleopolis Magna.
An additional, though indirect, argument for the dating of the
colossal enthroned statue in Alexandria is presented by a small detail
of a limestone relief (fig. 41) which was quoted above as one of the
carvings on which the rib-like parallel drapery folds indicate the
influence of the drapery treatment of the colossal enthroned emperor
in Alexandria. The relief represents an unidentified mythological
scene. In the centre of the slightly damaged frieze block the figure
of a haloed young woman is represented, dressed in a belted, longsleeved costume with widely spaced, rib-like parallel folds. Two drapery folds cross each other over her right breast in an idiosyncratic
manner also occurring on other sculptures from late Roman Egypt.49
The woman is represented sitting on the ground with her left knee
drawn up and her left hand in an introspective posture on her chin.
The posture indicates contemplation or indecision in a difficult situation50 and repeats an iconographic formula in Classical art associated,
17, from Heracleopolis Magna (?). Fig. 41: CM 7819, Török 1990 fig. 27 (provenance not known). Fig. 42: CM 7039, Strzygowski 1904 24 f. no. 7281, fig. 28,
Török 1990 fig. 22 (provenance not known).
46
CM 7050, from a representation of the birth of Aphrodite: Török 1990 441,
445, figs 18–20.
47
Beckwith 1963 Pl. 1.
48
Effenberger – Severin 1992 fig. 19.
49
Serpentine statuette of Isis lactans, Cat. Hamm Cat. 8 (with an improbable dating to the AD 1st cent.); relief with bust of Tyche, ibid. Cat. 10.
50
Cf. the figure of Phaedra shown before taking the fatal step in the 4th-century mosaic found at Sheikh Zouveida in the Gaza region, now Ismailia, Museum,
Levi 1947 72 f., fig. 29.
192
chapter seven
e.g., with Penelope. Behind her stands a badly damaged male (?)
figure holding a club (?) in his right hand. To the left of the seated
female figure are two source Nymphs. To the right are two draped
female figures turning their (now destroyed) head towards the scene
centre but striding towards a column, statue base (?), or altar (?)
standing at the right end of the scene. They extend their right arms
towards the figure in the centre. Their gesture gives expression of
reproach or negative feelings at a deed against the consequences of
which they had warned the central figure in vain.
The seated figure in the centre wears a summarily rendered but
clearly identifiable Scheitelzopf coiffure. The contour of the long tresses
of hair gathered over the ears into a plait and brought forward over
the top of the head recalls portraits of the first third of the fourth
century, while the manner in which the hair is parted in the centre
and drawn back in loose waves occurs in late third-early fourth51
and again in late fourth century52 (and later) portraits. The individual
elements of the Scheitelzopf coiffure do not provide an entirely sufficient
dating basis in themselves: its proportions are also significant. The
relationship of the big, round head with the low coiffure with a narrow, flat plait over the top of the head indicates that the model that
was copied by the master of the Cairo relief is not later than the
second third of the fourth century.53
The theme of the two other Cairo reliefs quoted above on account
of their related special drapery treatment is similarly mythological.
CM 7020 (fig. 40) probably represents Ariadne from a scene with
Dionysos and Ariadne (cf. fig. 44).54 CM 7039 (fig. 42) represents
the triumphant Heracles with the Nemean lion, flanked by two
Victories holding palm branches and crowns.55 The three carvings
51
Late 3rd cent.: Age of Spirituality Cat. 363.
E.g., bronze head in the monastery of Santo Domingo de Silos in Spain,
Bergmann 1999 72 f., Pls 85/1–4.
53
Cf. the figure of Saphira on the back of the ivory lipsanotheca in Brescia,
Volbach 1972 no. 107; Grabar 1969 fig. 337, third quarter of the 4th cent. For
the variants of the Scheitelzopf cf. R. Delbrueck: Spätantike Kaiserporträts. Berlin-Leipzig
1933 46 ff.; K. Wessel: Römische Frauenfrisuren von der severischen bis zur konstantinischen Zeit. AA 1946–1947 62–72; M. Bergmann: Studien zum römischen Porträt
des 3. Jhs. n. Chr. Bonn 1978; and cf. Kiilerich 1993 115 f.; Bergmann 1999 72.
54
CM 3558, Török 1990 fig. 43.
55
For the iconographic type cf. the representation of the apotheosis of the deceased
as Heracles on Roman sarcophagi, e.g., fragment in Roma, Villa Pamphili, C.
Robert: Die antiken Sarkophag-Reliefs III.1. Einzelmythen 1. Actaeon-Hercules. Berlin 1897
[reprint edn. Roma 1969] 166 no. 142, Pl. XLIII.
52
193
are associated with each other through the use of the widely spaced,
parallel, rib-like drapery folds. They also display the same sort of
spatial illusionism achieved by the deep relief of the figures and their
deep, in cases daring and virtuoso, undercutting. The face of a Victory
on CM 7039 is similar to the face of the central female figure on
CM 7819 (fig. 41). Analogous almond-shaped eyes with a drilled iris
also occur on the figural abacus decoration of a pilaster capital from
Heracleopolis Magna (fig. 45)56 dating from the second third of the
fourth century.57
Notwithstanding their stylistic affinities, the three reliefs and the
pilaster capital represent the work of four different masters. As suggested by the (in contemporary Egyptian sculpture) exceptional rendering of the eyes in CM 7819, 7039, and 7051, they were influenced
in this particular respect by the same model(s). Though it is a small
and seemingly unimportant detail, the rendering of the eyes in these
modest carvings nevertheless establishes remarkable connections and
throws an unexpected light on the organisation and connections of
the bigger workshops. Analogous almond-shaped eyes with a drilled
iris occur on a mask in a peopled scroll fragment in the British
Museum58 and the eyes of animal figures are rendered in an identical
manner on other carvings decorated with peopled scrolls of a closely
related style.59 All these carvings belong to a distinct group of architectural sculptures—first of all friezes—which display splendidly executed foliage scrolls with slender, strongly stylized acanthus leaves
with rounded or spiky lobes.
1.2. The masters of acanthus foliage
The carvings with acanthus foliage represent the highest quality of
Egyptian late antique decorative sculpture. Their stylistic homogeneity
is obvious and they also share the luxurious effect achieved by a
CM 7051, Monneret de Villard 1923 fig. 76.
For the dating of 4th-cent. Egyptian capital- and acanthus types, see Kautzsch
1936 38 ff.; Severin 1977a.—For CM 7051 cf. also Severin 1977a 249 no. 276a, CM
7032, from Naville’s excavation at Heracleopolis Magna, cf. Naville 1894 Pl. XVI.
58
BM 1794, Monneret de Villard 1923 fig. 89; Badawy 1978 fig. 3.130. Fragment
with the figure of a lion from the same frieze: Monneret de Villard 1923 fig. 88.
59
E.g., CM 7063, Monneret de Villard 1923 fig. 50/a; CM 3757, Török 1990
fig. 55, from the same frieze: Brooklyn 41.1266, Beckwith 1963 Pl. 76; BM inv.
no. unknown, Monneret de Villard 1923 fig. 88.
56
57
194
chapter seven
daring undercutting of the figures and ornaments. The standard measurements of the friezes (height 36–38 cm) corroborate the impression
that their masters were not only contemporaries but also worked in
the same workshop. On the basis of finds made by Naville (figs 40,
55),60 this workshop may be localized at Heracleopolis Magna.
The masters of the figural reliefs CM 7819, 7039, 7276 and capital CM 7051 (figs 41, 42, 44) were unable to produce carvings of
a similar quality. It is likely, too, that the remarkably fine seated
female figure in CM 7819 (fig. 41) was not made by the same hand
as the rest of the relief. The masters of these figural reliefs, also
including the master of the better-quality capital, possessed skills of
a technical rather than artistic nature. Yet, as the well-executed
figural decoration of the capital or the remarkably fine central figure
in CM 7819 indicates, they worked in a workshop in which sculptures
of higher quality were also produced and where they could not only
acquire the knowledge of iconographic models but also become
acquainted with recent stylistic trends and mannerisms. The rendering
of the eyes in the figural carvings suggests that the workshop in question was identical with the workshop in which the architectural carvings with acanthus scroll decoration were executed. The modestly
skilled masters of the mythological reliefs were not only influenced
by the excellent sculptors of the peopled scrolls; the latter may also
have executed certain details in the works of the former, as suggested
by the central figure in CM 7819. Though this actual cooperation
may have been accidental, a division of labour between specialists
in figural and decorative sculpture and between supervisors and subordinates was probably part of the organisation of the work in the
larger workshops which satisfied the demands of an elite clientèle.
The imitation of good quality models by less skilled craftsmen
sometimes led to pathetic results. The stylized treatment of Heracles’
muscles and veins which constitute a sort of net over the body of
the hero in CM 7039 (fig. 42) seems to represent a failed attempt, to
reproduce the manneristic Hellenistic-type musculature of late antique
male statues carved in the workshops of Aphrodisias and also imi-
60
Naville 1894 Pl. XIV, top right (CM 7020 = my fig. 40); bottom right (present whereabouts unknown, from the same frieze: CM 7306, Naville 1894 Pl. XVI,
centre); Pl. XV, centre left (CM 7314), right (CM 7070); Pl. XVI, left (CM 7301),
centre top (CM 7317); 3rd from top (CM 7306); bottom (CM 7313, from the same
frieze as CM 7314 in Pl. XV); right (CM 7038 = my fig. 55).
195
tated in Constantinopolitan workshops of the second half of the fourth
century.61 Though the distance in quality is enormous, the connection is not impossible. Sculptures exported to Egypt from Aphrodisias
or Constantinople and/or sculptures made in Alexandria under their
influence could have been studied and copied by artesans working
in provincial workshops. In her recent work on the impact of the
workshops of Aphrodisias on the production in other centres of late
antique sculpture, Marianne Bergmann discusses a marble tondo
from Alexandria62 with the bust of a youthful god suggesting that it
was a modest quality local product imitating a fashionable Aphrodisian
tondo type of the second half of the fourth century which was traded
to and imitated in other centres of the East and the West:63 and
also in Egypt.
We should not stop at this point with mapping the stylistic connections of the Heracleopolis Magna workshop producing the abovediscussed mythological reliefs and the architectural carvings decorated
with acanthus scrolls. Let us examine the variants of the stylized
foliage and their association with figural decoration. It is important
to advance that, however homogeneous the impression they make
is, the carvings associated with each other by the occurrence of the
same foliage types do not come from one single monumental building, although, evidently, several carvings may have come from the
same edifice. For lack of archaeological evidence, however, more
concrete architectural contexts cannot be reconstructed.
One of the more frequent foliage variants displays tendrils with a
sculptured midrib and small, flat, rounded leaf lobes. It occurs in elaborate spiral scrolls decorating friezes from entablatures as well as in
more liberally, i.e., impressionistically, treated foliage. Two frieze
fragments with a scroll enclosing four-petalled rosettes, one from a
horizontal (fig. 46),64 the other from an arcuated entablature of large
dimensions,65 in all probability come from the same building. A fine
spiral scroll with tendrils arranged in fan-like patterns decorates a
Bergmann 1999 62 ff.
Port Said, National Museum. Found at Kôm esh-Shugafa, P. Graindor: Bustes
et statues-portraits d’Egypte romaine. Cairo n.d. 84 no. 33, Pl. XXVIII/b; Bergmann
1999 Pl. 36/2, 3.
63
Bergmann 1999 45 ff. and esp. 47, 58, 59.
64
CM 7042, Strzygowski 1904 49 f. no. 7308, fig. 59; Török 1990 fig. 33 (according to Gayet 1902 218 from Heracleoplis Magna).
65
CM 7009, Strzygowski 1904 50 f. no. 7309, fig. 60; Török 1990 fig. 34.
61
62
196
chapter seven
moulded frieze from a monumental door pediment (?).66 Five blocks
from a frieze in Berlin (fig. 47),67 including a block with the representation of two flying Erotes carrying the head of a city personification
enclosed by a wreath and placed originally above a door, display a
peopled scroll above an egg-and-dart moulding. The spiral tendrils
are peopled with animal figures and masks rendered in a naturalistic style that also occurs on other friezes produced in the workshop
under discussion.68 Two fragments from a remarkable frieze in the
Coptic Museum (fig. 48)69 come from the architecture of a large
niche or a small apsidal room. On the preserved blocks, the impressionistically rendered, boldly undercut foliage encloses the bust of
Dionysos (?) and the figure of a wild boar (not illustrated). A similar
architectural context yielded a moulded frieze70 decorated with a
peopled scroll enclosing a wild boar as on CM 11/2/17/3 and
rosettes as on CM 7042 (fig. 46).71 The rendering of Dionysos’ face
and hair on CM 7060 (fig. 48) displays features returning on other
carvings that may likewise be associated with the workshop of the
acanthus foliage as, e.g., a niche head with the figure of Dionysos.72
Foliage of this type occurs in a subordinate function on the Christian
niche head from Heracleopolis Magna (fig. 22).73 This occurrence is
not irrelevant from the aspect of the chronology of the workshop.
The motif of the cross (as on this niche head) or the Christogram
(as on other monuments) inscribed in a wreath and carried by flying
angels seems to appear first in the early Theodosian period in
66
Formerly built in above the door leading to the Ahnas Hall of the Coptic
Museum, inv. no. not known.
67
Effenberger – Severin 1992 Cat. 72. Note that the composite photograph of
Effenberger – Severin includes by error segments from the first and the second
block placed to the right of the figural block, while the block placed to the left of
the latter is shown incompletely in the photograph. Cf. Wulff 1909 70 no. 208.
68
See also a frieze fragment with a spiral scroll inhabited by rather clumsily rendered birds, Strzygowski 1904 46 no. 7302, fig. 53.
69
CM 7060 and CM 11/2/17/3, Monneret de Villard 1923 fig. 45; Török 1990
fig. 31 (CM 7060).
70
Strzygowski 1904 55 no. 7317, fig. 69. From Heracleopolis Magna, see Naville
1894 Pl. XVI, centre, top.
71
Cf. also CM 7009, Strzygowski 1904 50 f. no. 7309, fig. 60; Török 1990 fig. 34.
72
CM 7008, Monneret de Villard 1923 fig. 50/B; Török 1990 fig. 32.
73
CM 7030, Strzygowski 1904 28 f. no. 7285, fig. 34; Severin 1977a 250 no.
278/b (2nd third of the 4th cent.); Severin 1993 80, fig. 6 (late 4th or early 5th
cent.); for the gradual shifting of its dating, see also Effenberger 1996 38 f., fig. 9:
5th century.
197
Constantinopolitan sepulchral art.74 The motif developed from the
types of standing or hovering Genii and Victories carrying a laurel
wreath inscribed with the chrismon. A niche head fragment from
Heracleopolis Magna originally displayed two hovering Victories with
the chrismon.75 On account of the rendering of the preserved Victory
figure and the treatment of her dress and the foliage frieze framing
the niche head, this fragment is distanced chronologically and qualitatively from the acanthus foliage group.76 Its style and iconography
suggest a dating to the late fourth-early fifth century, corroborating,
however indirectly, the dating of the niche head with the nude Genii
carrying the cross to a slightly earlier period, viz., to the last decades
of the century, the end of the main period of the production of the
carvings with acanthus foliage and the associated figural reliefs.
The above foliage type occurs with sculptured lobes on the fragment
of a semicircular niche with the figure of Daphne (fig. 49).77 The
figure probably remains from a scene depicting Apollo pursuing
Daphne, who changes into a tree to avoid him.78 It is a large-headed
figure with angularly rendered body the details of which are marked
with incised lines. The large, almond-shaped eyes with a drilled iris
are framed with stylized upper and lower lids and present a paraphrase
of the eyes in the mythological reliefs discussed above. The schematically rendered coiffure follows Classical models. On the whole, the
figure shows that elements of the “tetrarchic mode” of representing
the human body survived in the workshop in an incoherent way, as
is also demonstrated by a more completely preserved niche head in
the Coptic Museum (fig. 50).79 It is decorated with the figure of a
74
On the so-called Sarigüzel sarcophagus, see recently Kiilerich 1993 126 ff.,
figs 69, 70; B. Kiilerich: The Sarigüzel Sarcophagus and Triumphal Themes in
Theodosian Art. in: G. Koch – K. Kirchhainer (eds): Sarkophag-Studien 2. Akten des
Symposiums “Frühchristliche Sarkophage” Marburg, 30. 6.–4. 7. 1999. Mainz 2002 137–144.
75
CM 7075, Monneret de Villard 1923 fig. 74; Severin 1993 78, fig. 4 (late 4th
or early 5th cent.).
76
Poorer quality is not necessarily a chronological indication, see, e.g., CM 8078
(unpublished).
77
CM 7061, Strzygowski 1904 34 f. no. 7290, fig. 41; Monneret de Villard 1923
fig. 39; Beckwith 1963 Pl. 65; Török 1990 fig. 29.
78
Cf. the so-called shawl of Sabina, Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des
Antiquités Egyptiennes E 29302, Age of Spirituality Cat. 112; M.-H. Rutschowscaya:
Le châle de Sabine. Études coptes VI. Cahiers de la Bibiothèque copte. Paris-Louvain 2000
21–28; ead.: Le châle de Sabine chef-d’oeuvre de l’art copte. Paris 2004. For the iconographic type cf. Török 1998 36 f.
79
CM 7017, Strzygowski 1904 33 f. no. 7289, fig. 40 (restored from two fragments); Török 1990 fig. 30; Severin 1998a 81 fig. 24 (dated late 5th cent.).
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Nereid riding a sea lion, carved perhaps by the same hand. Here
the stylized, geometrical treatment of the female body is coupled
with Classical body proportions and a face showing again the influence
of the master(s) of the afore-discussed mythological reliefs.
In turn, the “tetrarchic mode” of body and drapery treatment prevails in two frieze fragments displaying acanthus foliage with minutely
detailed leaves.80 In the first fragment the foliage accompanies a scene
representing Dionysos and Ariadne (fig. 44).81 The figures are deeply
undercut giving nearly the impression of free-standing sculptures in
the round. On the other frieze block a similarly rendered head of
a personification is inscribed in a wreath of finely detailed acanthus
leaves (fig. 51).82 The inlaid irises of Ariadne and the sculptured irises
of the personification in fig. 5183 also occur on other sculptures from
Heracleopolis Magna. The incised or sculptured iris84 repeats a
Classical commonplace, while the inlaid iris may be regarded as an
Egyptian tradition revived perhaps under the influence of a late
Roman fashion.85 It seems that the inlaid eye is associated with figures
rendered in a more Classical style (figs 17, 23, 52),86 while sculptured
irises occur on figures in the “tetrarchic style” (fig. 43).87 While these
preferences may indeed have also been motivated by the stylistic
training of individual masters, the contemporaneity of both types of
the rendering of the eye and their possible independence from consequent stylistic contexts is suggested by two carvings that may be
attributed to the same hand: one of them with inlaid (fig. 53),88 the
other with sculptured eyes.89 Inlaid irises as a presumably more expen-
80
This foliage type also occurs on peopled scroll friezes of poorer quality: CM
7002 (49659), Török 1990 fig. 42; CM 3584.
81
CM 3558, Kitzinger 1938 Pl. LXXIII/7; Török 1990 figs 43, 44.
82
CM 7014, Török 1990 fig. 40.
83
The pupils were perhaps painted.
84
A sculptured iris and pupil occurs only rarely, see, e.g., GRM 14140, Monneret
de Villard 1923 fig. 35. From Heracleopolis Magna, cf. Chapter II, note 8.
85
Cf. a marble head identified as Galerius from Greece, Age of Spirituality Cat.
6.
86
Fig. 52: CM 7031, Monneret de Villard 1923 fig. 43, keystone with the figure
of Apollo.
87
Cf. also CM 3586, Cat. Paris-Agde Cat. 161, niche pediment, birth of Aphrodite;
BM 36143, Badawy 1978 fig. 3.66, fragment of niche pediment with birth of
Aphrodite (?).
88
CM 7021, frieze block from an encroached entablature with the personification
of the Nile, Monneret de Villard 1923 figs 62, 63; Török 1990 figs 46, 47.
89
Brooklyn 41.891, Beckwith 1963 Pls 72, 73, Nile and Euthenia.
199
sive solution also occur on other sculptures in the “tetrarchic style”
(fig. 54).90
In other carvings the foliage with flat, rounded leaf lobes is simplified
insofar as it has incised midribs instead of sculptured ones. Carvings
decorated with this type of acanthus tendrils come from luxurious
architectural contexts as, e.g., a block on which a horizontal frieze
(framed at the bottom with a bead-and-reel moulding) meets an arcuated frieze,91 or a fine frieze with peopled scroll92 from Naville’s excavation at Heracleopolis Magna.93 The first piece comes from an arch
dividing two rooms of fairly large proportions.94 Fine fragments with
similar foliage display figures with eyes rendered in the manner of
the mythological reliefs in figs 41–45 and their circle.95
Flat, but spiky leaves with an incised midrib represent a variant of the
foliage with flat, rounded leaves with an incised midrib (fig. 46).96
The same leaf type also occurs on a remarkable frieze block with
intertwined foliage (fig. 55)97 from Naville’s excavation at Heracleopolis
Magna,98 on two moulded frieze fragments with scrolls inhabited by
animals,99 and on a frieze with scrolls enclosing lotus flowers, all
from the same excavation.100 A master of humbler skills employed
this foliage variant in a peopled scroll frieze101 bordered at the bottom
by a fine bead-and-reel moulding. Small but diagnostic details of his
carving, including a pathetically poor figure of Heracles, illuminate
90
CM 7022, Török 1990 fig. 41, frieze block with personification of a season
or Abundance.—Cf. also CM 7047, Monneret de Villard 1923 fig. 16, Effenberger
1996 fig. 2 (archive photograph), in a more damaged condition: Török 1990 fig.
51, birth of Aphrodite.
91
CM inv. no. not known, Monneret de Villard 1923 fig. 83.
92
Strzygowski 1904 45 no. 7301, fig. 52; Török 1990 fig. 37.—The same type
of scroll with clusters of grapes and pomegranates: CM 7046, Strzygowski 1904 47
no. 7303, fig. 54
93
Naville 1894 Pl. XVI, left.
94
Cf., e.g., BM 1794, Monneret de Villard 1923 fig. 89.
95
E.g., CM 7063, Monneret de Villard 1923 fig. 50/A.
96
Cf. also Strzygowski 1904 47 f. no. 7304, fig. 55.
97
CM 7038, Strzygowski 1904 51 no. 7310, fig. 61.
98
Naville 1894 Pl. XVI, right.
99
CM 7070, Strzygowski 1904 53 f. nos 7315a, 7315b, fig. 67.—Strzygowski’s
7315b: Naville 1894 Pl. XV, right.
100
CM 7020, Strzygowski 1904 48 no. 7305, fig. 56, cf. Naville 1894 Pl. XIV,
top right.
101
CM 7006, Török 1990 fig. 38. It may come from the same architecture as
a frieze fragment with Heracles and Dionysos in the CM, inv. no unknown, Monneret
de Villard 1923 fig. 49.
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again the organisation of work in the Heracleopolis Magna workshop
and the quality range of its products. Namely, this sculptor copied
details from the work of the leading artesans of the workshop, viz.,
a mannered triple leaf collar at the ramifications of the scroll (cf.
fig. 52) and a variant of the heart-shaped leaves from the motif repertory of the master of CM 7042 (fig. 46).102 Returning briefly to the
frieze with intertwined foliage, it repeats a motif also occurring on
contemporary architectural carvings from Oxyrhynchos,103 which do
not display, however, the same treatment of the acanthus lobes.
The acanthus leaf variant illustrated in fig. 55 also appears on the
fragment of a semicircular niche head the conch of which was originally decorated with the scene of Aphrodite’s birth (fig. 43).104 The
modelling of the bearded head of a Triton remaining from the figural
decoration is based on the “tetrarchic mode” of representing the
human body and face, preserved in a simplified form in the Heracleopolis Magna workshop. We find figural carvings in the production
of the workshop in which the stereotyped faces and bodies indicate
either that all these pieces were made by the same two or three
masters or that they belonged to a series of mass-produced carvings.
The first option seems more probable to me. Be as it may, so much
is obvious that some masters carving figures in the “tetrarchic mode”
worked together with the masters of the acanthus foliage group.
Spiky leaves also occur with an incised midrib and sculptured lobes. The
finest peopled scrolls produced in the workshop display this variant,
as shown by two fragments from a frieze, now in Cairo (fig. 56)105
and Brooklyn,106 and a third frieze fragment in Cairo (fig. 57).107 Less
skilled hands have also produced foliage friezes of this type, both
with (fig. 58)108 and without figural details.109
Cf. also CM 7009, Strzygowski 1904 50 f. no. 7309, fig. 60; Török 1990 fig. 34.
E.g., Breccia 1933 Pls XXVIII, top left, XXXIX/102, top left.
104
For the iconographic type cf. CM 7047, Monneret de Villard 1923 fig. 16;
Török 1990 fig. 51.
105
CM 3757, Török 1990 fig. 55.
106
Brooklyn 41.1266, Beckwith 1963 Pl. 76.
107
CM 7019, Monneret de Villard 1923 fig. 86.
108
CM 7003, Kitzinger 1938 Pl. LXXI/4.
109
CM 7013, Török 1990 fig. 54.—CM 7013 is reconstructed, however, in the
Coptic Museum from two fragments which have the same measurements but did
not belong to the same frieze. The bigger fragment is identical with Strzygowski
1904 49 no. 7307, fig. 58, the smaller with a fragment belonging originally to the
frieze Strzygowski 1904 48 f. no. 7306, fig. 57. A large fragment from Strzygowski’s
no. 7306 is visible in Naville 1894 Pl. XVI, centre, 2nd from bottom. Also from
the same frieze: ibid. Pl. XIV, right, bottom.
102
103
201
So far, our survey has focused on the relationship between figural
and non-figural decoration in the production of the fourth century
sculptors’ workshop at Heracleopolis Magna. We have found that
labour was divided between artesans specialised in ornamental decoration and sculptors trained in figural decoration. Different specialists may have cooperated not only in the decoration of the same
building but occasionally also in the execution of the same carving.
Arranging the production of the workshop according to its artistic
quality, we can see that it was in fact an architectural workshop
rather than a sculptors’ workshop. For a considerable period, its leading masters executed architectural carvings decorated with distinctive types of acanthus foliage, including peopled scrolls with masks
and fine animal figures. Figural sculpture on other contemporary
products of the workshop is in most cases of a poorer quality and
shows a stylistic pluralism. Throughout the fourth century, the canon
of human representation formed in the imperial workshops producing the porphyry portraits of the emperors of the first Tetrarchy
exerted a decisive influence on the Heracleopolis Magna workshop.
The “tetrarchic mode” existed, however, side-by-side with elements
of the Classical tradition. The masters trained in different styles
influenced each other’s work and the production of the workshop
was stylistically eclectic and heterogenous. The influx of information
from Alexandria was also more or less constant.
The chronology of the workshop remains fairly sketchy. Mannerisms
inspired by the style of porphyry sculpture dating from the later
reign of Constantine indicate that the workshop was active by the
late 330s. The activity of the masters of the acanthus foliage, and
consequently also that of the masters of the associated figural carvings, extends from the time when the mythological reliefs and the
pilaster capital discussed at the beginning of this chapter (figs 41–45)
were carved to the last decades of the fourth century when the niche
pediment with the Genii holding the cross was carved (fig. 22): masters maintaining the stylistic and formal traditions of the workshop
in the second third of the century continued to work after the turn
of the century. We shall return later to their activity.
It is worth stressing here that our survey of carvings that may be
attributed safely to the same workshop and embrace in time a period
of several decades clearly contradicts Thelma Thomas’ conclusions
quoted below, at least in the special case of the sculptures from the
late antique necropolis of Heraclepolis:
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artisans were not organized in ‘workshops’ as has usually been assumed
in the sense of one group of craftsmen (usually working out of a shop)
completing a job from start to finish, and having artistic control over
the entire work . . . In addition to the fact that no two tombs or decorative programs are exactly alike, there is now the added consideration
that each was constructed ad hoc according to specific orders placed
by an overseer.110
The products of the workshop surveyed above are characterized by
decorations executed in an unusually high relief. Actually, the figures
are almost in the round and their deep undercutting gives the impression that they are hovering in front of the relief ground. Through
the daring undercutting of the foliage, the (peopled) scrolls appear
as ornamental grids.111 Although the technique of undercutting was
facilitated by the softness of the limestone, it was a technique associated
primarily and traditionally with certain sorts of marble. A marble
cornice block with a boldly undercut vine scroll frieze in the Coptic
Museum (fig. 59)112 is an import from Constantinople (?) and it might
have been among the models for the grid-like scrolls produced at
Heracleopolis: the small heart-shaped leaves of the marble cornice
also appear on works of the leading masters at Heracleopolis (fig. 46).
Figures and ornamental motifs frequently disregard the conventional limits between relief decoration and the framing architectural
member(s). Cases of a baroque disregard for the visual integrity of
architectural members were already discussed in Chapter V. Other
cases may be found among the carvings surveyed in this chapter.
E.g., a remarkable entablature fragment was catalogued by Strzygowski113 in which an animal figure from the peopled scroll frieze
partly overlaps the egg-and-dart moulding above the frieze. The
figures partly cover the framing architecture on significant products
of the Heracleopolis Magna workshop too, as is illustrated by the
Orpheus niche pediment CM 7055 (fig. 39). Such an illusionistic
treatment of architectural decoration may have been encouraged by
great art: see, e.g., the hands of the fallen Persians grasping the
moulding that constitutes the base line of the second relief register
110
Thomas 1990 I 163 f.
See especially CM 7007, Strzygowski 1904 55 f. no. 7318, fig. 70. From
Heracleopolis Magna, Naville 1894 Pl. XIV, centre, right (in a still less damaged
condition than in Strzygowski’s photograph).
112
113
Strzygowski 1904 61 no. 7325, fig. 77, present whereabouts unknown.
111
203
on the southwest pillar of Galerius’ arch at Thessalonica (293–303).114
Stylistically, the overexaggerated three-dimensionality of the figures
in the reliefs from Heracleopolis Magna fits well into the general
trend of spatial illusionism in Roman relief from the second century115 through the historical reliefs carved for the Arch of Constantine
to fourth-century Italian sarcophagi.116 Examples may be quoted from
the East as well as the West.117 The grid-like composition of interacting figures as on two niche heads in Berlin and Trieste (see below)
may also have been encouraged by fourth-century marble sculpture
from, and under the impact of, Aphrodisias.118
Spatial illusionism coupled with a virtuosity of technical execution
is doubtless a meaningful part of monumental display. On the niche
pediments discussed in Chapter V we encountered spatial illusionism in the Hellenistic sense of the word; this kind of illusionism prevails also on the Christian niche head discussed above. Most of the
products of the Heracleopolis Magna workshop—and other workshops
at Oxyrhynchos and elsewhere in Egypt—is characterized, however,
by a radically different conception of illusionism. Deeply undercut,
almost three-dimensional figures and foliages are put before a neutral
background not in order to create an illusionistic space rendered
according to the rules of natural perspective. To quote two paradigmatic
examples, there is no trace of the Classical tradition of space in the
otherwise classically inspired niche pediments of the Berlin collection
(fig. 60)119 and the Trieste Civici Musei di Storia ed Arte (fig. 61).120
The daring procedure of undercutting as it was practiced in fourthcentury Egyptian sculptors’ workshops seems to have had other aims:
namely, to create images that are real in a religious sense and to create a luxurious architecture. Before one would interpret the discrepancy between the composition and the naturalistic figures as a late
antique development, however, it must be remembered that, as also
Elsner 1998b fig. 87.
Cf., e.g., the “Great Trajanic Frieze” from Trajan’s forum in Rome, incorporated into the Arch of Constantine, or the reliefs from a lost monument of Marcus
Aurelius in Rome, Elsner 1998b figs 53 and 12, respectively.
116
G. Bovini – H. Brandenburg: Repertorium der christlich-antiken Sarkophage I. Rom
und Ostia. Wiesbaden 1967; R. Sansoni: I sarcophagi paleocristiani a porte di città. Bologna
1969; G. Koch – H. Sichtermann: Römische Sarkophage. München 1982.
117
For the 4th-cent. evidence cf. Kiilerich – Torp 1994; Bergmann 1999.
118
Bergmann 1999 63, 75.
119
Berlin 4452, Effenberger – Severin 1992 Cat. 65.
120
Inv. no. 5620, Cat. Hamm Cat. 16.
114
115
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pointed out by Ja≤ Elsner,121 cases of such a discrepancy had already
occurred in second-century sculpture.
The characteristic foliage motifs found on the products of the
workshop provided useful keys for the examination of the organisation of work and the interconnections of stylistic trends. Typologically
as well as stylistically, the (peopled) scrolls carved by the masters at
Heracleopolis Magna constitute a distinct group among the scroll
friezes from the Roman east in general and Egypt in particular.
Their artistic quality was repeatedly emphasized in the foregoing;
now questions should be posed about the sources of their style and
the training of their masters.
We do not need to go back farther in time than the famous
pilasters of the Severan basilica at Leptis Magna in search of the
stylistic and formal ancestry of the inhabited scrolls executed in deep
relief.122 It seems highly probable that these pilasters were imported
from Aphrodisias. Through the export of finished works and artesans,
the sculpture of Aphrodisisas exerted a decisive influence on the
development of architectural sculpture in the East from as early as
the second century. Alexandrian architectural sculpture also absorbed
stylistic influence from Aphrodisias. The formal elements as well as
the style of the scroll on a limestone door lintel in the Coptic Museum
(fig. 62)123 compare excellently with a late antique peopled scroll from
Aphrodisias, now in London.124 On the other hand, the scroll on
the door lintel may also be compared to the acanthus/ vine scroll
on the porphyry sarcophagus of Constantina and Helena in Rome.
Its formal elements also return in the more stylized acanthus foliage
variants produced in the Heracleopolis Magna workshop. Curiously,
the master of the door pediment did not try to create a scroll with
a rhythm also adapted to the frieze length. Nevertheless, not only
the size and form of the pediment but also its sculptural quality indiElsner 1998b 19 ff.
J.M.C. Toynbee – J.B. Ward Perkins: Peopled Scrolls: A Hellenistic Motif in
Imperial Art. PBSR 18 1–43; C. Dauphin: The Development of the ‘Inhabited
Scroll’ in Architectural Sculpture and Mosaic Art from Late Imperial Times to the
Seventh Century AD. Levant 19 (1987) 183–205; id.: Byzantine Pattern Books: A
Re-Examination of the Problem in the Light of the ‘Inhabited Scroll’. Art History 1
(1978) 400–423; A. Ovadiah – Y. Turnheim: “Peopled” Scrolls in Roman Architectural
Decoration in Israel. The Roman Theatre at Beth Shean/Scythopolis. Roma 1994.
123
Provenance and inv. no. unknown. Pensabene 1993 529 no. 993 dates it to
the tetrarchic or the early Constantinian period.
124
British Museum, Bergmann 1999 56, Pls 62, 63, 67/1.
121
122
205
cates the context of a monumental public edifice where artesans
trained in the capital may also have participated in the construction.
At Heracleopolis Magna, the impact of Alexandrian sculpture was
recognized in the “tetrarchic stye” of a considerable number of the
figural carvings as well as in details of drapery treatment imitating
porphyry sculptures of the Constantinian period. It is important to
note, however, that influence from imperial and other elite workshops
in the capital seems to have been transmitted to Heracleopolis by
artesans specialized in ornamental rather than figural sculpture.
However indirectly, the cosmopolitan background of the master(s)
of the carvings with acanthus foliage may also be indicated by the
acanthus scrolls appearing in the remarkable late fourth- or early
fifth-century opus sectile wall decoration from an assembly hall outside Porta Marina at Ostia.125 The scrolls on horizontal friezes and
pilaster panels (the latter inhabited by birds, butterflies, snails, etc.)
display leaf collars and rosette flowers which are also distinctive features of the acanthus tendrils produced at Heracleopolis (fig. 46),
and the treatment of the slender acanthus leaves is also similar.126
Though continuing the tradition of opus sectile decoration in Rome
and Ostia, the scrolls from the hall outside Porta Marina are assumed
to have been influenced by the work of Egyptian artesans.127 While
this assumption remains hypothetical, Egyptian influence on fourthcentury Roman opus sectile may also be suggested by the Egyptianizing
cult scenes and symbols on the hanging curtain represented below
the Rape of Hylas by the Nymphs on an opus sectile panel from the
basilica of Junius Bassus (consul in 331).128
1.3. Sculptor’s workshops at Oxyrhynchos in the fourth and
early fifth centuries
The existence of local workshop traditions is also testified to by finds
from Oxyrhynchos, capital of the nome of Oxyrhynchos, a town c.
70 km south of Heracleopolis Magna. Papyri from Oxyrhynchus present a uniquely detailed picture of life in the town in the Roman
Becatti 1969; Dunbabin 1999 265 ff.
Becatti 1969 Pls LXIX, LXX; Dunbabin 1999 Pl. 39; and see epecially the
detail in Bianchi Bandinelli 1971 fig. 91.
127
Bianchi Bandinelli 1971 96.
128
R. Paris: Il pannello con Hylas e le Ninfe dalla Basilica di Giunio Basso.
Bolletino di Archeologia 1–2 (1990) 194–202; Dunbabin 1999 264.
125
126
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period and of the Greek education of its elite (cf. Chapters IV.2.2,
2.3). The famous Oxyrhynchos papyri129 were discovered in the late
nineteenth and early twentieth centuries by sebakhin (mud-diggers)
who were interested in excavating fertilizer. The sebakhin destroyed
the building ruins and annihilated the archeological context of the
objects they found and sold to the antiquities dealers who employed
them as diggers. Sebakhin were also employed by institutional excavators—moreover, the mud-diggers themselves frequently ran “excavations” under license from the government and the Cairo Museum.130
For lack of systematic modern excavations, the architecture and art
of Oxyrhynchos remains insufficiently known.
A distinctive group of portrait stelae,131 dispersed in the museums
and private collections of the world,132 with the representation (full
or bust-length) of the deceased standing (adults, adolescents) or squatting (boys)133 in niches and carved mostly in such deep relief as to
be in the round,134 is traditionally associated with Oxyrhynchos. This
association is supported by actual finds from field works conducted
by Flinders Petrie135 and Evaristo Breccia.136 Chronologically, these
portrait stelae range from the late second-early third (?) to the fourth
century. During the c. one and a half centuries of its (their) activity,
the workshop(s) of the stelae maintained with little alteration a char-
129
B.P. Grenfell et al. (eds): The Oxyrhynchos Papyri. London 1898–.
Thomas 1990 I 14 f.
131
For the iconography and religious background of the portrait stelae from
Oxyrhynchos—among which we have no reasons to look for mortuary monuments
made for Christian burials (cf. Chapter II.4)—I refer to Chapter V.
132
Schneider 1982.
133
The asymmetrically squatting position of the boys seems to derive from one
of the standard iconographic types of the child god Harpocrates. It is known from
terracotta statuettes from the Hellenistic and Roman periods representing the god
himself or mortal boys in the attire of the god and associated mainly with mortuary religion, cf. Török 1995 Cat. 48–53, 58, 60, 64 f., 169.
134
From the early decades of the 20th century, dealers used to cut out the figures
from their niches and sold them to museums and collectors as “statues”: see, e.g.,
the carving acquired before 1931 by Prince Johann Georg of Sachsen, Cat. Hamm
Cat. 4. Recently, R. Loverance in Buckton (ed.) 1994 Cat. 12 still identified a cutout figure from a portrait stela as a “rare example of sculpture in the round from
this period”.
135
Petrie 1925 Pl. XLV/10, now BM 1795, Beckwith 1963 Pl. 57; Petrie 1925
Pl. XLVI.—For Petrie’s work cf. Severin 1981a.
136
Breccia 1932 59 note 3, 61, Pls XXXIX/137, 139, XL/146; Breccia 1933
40 f., Pls XXVI/81, 82, XVII/83, 84. Breccia published many of his finds, yet the
excavations themselves remained largely unpublished. For Breccia’s work cf. Severin
1981a.
130
207
acteristic rendering of the human figure which was shaped in the
third century under the strong influence of Roman portraiture.137
Fourth-century stelae of adults138 display the same Classical body
proportions as their third-century predecessors and represent a local
tradition that markedly contrasts with the “tetrarchic mode” of representation which remains characteristic for a significant group of
contemporary carvings from Heracleopolis Magna (see above in
Chapter VII.1.2).
Portrait stelae from Oxyrhynchos are distinguished by a Classicizing,
yet fairly summary, broad modelling of the face. The final effect of
the images was achieved by polychrome painting139 which gave special emphasis to the eyes and details of the costume and jewelry—
the latter being essential attributes of social identity (cf. Chapter
IV.1). A considerable number of portraits share a small, but distinctive
feature, viz., a fine little smile.140 It seems to belong to the special
repertory of the Oxyrhynchos workshop(s) during the second half of
the third and the first half of the fourth century.141 In sculptures
coming from Heracleopolis Magna and other places, this particular
feature is absent. It occurs, however, on fourth-century mythological
reliefs attributed to masters working at Oxyrhynchos. The smile of
the Centaur in a relief in Budapest (fig. 63)142 conveys the beatitude
of eternal youth. The sculptor of the Centaur relief rendered this
smile by the use of formal means deriving from the Egyptian sculpture of earlier periods.143
Hundreds of late antique architectural carvings also come from
modern Bahnasa, the site of ancient Oxyrhynchos: niche pediments
with figural or ornamental decoration, pilaster and column capitals,
entablature fragments, and friezes.144 A rich collection of carvings
137
For late examples, see, e.g., CM 8024/37677, Monneret de Villard 1923 fig.
98 (only detail); Wessel 1963 fig. 70; Török 1998 fig. 15.
138
E.g., Parlasca 1978 116 ff. Pls 39, 41–44, 47; Schneider 1982 42 ff. figs 34,
36–41.
139
Thomas 2000 26 f., 81 f.
140
E.g., formerly antiquities market: Parlasca 1966 Pl. 62/1; formerly Mellawi
Museum 592, later Cairo, antiquities market: M. Abdel Tawab el Hitta – Hishmat
Mesiha: Guide of the Archaeological Museum Mellawi. Cairo 1973 Pl. 25 (cf. Parlasca
1978 118 note 24).
141
For its assumed religious background cf. Parlasca 1978 117.
142
Museum of Fine Arts 93.11.A, Török 1998 figs 1–3.
143
Török 1998 14, 35.
144
Petrie 1925; Breccia 1932, 1933; H. Zaloscer: Une collection de pierres sculptés du
208
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from Breccia’s excavations is kept in the Graeco-Roman Museum
and many pieces have reached museums and private collections all
over the world. In all probability they come from the elite necropolis
of the town. The figural niche pediments are decorated with mythological scenes145 or Christian representations.146 Some of the architectural members, too, carry Christian symbols.147 The religious context
of most ornamental carvings remains, of course, unknown. We have
seen that by the late fourth century the same masters worked in
Heracleopolis Magna for both pagan and Christian clients (fig. 22).
The situation was similar in late fourth-century Oxyrhynchos, where
polytheism and Christianity also coexisted in elite circles.148 It is also
highly likely that pagans and Christians were not buried in separate
necropolis sections.149 Some time in the late fourth century, a pagan
portrait stela (fig. 64)150 was usurped for a Christian burial by the
addition of a finely executed painted ankh-cross flanked by the Greek
letters alpha and omega. This stela shows that the Christianization of
the pagan mortuary portrait was at that time an evident idea—it is
another matter that local solutions such as the “conversion” of the
Oxyrhynchos stela were then superseded by standardized types promoted by the organized Church.
The local workshop traditions were markedly different at Heracleopolis and Oxyrhynchos. The stylistic plurality of the Heracleopolis
workshop(s) was determined by the strong impact of the “tetrarchic
mode” of human representation, which was not invalidated when
the Classicizing trend of Constantinian sculpture and architectural
Musée Copte du Vieux-Caire. Le Caire 1948; cf. also J. Harris: Coptic Architectural
Sculpture from Oxyrhynchus. American Philosophical Society Yearbook 1960 (1961) 592–597
(with arbitrary datings not accepted here); Thomas 1990 I 95 ff., II 9 f., 21 f. and
see recently Krumeich 2003.
145
E.g., Breccia 1932 Pl. XLIII/153, Severin 1993 fig. 17; Kitzinger 1938 Pl.
LXXV/1; Breccia 1933 Pl. XLVI/119–121; Severin 1993 fig. 20; for further pieces
in the stores of GRM, see Thomas 1990 I 102 ff.
146
Thomas 1990 101, GRM 23388.
147
E.g., Breccia 1933 Pl. XXXVII, top right, Torp 1969 Pl. VIII/c, GRM 23644,
frieze fragment with two Genii carrying a cross inscribed in a wreath; Pl. XXXVIII,
second row, centre, Torp 1969 Pl. VIII/d, frieze fragment with Christogram in
wreath; ibid., bottom row, centre, keystone with cross in wreath; Atalla n.d. II fig.
p. 101, top right, GRM 23567, arcuated frieze with cross in wreath.
148
Trombley 1994 241 ff.
149
Compare the pagan and Christian burials in the neighbouring Cubiculae N
and O of the Catacomb on the Via Latina, Rome, Engemann 1997 18 ff.
150
CM 8616, Wessel 1963 fig. 71; good photograph in G. Deneuve: L’arte copta
(Forma e Colore). Firenze 1970 no. 1.
209
decoration was imported by masters arriving from the capital (Chapters
VII.1.1–2). The workshop(s) producing figural sculpture (i.e., portrait
stelae) for elite tombs at Oxyrhynchos was (were) receptive, it seems,
only to changes in the iconography of social identity. Changes in
hair style, dress, and jewelry articulate changes in the relationship
between concepts of afterlife and social identity. The introduction of
portrait stela types with representations of small boys signals the formation of a cosmopolitan hereditary aristocracy in Egypt in which
the status of children was also reformulated (cf. Chapter IV.1).
The masters of the portrait stelae were specialists. They do not
seem to have participated in the production of architectural carvings. Unlike them, the artesans and craftsmen decorating the tombs
of the Oxyrhynchite elite were open to new stylistic influences transmitted by artesans arriving from metropolitan workshops. Such
influences seem to have arrived rather infrequently, however. By the
middle of the fourth century two powerful impulses reached the
Oxyrhynchos workshops. The first was rather incidental and arrived
with (a) master(s) skilled in the carving of vine scrolls. The second
impulse transmitted more than an individual motif and the manner
of representation associated with it; it introduced the fashion of geometrical and interlace decoration (cf. Chapter VIII.4).
The vine scroll motif was imported by (a) master(s) trained in the
same milieu as the master(s) of the acanthus tendrils of the Heracleopolis
workshop (cf. Chapter VII.1.2), as is suggested by a remarkable peopled scroll frieze fragment from Oxyrhynchos151 which could have
been carved by the same hand as the Heracleopolis scroll in fig. 46.
The bold undercutting giving the impression of sculpture in the round
and occurring in figured carvings associated with the vine tendril
group (fig. 65)152 likewise points toward metropolitan inspiration.
A group of carvings decorated with vine tendrils stands out on
account of its quality. It consists of blocks from arcuated, horizontal and vertical friezes the measurements of which (especially the
blocks from arcuated friezes) indicate (a) building(s) of larger dimensions. The vine branches and scrolls are treated in a fairly naturalistic style; the vine leaves and the grape clusters are more stylized.
151
Breccia 1933 Pl. XL/104, top, left; Kitzinger 1938 Pl. LXXI/3.
CM 4475, Kitzinger 1938 Pl. LXXV/1; Török 1990 fig. 63; Severin 1993
82, fig. 19.
152
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On some of the carvings153 a vine branch runs along the frieze. The
surface of the branch is smooth (fig. 66).154 On other carvings the
frieze is composed of a vine scroll in which the branches have incised
details.155 Small birds picking at grape clusters occur in both subgroups (fig. 67)156 and two types of vine leaves may occur together
on the same block, one oblong, less stylized, the other short and
more stylized, with drilled eyes.157 Remarkable subsidiary motifs also
appear on carvings of both subgroups. Acanthus leaves (fig. 67) and
flower rosettes158 relate, however remotely, the vine friezes to acanthus
tendril friezes from Heracleopolis (Chapter VII.1.2). The characteristic
acanthus leaves with lens-shaped eyes between the spiky four-fingered
lobes suggest a dating to the early fourth century.159 Variants were
produced by less skilled artesans in large quantities,160 indicating a
similar workshop organisation and practice as at Heracleopolis Magna.
Inventive variations on the Greek key pattern,161 also employed in
combination with rosettes,162 and various designs of interlace, looped
bands, and foliage163 are characteristic of another large group of architectural carvings from Oxyrhynchos. The chronological position of
these carvings is indicated by the manner in which their diagnostic
153
Breccia 1932 Pl. XLIV/157; Breccia 1933 Pl. XXXI/94, top, GRM 23775;
ibid. second from top, inv. no. not known; ibid. third row from top, left, GRM
23779 (here fig. 66), right, GRM inv. no. not known; Atalla n.d. II fig. p. 109,
top, GRM 23775; further: GRM 23776, 23482, 23483 (arcuated), 23484; and cf.
Pensabene 1993 537 Cat. 1025.
154
GRM 23779, Breccia 1933 Pl. XXXI/94, third row, left; Kitzinger 1938 Pl.
LXXII/3; Christentum am Nil Cat. 119; Atalla n.d. II fig. p. 109, centre.
155
Atalla n.d. II fig. p. 110, top, GRM 23494 = left half of the frieze fragment
Breccia 1932 Pl. XLV/160; Atalla n.d. II fig. p. 110, centre, GRM 23499; further:
GRM 23493, 23495–23498.
156
GRM 23494, Atalla n.d. II fig. p. 110, top.—Cf. also GRM 23779 = my fig. 66.
157
For the leaf types, see also a niche pediment from the second half of the 4th
cent. reused in the transept basilica of Hermopolis Magna (see Chapter VI.3),
Wace – Megaw – Skeat 1959 Pl. 25/4.
158
Breccia 1933 Pl. XXXI/94, second from top, GRM inv. no. not known;
Atalla n.d. II fig. p. 110, top and centre, GRM 23494 (= my fig. 67) and 23499.
159
For a later variant cf. the acanthi of a capital of the Gethsemane Church,
Jerusalem, Kautzsch 1936 102 no. 295, Pl. 19; Kitzinger 1938 186 f., Pl. LXVIII/3.
160
E.g., Breccia 1933 Pls XXVIII/89, 90; XXXI/94, second from bottom and
bottom; XXXII/95; XXXIX/102, bottom, centre, 103, right; Atalla n.d. II fig.
p. 110, bottom, present whereabouts not noted, ibid. fig. p. 111, CM 6509; further:
CM 49551 (unpublished).
161
Breccia 1933 Pls XXVIII–XXXIX.
162
E.g., Breccia 1933 Pl. XXVIII/91, bottom, left.
163
E.g., Breccia 1933 Pls XXX/93, right; XXXIII, 2nd row, right, third row,
left; XXXIV, top; XXXV/98, left; XXXVI, XXXVII/100, bottom, right.
211
decorative motifs are combined with variants of the above-discussed
vine scroll motifs, especially with vine scroll motifs as they appear
in the work of less skilled masters. Carvings of this group are, as a
rule, without figural details. Foliage motifs occurring on them are
stylized in a manner which recalls acanthus foliage of inferior quality from Heracleopolis. The deep undercutting in carvings decorated
with geometric and interlaced patterns164 attests to the adherence to
workshop traditions and to standards of luxury in visual display.
The fashion of the Greek key, interlace and looped designs was
influenced in third- and fourth-century Egypt by the great popularity of geometric and interlace patterns in other media, primarily textiles (cf. Chapter VIII.4). Direct inspiration came, however, from a
new style of architectural decoration emerging in the second half of
the fourth century in the eastern half of the Empire. Its spread is
best illustrated by mosaics decorated with geometric and floral carpet patterns.165 Several geometric patterns had a symbolic significance
for polytheists and Christians alike.166 The carvings in geometric style
from Oxyrhynchos do not reveal directly the religious affiliation of
the persons whose tombs they decorated. In some cases, however,
Greek key patterns occur in the company of Christian symbols.167
1.4. The end of late antique illusionism in architectural sculpture
In the Oxyrhynchos sculptors’ workshop(s), the production of geometrical and interlace decoration spanned the third third of the
fourth, the fifth, and the first half (?) of the sixth century.168 As noted
above, geometric and interlace patterns occur on niche pediments
in association with vine scrolls169 which imitate the work of secondrate artesans who were, in turn, imitating the master of the friezes
in figs 66 and 67. A niche pediment now in Cairo (fig. 65) is decorated
164
E.g., Breccia 1933 Pls XXVIII/91, 2nd row left, 3rd row right, XXX/93,
top right, XXXIII, bottom row, XXXV, XXXIX/102, top left etc.
165
Dunbabin 1999 176 ff., 193 f.
166
A. Schmidt-Colinet: Zwei verschränkte Quadrate im Kreis. Vom Sinn eines
geometrischen Ornaments. in: Stauffer 1991 21–34.
167
CM 5970, unpublished cornice with Greek key pattern and an ankh-cross
flanked by the Greek letters alpha and omega; see also GRM 23388, Thomas 2000
fig. 83; Krumeich 2003 II 155 f. no. N-17, Pl. 119, niche pediment with meander
frieze and decorated with a cross inscribed in a wreath.
168
For a more detailed investigation, see now Krumeich 2003 I 113 ff.
169
Breccia 1933 Pl. XXXII/95, centre, right.
212
chapter seven
with the figure of a Nereid riding a sea horse. The Classicizing style
and the good quality of the figures carved in such deep relief as to
be in the round contrast significantly with the routine but strangely
lifeless modelling of the geometric and floral motifs. This particular
niche pediment is, however, fairly unique as to the good quality of
its figures. The majority of the figural niche pediments from
Oxyrhynchos170 display poor quality figures associated with geometrical
and floral motifs which, albeit executed generally with a cold precision,
give the impression of a similar professional incompetence. There
can be no doubt that the poor quality niche pediments and the fine
cornices and friezes with geometric and interlace decoration were
carved by different artesans. The craftsmen executing the niche pediments in question do not seem to have had a training during which
they could have acquired a basic knowledge of the canonic structure
of the forms they were reproducing. The vague rendering of Classical
mouldings such as the egg-and-dart, the bead-and-reel and the astragalus is an especially unpleasant feature of these niche pediments.
The production of portrait stelae ceases at Oxyrhynchos by the
third third of the fourth century. The end of the production of this
special class of Classicizing sculpture may have been brought about
by the spread of Christianity among the elite. It is certainly not accidental that, except for the above-mentioned Christianized carving
(fig. 64) and the fakes discussed in Chapter II.4, we do not know of
Christian portrait stelae from Oxyrhynchos. The end of the workshop
producing this Classicizing type of sculpture coincides with the beginnings of a more general trend of re-orientation in Egyptian sculpture.
The stylization of the acanthus scroll by the masters of acanthus
foliage at Heracleopolis and the graphic treatment of the geometric
and floral motifs by the more skilled masters of the cornices and
friezes in the Oxyrhynchos workshop(s) describe a general stylistic
trend rather than the decline of particular workshops. The poorquality niche heads reflect the same trend.
Four niche pediments, presumedly from Heracleopolis, may be taken
as examples for the process of re-orientation in a workshop with
strong local traditions. CM 7035 (fig. 68)171 displays a conventional
170
See, e.g., Breccia 1932 Pl. XLIII/153; Breccia 1933 Pl. XLVI/119–121; CM
8005, Torp 1969 Pl. VII/h, Severin 1993 fig. 20.
171
Monneret de Villard 1923 figs 47, 48; Török 1990 fig. 77; Severin 1993 78
ff., fig. 5.
213
broken pediment cornice, while its conch is decorated with an image
of Dionysos which, though undercut in the traditional late antique
manner, is rendered as if it were removed from a low relief and fixed
vaguely in front of a conch surface. The modelling of Dionysos’ face
recalls the Victory figure of a Christian pediment from Heracleopolis
dated to the late fourth century.172 Similarly, the other three pediments are formally conservative, but they are decorated with relief
figures lacking the three-dimensionality of the figural decorations discussed in Chapter VII.1.2 and even the undercutting of the aforementioned piece. They are decorated uniformly with friezes of
heart-shaped leaves in the place of a Classical moulding and/or a
traditional (peopled) scroll frieze. One of them bears the image of
a personification (Earth, Summer or Abundance?),173 the second the
figure of a Nereid riding a sea horse,174 the third (fig. 69) a male
bust (Dionysos?) emerging from acanthus foliage.175 The stylized acanthus leaves display round eyes with drilled centres between threefingered lobes. The decorative leaves show the influence of an acanthus
type that occurs on much-cited Constantinopolitan marble capitals
from the early fifth century, viz, the capitals from the propylaeum
of Theodosius II’s Hagia Sophia (consecrated in 415) and the Golden
Gate (425–430).176
Niche pediments produced in different workshops in the first half
of the fifth century no longer display marked differences that could
be ascribed to local traditions. A niche head and geison fragments
from Oxyrhynchos,177 with a liberal rendering of the modillion cornice, are stylistically so close to a pediment from Heracleopolis178
that they could be works of the same hand. There are many similar
cases which show that the two workshops produced architectural
carvings displaying the same reduction and simplification of traditional forms.179
CM 7075, Monneret de Villard 1923 fig. 74; Severin 1993 78, fig. 4.
CM 7074, Monneret de Villard 1923 figs 8, 9; Török 1990 fig. 75.
174
CM 7068, Török 1990 fig. 76.
175
CM 7024, Monneret de Villard 1923 fig. 7; Török 1990 fig. 65.
176
Kautzsch 1936 44 ff., nos 155a, b, Pl. 11; Schneider 1941 7, Pls 14–16;
Kramer 1994 103 f., Pl. 15/2.
177
Breccia 1933 Pls XLVII/122 and XXXIII, top, respectively; Török 1990 figs
67/a, b. Cf. also GRM 23685, Severin 1993 fig. 21.
178
CM 4424, Török 1990 fig. 68.
179
For examples, see Török 1990 477 ff., figs 69, 71–73, 78, 79.
172
173
214
chapter seven
The same lack of interest in spatial illusionism and Classical naturalism are characteristic of the sculptured architectural decoration
created around 440 for Shenoute’s Deir Anbâ Shinûda (Chapter
VI.2) and for the sanctuary of the somewhat later Deir Anbâ Bishûy
(figs 29, 30, 70, 71). The architectural carvings of these splendid
edifices show the result of the trend that had started with the vogue
of geometrical and interlace motifs in architectural decoration and
with the spread of carpet patterns in other artistic media (cf. Chapters
VII.1.3, VIII.2.1). Decorative motifs in the Deir Anbâ Shinûda and
the Deir Anbâ Bishûy no longer present idealized renderings of forms
taken from the physical world: they are expressionistic simplifications,
forms turned into ideograms. The radical change in attitude towards
forms taken from the physical world was prepared for stylistically by
the geometric fashion. In the churches of Sohag, however, it cannot
be interpreted independently from Shenoute’s principles. Yet, Shenoute’s
attitude towards depiction was only one of the possible options, and
not the option for the Christianization of art in Egypt (see Chapter VIII).
The decorated niche frames and conchs of the Deir Anbâ Shinûda
(figs 29, 30) and the capitals, niches, and door pediments of the Deir
Anbâ Bishûy (figs 70,180 71181) are closely related formally and stylistically and may be ascribed to the same workshop, even if not
always to the same generation of artesans. Both decoration programmes
(for the Deir Anbâ Shinûda see Chapter VI.2) are characterized by
a structural comprehension of Classical forms (most obvious in the
case of the column capitals), on the one hand, and, on the other,
by an autonomous reduction of the same forms into elegant ideograms
and ornaments the graphic effect of which was further enhanced by
painting. The maintenance of the structure of the Corinthian capital in the Deir Anbâ Bishûy (fig. 71) is coupled with the same ornamental treatment of its constituents which is also the central stylistic
feature of the decorative carvings in the Deir Anbâ Shinûda.
The evolutionist interpretation of “Coptic” art explains the stylized
architectural decoration of the two churches at Sohag and of later,
sixth-century, churches (e.g., Dendera) and monastic buildings (e.g.,
Saqqara, Bawit) in terms of a postulated estrangement of a (postulated) native art from the Classical tradition. This is certainly wrong:
180
181
Severin 1998a fig. 8.
Severin 1977a 249 no. 276/d.
215
the fifth-century products of the Heracleopolis and Ahnas workshops
and the carvings decorating the splendid churches at Sohag represent no more than a stylistic trend in architectural sculpture the course
of which was modified before long. Meanwhile, the Classical tradition of late antique art was uniterrupted in other areas of artistic
production.
It also remains a somewhat biased hypothesis that the changed
orientation of architectural sculpture culminating in the carvings of
Shenoute’s monastic churches was a purely Egyptian development.
Though Hans-Georg Severin is probably right in suggesting that no
direct formal prototypes from Constantinople may be detected in the
decoration of the churches at Sohag,182 the abandonment of illusionism achieved by boldly undercut deep reliefs also occurred as
a—however insignificant—trend in early fifth-century Constantinopolitan sculpture. The sarcophagus fronts from Taskasap, Ambarliköy183
and the Silivri Kapi hypogeum,184 all associated with elite burials,
are decorated with reliefs which stand closer to the adlocutio and largitio reliefs of the Arch of Constantine than the Classicizing reliefs
of Theodosius and Arcadius. Their floral friezes and mouldings show
a similarly free treatment of Classical prototypes as the late products of the Heracleopolis and Oxyrhynchos workshops.
182
Severin 1998a 318.
N. Firatli: Deux nouveaux reliefs funéraires d’Istanbul et les reliefs similaires.
Cah. Arch. 11 (1960) 73–92 (Taskasap); Firatli et al. 1990 Cat. 96, 97 (Taskasap),
98 (Ambarliköy).
184
Effenberger – Severin 1992 33 ff., figs 24, 25; Deckers – Serdaroglu 1993;
Koch 2000 408 f.
183
CHAPTER EIGHT
IMAGES OF THE GOOD LIFE:
DISPLAY AND STYLE
Wealth—Joy—Praise—
Abundance—Virtue—Progress1
1. Iconography of wealth
In his study of landholding and distribution of wealth in late Roman
Egypt, Roger Bagnall speaks about
the absence of really great landed fortunes in the hands of the curial
class, fortunes that might support a rise from municipial status to the
aristocracy of the empire . . . Egypt contributed disproportionately few
persons to that aristocracy, even in the fourth century and later. The
lack of great fortunes underlying this state of affairs seems to have
been deeply rooted in patterns of land ownership.2
Indeed, not many families or individuals rose from Egypt to the aristocracy of the Empire (Chapter IV.2.4, 5). It would be rash to conclude,
however, that the villas and town houses of the Egyptian aristocracy
were also, as a rule, less sumptuous than the villas and houses of the
elite of other provinces. We can collect rich evidence to the contrary.
Let me quote first of all a paradigmatic example of the cosmopolitan standards of patrician display in late antique Egypt. I refer to
the cache of (partly?) imported marble sculpture found in what must
have been the ruins of a seaside villa at Alexandria. The thirteen
pieces of sculpture discovered at Sidi Bishr in modern Alexandria3
1
Names of the symbolic gifts offered to the personification of Hestia Polyolbos,
the “Blessed Hearth”, in the tapestry Dumbarton Oaks Collection 29.1, Maguire
1999 244.
2
Bagnall 1992 143.
3
B. Gasowska: Depozyt rzezb z Sidi Bishr w Aleksandrii. in: Starozytna Aleksandria
w badaniach polskich. Materialy Sesji Naukowej organizowanej prez Instytut Archeologii Uniwersytetu
Jagellonskiego Krakow 8–9 kwietnia 1975. Warszawa 1977 99–118; my description follows Hannestad 1994 123 f.
218
chapter eight
come from a collection put together by a connoisseur in the early
fifth century. They include a female portrait statue and a series of
medium- and smaller-sized figures of deities (Harpocrates, Asclepios,
Hygieia, Dionysos, the young Mars, Venus removing her sandal)4
and personifications (e.g., the Nile). The thematic context, style, and
quality of the sculpture collection decorating the villa of the unknown
Egyptian aristocrat may be compared to more famous collections
brought together in the same period, i.e., in the second half of the
fourth and the first half of the fifth century, in aristocratic villas in
other parts of the Empire at, e.g., Antioch,5 Silahtaraga in Constantinople,6 Rome (Esquiline),7 Cremna in Pisidia,8 and Chiragan in France.9
Late antique personal adornment from Egypt, similarly to the
objects produced for the decoration of elite residences—textiles, silver plate, carved and painted wood, etc.—give evidence of forms
and concepts of display that are in perfect accordance with elite display in other povinces of the late Empire. The explanation for this
is in the similar education and self-definition of the Egyptian elite
(Chapter IV.2.3, 2.4). Besides conceptual and stylistic expectations
formulated by the commissioners, the production of Egyptian workshops satisfying the demands of an elite clientèle was basically
influenced by the influx of luxury objects from other centres of the
Empire, primarily Constantinople.10
The following chapters will focus on the supranational concepts
and styles of expression appearing in Egyptian personal display.11 As
an indirect comment on the sentences quoted from Bagnall’s work
Hannestad 1994 figs 80–82.
D.M. Brinkerhoff: A Collection of Sculpture in Classical and Early Christian Antioch.
New York 1970; Hannestad 1994 118 ff.
6
N. de Chaisemartin – E. Örgen: Les documents sculptés de Silahtaraga. Paris 1984;
Kiilerich – Torp 1994.
7
Moltesen 1990; Bergmann 1999 14–17.
8
Hannestad 1994 122 f.
9
Hannestad 1994 127 ff.; Elsner 1998b 109 f., 186 f.; Bergmann 1999 26 ff.
10
The suggestion of M.C. Ross: Objects from Daily Life. in: Age of Spirituality 297–301
298, according to which “luxury arts gradually disappeared” in Egypt from the 4th
century is as biased as his (hypothetical) attribution to Constantinopolitan workshops
of all 7th-century luxury jewels found in Egypt: “Necklaces and bracelets found in
Egypt . . . were probably either sent there as gifts or taken by great families back
to Egypt when they returned from a visit to the court”. The argument is circular:
“This could explain why such jewelry of the late sixth and seventh centuries reached
Egypt long after Alexandria has lost its place as a great art center” (ibid. 299).
11
This investigation benefited greatly from the reading of Maguire 1993 and
1999. See also Y. Hirschfeld: Habitat. in: Bowersock–Brown–Grabar 1999 258–272.
4
5
images of the good life
219
in the introduction, let us introduce this investigation with some
Egyptian visual manifestations of “the enormous ideological preference
that all of Classical antiquity attached to land as a form of wealth”.12
One of the most splendid Egyptian textiles, a tapestry hanging in
the collection of the Textile Museum in Washington (Pls II, III),13
represents friezes of figures of Erotes carrying birds, bowls, fruit baskets, and jewelled crowns. The Erote friezes are bordered by friezes
representing roses14 framed by pearl strings and by floral scrolls with
fruits and they alternate with friezes representing hunting dogs and
wild animals. The heads of personifications in medallions inserted
into the floral scrolls as well as the gifts of the seasons carried by the
Erotes and their attributes symbolize the prosperity originating from
the aristocratic estate. The jewelled golden crowns held by some of
the Erotes15 reproduce the aurum coronarium, i.e., the tribute in the
form of a golden crown which was received by the triumphant late
Roman emperor.16 It associates aristocratic status and wealth with
imperial imagery. The symbolic significance of the fighting animals
is also indicated by their collars: they allude to aristocratic virtus, the
owner’s triumph over all negative powers in his way.
Tapestries decorated with designs in weft loops depict nicely dressed
pages offering wine17 or holding candelabra at aristocratic banquets
(Pl. IV).18 They recall the attendant figures represented in fourthcentury aristocratic tombs (cf. Chapter IV.1). On four closely related
tapestry hangings preserved in the Brooklyn Museum,19 the Abegg12
Bagnall 1992 128.
Inv. no. 71.118, Trilling 1982 Cat. 1; Rutschowscaya 1990 figs on pp. 38, 39.
Preserved height 3,25 m, width 1,8 m.
14
For the significance of the rose as an attribute of Venus, ladies of the imperial house, and aristocratic ladies, see Kiilerich – Torp 1989 363; Warland 1994 189
ff.; for the rose as attribute of aristocratic life style cf. Raeck 1992 87 f.
15
Cf. also a pair of stylistically related 4th-cent. tunic insets with Erotes holding
a jeweled golden crown and a wine bowl, respectively: Moscow, State Pushkin
Museum of Fine Arts inv. nos I, 1a 337 and I, 1a 5184, Shurinova 1967 no. 26;
Cat. Paris-Agde Cat. 162a, b.
16
Cf. F. Cumont: L’adoration des mages et l’art triomphal de Rome. Mem.
Pontificia Accademia Romana 3 (1932–1933) 81–105 101; Engemann 1997 79.
17
Boston, Museum of Fine Arts 49.315, Christentum am Nil Cat. 277.
18
Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des Antiquités Egyptiennes E 10530,
Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. p. 52.—See also Chapter VIII.4.
19
Acc. no. 46.128, Thompson 1971 Cat. 22. Thompson (ibid. 54) argues for an
early 7th-cent. dating under the impression that the costume of one of the figures
is a late Sassanian-type military dress. This assumption cannot be substantiated.—
Fragment originating from the same, or a closely related, hanging: Lorquin 1992
Cat. 63.
13
220
chapter eight
Stiftung,20 the Dumbarton Oaks Collection,21 and the Coptic Museum
(Pl. V),22 respectively, personifications and attendants are represented
under jewelled arcades.23 Both the personifications and the attendant
figures are, however, haloed. They carry gifts of the seasons, earth
and water; hold floral crowns and garlands (Riggisberg), wine (?)
bowls (Dumbarton Oaks and Cairo), elongated flasks of the type that
could contain scent sprinkled by the attendants over the hands of
the guests at an aristocratic banquet24 (Riggisberg, Dumbarton Oaks),
flowers and cornucopiae (Cairo), or agricultural implements (Riggisberg).
On one of the textiles (Brooklyn) the figures of a Satyr and a hunter
with a bow and arrows (?) also appear. Associating personifications
of abundance and virtus with attendants carrying the paraphernalia
of banquets and feasts, the iconography of the hangings alludes both
to the symbolic-ideological and the wordly-social aspects of “the good
life” deriving from the landed estate.25
The popularity of the iconographic type represented by these tapestries is also indicated by the fragments of a limestone relief in
Moscow26 depicting five haloed attendant figures under arcades. The
better-preserved figures are shown sowing grain, carrying the spoils
of a bird hunt, and holding a wine bowl.27 Similarly to a number
of wooden reliefs carved for the decoration of ceiling beams and
representing grape and grain harvest scenes (cf. Chapters VIII.3,
IX.1.1),28 the limestone relief as well as the tapestries come from the
interior decoration of elite houses.
An especially splendid and clear formulation of the metaphoric praise
of the prosperity of the landed estate/villa29 is presented in the muchillustrated Hestia Polyolbos hanging in the Dumbarton Oaks Collection.30
Inv. no. 1638, Flury-Lemberg 1988 fig. 740 no. 41; Schrenk 1998 fig. 13.
Maguire 1999 fig. 8.
22
CM 8454.
23
Fragments of tapestries with similar representations but of poorer quality:
Thompson 1971 Cat. 22; Lorquin 1992 Cat. 63.
24
Maguire 1999 244.
25
Schneider 1983; Raeck 1992 39 ff., 76 ff.
26
State Pushkin Museum of Fine Arts inv. no. I 1a 5836, Cat. Paris-Agde Cat. 172.
27
One figure carries a stick; one figure is badly damaged.
28
E.g., CM 7184, 7185, 7186, unpublished.
29
Warland 1994 191: Villenlob.
30
Inv. no. 29.1, Dumbarton Oaks. Handbook of the Byzantine Collection. Washington
1967 No. 36; cf. P. Friedländer: Documents of Dying Paganism: Textiles of Late Antiquity
in Washington, New York and Leningrad. Berkeley 1945 1–26; Maguire 1999 244.
20
21
221
Seated on a jewelled throne among rose-bushes, the personification
of the “Blessed Hearth” is flanked by six Erotes carrying disks inscribed
in Greek with the names of the gifts of Hestia Polyolbos, “Wealth”,
“Joy”, “Praise”, “Abundance”, “Virtue”, and “Progress”,31 and by two
female personifications carrying caskets (?) inscribed “Light” and perhaps “Life” (the damaged letters cannot be read). As also alluded to
by the rose-bushes of the background, the personifications presenting metaphors of prosperity, “the good life” and elite ideals (“Virtue”
and “Progress”) all relate to the ideal domina of the aristocratic household. As a whole, the representation derives from the iconography
of the imperial realm.32
2. Styles of wealth
2.1. Praise to the glorious house. The tapestry of the Erotes and its circle
But this is not all that we can tell about these textiles. The splendid large hangings with figural and ornamental decoration (including resist-dyed textiles as well as textiles with paintings in tempera,
see below) produced in metropolitan workshops also present a guideline for the understanding of stylistic processes in the fourth through
sixth centuries. The large hangings with mythological representations,
hunting scenes, and/or vegetal/ornamental representations borrowed
their themes from Greek mythology and, in more general terms,
from the official/aristocratic iconography of virtue, abundance, fertility, etc. They reflect traditional patterns of patrician patronage and
give an idea of the adornment of the aristocratic dwellings. The
iconography of the preserved hangings (similarly to the figured decoration occurring in other media such as sculpture, toreutics, jewelry, manuscript illustration, etc.) supports the conclusions drawn
from the literary evidence concerning the cultural integration of the
Egyptian elite into the empire (cf. Chapter IV.2).33
The large mythological tapestries may appear an Egyptian speciality. Yet this is an optical illusion due to the climate of Egypt
where, as opposed to other parts of the Mediterranean, textiles were
preserved for millennia in the dry sand. In reality, the Egyptian
31
32
33
Hestia Polyolbos touches the disks with “Joy” and “Virtue” with her hands.
Warland 1994 191.
Muth 2001.
222
chapter eight
vogue of large wall hangings conformed with a general late antique
trend in the decoration of wall surfaces and in the use of textiles in
the division of interior spaces.34
Measuring 1.8 × 3.25 m, the above-described (Chapter VII.2.1)
tapestry hanging with the representation of Erotes in Washington
(Pls II, III) is considered to be one of the largest late antique tapestries yet discovered. In its present state of preservation, however, it
is incomplete. Its original size is indicated by the composition of the
Erote friezes. In the better-preserved upper frieze, the first Erote at
the (spectator’s) left, though flying towards the (spectator’s) right,
glances to the (spectator’s) left and holds in his right hand a crown
encircling an inscription. The second Erote glances similarly to the
left, while the next Erote, who is the former’s mirror image, glances
to the right, i.e., to the fourth Erote who glances to the left and holds
an uninscribed crown in his right hand. The fourth Erote is not followed by a fifth one, thus his figure marks the right edge of the
tapestry, as is also indicated by his glance directed towards the centre
of the composition. In the present state of preservation, the frieze is
asymmetrical without any obvious compositional reason. Its asymmetry
is eliminated if we attach to its left end the mirror image of the preserved four figures. Accordingly, the preserved portion of the textile
represents more or less exactly the (right) half of the original. The
symmetry axis of the original composition was between the preserved
first Erote and his lost mirror image, who may well have held an
inscribed crown similarly to his pendant. The animal friezes above
and below the Erote frieze seem to have taken the same symmetry
axis into account. A secondary symmetry axis runs between the Erotes
flying towards each other. The masks in the peopled scroll above
the upper animal frieze are coordinated with this secondary axis.
The crown of the first Erote enclosed two lines in Greek.35 The
first line is illegible. The second reads HPAK. H. Seyrig and L. Robert36
suggested that HPAK stands for the toponym “Heracleias”, “at
Heracleia”, and would refer to the weaving center Heracleia Perinthos
near Constantinople. This interpretation is improbable on several
accounts.37 It is difficult to imagine that a workshop signature could
34
35
36
37
Maguire 1999 239 f.; Warland 2001 19 ff.
Fairly well visible in fig. 13 of Picard-Schmitter 1962.
H. Seyrig – L. Robert: Sur un tissu récemment publié. Cah. Arch. 9 (1956) 27–36.
Cf. also Trilling 1982 31.
223
have been inscribed into an aurum coronarium placed in the conceptual and optical centre of a glorificatory context. It would have been
more in accordance with the symbolic message of the tapestry if the
jewelled crown contained the name of the person who is in the
actual centre of the composition: it is the glory, splendour and wealth
of his house to which all woven images in the tapestry were meant
to allude.38 Inscribed in a pendant crown held by a now lost Erote
to the left of the symmetry axis, one also may imagine the name of
his wife. In this way, the (glorifying and well-wishing) inscription of
the name(s) of the tapestry’s owner(s)/patron(s) would have imitated
(like the rest of the imagery) an imperial prototype, viz., the abbreviated vow inscriptions occurring in ( jewelled) wreaths on coins and
other objects.39 It is perhaps not irrelevant, either, to mention here
the portraits of Secundus and Proiecta enclosed by a jewelled wreath
and held by Erotes on the top of the lid of Proiecta’s casket from
the Esquiline: a representation that was meant to be “read” together
with the dedicatory inscription on the front of the lid.40
The decoration is composed of four figural friezes which are bordered by peopled scrolls and friezes representing roses framed by
pearl strings. The tapestry is bordered with double interlace bands
at the top and the bottom. The striped composition complies with
the architectural frame into which a wall tapestry displaying repetitive representations of a non-narrative kind—intended as a backdrop—is usually fitted.41 The traditional rules of wall decoration also
prevail in the proportions and vertical sequence of the friezes, with
38
For the compositional context of the (rare) late antique patrons’ name inscriptions on mosaics in domestic buildings cf. Dunbabin 1999 318.
39
See, e.g., the silver bowls of Licinius made on the occasion of the tenth anniversary of his accession (317), Age of Spirituality Cat. 8, and the silver medallion of
Constans issued on the fifth anniversary of his accession (337/338), ibid. Cat. 38.—
On the reverse of a silver medallion of Constantine, issued in Siscia probably in
336 and imitating the type of a coin of Augustus, the title CAESAR is inscribed
in a wreath, Age of Spirituality Cat. 37. Identical type: silver medallion of Constantine
II from 337, P.M. Bruun: Roman Imperial Coinage VII. London 1966 no. Siscia 259.—
For the silver plate from the 4th-century Esquiline treasure with the monogram of
the aristocratic lady Pelegrina Turcii: Buckton (ed.) 1994 Cats 11, 12.
40
SECUNDE ET PROIECTA VIVATIS IN CHRI[STO], “Secundus and
Proiecta, live in Christ”, Shelton 1981 72 ff. Cat. 1. Dated by Shelton to c. 330–370,
by Kiilerich 1993 164 f. to the early 380s.
41
Cf. with the 5th-century (?) non-figured wall tapestry with similarly distributed
horizontal friezes, height 2.39 m, Trilling 1982 Cat. 108. Its colour scheme represents a reduced variant of the tapestry with the Erotes.
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a higher base zone and a narrower top zone and with the main
figural friezes in the lower 2/3 of the surface. The horizontal distribution of the Erotes, who formed, if the reconstruction suggested
above is correct, two groups of four figures each, resulted in a balanced yet not monotonous symmetry. The rhythmical order of the
eight figures would thus be:
¯˘˘¯|¯˘˘¯
The decorative character is also enhanced by the use of colours and
colour shades.42 The weft of the tapestry is made up of nineteen colors of wool woven together on an undyed linen weft with extraordinary skill and precision. The symbolic significance and the imperial
connotations of the flying Erotes and fighting animals are stressed
by the luxurious bright red background. The peopled scrolls are
placed on a yellow background representing gold similarly to the
yellow of the Erotes’ haloes and the medallions enclosing the personifications in the upper peopled scroll.43 The naturalistic effect
achieved by the fine modulations of the colours in the Erote friezes
is subdued by the unifying red background. The short, rather plump
yet classically rendered, Erotes with their fine faces, the calculatedness
of their postures and directions of glances, the rhythm resulting from
the connections of the antithetical figures, and the fairly angular
draperies suggest a dating to the second third of the fourth century.
The Classicism of the representation is not completely consistent,
however. The limbs of the Erotes and details of their anatomy (e.g.,
breasts) are outlined in several places with a darker hue of the body
colour, while in other places even black contours are applied.44 The
haloes and the wings of the Erotes have no contours at all. The
same inconsistency occurs in the representation of the animals. While
a dark (but not black!) contour line may be required in Classicalstyle mosaics to set off (parts of ) a figure from its surroundings or
to enhance plastic value, its use to define forms and figures uniformly
would signal a marked deviation from the traditional canon. The
42
On the colours used in Egyptian textile production and the contemporary
colour names, see Andorlini 1998, with further literature.
43
For the colours of the tapestry, see K. de Carbonnel: Appendix II. Remounting
the Tapestry Cat. No. 1. in: Trilling 1982 109–110.
44
Cf., e.g., CM 7690, fragment of tapestry with figure of Erote with flower garland, Cat. Paris-Agde Cat. 163.
225
significance of the contours in the Erote tapestry becomes clearer if
we recall a tapestry produced some decades earlier. The master of
the much-illustrated tapestry with fishes discovered at Antinoe,45 one
of the most impressive works of art from post-pharaonic Egypt (Pl.
VI), set off the fishes from the green of the water by their colour
and by masterfully rendered shadows below them, thus entirely without the use of non-realistic elements. Though the late third- or early
fourth-century designer of the textile probably relied on models based
ultimately on illustrations of scientific works46 and not on the study
of the nature, the presentation of the fishes as if they were swimming
in a shallow pond and the impressionism of the composition as a
whole result nevertheless in a feast of Classical naturalism and
Hellenistic taste. One is reminded by the textile of Pliny’s description of the Pergamene mosaicist Sosos’ work depicting
a dove, drinking and casting the shadow of its head on the water, and
others sunning and preening themselves on the rim of a cantharus.47
By the middle of the fourth century most textile workshops producing
luxury tapestries seem to have been as inconsistent as the master of
the tapestry of the Erotes when treating the interference of forms
with each other and with the space in which they were placed (even
if the space was marked only by a homogeneous background colour).
The invention and spread of the abstract (usually black) contour line
was motivated by the same trend of presenting figures and forms as
ideograms which we observed in the sculpture of the late third and
early fourth centuries (Chapters III.3, V.2, VII.1.1–3). The combination
of abstraction (non-naturalistic contours) with Classicizing naturalism
(realistic modulations in the representation of figures and objects of
the natural world) in textiles such as the Washington hanging concurs
45
Two fragments were found by A. Gayet, the larger one (0.87 × 1.38 m): Lyon,
Musée Historique des Tissus 28927 (= my Pl. VI); the smaller one (0.49 × 0.35
cm): Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des Antiquités Egyptiennes E 29314.
Age of Spirituality Cat. 182, 183; Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. p. 68; Bourgon-Amir 1993
204 f., Pls 209, 210 (Lyon); Cat. Hamm Cat. 394 (Paris); Santrot et al. (eds) 2001
Cat. 70 (Paris).
46
For the Hellenistic tradition of zoographical illustration cf. K. Weitzmann: Ancient
Book Illumination. Cambridge Mass. 1959; Weitzmann 1971; K. Weitzmann: Late
Antique and Early Christian Book Illumination. New York 1977; Meyboom 1995 177 ff.
47
Pliny, N. H. 36.184, quoted by Dunbabin 1999 26. The realism of the Roman
(?) copy of Sosos’ mosaic from Hadrian’s Villa at Tivoli is far from what is indicated by Pliny’s inscription and what is achieved in the Egyptian textile.
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with the contrast which we may observe on the reliefs carved for
the Arch of Constantine between the abstraction of the spatial setting, bodies, and draperies on the one side, and the naturalistic treatment of the faces, on the other. In this sense, the tapestry in
Washington and its stylistic analogues represent the emergence of
the “modern” trend of late antique expressionism in Egypt (cf.
Chapters III.3, VI.4). As we have seen in the discussion of fourthcentury sculpture (Chapters VII.1.1, 1.2), however, this trend existed
side-by-side with a consistently traditionalist Classicizing trend which
can also be illustrated with fine hangings and other textiles as well
as with objects in other materials (see Chapters VIII.3, VIII.5).48
Returning to the circle of the textile of the Erotes, a similarly
careful consideration of the colour scheme and a similar coordination of function and decorative pattern characterizes another impressive tapestry in the Washington collection (Pl. VII).49 It is decorated
with a jewelled tympanon resting on two garlanded columns placed
on a bright red background. The tympanon encloses a square panel
containing four roses framed by pearl strings. A grid pattern composed from stylized vine leaves with inscribed birds and bunches of
grapes is between the columns, and “in front” of them; an image
of richness and luxury.50 The spatial relationship between the architecture and the inhabited vine foliage may be understood with the
help of another tapestry. The scale and the position of the servant
figure represented standing “behind” a column and pulling back a
curtain in a remarkable hanging of the Boston Museum of Fine Arts
(fig. 72)51 suggests that the Washington hanging was meant to “represent” a door opening into a grape arbour: in spite of the appearance of the foliage pattern below the column bases, the arbour is
behind the door. The columns are shaded in order to give a naturalistic impression, yet the rest of the representation is rendered in
a decorative manner in accordance with the decorative function of
the textile. The luxurious impression made by the motifs and the
colour scheme is further enhanced by the intricacy of the grid design.
48
See also the illustrations of the early 5th-cent. Vergilius Vaticanus and the late
5th-cent. Vergilius Romanus, Age of Spirituality Cat. 203, 204.
49
The Textile Museum 71.18, Trilling 1982 Cat. 2; Rutschowscaya 1990 fig.
p. 65.
50
Cf. Raeck 1992 87 f.
51
L. Salmon: An Eastern Mediterranean Puzzle. Bull. BMFA 67 (1969) 136–150;
Maguire 1999 244, fig. 9.
227
The mannerisms in the rendering of the birds, the foliage, and the
heraldic roses enclosed in pearl string frames repeat diagnostic details
encountered in the tapestry of the Erotes (Pls II, III). As also suggested by Trilling,52 the two hangings were produced in the same
workshop—we may add that they may have been woven for the
decoration of the same house.
It is equally relevant from the aspects of chronology, workshop
connections, and social context that the narrow interlace friezes running along its top and bottom edges as well as its pearl string borders relate the hanging of the Erotes to a special class of late thirdearly fourth-century luxury tunic insets.53 These latter are characterised
by the use of silk and gold threads and wool dyed with real purple.54
Purple insets with inwoven gold decoration, restricted originally to
the dress of members of the imperial family, pertained to the costume insignia of high dignitaries in the fourth century.55 Though it
cannot be decided if there was a closer workshop connection between
the producers of the great Washington hangings and the purple tunic
insets with silk and gold threads, the formal and stylistic affinities
between these textiles of different functions testify to the homogeneity
of taste in the various areas of aristocratic display in the first half
of the fourth century.
The use of the red and yellow (gold) backgrounds in the Washington
tapestries (Pls II, III, VII) contribute greatly to the impression of
magnificence and splendour. We find a similarly calculated use of
red and yellow backgrounds and a similarly inconsistent use of black
contours in a number of great tapestries of Classicizing iconography
and style. One of them (Pl. VIII)56 is connected to the two Washington
52
Trilling 1982 31.
Renner 1981, with figs 1–6; Trilling 1982 Cat. 83 (Friedman [ed.] 1989 Cat.
60).—The arguments presented by Beckwith 1959 6 f. for a mid-5th-cent. dating
are not convincing.
54
The pieces published by Renner 1981 figs 1–4 are woven on a silk warp and
use gold thread made of gold leaf on a silk core; in Trilling 1982 Cat. 83 the gold
thread is on a linen core, see Trilling 1982 81. The weaver of the tunic neck decoration Boston, Museum of Fine Arts acc. no. 46.401, Renner 1981 fig. 6, copied
a complex marine thiasos scene on a 14 × 14 cm surface translating the original
into a coloured line drawing in which the calculated use of different line thicknesses
enhances rather than reduces the illusionistic impression.
55
Delbrueck 1929 38 f.
56
Washington, Dumbarton Oaks Collection 32.1, Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. pp.
120–121.
53
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chapter eight
tapestries by the characteristic birds inhabiting the foliage scroll that
frames the central scene and may be regarded as a product of the
same workshop. The medium large tapestry (preserved size 1.44 ×
0.82 m) depicts two Nereids riding sea monsters: the better-preserved
one is a sea bull.57 The Nereid on the right side of the scene holds
a mirror and regards her reflection in it. Curiously, the mirror image
has a different coiffure. The Nereid’s posture is that of the frequently
represented marine Aphrodite. The representation may be interpreted
as praise and celebration of an aristocratic matron who is alluded to
as an analogy of Aphrodite by the mirror held by one of the Nereids.
Iconographically as well as stylistically, the elegantly rendered
figures of the Nereid tapestry recall the silver casket of Proiecta from
the Esquiline.58 The casket’s representations associate its owner’s toilet with that of the marine Venus.59 Fragments of a contemporary
Egyptian casket of identical shape—lid and body each in the form
of a truncated pyramid—and of approximately the same size, but
made of wood and inlaid with bone plaques decorated with incised
and coloured drawings, are kept in the Coptic Museum (figs 73–75).60
On the preserved short sides of the casket and the preserved top of
its lid a young lady and her maidens are represented, holding various
objects of toilet.61 The Egyptian casket displays—within the limitations
of the technique of incised bone—an excellent routine in presenting
classically modelled and draped figures in elegant postures. This routine is not much inferior to the skill of the master of the Proiecta
casket. It is also rather likely that the now-missing sides of the lid
of the Cairo casket were decorated with mythological scenes in order
to place the owner’s life and qualities into a divine perspective.
57
For the iconography cf. the marine mosaic in the Baths of the Lighthouse,
Ostia, mid-3rd century, Dunbabin 1999 fig. 63.
58
Shelton 1981 72 ff. Cat. 1.
59
Cf. also the complex iconography of the mosaics decorating the private baths
at Sidi Grib south of Carthage, late 4th-early 5th cent., with the toilet of the domina
compared to the marine Venus and a marine thiasos with Neptune (implicitly compared to the dominus) and Amphitrite: Dunbabin 1999 322.
60
CM 9060–9063, Strzygowski 1904 172–175 nos 7060–7064, Pls XI–XIII;
H. Buschhausen: Die spätrömischen Metallscrinia und frühchristlichen Reliquiare. Wien 1971
217 ff.; Age of Spirituality Cat. 311.
61
In one of the scenes on the lid and on one of the side panels the matron
holds an object which may best be identified as a scroll: perhaps the marriage contract? Cf. Proiecta holding a scroll on the lid of her casket, Shelton 1981 Pl. 4,
top.—For the maidens’ coiffures cf., e.g., the maiden on the late 4th-cent. Dominus
Julius mosaic from Carthage, Dunbabin 1999 fig. 122; Muth 2001 fig. 35.
229
There can be little doubt that the Nereid textile was associated
with the role patterns of an aristocratic matron. As element of visual
display in the house of a patrician couple, it articulated a female
aspect of aristocratic ideals of status and identity. The mythological
prototypes occurring in the domestic sphere of the late Empire’s
patricians emphasize and celebrate the beauty and erotic charms of
the lady of the house and the virtus and learning of the dominus and
his power and importance as a landowner. Hence the prominence
of representations, e.g., of Nymphs and Nereids, Leda and the swan,
the rape of Europa; or Bellerophon, the education of Achilles; Dionysos
and Ariadne, Heracles and Omphale, Meleagros and Atalanta, Adonis
and Aphrodite, Hippolytos and Phaedra, etc.62
In the same sense that representations of Aphrodite and/or the
Nereids were normative for the display of the female role, the representation of hunting was normative for the visual manifestation of
aristocratic male virtue.63 Hunting was an organic part of the management of large estates and hence, as a theme, part of the iconography of “the good life”.64 Continuing with luxury tapestries attributed
to the workshop of the tapestry of Erotes (Pls II, III), I cite a remarkably fine textile from the Dumbarton Oaks Collection (Pl. IX).65 This
tapestry of smaller dimensions (originally c. 0.94 × 0.94 m) is decorated with two hunting scenes placed on a bright red background
and framed by a double border. The colour schema with the red
background of the main scenes, the hues of yellow dominating the
main figures and the inner border, and the dark colours of the outer
border—which is framed by yellow stripes—repeats the colour schema
of the hanging of the Erotes. The consistent and emphatic use of
black contours circumscribing the figures and the bows and arrows
of the hunters indicates a different master rather than a later dating and/or a different workshop. Except for some shells, the aquatic
creatures represented in the outer border66 have no black contours,
Muth 2001 104 ff.
Raeck 1992 32 ff.
64
Dunbabin 1978 43 f.; Schneider 1983 68 ff.; Raeck 1992 39 ff.
65
Dumbarton Oaks Collection 37.14, Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. p. 64.
66
Fragments from analogous borders with shells and fishes, probably produced
in the same workshop: Lorquin 1992 Cat. 109; de Moor (ed.) 1993 98 f. Cat. 8;
C. Giroire: Présentation de la collection des tissus coptes du Musée de la Mode et
du Textile de Paris. Études coptes VII. Cahiers de la Bibliothèque copte 12. Paris-Louvain
2000 159–172 164 ff., fig. 1.
62
63
230
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suggesting that a different model was used for the outer border than
for the main scenes.
The compositional schema points towards models and parallels in
other media. The superimposed and individually framed scene registers
as well as the double border, one of which is figured here, the other
ornamental, recall the compositional structure of fourth-century
mosaics.67 Multiregistered illustrations also appear in contemporary
manuscripts.68 The scenes represent young hunters armed with reflex
bows and arrows and dressed in an Orientalizing style. The significance
of the hunting scenes is indicated by the game: the lion and the
wild boar were favoured prey of the emperor and of privileged aristocratic hunters69 and were part of the symbolic imagery of transcendent triumph. The hunters are not images of the lord of the
house, however; they are symbolic images of virtue and victory over
the dangerous and destructive forces of nature. The symbolic significance of the scenes is also alluded to by the vine foliage in their
background, introducing the concept of the fertility and abundance
of earth. The aquatic creatures of the outer border evoke Ocean.
The association of the fertility of the earth as the scene of the triumph
of virtue over the evil and the destructive forces of nature with the
gifts of Ocean—which literally surrounds Earth in the tapestry70—
lends cosmic dimensions to the good fortune-bringing allegories presented in the textile.71
The geometrically rendered vine leaf grid on the hanging illus-
67
See, e.g., Nea Paphos, Cyprus, House of Aion, triclinium, 2nd quarter of the
4th cent., Dunbabin 1999 230, fig. 242.
68
Quedlinburg Itala, late 4th or early (?) 5th cent., H. Degering – A. Boeckler:
Die Quedlinburger Italafragmente. Berlin 1932; Age of Spirituality Cat. 424.
69
Permission to hunt the imperial animal was a favour granted by the emperor,
cf. C.Th. XV.11.1, quoted by Y. Thébert: Private Life and Domestic Architecture
in Roman Africa. in: Veyne (ed.) 1987 313–409 404.
70
Miniature versions of the iconographic schema of the personification/symbols
of Earth surrounded by symbols of Ocean were also employed in the decoration
of luxury garments, see the silk sleeve band illustrated in Maguire 1999 fig. 20.
71
Cf. (especially for the Christian representations based on the Classical iconographic tradition of Earth encircled by Ocean): Maguire 1987; Engemann 1997
149 ff.—Square tunic inset with mounted hunter in the central medallion which is
framed by a scroll peopled with aquatic birds and fishes: Paris, Musée de la Mode
et du Textile 14633, Cat. Paris-Agde Cat. 175. Square inset with horseman in the
centre and clavus fragment from the same (?) tunic decoration: London, Victoria
and Albert Museum 43049, Rutschowscaya 1990 figs p. 141. Analogous square
panel: Boston, Museum of Fine Arts 35.87, Friedman (ed.) 1989 Cat. 67. Late 4th–
early 5th century.
231
trated in Pl. VII represents a forerunner of the floral carpet style of
mosaics emerging in the second half of the fourth century in Syria
and the east.72 According to Katherine Dunbabin,
[t]he floral carpet-mosaics, and the motifs that go with them, are only
one aspect of more profound changes, from three-dimensional framed
‘picture’ to two-dimensional ‘carpet’, from clearly delineated ornamental
designs to surfaces defined by colour: changes which had already been
anticipated in many other parts of the empire. The oriental textiles
which must have introduced the new motifs were attuned to the new
aesthetic: they did not create it.73
The trend of these “more profound changes” is demonstrated in more
direct terms by a further textile attributed to the workshop of the
above-discussed tapestries with the Nereids and the hunting scenes.
It is an incompletely preserved large hanging (preserved size 1.25 ×
0.91 m) originally consisting of fifteen busts in medallions framed by
an interlace of garlands with vine leaves, grape clusters, and stylized
leaves (Pl. X)74 of the same design as the inner border of the tapestry with hunting scenes (Pl. IX). The thirteen preserved busts are
those of characteristic members of Dionysos’ cortège: Pan, Silenos,
Maenads, Nymphs, Satyrs and perhaps also include the bust of
Dionysos himself (bottom, second from left?), although it is more
likely that the god was represented in one of the now lost central
medallions. The background of the central field is again bright red,
while the busts, which are circumscribed with heavy black contours,
are placed before a yellow (gold) background, also used for the background colour of the rose garland bordering the central field. The
vivid postures and the emphasis given to the various (yet not always
well-coordinated or consistent)75 directions of glances indicate that
the busts are adaptations of iconographic types that derived from
scenic representations. The reduction of the scenic-narrative iconography of the Dionysiac thiasos to a portrait gallery visualizes a decisive
Dunbabin 1999 177 ff.
Dunbabin 1999 178 f.; cf. A. Gonosová: The Formation and Sources of Early
Byzantine Floral Semis and Floral Diaper Patterns Reexamined. DOP 41 (1987)
227–237.
74
New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art 31.9.3, Brooklyn Cat. 238; Age of
Spirituality Cat. 129; Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. pp. 88–89.—A. Gonosová in: Friedman
(ed.) 1989 Cat. 42 dates the tapestry to the late 5th-early 6th cent. with an unconvincing reference to the original mosaics of St. Apollinare Nuovo and the Archiepiscopal
chapel in Ravenna.
75
E.g., the Maenad in the upper right corner of the tapestry glances outward.
72
73
232
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stage in the process during which mythological narratives first take
the form of episodes standing for the whole of the story and then
are reduced to isolated portraits of their protagonists. The Dionysiac
tapestry uses shades of blue like the Nereid textile and it is also associated with the Nereid textile and the hunt tapestry through its naturalism, achieved by the fine transitions of colours as well as through
a similarly subtle rendering of the faces, especially the expressive eyes
and stylized eyebrows.
We could conclude the survey of the textiles attributed to the
workshop of the tapestry of the Erotes with the mention of the wellknown “châle de Sabine”76 as an illustration of the stylistic homogeneity of aristocratic display in monumental decoration and personal
adornment. Yet there is another textile which deserves special mention here. Fragments from a large tapestry preserved in the Fogg
Museum of Art representing standing warrior saints display the haloed
head of a bearded saint (Pl. XI).77 Its closeness to the naturalistic
style of the fourth-century tapestries discussed so far is obvious. The
luxury textile workshops worked for a clientèle in which polytheists
and Christians coexisted. It would be wrong to suppose that there
were textile or other workshops specialized exclusively for either half
of the commissioners (Chapter VII.2.3). The sculptors’ workshops at
Heracleopolis Magna and Oxyrhynchos met the demands of both
pagan and Christian commissioners (Chapters VII.1.1–1.4). This may
well have been the case of the Alexandrian workshops producing
decorative bone carvings for a less wealthy, socially and religiously
mixed urban clientèle (Chapter VIII.5).78 Yet before turning to the
76
from Antinoe, Age of Spirituality Cat. 112; Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. pp. 94–95; Santrot
et al. (eds) 2001 Cat. 76. Associated with the tapestries discussed in the foregoing
through the red ground and the yellow (gold) scene backgrounds, the black contours, the Classicism of the iconography and the style, and the overall quality of
the design (somewhat blurred by its imprecise execution by the weaver): note especially the splendid interaction of the directions of the glances.—From the same
workshop (?): Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des Antiquités Égyptiennes E
27205, Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. pp. 60–61; Santrot et al. (eds) 2001 Cat. 82.
77
Cambridge, Mass., Fogg Museum of Art 1939.112.1,2, Rutschowscaya 1990
fig. pp. 138–139.—A. Gonosová in: Friedman (ed.) 1989 Cat. 128 dates the fragments to the 6th cent. and compares them to the style of the Hestia Polyolbos
tapestry (cf. Chapter VIII.1, end). The comparison is not convincing, however.
78
The Nicomachorum-Symmachorum and the Probianus dyptichs were carved
in the same Roman workshop as the Milan panel representing the Holy Women’s
Visit to the Tomb, Volbach 1976 nos 55, 62, 111.
233
connections between the art produced for the less wealthy and the
elite workshops, we have to discuss further developments in fourthand fifth-century great art.
2.2. From narrative to symbol. The great Dionysiac tapestry in Riggisberg
Good illustrations for the transformation of scenic into symbolic representation are provided by fourth-century hangings with mythological figures depicted under a series of arches in front of a ceremonial
portico, as on the fine hanging with Meleagros and Atalanta in
Riggisberg (fig. 76),79 or shown in the niches of a decorative façade,
as on a Dionysiac tapestry the surviving fragments of which are
divided among three different collections (fig. 77, Pl. XIII, see below).
These tapestries signal the emergence of a symbolic mode of representation less in the terms of the intended narrative content of the
representations than in the formal isolation of the actors from each
other. Let us first discuss the famous Dionysiac hanging of the AbeggStiftung,80 an especially large (7.30 x 2.20 m, original length probably c. 10 m) and highly impressive textile (Pl. XII).81 Its style suggests
a dating to the second half of the fourth century, which is apparently also supported by a 14C-date.82
The figures appear on the tapestry in spatial isolation, yet their
interconnections are clearly indicated by the directions of their movements and glances as well as by more complex iconographic hints
(many of which elude, however, our understanding). The preserved
eight figures include (from left to right) a bearded old man carrying
a flail (?), a richly clad matronly lady holding a bowl and a flower
garland, a young lady with one breast exposed, Pan playing his syrinx,
Ariadne, Dionysos, a Satyr, and a Maenad. In the centre of the representation stand Dionysos and Ariadne, towards whom the movements
of the other figures are directed. The presence of the old man83 and
79
Riggisberg, Abegg Stiftung, Simon 1970 Pls I–IX. For the late antique iconography of the Meleager and Atalanta story cf. Raeck 1992 78 ff. and esp. 84 ff.
80
Bowersock 1990 52 f.; Elsner 1998b 110.
81
Inv. no. 3100a, 7.30 × 2.20 m, Rutschowscaya 1990 figs pp. 83–85.
82
Flury-Lemberg 1988 368 f., 418.
83
J. Balty: Notes d’iconographie dionysiaque: la mosaïque de Sarrîn (Oshroene).
MEFRA 103 (1991) 19–23 (= in: J. Balty: Mosaïques antiques du Proche-Orient. Paris
1995 255–262) argues that the “old peasant” (“der würdige Greis” of D. Willers:
Zur Deutung eines spätantiken Wandbehanges aus Ägypten. WZRostock 27 [1988]
76–79) is identical with Silenos, who carries the instrument called februum which
played a role in the Dionysiac initiation.
234
chapter eight
the matronly lady indicates an initiation scene the meaning of which
is defined more precisely by the figures of Pan and the young woman.
While both the old man and the matron move towards the centre,
the matron turns her head back towards the old man. Pan and the
young woman are also connected with each other. Pan looks directly
at the young woman and plays his flute in an amorous attempt to
overcome her resistance—in which he eventually succeeds, for the
young lady, who had exposed her breast and right leg at an earlier
point of the story, is shown just at the moment when she lets the
sandal, with which she had tried to defend herself against Pan’s
approach, fall with a resigned gesture. The scene presents a paraphrase of the iconography of Aphrodite, Pan, and Eros as it was
represented in a late Hellenistic statue group from Delos84 in which
the goddess is about to beat Pan with her sandal, an ambivalent
gesture which may be understood as serious self-defence as well as
an invitation.85 It is thus tempting to identify the scene with Pan
and the young woman as a scene from the rites of preparing a bride
for her wedding. Such a meaning would fit well into the broader
context of Dionysiac initiation, similarly to the nude figure of Ariadne,
the matron, and the old man.
The tapestry does not repeat any of the traditional scenes of the
myth of Dionysos as they were formulated in Hellenistic and Roman
art. Instead, it combines a gallery of figures from the myth with a
gallery of non-mythical figures. The reason for the creation of a nonscenic representation of this kind is explained by the presence of the
non-mythological figures: the tapestry was meant to present a visual
articulation of the relationship between the mythological and worldly
spheres rather than (an) episode(s) of the myth of Dionysos. According
to Ja≤ Elsner, who discusses the tapestry as “among antiquity’s most
splendid and underrated remains”, we can never know
[w]hether the decoration of a wall or couch with this textile would
have implied the adherence of an initiate to Dionysiac religious cult,
or would have been a less sacredly charged declaration of paideia in
the form of mythological imagery, or would just have been an appropriate and suitably lavish adornment for a nobleman’s drinking party[.]86
84
85
86
Athens, National Museum 3335, Beard – Henderson 2001 fig. 96.
Beard – Henderson 2001 139.
Elsner 1998b 110.
235
Indeed, all these options appear equally likely. Placing the tapestry in
the context of aristocratic display, I would prefer, however, to interpret it as another case of the articulation of elite self-image through
its projection into the world of the myths. A visual comparison of
an aristocratic marriage to the myth of Dionysos and Ariadne and
to a religious initiation would have been an appropriate adornment
for a glorious house where the fortune and wealth were based upon
the union and fertility of its master and mistress. The images of
Dionysos and Ariadne stood for the highest form of the good life
and were also symbolic of the highest spheres of society. At the same
time, the images of the tapestry alluded to the paideia of the owners
of the house and invited educated comments from their guests.
The “modernity” of the great Riggisberg tapestry becomes especially distinct if we compare it to another monumental Dionysiac
textile, the surviving fragments of which are now divided between
collections in Bern (Pl. XIII),87 Boston,88 and Cleveland (fig. 77).89
The Bern-Boston-Cleveland tapestry represents a slightly earlier stage
of the stylistic process that led to the creation of works of art such
as the great Riggisberg tapestry. The actors of the myth also appear
in a non-scenic context in the Bern-Boston-Cleveland tapestry. The
relationship between the figures and their architectural backdrop is
different, however. With their frontal poses and/or restricted movements, the figures of the Riggisberg tapestry fit harmonically into
the arcaded architecture. Each of them dominates an equal space.
The uniform rhythm of the arcades is perfectly coordinated with the
rhythm of the figures, whose interconnections do not interfere with
the overall symmetry of the composition. In contrast, the designer
of the Bern-Boston-Cleveland tapestry did not take into account the
coordination of the figures with the framing architecture, even though
he used a niche architecture with obvious religious connotations (cf.
Chapter V.2).90 This is because he adopted figures from (a) scenic
representation(s)91 without altering their postures and movements,
Maenad playing the kithara: Abegg Stiftung 1637, 1.43 × 0.855 m.
Dionysos with cornucopia: Boston, Museum of Fine Arts 1973.290, 1.39 × 0.79 m.
89
Satyr and Maenad: Cleveland, Museum of Art 75.6, 1.38 × 0.857 m:
Rutschowscaya 1990 figs pp. 86–88.
90
In addition, the conchs of the niches in the Boston and Cleveland fragments
are yellow, i.e., gold.
91
Cf. the fragment of a small tapestry with the figure of a female dancer,
Riggisberg, Abegg Stiftung 1158, Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. p. 111, right; and see
87
88
236
chapter eight
which made sense in a scenic context but did not conform with an
architectural framework prepared for isolated symbolic figures.
Consequently, the figures break out of their unsuitable, narrow niches.
Trying to fit the duo of the Satyr and Maenad on the Cleveland
fragment (fig. 77) into the same niche, the designer even had to
remove one of the columns supporting the niche pediment. The awkward spatial relationships follow from the impossibility of coordinating
the static symbolism of the architecture with figure groups taken
from a scenic context. The overlappings of the figures with the architecture have nothing to do with the playful illusionism occurring,
e.g., in the tapestry with hunting scenes discussed above (Pl. IX).
The stylistic differences between the two Dionysiac tapestries are
no less significant. In the Bern-Boston-Cleveland textile the figures
have no contours and their anatomy is rendered in a more naturalistic manner. The faces recall Hellenistic prototypes.92 In contrast,
the Riggisberg tapestry displays a conspicuous stylization of facial
features, anatomy, and drapery. A similar difference occurs in the representation of architectural forms. Although we cannot know whether
the Bern-Boston-Cleveland tapestry also contained non-mythical figures
or not, it is obvious that it represents a less consistent transformation of a narrative/scenic composition into a symbolic one than the
great Riggisberg textile. The weaknesses of the composition, the distorted proportions of the figures or unsolved details such as the modelling of the legs of the Satyr in the Cleveland piece show equally
that the weavers of the Bern-Boston-Cleveland tapestry were not up
to the task of copying a monumental cartoon: but, it must be stressed,
these are features of the quality, and not the style of the tapestry.
3. Ornaments for the patrician house and the church
The Dionysiac tapestry in Riggisberg with its original length of c.
10 m and other wall hangings of similar size (cf. Chapter IX.1.2)
give an idea of the dimensions of the main reception rooms and
dining halls in the houses of Egyptian patricians in the late antiquethe lost fragments of a large Dionysiac tapestry formerly in Berlin, Effenberger 1975
Pl. 108.
92
Note also the observation of the Classical canon in the representation of the
feet in which the second toe is always longer than the first. Cf. Kiilerich 1993 127
on the angels of the early Theodosian Sarigüzel sarcophagus.
237
early Byzantine period. Otherwise, we have little, if any, idea of the
architecture and functional structure of the aristocratic dwelling. In
addition to the evidence of the wall hangings, further glimpses of its
decoration and furniture may be obtained, however, with the help
of isolated and unprovenanced, yet not quite irrelevant, finds such
as silver plate, painted wooden ceiling panels, carved roof beams, or
wooden caskets with carved bone decoration (cf. Chapters VIII.2.1, 5).
The stylistic and quality range of late fourth- and early fifth-century silver plate is excellently represented by objects originating from,
but discovered outside, Egypt in the Nubian princely necropoleis of
Qustul and Ballana c. 250 km south of the Egyptian frontier.93 These
objects found their way to the rulers of Egypt’s southern neighbour
partly as diplomatic presents and partly as booty acquired in Upper
Egypt in times of hostility. A pair of silver ewers94 of outstanding
elegance found in the tomb of a prince buried around 410–420
could equally have been made in Rome, Constantinople, Antioch or
Alexandria.
A remarkable assemblage from the tumulus of a Nubian king
buried around 450–46095 contains silver plate made in Egyptian
workshops as well as objects of Constantinopolitan provenance. While
items from a late fourth-early fifth-century table service, viz., two
large dishes, smaller bowls and an alabaster statuette,96 are of Egyptian
workmanship, two pieces of a church equipment, viz., an octagonal
reliquary97 and a censer,98 are of Constantinopolitan origin and date
from the first decades of the fifth century.99 It is tempting to infer
that the service arrived in Nubia from the same source as the reliquary and the censer, namely, from an Upper Egyptian church100
which was plundered by Nubian marauders during the Nubian incur-
93
Emery–Kirwan 1938; Török 1988 75–178.
From Qustul tumulus 2, Cairo, inv. no. unknown, Strong 1966 Pl. 189; Török
1988 108, Pls III, 57; Mielsch – Niemeyer 2001 15 f.
95
Ballana tumulus 2, Török 1988 134–144, Pls XVII–XXIV, 94–105.
96
Török 1988 Pls XVII, XVIII, 95–98, 104.—Three spoons from the same
tumulus, ibid. Pl. 103, may be dated to the middle of the 5th cent., cf. Mielsch –
Niemeyer 2001 17.
97
Török 1986; Török 1988 Pls 99–102.
98
Török 1988 Pl. XIV.
99
Török 1988 135 ff.; 1995 92.
100
For the relatively rich possessions of the village church of Ibion in Egypt, also
including silver plate, see the inventory in P.Grenf. 2.111, Lee 2000b 233 f., quoted
above in Chapter IV.2.5, note 344.
94
238
chapter eight
sions between c. 425 and 450.101 We know that, following the model
of the emperor, aristocrats all over the Empire donated precious
plate and other luxurious possessions from their palaces to churches.102
The reliquary and the unique censer103 were perhaps part of the
same donation. The reliquary was made probably in Constantinople
and, judging by the representation of Christ and seven apostles on
its sides, contained apostle relics.104 After being taken to Egypt, it
was complemented with a bell-shaped crest with an attached chain
and, according to an Egyptian custom, it was suspended in the sanctuary of the church to which it was donated.105 One of the solidcast large dishes of the table service (fig. 78)106 is decorated with the
figure of an Egyptian syncretistic deity whose figure fills the whole
surface of the vessel. The flatness of the relief and the drapery treatment recall, e.g., the style of the missorium of Theodosius I107 and
the Artemis dish in Berlin.108 The unfortunate rendering of the god’s
shoulder is usually commented upon as a sign of the provincial quality of the dish,109 yet we also cannot fail to notice that on the missorium Tellus’ body is badly distorted and the emperors sit awkwardly
on their thrones.110 The complexity of a luxurious table service is
illustrated by the finely carved alabaster statuette of Dionysos from
the same find (fig. 79),111 which also indicates, together with a fragmentary largitio dish with the relief busts of two co-emperors of the
Theodosian period,112 that figured alabaster carvings continued to be
produced as a traditional Egyptian speciality.
101
For the evidence concerning the Nubian incursions to Upper Egypt in the
1st half of the 5th cent., see FHN III No. 314.
102
Cf. The Book of Pontiffs 34.9–12 (Constantine’s donations to the Lateran church
in Rome); Cornutian Deed (endowment of a church in Tivoli by a 5th-cent. courtier),
Lee 2000 228 ff.; and see Hunt 1998b 257 ff.
103
It is the only silver censer preserved from Late Antiquity.
104
Relics of the apostles Peter and Paul donated in 359 to a church in Mauretania:
CIL VIII.20600, Lee 2000 288.
105
Török 1986.
106
Cairo inv. no. not known, Török 1988 135 f., Pls XVII, XVIII; Török 1995
fig. 1; Mielsch 1997 48 f.; Mielsch – Niemeyer 2001 16 f.
107
Madrid, Real Academia de la Historia, Kiilerich 1993 19 ff., 68 ff.; cf. Age
of Spirituality Cat. 64 (K. Shelton).
108
Berlin, Staatliche Museen Preussischer Kulturbesitz, Antikenmuseum Misc.
7883, Age of Spirituality Cat. 111.
109
K. Shelton in: Age of Spirituality 189 f.
110
Noted by Kiilerich 1993 69.
111
Török 1988 Pls XXII, XXIII; 1995 fig. 2.
112
From a princely tumulus at Gemai in Lower Nubia, F.W. Deichmann: Eine
alabasterne Largitionsschale aus Nubien. in: W.N. Schumacher (ed.): Tortulae. Studien
zu altchristlichen und byzantinischen Monumenten. Freiburg i. Breisgau 1966 65–76.
239
However indirectly, the dish with the syncretistic deity and the
Dionysos statuette also highlight an interesting aspect of the connection between the function of an object and the theme of its decoration. Being removed from their original functional context in an
aristocratic household and incorporated into the inventory of a
Christian church, the pagan images on the table service became, as
if suddenly effaced, completely meaningless in their new context.
High quality Egyptian silver table services from the early fifth century are also represented by six dishes in the Benaki Museum,
Athens.113 They were found in Bubastis in the eastern Delta. Their
centre medallions are decorated with marine thiasos scenes in a
rather high relief. The replacement of a Nereid riding a sea Centaur
with the figure of Ino nursing Melicertes on one of the dishes114
reflects a pedantic display of mythological education. The cosmopolitan
style of late fourth-early fifth-century Egyptian luxury silver is indicated, e.g., by the similarly rendered grotesque, hawk-nosed Erotes
on some of the Bubastis dishes and the circular toilet vessel of the
Seuso treasure.115 The literary implications of the marine thiasos
episodes may have been commented upon by the participants of the
banquets held in the house of the service’s owner in the same manner as the silver plate described by Sidonius Apollinaris was contemplated by its aristocratic spectators.116
The abbreviation and concentration of mythical stories into one
scene as it occurs on the plate with Ino and Melicertes illustrates
the same general trend of the transformation of Classical iconography as the monuments of sculpture and textile weaving discussed in
Chapters V.2, VII, and VIII.1, 2, 4. Classical iconographic models
may be abbreviated or radically altered in order to reduce a story
to one basic interpretative aspect selected from its traditional interpretations and implications. E.g., the central medallion of a silver
dish117 closely related to the Bubastis finds represents the lovesick
Phaedra with Hippolytos reading the letter from which he learns of
113
S. Pelekanides: ÉArgurã pinãkia toË Mouse¤ou Mpenãkh. SumbolØ efiw tØn
BuzantinØn ToreutikØn. Arch. Ephem. 1942–1944 (1948) 37–62; Mielsch – Niemeyer 2001
17 f.; on their provenance, see M.M. Mango in: Buckton (ed.) 1994 83 Cat. 75.
114
Mielsch – Niemeyer 2001 fig. 18.
115
Mango – Bennett 1994 445 no. 14; for the comparison, see Mielsch – Niemeyer
2001 18.
116
Sidonius Apollinaris, Epistulae 9.13.5, second half of the 5th century, cf. Maguire
1999 241.
117
Dumbarton Oaks Collection 49.6, Ross 1962 7 ff.; Age of Spirituality Cat. 217.
240
chapter eight
the passion of his stepmother. Altering the story, the nurse of Phaedra
who informs Hippolytos in a forged letter is left out. The letter is
obviously written by Phaedra herself: two separate episodes of the
story (Hippolytos reading the letter; Phaedra in the palace) are united
into one single scene in which Phaedra grasps her reading stepson’s
cloak in the manner of Potiphar’s wife.118
The praise of the Gothic king Theoderic II’s court by Sidonius
might well have been fitting for the quality of display in any wellmanaged patrician house in Egypt, too:
When one joins him at dinner . . . there is no unpolished conglomeration of discolored old silver set by panting attendants on sagging
tables . . . The viands attract by their skillful cookery, not by their costliness, the platters by their brightness, not by their weight.119
The well-polished silver reflected the bright colours of the figured
tapestries hanging on the walls. In the representative rooms of patrician houses the colours of the tapestries, luxurious curtains and covers were repeated on the painted wooden panels of the coffered
ceilings.120 The decoration of the ceilings with personifications and
ideal representations was modelled on the decoration of late antique
imperial residences.121 A related group of panels dating from the end
of the fourth or the first half of the fifth century, executed in the
encaustic technique in white, black, pink, red, blue, yellow and brown
colours, is preserved in the Coptic Museum, the Louvre, and the
Museum für Spätantike und Byzantinische Kunst in Berlin. Many
of these panels represent busts or masques (fig. 80)122 of mostly
haloed123 personifications in more or less elaborate rectangular, rhomboid, octagonal, or circular frames which are occasionally decorated
with egg-and-dart or foliate (laurel) ornaments and various kinds of
118
M. Bell in: Age of Spirituality 241 f. suggests that the representation on the dish
was modelled on Old Testament illustrations.
119
Sidonius Apollinaris, Epistulae 1.2.6, quoted by Maguire 1999 241.
120
Constantine’s Edict to the Praetorian Prefect Maximus issued in 337 lists the
makers of panelled ceilings, laquearii, among the artesans exempted from public services, C.Th. XIII.4.2, Mango 1972/1986 14 f.
121
Cf. the painted ceiling panels from the imperial palace at Trier, first quarter
of the 4th century, E. Simon: Die Konstantinischen Deckengemälde in Trier. Trier 1986.
122
CM 7259.
123
A. Ahlquist: Cristo e l’imperatore romano: i valori simbolici del nimbo. Acta
IRN 15 (2001) 207–227.
241
leaves in the corners.124 Other panels are decorated with figures of
Erotes,125 deities,126 mythological figures,127 or scenes from the life of
an aristocratic household, e.g., a handsomely dressed groom leading
a stately harnessed horse (Pl. XIV).128 There are panels with lively
rendered aquatic scenes with ducks and fishes,129 representations of
birds,130 wild animals,131 floral,132 and interlace patterns.133 The panels display the same routined, quick brushwork, elegant sketchiness
and mannered use of white contours and highlights characteristic of
the Hellenistic painting tradition and maintained in the decorative
painting of the Roman East. The calculated application of light
colours and white highlights and lines enhanced the illusionistic presence of the large-eyed figures hovering over the spectator’s head.
The tradition of painted ceilings continued in the second half of
the fifth and in the sixth century. Two fine late fifth-early sixth-century panels from a ceiling in Berlin (Pl. XV)134 and St. Petersburg135
are decorated with male and female busts. The busts have no attributes that would identify them as personifications. It may perhaps be
speculated that they were idealized portraits of the master and mistress of the house and/or their ancestors.136 Panels from later sixth
century painted ceilings in the Louvre collection are decorated with
geometrical and ornamental motifs.137
124
Ross 1962 Cat. 126; New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art 39.158.1, Age
of Spirituality Cat. 596 (double panel with two busts of winged Genii looking towards
each other); from the same or a closely related ceiling: CM 7251 (unpublished).
Panels from five different ceilings: (1) CM 7258, 7259 (= my fig. 80), 7260; (2) 7252
(two panels); (3) 7261, 7262; (4) 7253; (5) 7251. All unpublished, except for CM
7260 which is illustrated in Wessel 1963 fig. 102.
125
CM 7249, small fragment of panel, unpublished.
126
Berlin 11/83, Effenberger – Severin 1992 Cat. 81.
127
Rutschowscaya 1992 Cat. 42.
128
129
Rutschowscaya 1992 Cat. 12, 44 (double panel); CM 7278, 7299; CM, several panels, inv. nos not available (all unpublished).
130
Rutschowscaya 1992 Cat. 13, 45; CM, inv. no. not available (unpublished).
131
CM, inv. no. not available.
132
Rutschowscaya 1992 Cat. 1–11, 15, 16; CM 7284 (unpublished).
133
134
135
Hermitage 8684, Cat. Paris-Agde Cat. 140.
136
Cf. B. Kiilerich: Ducks, Dolphins, and Portrait Medaillons: Framing the Achilles
Mosaic at Pedrosa de la Vega (Palencia). Acta IRN 15 (2001) 245–267 255 ff. on
the “decorative” portrait medallions in the border of the Pedrosa de la Vega mosaic
dating from c. 350–375.
137
E.g., Rutschowscaya 1992 Cat. 1–11, 15, 16, 18–23.
242
chapter eight
The carved relief decoration of the wooden panels applied to the
visible surface of wooden ceiling beams138 borrowed similarly from
the allegoric repertory of the aristocratic good life. It will be shown
in Chapter IX.1.1 that the iconographic themes occurring on these
wooden carvings were also Christianized and wooden panels decorated thus were also used in identical structural contexts in ecclesiastical
architecture. Some of the figured Christian carvings come from
Clédat’s excavations conducted at the monastery of Bawit (cf. Chapter
IX.2.2).139 Even if their architectural contexts were better known,
Clédat’s field work and documentation would not present clues for
their dating, which must thus be attempted on the basis of their style.
A fragmentarily preserved frieze from Bawit (fig. 81)140 was decorated with pairs of hovering angels holding jewelled crosses in wreaths.
Between the pairs of angels there were busts of apostles (?) in wreaths.
The characteristic rendering of the curls, wings, feet, and costume
of the angels and the curtains and draperies around the wreaths
(which indicate the wreaths’ sacral context) recalls limestone reliefs
from the same site (figs 137–143),141 indicating that the artesans executing reliefs in wood were closely associated with the stone sculptors
engaged in the same building project. The stone reliefs and the
wooden panel may be dated to the first half of the sixth century.142
Most of the unprovenanced wooden relief panels preserved in the
Coptic Museum and other collections comes, however, from earlier,
late fourth (?) to late (?) fifth-century, buildings. We cannot decide
which carvings come from dwellings of pagan and which from
dwellings of Christian aristocrats, and which carvings belonged originally to the architecture of churches, for these contexts are not associated with distinctive iconographic and/or stylistic features. The sign
138
The length of some more completely preserved carvings is over 1.50 m.
Nevertheless, some pieces may also have been applied to door lintels or to wooden
tie beams inserted between courses of a dressed masonry wall, see, e.g., the architecture of the so-called south church at Bawit, cf. Chassinat 1911 Pl. LVIII/1, 3;
Rutschowscaya 1986 Cat. 419, 434.
139
Rutschowscaya 1986 13 f., 168 f.
140
Rutschowscaya 1986 Cat. 343.—A related fragment of unknown provenance:
CM 7190 (unpublished).
141
CM 7100, 7102, Cat. Paris-Agde Cat. 84, 85; 37798 (7110), Torp 1965b Pl. VI/a.
142
Cf. the similar, though higher quality, rendering of the drapery folds and especially the bottom hem of the garment in early 6th-cent. ivories, Volbach 1976 no.
68, Monza, Cathedral, poet and Muse diptych; ibid. no. 78, Paris, Musée National
du Moyen Age-Thermes de Cluny, figure of Ariadne (?).
243
of the cross reveals the faith of the commissioner but does not refer
directly to a non-profane architectural context; and “pagan” motifs
may also be Christianized and applied in church decorations (see
Ch. IX.1.1).
It would thus seem that late fourth- and fifth-century church decoration not only borrowed forms and iconographic themes from contemporary representative profane architecture but was also executed
by artesans working both for private clients (pagan as well as Christian)
and for the Church. The thematic homogeneity of their work was
the consequence of a shared Classical education and of the versatility of the iconographic formulae applied. Ceiling beams were decorated with friezes composed from repetitive units. Most of the
preserved carvings display the same basic structure: pairs of hovering Erotes, Genii, Victories, or angels holding a crown with an
inscribed portrait (?)/personification/apostle (?) bust or cross, framed
by columns and curtains drawn apart, are repeated along the length
of the beam. These identical main units may be divided from each
other by inhabited flower or laurel festoons (fig. 82),143 flexibly formulated Nilotic scenes (fig. 83),144 symbolic images,145 or scenes with
Erotes performing various activities (harvest, presentation of produces,
etc.).146 While the main scenes have triumphal connotations, the dividing scenes present allegories of Nature’s riches and/or the gifts of a
landed estate. The stylistic and iconographic closeness to sculpture
in stone147 may be illustrated with a fine late antique limestone frieze
decorated with an inhabited scroll and reused in the so-called “south
church” at Bawit (fig. 84).148
The carvings were painted in bright colours in a decorative manner. On a fragment now in Berlin (Pl. XVI)149 the laurel guirlands
are painted in red and the birds inhabiting them in pink, yellow,
brown, and black. White lines and patches are applied in a similar
manner to figured ceiling casettes and a spatial illusionism is attempted
143
Rutschowscaya 1986 Cat. 342; CM 7184–7186, 7195, 7196, 7197, 7201, 7203,
7236, 7241 (unpublished).—Fig. 82: CM 7201.
144
CM 7211, Cat. Paris-Agde Cat. 165a; CM 7214, ibid. Cat. 165b; CM 7189,
7201, 7206, 7217, 7218 (unpublished).—Fig. 83: CM 7211.
145
Birds flanking a fruit basket: CM 750 (unpublished).
146
CM 756, 840, 7243, 7184–7186, 7196, 7197, 7236 (unpublished).
147
Cf. Chassinat 1911 Pls XXIII, XXVI–XXXII, XXXIII/1, 2; Severin 1977b
116, Pl. 34/b.
148
Torp 1971 Pl. 31/1b.
149
244
chapter eight
by overlaps (bird figures, feet of the birds). The fine quality of most
carvings is obvious even after the loss of their finishes. With good
proportions, sketchily yet correctly treated anatomies, and the postures of their figures skilfully rendered, the wooden reliefs stand closer
to the Classical tradition than was the case of fourth-century architectural scupture (cf. Chapter VII.1.1–3) and especially as is the case
of contemporary fifth-century architectural sculpture. It suffices to
illustrate the cosmopolitan training of the masters of the figured ceiling beams with a late fourth-early fifth-century (?) fragment with an
idealized portrait (?) and a harvesting Erote (fig. 85)150 and a frieze
with the representation of Victories holding a cross in a wreath,
Erotes, and birds (fig. 86).151 The stylistic and thematic homogeneity of the products of various branches of elite art in this period may
be illustrated, e.g., by a fine tapestry frieze in Boston (fig. 87).152
A carving representing Jonah in the gourd vine as a Classicizing
nude figure with curly hair may be dated to the late fourth or early
fifth century (fig. 88).153 The Prophet is seated and reaches out for
a gourd.154 The plants next to his figure indicate that the scene was
meant as an allegory of Paradise.155 It remains undecided if a unique
carving representing a boat with a cargo of amphorae from the deck
of which Jonah is thrown to the ketos belongs to the same relief (fig.
89).156 While these scenes probably decorated a church, the original
context of a rather modest quality carving representing hunting scenes
(fig. 90)157 remains undecided. As we learn from St Nilus of Sinai
(d. c. 430), profane allegories of virtus appeared in church decoration before a more serious, didactic Biblical iconography took their
place (cf. Chapter IX.2.3).158
150
CM 840.
CM 7236.
152
Boston, Museum of Fine Arts, Charles Potter Kling Fund 66.377, Zaloscer
1974 fig. 84; Friedman (ed.) 1989 Cat. 35.
153
CM 4876.
154
Cf. Mainz, Römisch-Germanisches Zentralmuseum 0.39677, North African
sigillata dish, 2nd half of the 4h cent., Age of Spirituality Cat. 384; BM, sarcophagus, around 300, Engemann 1997 fig. 90; for the curly hair cf. New York, Metropolitan
Museum of Art 1877,77.7, stone sculpture with story of Jonah, Asia Minor, 1st
quarter of the 4th cent., Age of Spirituality Cat. 369.
155
Engemann 1997 111 ff.
156
CM 7182.
157
CM 7232.
158
St. Nilus of Sinai, Letter to Prefect Olympiodorus, Mango 1972/1986 32 f. Cf.
also Cormack 2000a 894 ff.
151
245
4. Images and ideals. Creating an Egyptian style
Imagination wrought these works, a wiser and subtler artist by far than imitation; for imitation can
only create as its handiwork what it has seen, but
imagination equally what it has not seen; for it will
conceive of its ideal with reference to the reality.159
There can be little doubt that the textiles discussed in Chapter
VIII.2.1–2 were products of workshops which sensitively followed the
stylistic trends emerging in or imported to a cosmopolitan milieu
and which were produced to satisfy the demands of a wealthy, highly
educated, and well-informed aristocracy. The cartoons used for textiles such as the tapestry with the Erotes in Washington (Pl. II) or
the great Dionysiac hanging in Riggisberg (Pl. XII) were designed
by gifted artists who had access to high-quality cosmopolitan models and pattern books160 and who can by no means be regarded as
mere copyists. Some of them contributed to the shaping of the stylistic and iconographic repertory of Egyptian late antique visual arts
by adopting and combining various prototypes. Others designed stylistically updated renderings of traditional images like the artist of the
Nereid tapestry (Pl. VIII). Still others developed mannerisms as the
black figure contours which become meaningful for the twenty-firstcentury observer if s/he realizes their conceptual affinities with more
general trends in contemporary art (Chapter VIII.2.1). We cannot
forget that “what was admired” in the Roman world “was . . . the
skill in reproducing, and often varying or adapting, well-known originals.”161 Tapestry hangings and curtains of quasi-monumental dimensions were produced in specialized workshops whose reputation may
well have depended on the reputation of famed individual designers
and master weavers attached to them.162
159
Philostratus, The Life of Apollonius of Tyana 6.19, quoted by Dagron 1991 23.
The occurrence of the rare type of nude, yet bearded Dionysos is characteristic for the range of models available for the elite textile workshops, see the 4thcent. tapestry in Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des Antiquités Egyptiennes,
AF 6109, Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. p. 42. For contemporary mosaics and statuary
with this type of Dionysos from the Eastern parts of the empire cf. P. Canivet –
J.-P. Darmon: Dionysos et Ariane. Deux nouveaux chefs-d’oeuvre inédits en mosaïque,
dont un signé, au Proche-Orient ancien (IIIe–IVe siècle apr. J.-C.). Mon. Piot 70
(1989) 1–28 10 ff., 14, fig. 18.
161
Dunbabin 1999 272.
162
For the general background, see A. Burford: Craftsmen in Greek and Roman Society.
160
246
chapter eight
The impact of the great workshops on artesans producing less
expensive textiles163 may be studied with the help of thousands of published finds.164 Theoretically, such a large and varied corpus of objects
provides an optimal ground for the study of the spread of stylistic
trends and the stratification of artistic production. The published textiles represent, however, only the tip of an iceberg constituted by
hundreds of thousands of textiles dispersed in public and private collections all over the world. Their study is rendered difficult by the
fact that hardly any textile comes from a controlled excavation and
hardly any textile is dated by independent evidence.165 For the lack
of archaeological evidence for dating, the chronology of textile production and the reconstruction of its context in late antique and
early Byzantine art can therefore be established only on the basis of
style-critical analyses. Style-critical analyses, however, frequently prove
biased or ill-informed (cf. Chapters II.2., III.1, 2). The myth of
“Coptic” art as the result of anti-Classical and anti-Byzantine sentiments
and/or as a folk art has greatly influenced museum curators in their
acquisition policy and art historians in their ideas as to what is paradigmatic and what is not (Chapter II.4). The generally accepted,
yet not fully justified, notion of textile production as a standardized
industrial activity based on models and patterns that can be endlessly
copied has given an ambivalent status to Egyptian late antique textiles as “applied art” objects. The postulate of industrial production
also explains the shyness of art historians to identify “individual”
works of art among the textiles and to distinguish them from actual
mass production. In this chapter I shall try to grasp one of the
moments in the history of Egyptian textiles in which artistic innovation turns into style and style into mass production.
London 1972; J.-P. Sodini: L’artisanat urbain à l’époque paléochrétienne. Ktema 4
(1979) 71–119.
163
For the grading of textiles and their pricing and about linen merchants cf.
P. Oxy. LIV 3776.
164
On the evidence concerning the organisation of work cf. Wipszycka 1965;
Gonosová 1989 65 ff.; van Minnen 1987; E. Wipszycka: Textiles. CE VII 2219–2220.
165
Two such cases are usually quoted, viz., an ornamental textile from Hawara,
W.M.F. Petrie: Hawara, Biahmu and Arsinoe. London 1889 Pl. 21, allegedly found
together with a coin of c. 340, and the so-called hanging of Collouthos found by
Gayet at Antinoe, Brussels, Musées Royaux d’Art et d’Histoire Tx 2470, 1.77 ×
1.24 m, Cat. Hamm Cat. 424. The latter is claimed to have been found in a burial together with papyri dating from 454–456. While such an (in any case approximate) dating would not be contradicted by the tapestry’s style, the excavator’s
communication is doubted, cf. Cat. Mariemont 107, as is also Petrie’s evidence, cf.
Trilling 1982 104 note 3.
247
The not-always-transparent relationship between style, quality, and
date was already touched upon in Chapters III.1–2. Further examples are presented by the tapestries representing symbolic figures
under arcades which were discussed in Chapter VIII.1 (Pl. V). The
proportions of the figures on these tapestries, their stylized rendering of the human face, anatomy and costume, or their ornamental
treatment of the architecture, decorative and floral motifs are usually
referred to as indicative of a sixth-seventh-century dating. The iconography as well as the transitions of colour shades in the representation
of the figures, their costumes,166 the rendering of the eyes and eyebrows
warn, however, that such a late dating may be based on false premises.
The simplicity and even clumsiness of the visual language or the
repetition of the same figure in a textile167 are not necessarily “late”
features; they may equally well be features of less expensive imitations of luxury products. The way in which colour modulations are
rendered in the textiles of this group is especially relevant. The fine
dovetailing of one colour into another characterising, e.g., the circle
of the tapestry of the Erotes (Pls II, III) also appears, albeit in a
summarily reduced form. This reduction is a symptom of the weaver’s
saving of effort rather than an advanced degree of stylistic abstraction.168
On account of their more summary rendering of forms, textiles
with patterns in weft-loop pile (French bouclé, German Schlingen- or
Noppengewebe)169 are also assumed to be generally “later” than tapestries with more naturalistic decorations. Contrary to this assumption,
all characteristic decorative forms and styles occurring in tapestry
weaves between the early fourth and the eighth century have their
equivalents in textiles decorated with patterns in weft-loop pile.
Textiles with weft loops were produced by specialists in this technique.170
Though the technique was less demanding, the artistic quality of these
textiles is not necessarily inferior to that of many great tapestries.
166
For the sleeved tunic cf. Chapter IV.1.
E.g., the second and the fourth figure in Riggisberg, Abegg Stiftung 1638,
Rutchowscaya 1990 fig. p. 21, are almost entirely identical.
168
Trilling 1982 30 contrasts the modulation of colours achieved by dovetailing
with the use of large areas of unmodulated colour as alternative options, illustrating the second alternative with 6th–7th-cent. or later textiles. Trilling does not comment on the apparently complete lack of fine colour modulation in this period.
169
The technique was already employed in pharaonic textiles.
170
Schrenk 1998 355 f.—For early examples, see, e.g., Trilling 1982 Cat. 104;
Cat. Hamm Cat. 340, 347 (with late datings); New York, Metropolitan Museum of
Art 31.2.1, Schrenk 1998 fig. 9, is a floor (?) carpet imitating a late 4th-early 5thcent. geometric floor mosaic pattern.
167
248
chapter eight
Some of the skilled specialists of bouclé seem to have deliberately
exploited the mosaic-like effect of the weft-loop pile, especially when
copying high-quality cartoons based on prototypes also used for
mosaics.171 Tapestries of smaller dimensions with decoration in weftloop pile introduced images of the aristocratic good life into the
houses of the less wealthy, as is illustrated by a mid-fourth-century
hanging in the Louvre (Pl. IV) representing a page standing between
garlanded columns and holding burning candles in silver candelabra,
or by a set of contemporary hangings in Berlin decorated with Erotes
presenting paraphernalia of a banquet.172
The self-identification of the socially ambitious with a mythologized/
allegorical status image may go quite far, as shown by a remarkable
fifth-century tapestry wall hanging of moderate dimensions (preserved
size 0.80 × 0.49 m) in Hildesheim (fig. 91).173 It presents the portrait of a military officer. The signum-bearer soldier figure stands
before the symbolic background of Ocean inhabited by fishes and
sea monsters and is encircled by a frieze of gift-bringing and celebrating Erotes.
The Erotes on the wall hanging of the military officer and in other
contemporary representations may seem no more than mere decorative
devices and “attendants” of the protagonists. In reality, the Erotes
surrounding the military officer play, similarly to the Erotes on the
great tapestry in Washington (Pl. II), the role of the mediator between
the sphere of myth and the real world. It is in this meaningful, yet
ideogrammatically rendered function174 that Erotes appear in imperial iconography,175 in which they would also be adopted in Christian
171
BM 20717, tapestry with fishing Erotes, mid-4th century, Beckwith 1959 5 f.,
fig. 1; A. Gonosová in: Friedman (ed.) 1989 Cat. 36; Rutschowscaya 1990 fig.
p. 69, top left; cf. for the masks in the border: Chania, Crete, town house, late 3rdcent. mosaic, Muth 2001 fig. 8; for the decorative schema and iconography: Desenzano
(Italy), Villa, mid-4th-cent. vestibule mosaic, Dunbabin 1999 fig. 73.
172
Berlin 9237a, 0.68 × 0.54 m, Cat. Hamm Cat. 361; 9237c, 1.10 × 0.91 m,
ibid. Cat. 363; an associated hanging with the representation of foliage (an arbour?):
Berlin 9237b, 0.77 × 0.90 m, ibid. Cat. 362.
173
Hildesheim, Pelizaeus Museum 4726, E. Eggebrecht: Koptische Textilien. Corpus
Antiquitatum Aegyptiacarum Hildesheim 2. Mainz 1978 41–47; Cat. Hamm Cat. 367.
174
Erotes may express abstract notions as, e.g., gaudium publicum on coins, cf.
M.R. Alföldi: Die constantinische Goldprägung. Mainz 1963 nos 141–143; in general,
see A. Alföldi: Zur Erklärung der Konstantinischen Deckengemälde in Trier. Historia
4 (1955) 131–150.
175
See, e.g., the mediating Erotes between the passively reclining personification
of Earth and the enthroned emperor on the missorium of Theodosius I.
249
imagery. It is this function, too, that may explain why Erotes appear
more frequently in the context of symbolic-emblematic representations
of mythological figures than in scenic compositions.
Similarly to tapestries produced in great cosmopolitan workshops,
high quality woven costume decorations with mythological images
copied prototypes that were selected on account of their meaning.
It may be assumed of course that the selection was also influenced
by current stylistic vogues, i.e., the “modernity” of a representation,
or by the prestige of an individual rendering of a traditional theme.
The iconographic coherence of a high-quality costume decoration
may be illustrated with an ensemble of two orbiculi,176 two neck bands,
sleeve bands and borders from the first half of the fourth century,
preserved in the collection of the Louvre.177 The orbiculi are decorated
with splendidly composed Centauromachia scenes, the rear neck band
with Amazonomachia scenes. The front neck band (fig. 92)178 combines triumphal imagery with images of mythological couples179 and
the erotic pursuits of mythological heroes, themes central to visual
display in the aristocratic house in Late Antiquity.180 The first of the
five scenes represented on the neck band depicts Perseus saving
Andromeda, the second Hippolytos and Phaedra (?),181 the third
Aphrodite and Adonis, the fourth Heracles pursuing a mortal woman,
and the fifth Narcissus in the company of Echo.182 In spite of the
limitations posed by the small dimensions, the Classical rendering of
the figures and their costumes is outstanding. The figures harmonically
fill the space allotted them and the relationships between the couples
is indicated by their coordinated movements, postures and directions
of glance. The neck band was composed as a whole; the figures at
176
Orbiculus: round tunic decoration.
Rutschowscaya 1984 figs 1, 4–8, 10, 11, 13, 14, 17, 19; Rutschowscaya 1990 fig.
pp. 98–99 (dated to the 3rd cent.); Santrot et al. (eds) 2001 Cat. 77.
178
Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. pp. 98–99.
179
Cf. C. Nauerth: Spätantike Liebespaare, dargestellt an Beispielen aus der koptischen Kunst. Dielheimer Blätter zum Alten Testament und seiner Rezeption in der Alten Kirche
25 (1988) 101–120.
180
Dunbabin 1978; Muth 2001.
181
Rutschowscaya 1984 suggests Perseus and Athena, but the male figure holds
a book in his right hand.
182
For the last scene cf. E. Simon: Andromeda auf einem spätantiken Stoff. in:
Studien zur Mythologie und Vasenmalerei K. Schauenburg zum 16. 4. 86. Mainz 1986 253–260
note 32.
177
250
chapter eight
the extreme left and right glance towards the centre, and the figures
of the central scene were arranged symmetrically as to mark the
central axis of the composition.183
The weaver used only two colours, viz., the yellowish-white of the
undyed linen warp and the violet of the woollen weft. Decorations
of this kind are termed monochrome. Most of the Egyptian textiles
surviving from the fourth to the tenth century were decorated with
monochrome patterns in a dark colour—red, reddish violet, brownish violet, violet, black—on a light (undyed or bleached) background.
Originally, the different shades of red, violet, or black were intended
to substitute for the colour of real purple.184
The monochrome decoration technique was first employed for
geometric and interlace patterns executed in weft dyed with real purple and woven for the decoration of expensive garments. The earliest
datable exemplars were produced in the early second century in the
eastern parts of the Empire.185 By the late third century, the repertory
of fine costume decoration was dominated all over the Empire by
monochrome geometrical and interlace patterns, whereas other dyes
frequently substituted for real purple. In Egypt, the production of
fine textiles with monochrome geometric and interlace decoration is
attested by the mid-third century.186 Among the earliest Egyptian
finds there are tunic decorations woven with gold thread on a silk
or linen core and real purple-dyed wool187 (cf. Chapter VIII.2.1) as
well as textiles using wefts dyed with various substitutes for real
purple.188 Though their social-hierarchical connotations were different,
183
The scenes of the rear neck band are similarly symmetrically composed.—
Stylistically and through the use of the diagnostic paired undyed and purple warps
in the background, the tunic decorations in Paris are connected to similarly fine
tunic decorations in Washington and in other collections, for lists cf. Trilling 1982
Cat. 27; Stauffer 1991 Cat. 25.
184
R.J. Forbes: Studies in Ancient Technology IV. Leiden 1956 98 ff.; A. Lucas –
J.R. Harris: Ancient Egyptian Materials and Industries. London 1962 150 ff.; Buschhausen –
Horak – Harrauer 1995 90 f.
185
R. Pfister: Textiles de Palmyre. Paris 1934; id.: Nouveaux textiles de Palmyre. Paris
1937; A. Schmidt-Colinet – A. Stauffer – K. al-Assad: Die Textilien aus Palmyra. Neue
und alte Funde. Mainz 2000.
186
For well-datable pieces of evidence, see Renner 1981 87 note 17; D. Renner:
Die koptischen Textilien in den Vatikanischen Museen (Pinacoteca Vaticana Kataloge 2). Wiesbaden
1982 Cat. 1.—For a forthcoming comprehensive investigation cf. S. Hodak: Die
ornamentalen koptischen Purpurwirkereien: Untersuchungen zum strukturellen Aufbau.
in: Emmel et al. (eds) 1999 175–200.
187
R.J. Forbes: Studies in Ancient Technology IV. 2nd edn. Leiden 1964 114 ff.
188
For these cf. Andorlini 1998 156 f.
251
in their technical and artistic quality the two kinds of textile decoration
did not differ from each other.
The fashion of costume decoration in colours imitating real purple was motivated by the imperial connotations and the associated
luck-bringing qualities of real purple.189 The use of real purple-dyed
textile for whole garments was reserved for the emperor and the
imperial monopoly of dyeing and producing purple textile was secured
by a law of Theodosius I, also included into the Codex Justinianus.190
It was evidently part of the same imperial monopoly that a restricted
use of purple—along with flame-red (like the background colour of
the tapestry of the Erotes and its circle) and crimson—was allowed
in stripes and bands on officially prescribed and hierarchically distinctive costume pieces of senior officials of the Empire.191 Patricians
living far from the court did occasionally break the law,192 and real
purple dye was eagerly coveted by barbarian princes.193 Textiles
coloured with real purple dye nevertheless remained very rare while
the use of imitation purple, while it obviously retained much of the
prestige and beneficial qualities of the real colour, was not restricted.
The significance of the various (imitation) purple patterns decorating costumes and luxury textiles used in the household is also indicated by the inwoven inscription reading EUFORI, “flourish!” on the
trunk of a stylized tree on a curtain (?) fragment.194
The purely ornamental repertory of purple and imitation purple
costume decoration was extended to include figural motifs around
the turn of the third century. Small images from the Dionysiac
cortège,195 busts of Erotes,196 heads of personifications,197 or Gorgoneia198
were inserted into the centre of geometrical and interlace patterns
189
M. Reinhold: History of Purple as a Status Symbol in Antiquity. Bruxelles 1970 passim and 48 ff.
190
C.Th. X.20.18 (= CJ XI.9.5), X.21 (= CJ XI.9).
191
Kelly 1998 168 f.
192
See, e.g., the purple dalmatica of a lady represented on a mummy shroud dated
c. 250–300 from Antinoopolis, Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des Antiquités
Egyptiennes AF 6487, Walker – Bierbrier et al. (eds) 1997 Cat. 181, cf. Andorlini
1998 158 f.
193
E.g., around 450 a Nubian federate chief commissioned an Egyptian monk
to send him a small quantity of purple dye, FHN III No. 322.
194
Boston, Museum of Fine Arts, Maguire 1990 217; Maguire 1999 246, fig. 31.
195
Riggisberg, Abegg Stiftung 650, 651, Renner 1981 figs 1, 2.
196
Formerly Orléans, Musée Historique et Archéologique, Renner 1981 fig. 4.
197
CM 6714, Beckwith 1959 7; Renner 1981 fig. 3.
198
Trilling 1982 Cat. 83, Pl. 7.
252
chapter eight
in order to enhance the decorative and symbolic value of the textile. It is in this manner that the master of the tapestry of the Erotes
in Washington (Pl. II) also inserted figured motifs into the interlace
borders of his textile (cf. Chapter VIII.2.1). In tunic decorations using
golden thread and weft dyed with real purple, the figural motifs were
executed in gold thread with purple interior design, thus reversing
the basic design scheme. The details on the faces and figures were
drawn in purple lines with a supplementary wrapping-weft or sketching weft. For this technique the so-called flying shuttle or flying
needle was employed.199 The flying shuttle technique was fundamental
to the production of geometric and interlace decorations in real purple or in its substitutes. It has been suggested200 that the ploumãriow,
“embroiderer”, occurring in fourth- to eighth-century papyri201 was
an artesan trained in the special technique of the flying shuttle.
The monochrome drawing style used for figured details by weavers
of textiles with gold and real purple-dyed threads was promptly imitated in workshops producing less expensive costumes202 and it also
started a short-lived fashion in figured textiles with white figures on
a dark background.203 Figures woven in gold thread had a conspicuous
and splendid effect and could easily act as the optical and conceptual
centre of abstract designs. Such an effect could not be achieved by
figures executed in the dull colour of undyed linen. A more powerful
visual effect could be achieved by the reversal of the design scheme
by using dark weft for silhouette figures with light interior design
placed on a light background. Such a solution must, after all, have
199
“The technique of using a supplementary wrapping-weft will be called a sketching weft. These may wrap in a weft-wise or warp-wise direction, or at an angle.
One or many sketching wefts are used during the tapestry weaving process to draw
the details on faces and figures, to create warp-wise lines that would be difficult to
weave, to form allover patterns, and to outline shapes”. N.A. Hoskins: Weaving.
in: Del Francia Barocas (ed.) 1998 167–169 168.
200
Gonosová 1989 66.
201
For the evidence, see P. Pruneti: Da plumarius a ploumãriow: la testimonanza
dei papiri. in: Del Francia Barocas (ed.) 1998 145–148.
202
E.g., Nauerth 1978 Cat. 28, coloured mask in centre of monochrome interlace pattern; Stauffer 1991 Cat. 15, modelled on the pattern also used in Trilling
1982 Cat. 83.
203
Textiles with gold thread and real purple: Boston, Museum of Fine Arts acc.
no. 46.401, 46.402, Age of Spirituality Cat. 125; Renner 1981 figs 6 and 5, respectively; textiles with imitation purple pattern: St. Petersburg, Hermitage 11620, Renner
1981 fig. 8; three medallions with slightly different renderings of the same Dionysos
bust, Trilling 1982 Cat. 30–32; square tunic decoration with the triumph of Dionysos,
253
seemed self-evident for artesans trained in the production of textiles
in which geometric and interlace patterns in (imitation) purple appeared
on a light background and in which much of the interior design was
executed in light linen weft with the help of the flying shuttle.204
The moment of the invention of the silhouette style is captured on
remarkable textiles decorated both with light figures on a dark and
with dark figures on a light background. This kind of decoration
may have been restricted originally to ornamental patterns including
motifs executed in gold thread inserted into a purple decoration.205 The
tunic decoration fragments illustrated here in fig. 93206 display the
same fine Classical figural style as the textile in the Louvre discussed
above (fig. 92). The manner in which the subsidiary figures are coordinated with the central scene in the tabula207 is reminiscent of mosaics
with a figured central panel framed by figured borders.208 The fine
foliage filling in the background occurs on a group of textiles stylistically
associated, all of them displaying a remarkable artistic quality.209 A
textile in Berlin (Pl. XVIII),210 combining mythological scenes with
a circus scene representing two wrestlers, is decorated with both light
figures on a dark and dark figures on a light background. Both kinds
of monochrome decoration are, however, enlivened with details woven
in red, yellow, and blue wefts: a jewelled wreath enclosing a central
medallion in a tabula, diadems and draperies of mythological figures,
and flames vomited forth by a sea monster. Such a calculated use
204
In the view of Dorothee Renner (1981 91 f.), the spread of the silhouette
style with dark figures on a light background was determined by the employment
of the flying shuttle and the introduction of less expensive dyes (chermes, coccineum)
to substitute for real purple (from the Murex snail). Renner compares the transition
from the light-on-dark to dark-on-light silhouette style to the transition from blackfigured to red-figured vase painting.
205
See, e.g., Stanford Museum acc. no. 14707, Lewis 1969 22 no. 8, Pl. 6, gold
replaced by pale yellow weft.—For figured decoration with light figures before a
dark and dark figures before a light background cf., e.g., Buschhausen – Horak –
Harrauer 1995 Cat. 190
206
207
Square tunic decoration.
208
For the directions of viewing the subsidiary figures cf., e.g., a mid-3rd-cent.
mosaic from Shahba-Philippopolis, Syria, Dunbabin 1999 fig. 167.
209
Du Bourguet 1964 Cat. B 19 = Christentum am Nil Cat. 317 (new inventory
number: AF 5492); Cleveland Museum of Art 50.615, Friedman (ed.) 1989 Cat. 62;
Berlin 9911, Cat. Hamm Cat. 319d; Berlin 2/74, ibid. Cat. 375; Lorquin 1999 Cat.
30; CM 1918 (unpublished); see also Kunisuke Akashi (ed.): Coptic Textiles from Burying
Grounds in Egypt in the Collection of Kanegafuchi Spinning Company. Kyoto 1955 Pl. 29.
210
Berlin 4658 (a), Cat. Hamm Cat. 341a.
254
chapter eight
of colour highlights was first introduced in workshops producing (imitation) purple costume decorations with geometric and interlace
motifs.211 These geometric and interlace patterns with inserted floral
motifs and representations of pearls and gems in bright colours212
may be compared to ornaments occurring on fourth-century nielloed
and gilded silver plate.213 The three modes of decoration: polychrome,
monochrome with colour highlights, and monochrome were mixed
before long in the same textile design,214 indicating, not surprisingly,
that artesans all over the land were equally receptive to new fashions
and styles formed in cosmopolitan workshops—but also showing that
the same communicative power was assigned to polychrome and
monochrome figures. The insertion of colour highlights into monochrome images or the combination of monochrome and polychrome
designs continued to be practiced until the very end of Coptic textile production.
The ornamental decorativeness of the silhouette style and the facility presented by the associated technique of the flying shuttle exerted
a decisive influence on Egyptian textile production. Concurrently
with the creation of monochrome figured decorations, floral and vegetal ornaments were also translated into the silhouette style.215 Monochrome representations, be they of human and animal figures or any
other form taken from nature, generated a graphic simplification of
the same subjects which continued to be represented in an illusionistic manner in other branches of contemporary art (painting, polychrome textiles, mosaic, manuscript illustration, etc.). The consequences
of the translation of polychrome illusionism into a stylized and graphic
two-dimensionality were far-reaching. Rather than being a sign of a
nationalistic refusal of the Classical form, as frequently suggested (cf.
211
E.g., Stauffer 1991 Cat. 16, 20; Düsseldorf, Kunstmuseum 12669, 12672, Cat.
Hamm Cat. 384b, 408; Berlin 9239a, ibid. Cat. 395c.
212
For the particular class of luxury textiles with geometric and interlace patterns enriched with subsidiary motifs as, e.g., pearls and rosettes in a third colour
cf. Stauffer 1991 Cat. 16; Bourgon-Amir 1993 Pl. 137 no. 24 400/83 I; Cat. Hamm
Cat. 384b.
213
See, e.g., the rim decoration of a plate from the Augst treasure, Age of Spirituality
Cat. 251.
214
For fine early examples, see, e.g., Lorquin 1992 Cat. 95; Hamburg, Museum
für Kunst und Gewerbe 1889.44, Cat. Hamm Cat. 401.
215
Cf. Trilling 1982 Cat. 63, 67, 68; Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des
Antiquités Égyptiennes AF 5635, Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. p. 48, left; Stauffer 1991
Cat. 4, 21, 22, 24 etc.
255
Chapter II.2), the monochrome style gave a further impetus to the
symbolic mode of representation and reinforced the late antique trend
of abbreviation and concentration.
Early figured textiles in the silhouette style closely followed
Classicizing fourth-century iconographic and stylistic models, as is
shown by the textiles of the Louvre (fig. 92) and the Bouvier collection (fig. 93) discussed above and stylistically related textiles like,
e.g., a set of orbiculi in Washington216 with the representation of
Orestes and Pylades before the statue of Artemis, an orbiculus in the
Frankfurt Museum für Kunsthandwerk with Orestes, Pylades, Iphigenia
and the barbarian king Thoas before the statue of Artemis (fig. 94),217
a tabula with the scene of Thetis’ visit in the forge of Hephaistos in
the Victoria and Albert Museum (fig. 95)218 or a fine orbiculus in the
Coptic Museum with Heracles and the Nemean lion.219
The designers of these textiles and other luxury costume ornaments relied directly on manuscript illustrations or on models deriving from manuscript illustrations. This is especially obvious in the
case of scenes which were originally composed to fit into a rectangular field and which could be used for a tabula without considerable alteration (e.g., Thetis in the forge of Hephaistos, fig. 95), while
most of the scenes applied to orbiculi show an adjustment of the original scene composition to the circular field into which it had to be
inserted (fig. 94). The direct impact of book illumination is particularly obvious in the case of the scenes from Euripides’ Iphigenia in
Tauris220 or the fragments from a remarkable textile divided between
collections in Düsseldorf (fig. 96),221 Paris,222 Trier,223 and St. Petersburg224 which was decorated with animal figures and mythical creatures
based on the illustration of a zoological or geographical manuscript.
216
Trilling 1982 Cat. 26.—From the same workshop (?): Trilling 1982 Cat. 27.
Frankfurt, Museum für Kunsthandwerk 3610, Weitzmann 1964 Pl. 12/2;
Christentum am Nil Cat. 292; Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. p. 116, bottom.
218
London, Victoria and Albert Museum 2140–1900, Rutschowscaya 1990 fig.
p. 116, top.
219
CM 7689, Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. p. 96, cf. Paris, Musée du Louvre,
Département des Antiquités Égyptiennes E 17368, ibid. fig. p. 102: tabula with lion
hunter.
220
E. Simon in: Christentum am Nil Cat. 292; Weitzmann 1964.
221
Düsseldorf, Kunstmuseum 12882 (a), 12884 (b), Cat. Hamm Cat. 379a, b.
222
Lorquin 1992 Cat. 82.
223
Nauerth 1978 Cat. 31.
224
Mat’je – Ljapunova 1951 Cat. 271.
217
256
chapter eight
A court scene is adopted for the representation of Dionysos in the
decoration of a fine tunic in the Louvre (Pl. XIX).225 The spread of
the great late antique innovation, viz., the codex form for the illustrated
book, gave a decisive impetus to the designers of fine textile ornaments
who started to borrow models from more easily available, and more
richly illuminated books in the early fifth century. As formulated by
Kurt Weitzmann,
[b]ook illumination developed two distinguishing characteristics: first,
as a result of the greater intimacy of the illustrations with the written
word, the illuminations more precisely illustrated the text and became
more fixed in their iconography; second, because of the greater amount
of space available, the scenes multiplied and developed the narrative
mode, whereby one episode would be illustrated in many scenes in
quick succession, so that the eye could glide from one to the other.226
Egyptian textiles with polychrome or monochrome decoration preserve many now lost book illuminations accompanying texts of various genres.227 Though physically and functionally detached from
the written word, a scenic image deriving from a book illumination
and applied as decoration of an expensive costume did not lose its
significance as a visual exegesis on a generally known text. It was
actually selected on account of its meaning: it served the display of
social identity and exerted a protective power exactly by its meaning, which was re-translated into words when visually apprehended.
Episodic illustrations were copied especially frequently from fifth- and
sixth-century manuscripts of bucolic poetry. Polychrome orbiculi with
bucolic scenes,228 however, unite several such episodes in the circular field of each tunic ornament.229
225
Du Bourguet 1964 Cat. D 50; Cat. Paris-Agde Cat. 123 and fig. p. 151. For
the iconography cf. the imported (?) textile Stauffer 1991 Cat. 28.
226
K. Weitzmann: Science and Poetry. in: Age of Spirituality 199–204 199.
227
For the impact of the illustrated literary text on late antique and early Byzantine
representational art, see K. Weitzmann: Illustrations in Roll and Codex: A Study of the
Origin and Method of Text Illustration. 2nd edn. Princeton 1970; Weitzmann 1971; id.:
The Study of Byzantine Book Illumination, Past, Present, and Future. in: The Place
of Book Illumination in Byzantine Art. Princeton 1975 1–60; id.: Late Antique and Early
Christian Book Illumination. New York 1977.
228
Four roundels from the same tunic: Thompson 1971 Cat. 4, Age of Spirituality
Cat. 230; see also Lorquin 1992 Cat. 27, 29 and cf. J. Weitzmann-Fiedler: Some
Observations on the Theme of the Milking Shepherd. in: Moss – Kiefer (eds) 1995
103–111.
229
For orbiculi with a single episode, see du Bourguet 1964 Cat. D 47 (two pieces);
Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des Antiquités Égyptiennes AF 5675, AF
5445, Rutschowscaya 1990 figs pp. 103, top, 107; Lorquin 1992 Cat. 27.
257
Iconographic models were treated with varying degrees of faithfulness. Alterations that did not touch the scenic structure of a book
illustration may have been necessary when it was transferred into
the framework of an oblong neck band or a round orbiculus. More
radical alterations, however, are also apparent. We have already
noted that the representation of mythological narratives in late antique
art was, as a rule, restricted to characteristic central scenes. The
graphic stylization inherent in the silhouette style also further emancipated the process of removing individual actors from scenic contexts in order to use them as ideograms which summarize whole
myths and function as symbols of the mythical values to which elite
social values were compared.
Silhouette style textiles constitute an equally important medium of
stylistic change. Designers preparing cartoons for elite textile workshops during the late fourth and the fifth century used the Classical
iconographic repertory with great autonomy and created individual
compositions. E.g., the triumphal procession of Dionysos is masterfully
abbreviated in the semicircular field of a small tapestry panel in New
York, with the god standing in his triumphal wagon in the centre
of the field and flanked by four symmetrically arranged yet individually characterized figures.230 Traditional images of Dionysos’ triumph
show the procession in a narrative mode, i.e., moving from one end
of the picture field towards the other. The New York textile presents
a frontal image of the triumphal procession, thus turning the motion
of a narrative/scenic representation into the symmetry of a symbolic
image and the timelessness of an ideogram.
The fine and imaginative graphic rendering of the draperies in this
textile, the unnaturally large, staring eyes, the elongated bodies and
large heads of the figures and their exalted, somewhat affected postures as well as the fine foliage filling the background are also characteristic of a group of textiles231 with bright red monochrome design
(Pl. XIX). It is probably these latter textiles that were imitated by
the master(s) of the New York textile and related textiles and not
vice versa. An orbiculus in the Bouvier collection (fig. 97)232 presents
230
New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art 90.5.873, Lenzen 1960 Pl. 1/a; for
the pendant of the textile in the Hermitage, see ibid. Pl. 2.
231
Cf. the list presented in Stauffer 1991 Cat. 30; a fine clavus fragment in Cairo:
CM 6639. See also the fine tabula with Artemis in the Stanford Art Gallery, acc.
no. 47–6, Lewis 1969 38 no. 46, Pl. 43
232
Christentum am Nil Cat. 287; Age of Spirituality Cat. 158; Stauffer 1991 Cat. 30.
258
chapter eight
an allegory of Abundance with the personification of Earth in the
centre receiving two nestlings from a draped female attendant. The
female attendant with the nestlings is a personification of Autumn
or Winter.233 Two male attendants holding sickles flank the central
group and seem to allude to activities and gifts of Autumn. The background is filled with vine tendrils (referring, too, to the grape harvest)
and figures of goats which give a Dionysiac accent to the grape harvest, an autumn labour. The male attendants stand on the invisible
ground line marked by the central figures, yet at the same time their
postures and the direction of their movement are adapted to the
tondo form. In an ingenious manner, the goats and trees of the
background are arranged in concentric circles, a remarkable device
of composition which is reminiscent of other outstanding works of
art such as, e.g., the late fourth-century silver-gilt dish from Parabiago
in northern Italy.234
The iconography of fourth- to sixth-century costume decoration
remains coherent in spite of the increasing dominance of abbreviated scenes and isolated figures. The coherence of images put on
costumes as symbols of self-identity and powerful luck-bringing devices
contradicts the assumption that the monochrome silhouette style presupposes a separation of form from meaning. In fact, the monochrome style maintained the unity of form and meaning—it actually
brought form closer to meaning by depriving it of its naturalistic
appearance and creating instead symbolic forms.
A broadening perception of the relationship between form and
contents is also revealed by the application of the silhouette style in
the quasi-monumental genre of luxury wall hangings. By the late
fourth century, a tapestry type emerges with large figures on a light
ground separated by vertical panels containing smaller figures, peo-
Originally one of a set of four orbiculi with identical design, three of which were
acquired by Maurice Bouvier.
233
In the Dominus Julius mosaic a male attendant brings the nestlings as gifts
of Autumn to the mistress of the house, H. Torp: Un décor de voûte controversé:
L’ornamentation “sassanide” d’une mosaique de la Rotonde de Saint-George à
Thessalonique. Acta IRN 15 (2001) 295–317 fig. 12. In contrast, on the 4th-cent.
Parabiago plate, lower register, a small girl draped as a matron personifies Winter,
Age of Spirituality Cat. 164; in the late 5th-cent. Mosaic of the Seasons from Hagios
Taxiarchis near Argos in Greece Winter appears as a draped man offering two
nestlings and fishes, Dunbabin 1999 Pl. 34.
234
For the date of the dish cf. J.M.C. Toynbee – K.S. Painter: Silver Picture Plates
of Late Antiquity: AD 300–700. Archaeologia 108 (1986) 15–66 29 f.
259
pled scrolls, and/or floral motifs. The large figures as well as the
smaller ones are rendered in the monochrome style with dark (purple) bodies and, in most cases, polychrome costumes and attributes.235
Hangings of this type continued to be produced during the fifth century.236 Most of the preserved hangings are decorated with figures
of the Dionysiac cortège, musicians, or personifications/attendants
offering the gifts of Nature, i.e., images of aristocratic display also
encountered on polychrome hangings and on other objects produced
for the houses of the elite. While personifications present themselves
for abstraction, this is not so much the case of Meleagros and Atalanta
portrayed as dark silhouette figures on an impressive tapestry hanging in the British Museum (fig. 98).237
5. Decline or transformation? Art for the less wealthy
They have invented some kind of vain and curious broidery which, by means of the interweaving
of warp and woof, imitates the quality of painting
and represents upon garments the forms of all kinds
of living beings, and so they devise for themselves,
their wives and children gay-coloured dresses decorated with thousands of figures . . . When they
come out in public dressed in this fashion, they
appear like painted walls to those they meet.238
The tens of thousands of textiles preserved in the dry sands of Egypt
present rich evidence of the impact of cosmopolitan art on the iconography and style of the textiles produced in workshops of all sizes,
ranging from metropolitan workshops to individual weavers hired by
loom owners in small villages.239 They also attest to the vast spread
among the population of the particular form of display which Bishop
Asterius of Amaseia criticizes so fiercely when speaking of the wealthy
235
Du Bourguet 1964 Cat. B 17, 18; Age of Spirituality Cat. 235 (with a list of
fragments from related hangings); Trilling 1982 Cat. 42; Richmond, Virginia Museum
of Fine Arts 64.56.1, Friedman (ed.) 1989 Cat. 39; CM 7948, Rutschowscaya 1990
fig. p. 111, left; Stauffer 1991 Cat. 3 etc.
236
E.g., Riggisberg, Abegg Stiftung 1025, Stauffer 1992 186 ff. no. 8, Pl. 5; ibid.
1385, Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. p. 69, right; Berlin 5/69, Cat. Hamm Cat. 356.
237
BM 43049, Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. pp. 100–101.
238
Asterius of Amaseia, Homilia I, Mango 1972/1986 50 f. Asterius died in c. 410.
239
For the hierarchy of workshops cf. Wipszycka 1965 53 ff.
260
chapter eight
appearing in “gay-coloured dresses decorated with thousands of
figures . . . like painted walls”. The differences in quality and iconographic complexity between textiles produced for the rich and costume
decorations made for the less wealthy are of course obvious. We have
seen in Chapter III.2 that quality differences between contemporary
products may easily be mistaken for stylistic and chronological
differences and considered as “useful indications”240 of a process of
decline taking place over a long period of time. We should not fail,
however, to discover actual stylistic differences between contemporary objects of art of different qualities, either. The transformation
of a style along its journey from a cosmopolitan model to a humble
provincial reproduction may also describe differences in the ways as
art is viewed and “used” in different social milieus. Differences of
this kind seem especially obvious in the case of the ivory and bone
carvings produced in late antique Egypt.
Figured ivory and bone carvings of Roman and late Roman date
were found in enormous quantities at sites in Egypt, especially in
Alexandria.241 The abundance of the finds was interpreted in the
terms of the traditional hypothesis according to which Alexandria
was one of the principal centres of late antique ivory carving.242 A
much-quoted letter of the Patriarch Cyril (412–444) listing bribes to
be sent to people at the court whose political support he wanted to
secure (cf. Chapter IV.2.4)243 gives a general idea of the value, prestige, and hierarchy of luxury textiles, ivory carvings and other elite
household items available in fifth-century Alexandria:
. . . To Paul the Prefect: four larger wool rugs, two moderate wool
rugs, four place covers, four table cloths, six larger bila,244 six medium
sized bila, six stool covers, twelve for doors, two larger caldrons, four
ivory chairs, two ivory stools . . . two larger tables, two ostriches; and
in order that he would help us in the cause about those matters which
were written to him: fifty pounds of gold.
And to his domestic, one wool rug, two rugs, four bila, two stool
covers, and one hundred gold coins.
To Marcella, the chambermaid, the same as was dispatched to him,
and that she would persuade Augusta by asking her: fifty pounds of
gold . . .
240
241
242
243
244
I borrow the expression from Beckwith’s discussion of bone carvings, 1963 10.
Marangou 1976 passim; E. Rodziewicz 1969; 1978.
For the literature cf. Beckwith 1963 10 ff.; Volbach 1976 24 and passim.
Cf. also Barnish – Lee – Whitby 2000 201.
According to Maas 2000 124: rugs or curtains.
261
To the prefect Chryseros, that he would cease to oppose us, we
were forced to dispatch double amounts: six larger wool rugs, four
moderate rugs, four larger rugs, eight place covers, six table cloths, six
large bila rugs, six medium size bila, six stool covers, twelve for chairs,
four larger caldrons, four ivory chairs, four ivory stools . . . four larger
tables, six ostriches; and if he shall have acted in accordance with what
was written to him by the most magnificent Aristolaus with the lord
Claudianus intervening as mediator: two hundred pounds of gold.
And to Solomon, his domestic, two larger wool rugs, four place covers, four table cloths, four bila, four stool covers, six covers for chairs,
six caldrons, two ivory chairs, two ostriches; and just as was written
to lord Claudianus, so he may use persuasion to forward the proposal:
fifty pounds of gold . . . To Romanus the chamberlain: four larger wool
rugs, four place covers, four stool covers, six covers for chairs, two
caldrons, two ivory chairs; and so that he would aid in our cause:
thirty pounds of gold.245
Judging by the textiles discussed in Chapters VIII.2, 4 and IX.1.2,
there may be little doubt that Cyril was in a position, to acquire
Egyptian-made luxury textiles of the highest quality and decorated
in the best cosmopolitan taste. In contrast, we are rather at a loss
if we want to form an idea of the appearance and quality of the
ivory carvings which decorated the chairs and stools he distributed
among high dignitaries whose status, wealth, and education precluded
that they be bribed with poorly executed, common or meaningless
objects.
It is a frequently repeated statement that few, if any, objects of
first quality can be found among the ivory and bone carvings unearthed
at Egyptian archaeological sites. The high artistic level of Alexandrian/
Egyptian ivory is argued for with reference to objects attributed only
tentatively to Egyptian workshops, such as the Queriniano diptych246
(late fourth century),247 the “great Berlin pyx” with the representation of Abraham’s sacrifice and Christ with the apostles (late fourthearly fifth century),248 the ivory medicine box in the Dumbarton Oaks
Collection (second half of the fourth-first half of the fifth century),249
245
Cyril of Alexandria, Letter 96. Trans. J.I. McEnerney: St. Cyril of Alexandria:
Letters 51–110. Washington 1987 151 ff.; Maas 2000 123 f.
246
Brescia, Civici Musei d’Arte e Storia inv. avori 2, Volbach 1976 no. 66.
Provenance not known.
247
For the dating and supposed Alexandrian provenance, see Kiilerich 1993 150 f.
The Egyptian stylistic parallels quoted by her are not convincing, however.
248
Effenberger – Severin 1992 Cat. 48. Provenance not known.
249
Weitzmann 1972 Cat. 9; Volbach 1976 no. 83. Provenance not known.
262
chapter eight
a panel with Ariadne (?) in the Musée de Cluny (early sixth century),250
the series of six figured panels mounted on the pulpit of Emperor
Henry II (1002–1014) in the Cathedral of Aachen (first half of the
sixth century),251 or the stylistically related pyxides with scenes of an
Isis festival in Wiesbaden (late fifth-early sixth century),252 and the
legend of St Menas in the British Museum (first half of the sixth
century).253 The hypothetical attribution of these carvings to Alexandrian
workshops was based on their iconography.254 In itself, this argument
is insufficient since the worship and representation of Egyptian deities
or saints was not confined to Egypt. It is more relevant that some
of these objects display distinctive stylistic features that are traditionally
associated with Alexandria, such as the combination of the Classical
rendering of the bodies with mannered postures on the Queriniano
diptych and the medicine box, on the one hand, or the illusionistic
composition and the use of extreme undercutting on the panels of
the Musée de Cluny and the Cathedral of Aachen, on the other (cf.
Chapters V.2, VII.1.2, VIII.4).
Stylistic predecessors of the Queriniano diptych or the Dumbarton
Oaks medicine box may be identified among carvings coming from
sites in Egypt such as, e.g., a late second-early third (?) century ivory
carving representing a poet or philosopher and his attendant in the
Dumbarton Oaks Collection (fig. 99),255 bone carvings in Alexandria
(figs 100, 101)256 and Oxford,257 a genre scene in Princeton from
Ramleh (Alexandria)258 and a particularly fine fragment found at
Oxyrhynchos, now in the Victoria and Albert Museum.259 These, and
other better-quality ivories and bone carvings attest the survival of
250
Volbach 1976 no. 78. From a tomb in the region of Trier, Germany.
Volbach 1976 nos 72–77.
252
Wiesbaden, Sammlung Nassauischer Altertümer 7865, Volbach 1976 no. 105;
Age of Spirituality Cat. 170. From the treasury of the Cathedral of Trier (?).
253
BM 79,12–20,1, Volbach 1976 no. 181; Age of Spirituality Cat. 514. From a
church near St Paul’s outside the walls, Rome.
254
J. Strzygowski: Hellenistische und koptische Kunst in Alexandria (BSAA 5). Wien 1902
47 note 1.
255
Washington, Dumbarton Oaks Collection 42.1, Beckwith 1963 Pl. 11; Badawy
1978 fig. 3.10.
256
GRM 12109, Bonasca Carra 1995 Pl. XXXV/2; GRM 13291, from Rhacotis,
Marangou 1976 Pl. 19/d; Bonasca Carra 1995 Pl. XXXV/1.
257
Oxford, Ashmolean Museum 1963.1395, Marangou 1976 Pl. 60/b.
258
University of Princeton, Art Museum, Beckwith 1963 Pl. 13.
259
London, Victoria and Albert Museum 1919,1919a–1897, Beckwith 1963 Pl. 14.
251
263
the Hellenistic illusion of space and the Hellenistic combination of
Classical forms with affected postures and foreshortenings.
These carvings reflect elite taste and demands. In turn, thousands
of small, mediocre or poor-quality bone carvings testify to the vast
popular demand for various items of furniture made in imitation of
elite objects that were intended to serve a meaningful display of status and education in their original context. Through their figured
decoration, these objects also possessed luck-bringing properties. More
recent excavations conducted in Alexandria identified some of the
countless small local workshops in which figured furniture ornaments
were mass-produced.260 The overwhelming majority of the products
from these workshops repeat a limited number of iconographic themes
alluding to conceptions of fortune, welfare, matrimonial bliss, themes
which were also perhaps meant to display a knowledge of Classical
mythology.
The moderately skilled masters of the cheaper carvings did not work
in complete isolation. While endlessly reproducing traditional iconographic and formal models with great routine, they were also aware
of more complex models which they tried to copy for more demanding clients. A fragmentarily preserved scene with young lovers in the
Coptic Museum (fig. 102)261 or a scene with musicians placed in an
illusionistic space in the same collection (fig. 103)262 derive from fine
Hellenistic-style models. The latter piece belongs to a group of related
carvings of somewhat more ambitious execution, consisting of, e.g., a
marine thiasos scene in Cairo (fig. 104)263 and a carving representing
a Maenad in the company of a bantering Satyr in Alexandria.264 A
remarkable moment of invention is caught in a relief on a piece of
cow femur: around the bone, the artesan represented four enthroned
emperors receiving the homage of their subjects (fig. 105).265
Evidently, mass-produced objects of a symbolic rather than aesthetic significance are stylistically as well as formally highly conservative, so much so that it is impossible to establish a reliable chronology
260
E. Rodziewicz 1969; E. Rodziewicz 1978; Rodziewicz 1984 243 ff.; Haas 1997
193, 204 f., 343 f.
261
CM 5408.
262
263
264
GRM 13298, Bonasca Carra 1995 Pl. XXXV/5. Cf. Marangou 1976 no. 62
Pl. 20/b.
265
GRM 13296, Alexandria, from the quarter of Rhacotis.
264
chapter eight
of the average second- through sixth-century bone carvings.266 We
may follow Florence Friedman in the interpretation of the long, boneless limbs and elegantly rendered yet enormously large hands of the
Nereid and Triton in fig. 104 as chronological indications typifying
“the breakdown of naturalism in the art of the Early Byzantine
period”.267 Yet while the mass-producers of bone carvings may indeed
have been aware of changing attitudes towards naturalism, the
simplification of the rendering of the human anatomy and the Classical
drapery was determined first of all by the working methods employed
in mass production. The increasing accentuation of the basic message
of a figure by selectively exaggerating its principal iconographic features may likewise be interpeted as a consequence of mass production rather than as a stylistic change.
It may be presumed that most of the figured carvings—primarily
those associated with the Dionysiac realm, which represent the bulk
of the material—have decorated toilet caskets of various sizes made
for female owners, who received them usually (but perhaps not exclusively) as bridal gifts or wedding presents. While the expensive models
of these caskets combined mythological images with idealized depictions of their aristocratic owners (Chapter VIII.2.1, figs 73–75), the
lack of such depictions among the cheaper carvings indicates that
the latter were not intended to convey direct messages concerning the
owner’s social status. The accent was laid on the connotations of the
figures and it seems that this accent shifted in the course of time
from concrete mythological knowledge and associations towards a
more general notion of the luck-bringing qualities of these figures.
This is also suggested by the sixth-century pieces found in the bone
workshop area in House D at Kôm el Dikka in Alexandria. Similarly
to the overwhelming majority of contemporary bone carving, these
pieces also display the usual pagan imagery. The cottage industry in
House D was operated, however, by Christians. The courtyard of the
house was the scene of communal life, an important aspect of which
is revealed by a fresco on one of its walls representing the enthroned
266
The suggestions of Marangou 1976 69 ff. are problematic. Many of her stylistic comparisons are between modest quality bone carvings and works of great art
and hence far too subjective. Marangou dates objects to the 1st–3rd centuries or
even earlier which are dated by others to the late antique period, cf., e.g., the datings in Friedman (ed.) 1989 or in Cat. Hamm (Cat. 197, 198).
267
F.D. Friedman in: Friedman (ed.) 1989 Cat. 23 (Nereid, Baltimore, The
Walters Art Gallery 71.56).
265
Virgin and Child.268 The painting was executed before the middle
of the sixth century and served as a votive/devotional image in front
of which communal prayers were said by a household whose members were engaged in the production of pagan images.269
The bone carvings produced in early Byzantine Alexandria and in
other urban centres not only present a transformation of mythological
images into symbols. They also reflect a special stylistic transformation
process in which the Classical relief is reduced to an impressionistic
graphic design with a minimal marking of three-dimensionality. Pieces
as, e.g., the carving with the Nereid and Triton in fig. 104 or the
Maenad in fig. 106270 have little to do with artistic incompetence or
the decline of an expressive idiom. The summary treatment of forms
and plastic values is not accidental or incompetent. The masters of
these carvings and the hundreds or thousands of their analogues
reproduced formulae that had been developed especially for mass
production with the aim of presenting the basic, essential features of
a standard image. Rather than imitating with little success a model
carved in an elite workshop, the carving in fig. 104 repeats an ideogram in which type, form, and stylistic means are equally fixed. It
would be mistaken, however, to deny the role of training and skills:
the same mass-produced pattern may be reproduced poorly just as
well as in a manner that gives the impression of fresh artistic invention.
The process of the transformation of naturalistically rendered figures
into ornaments, the symbolic significance of which sets limits to the
alteration of formal details, is also prevalent in the textiles produced
for the less wealthy. The shift towards a symbolic treatment of mythological figures should not be misinterpreted, however, as a process
during which the identity of the figures becomes first unimportant
and then entirely forgotten. The meaning and the identity of the
figures remain interconnected. There are splendid proofs for this
such as eighth-century textiles with the images of Heracles, Dionysos,
and Ariadne:271 not only does the iconography of the deities follow
Rodziewicz 1984 194 ff., figs 226–236.
For the significance of the painting and for the status of private oratories in
the 6th–7th cent., see Haas 1997 200 ff.
270
Alexandria, Graeco-Roman Museum 13267.
271
Heracles: Athens, Benaki Museum M, c. 108/8, L. Marangou: Koptikã Ífasmãta. Coptic Textiles. Benaki Museum. Athens 1971 fig. 8; Dionysos and Ariadne:
Benaki Museum M, c. 108/7, ibid. fig. 9; Dionysos: Düsseldorf, Kunstmuseum 12795,
Christentum am Nil Cat. 344; from the same (?) textile: Lorquin 1992 Cat. 22. Lorquin’s
6th-century dating is contradicted by a wide circle of stylistic analogues, cf. Török
1993 II Cat. 94–96.
268
269
266
chapter eight
a Classical prototype, but their names are also added in Greek letters
(fig. 107).272 As also in the case of the Christian costume decorations
representing holy persons and symbols, these images had an amuletic
character which was not independent of their identity.273
Boxes, caskets and chests with carved ivory and bone inlays were
not only produced in Alexandria. The output of provincial workshops was similarly considerable. While, e.g., a chest found at Hawara
was decorated with classicizing figures of Nymphs and Erotes,274
pieces traded to Nubia from Upper Egyptian workshops display a
remarkable mixture of Classical and traditional Egyptian iconography and style. Well-preserved exemplars discovered in dated Nubian
elite burials show that the same simple, traditional Egyptian casket
forms were repeated from the third to the fifth century. Early exemplars as, e.g., a box from an early (?) third-century Nubian tomb275 are
decorated with inlaid divine figures represented in a mixed EgyptianRoman style and standing in Egyptian-type tabernacles which are
replaced on later pieces with Classicizing niches and/or arcaded
architecture.
The mixing of Egyptian deities with figures of Greek mythology
indicates the outlook of a traditional provincial milieu in which Greek
deities, cults and myths were interpreted on the basis of Egyptian
religion and not vice versa. The front of a jewelry casket found in
the cemetery of Gebel Adda dated to the period between c. 350–450
is decorated with the image of Aphrodite flanked by two Harpocrates
figures,276 explaining the identity of the Greek goddess through associating her with Isis and Hathor and hinting thus in Egyptian terms
at her role in female fertility and marital bliss. More extensive crossreferences are presented by the figures on a large chest of Upper
Egyptian origin in Cairo. The chest was found at Qustul in the tomb
of a Nubian prince who was buried around 380 (fig. 108).277 The
272
Lorquin 1992 Cat. 22.
See Maguire 1996 123 ff.
274
W.M.F. Petrie: Hawara Biahmu and Arsinoe. London 1889 Pl. XVIII.
275
Karanog, grave 45, University of Pennsylvania, University Museum of Archaeology and Anthropology E 7519, D. O’Connor: Ancient Nubia. Egypt’s Rival in Africa.
Philadelphia 1993 153 Cat. 127.
276
N.B. Millet: Gebel Adda Expedition Preliminary Report, 1963–1964. JARCE
3 (1964) 7–14 Pl. IV/9, 10. For fragments of other caskets from the same cemetery,
see id.: Gebel Adda Preliminary Report for 1963. JARCE 2 (1963) 147–164 fig. 8.
277
Cairo JE 71191, from Qustul tumulus Q 14, Török 1988 Pls 38, 39.
273
267
figured panels decorating the chest were placed in Classical niches,
arranged in four tiers and surrounded by the vine tendrils of Dionysos.
The incised figures represent the native household god Bes and his
ithyphallic attendants, further a Siren, Satyrs killing mythological
enemies, Pan, Aphrodite, Dionysos, Ariadne and somersaulting acrobats.
The Upper Egyptian master explained the meaning of these Classical
figures which he borrowed from the iconographic repertory of late
antique toilet services by adding the figures of the Egyptian Bes, god
of fertility and the family, along with his aggressive associates. It is
also Bes who brings the aggressive images from the Dionysiac realm
which are otherwise unusual in such a context. The interrelated
Egyptian and Greek images are complemented with figures alluding
to the cosmic aspect of the good life (the Siren) and to the wordlyfestive aspect of the wedding (the acrobats). While the Classicizing
late antique models are clearly discernible behind the highly simplified,
graphically rendered mythological figures, the crowded and ill-balanced composition betrays the master’s ignorance of Classicizing
models of cosmopolitan quality.
The caskets produced in Upper Egyptian workshops were decorated exclusively with incised figures and ornaments. The simplicity
of the incised drawings indicates the non-Classical origins of the traditional technique, iconographic repertory and style of these workshops. Incised ivory and bone panels were also found at more northern
sites. On these, the incised (frequently double) lines marking the contours and interior details of the design were filled with dark mastic.
The designs were painted in bright colours and on more elaborate,
expensive pieces metal sheets were also applied as, e.g., on a fine
mid-fourth-century panel now in Liverpool (fig. 109).278 Its decoration
was modelled on the iconography of the personification of the month
of October as it appears, e.g., in the illustration of the famous Roman
calendar of 354.279 The cosmopolitan iconography conforms here
with a cosmopolitan style, similarly to many other high-quality incised
and painted panels from the fourth century (Pls XX–XXII)280 which
278
Formerly in the Fejérváry collection, Liverpool Museum M 100325, Gibson
1994 Cat. 2. Note the drilled holes at the right shoulder of the figure and above
his thighs for studs probably holding engraved metal discs representing tunic decorations.
279
H. Stern: Le calendrier de 354: étude sur son texte et sur ses illustrations. Paris 1953
Pl. XI/1; Gibson 1994 5.
280
CM 7065–7067, Strzygowski 1904 175 ff. nos 7065, 7066, 7067, figs 232–234.
268
chapter eight
were applied, as shown by other more completely preserved caskets,
together with relief plaques.281 It seems that the production of elaborately incised and painted ivory and blone plaques was a speciality of workshops in Alexandria and other great Egyptian metropoleis;
they represent, however, a variant of other late antique genres such
as niello decorations or metalwork with incised figured designs.282
281
E.g., Baltimore, Walters Art Gallery, wooden casket, Cat. Brooklyn Cat. 97.
E.g., Berlin, Staatliche Museen, Antikensammlung Fr. 1558 aaa, Effenberger –
Severin 1992 Cat. 23; New York, The Metropolitan Museum of Art, Rogers Fund
1913, 13.225.7, Age of Spirituality Cat. 215.
282
CHAPTER NINE
THE CHRISTIANIZATION OF ART IN
LATE ANTIQUE EGYPT
1. Classical tradition: from pagan to Christian
1.1. Double readings
That we’ve broken their statues,
that we’ve driven them out of their temples,
doesn’t mean at all that the gods are dead.1
From the late fourth century, the Heracleopolis Magna workshop
producing architectural carvings with mythological scenes for the decoration of elite tomb chapels also worked for Christian clients (fig.
22). Similar associations are also prevalent in other media. The stylistic and perhaps also workshop associations between a number of
late fourth- early fifth-century resist-dyed hangings decorated with
Christian scenes and hangings with mythological scenes are quite
obvious (see below, Chapter IX.1.2). The concurrent production of
stylistically closely associated pagan and Christian works of art in
the same fourth- and early fifth-century workshops may be explained
with the social and cultural homogeneity of the contemporary governing elite. For centuries after Constantine’s conversion, Christian
aristocrats of the empire received still an education in Hellenic culture. Many of them “asserted their Hellenic identity by surrounding
themselves with the images of the literary and mythical canon”.2
That the situation was similar in Egypt is attested by ample literary
and documentary evidence (Chapter IV.2.4)3 and may also be presumed on the basis of the evidence of visual arts.
1
Constantine Cavafy: Ionic. in: Collected Poems trans. E. Keeley and P. Sherrard,
ed. G. Savidis. Princeton 1992 34.
2
Elsner 1998b 13.—Cf. Torp 1997.
3
Brown 1978 81–101; Cameron, Alan 1982; Bowersock 1990 9, 55 ff.; Swain
1993; Bagnall 1993 241 ff.; Trombley 1994 241 ff.
270
chapter nine
Without doubt, Christian art in fourth- and fifth-century Egypt
was “fully part of late antiquity”4 and the evidence for continuity
and change in patronage, organisation, social context and use5 as
well as the evidence for the international connections of fourth- to
seventh-century architecture, sculpture, painting, luxury textile production, etc. speaks for profound similarities with other provinces of
late antique culture.
It is these similarities that prompt the modern student of Egyptian
late antique–early Byzantine art to raise again the original question
posed by his predecessors when they were confronted with what they
believed to have been mythological reliefs adorning a Christian
church, namely, how was mythological imagery received in a country where c. 80 percent of the population was Christian by the early
fifth century?6 And, accepting the warning that
the common oversimplification of identifying sympathy for classical culture with sympathy for paganism
is mistaken, the more so that
it was after all the marriage between Christianity and classical culture . . . that was the defining characteristic and backbone of Byzantine
civilization7
are we also prompted to revise “Leda Christiana”, too, and begin to
question the reality of the dividing line drawn between fourth–fifth
century and later mythological representations, a dividing line on the
one side of which we see have identified religious, on the other
purely allegorical, images?
Writing about the fourth century, Ja≤ Elsner argues that
it was supremely an age of exegesis . . . Such exegesis does not deserve to
be dismissed as ‘a sequence of misplaced discoveries’. On the contrary,
it marks a radically new relationship between the present and the past
which is of the utmost importance for understanding the conceptual
framework within which Christians throughout the Middle Ages interpreted not only their art but everything else in their world. This exegetic
4
Elsner 1998b 23.
For this particular problem, see now the evidence and considerations presented
in the seminal work of Haas 1997.
6
For the process of Christianization cf. Wipszycka 1988; Bagnall 1993 278 ff.;
Martin 1981; Martin 1996a; for the forms, social context, and extent of paganism
in the 4th to 6th/7th cent., see Frankfurter 1998 passim and 31 ff., 105 f., 265 ff.
7
Cameron, Alan 1982 287.
5
the christianization of art in egypt
271
frame of interpretation was not limited only to Old Testament themes.
It came to be applied more broadly to many pagan myths . . . Hence
we find in both art and literature representations of the Christian
Orpheus, the Christian Sol, the Christian Bellerophon, and the assimilation in Christian iconography of pagan themes such as Hermes
Criophorus and Endymion sleeping to Christian subjects like Christ
the Good Shepherd and the sleep of Jonah under the gourd.8
Elsner even goes as far as to suggest that in late antique religious
images
there may in fact be an implicit polemical commentary, as in a recently
discovered fourth-century pagan mosaic from the House of Aion, Nea
Paphos, in Cyprus, depicting Hermes seated with the infant Dionysus
(who has a halo) on his lap. This image seems remarkably like Christian
representations of the Virgin and Child: whether it represents a peculiar instance of Dionysiac-Christian syncretism or a deliberately antiChristian Dionysiac use of Christian iconography, we may never know.9
While there are indeed good reasons for thinking that the composition of the Nea Paphos mosaic was influenced formally as well as
conceptually by the iconography of the Magi approaching the Christ
Child,10 it is less probable that it was meant to give expression to
anti-Christian sentiments.
The possibility of a double, pagan and Christian reading11 also
emerges in the case of various Egyptian late antique iconographic
types and works of art. We have seen a splendid example for the
priority of content over form—even if the latter has connotations that
contradict to the former—in the Christianized pagan portrait stela
from Oxyrhynchos discussed in Chapter VII.1.3 (fig. 64). But there
are also more ambiguous cases. It is generally supposed that the type
of Maria lactans derived from the image of Isis suckling her son Horus.12
8
Elsner 1998a 752 f.
Ibid. 744 f.
10
Bowersock 1990 51 f.
11
On the different viewings of the same image cf. Elsner 1995 1 ff.; yet, see also
Engemann 1997 19 ff.
12
For the development of the iconography of Maria lactans in the 5th–7th cent.,
see Müller 1963. A late 5th or rather early to mid-6th cent. dating of the marble
crater with Maria lactans in the Museo Nazionale, Rome, is now preferred to its
earlier dating to the reign of Valens by H.-G. Severin: Oströmische Plastik unter
Valens und Theodosius. Jahrbuch der Berliner Museen 12 (1970) 211–252 211 ff. Cf.
J. Dresken-Weiland: Reliefierte Tischplatten aus theodosianischer Zeit. Città del Vaticano
1991 5 note 22; R. Warland: Der Ambo aus Thessaloniki. Bildprogramm – Rekonstruktion-Datierung. JdI 109 (1994) 371–385 376 f.
9
272
chapter nine
As a document of the Christianization of the pagan Isis-image, a
mortuary stela of the Berlin Museum für Spätantike und Byzantinische
Kunst is frequently cited (fig. 110).13 It represents a woman seated
on a folding chair between columns and two crosses and suckling
her baby. It was discovered recently that the stela was originally
inscribed in Greek for a 21-years-old woman. The inscription contained a funerary formula used for both pagans and Christians. From
the representation the attributes both of Isis (throne, dress, crown)
and Mary (throne or high-backed chair, halo)14 are missing. While
it cannot be excluded that an exegetic reading of the representation
in both a pagan and a Christian sense was nevertheless possible for
the contemporary viewer, the folding chair clearly places the figure
in a non-divine context.15
A more probable interpretation of the stela type with the mother
nursing her baby can be made. Independently from the formal
affinities with the images of Isis lactans and Maria lactans, the actual
iconographic and conceptual models of the mother figure on the
stela type represented by the Berlin relief were found among Egyptian
late antique votive pottery figurine types which depicted a mother
holding or suckling her baby. The original mortuary connotations
of these ancient votive types are well-known. As to their religious
context, however, it is important to note that they were also produced at Abu Mena for pilgrims visiting the shrine of St Menas and
praying there for fertility and motherhood, etc.16 Pagan as well as
Christian readings were possible, and were perhaps consciously invited
in the case of a remarkable clay statuette in the Budapest Museum
of Fine Arts (fig. 111).17 It unites the utterly simplified figure of the
enthroned Isis (identified by the crown of the goddess) suckling Horus
with the type of late antique votive orans statuettes, whence the characteristic triangular headdress and the raised arms.18
13
The halo is, however, not always present in 4th-early 5th-century representations, cf. the silk found with the Riggisberg Dionysiac hanging, Kötzsche 1993 fig.
1 (= my fig. 112). Mary is haloed on a resistance-dyed fragment with Nativity scene,
Victoria and Albert Museum 1103–1900, Kendrick 1920 64, no. 786; Illgen 1968
18 ff.; Age of Spirituality Cat. 392.
15
A. Effenberger suggested in: Effenberger – Severin 1992 154 and in: Cat. Hamm
115 that the crosses were incised secondarily in order to Christianize the image.
16
Török 1993 I Cat. G 7, 9, 33, 50, 51; Cat. Hamm Cat. 125 etc.
17
Török 1993 I 33 f., Cat. G 6.
18
See also CM 8003, Cat. Paris-Agde Cat. 106, 5th-cent. stela representing a
14
273
The Budapest statuette and other votives preserving pagan forms
and religious concepts but produced and used in Christian rather
than pagan milieus illustrate important features of the transformation
of culture in late antiquity. Their conflation of pagan and Christian
cult images and concepts of personal religiosity represents a plebeian
variety of what was going on in higher spheres of artistic patronage.
Let me quote here the example of the carved and painted wood from
architectural contexts. A series of fourth- to seventh-century wooden
panels decorated with—in most cases excellent quality—paintings
representing personifications, mythological and/or bucolic scenes,
scenes from the circus (?), or the life of the aristocratic household come
from luxuriously painted ceilings of elite dwellings thus indicating again
that the Egyptian governing class was also integrated in the empire
as to the types of the decoration of their houses (Chapter VIII.3).
There are also panels with paintings representing Christian subjects.19
They may come from the ceilings of churches, and this may also
have been the case of other panels painted with representations of
birds and/or fishes (Chapter VIII.3). This is indicated by some beams
with relief decoration representing aquatic, frequently Nilotic, scenes
framing images of flying angels holding laurel crowns with inscribed
crosses or busts of angels or saints (fig. 82);20 on other beams these
latter images were framed by exquisitely carved harvest and/or vintage scenes (fig. 86).21 The architectural context of beams of these
types is indicated by the roof beams of Justinian’s basilica in the
Monastery of St Catherine at Mount Sinai, which were decorated
with Nilotic scenes22 presenting images of the Paradise.23 The decoration of the roof consoles or the ceilings of churches and mausolea
with aquatic scenes and animals (as is indicated, e.g., by the ceiling
mosaics of the Mausoleum of Sta Costanza in Rome or of the chancel
of S. Vitale in Ravenna) is attested in the eastern as well as the
woman seated in a niche architecture. She holds a child dressed in a tunic and she
raises her right arm in the gesture of prayer.
19
E.g., Rutschowscaya 1992 Cat. 43.
20
E.g., L’art copte Cat. 164–166; CM 7201 (= my fig. 82), 7208+7217.
21
E.g., Cat. Hamm Cat. 94; CM 7196–7197, 7236 (8409) (= my fig. 86).
22
Carved between 548–565, Forsyth – Weitzmann 1973 Pls LXVI, LXVII; cf.
Maguire 1999 249 f., fig. 36.
23
L.J. Drewer: The Carved Wood Beams of the Church of Justinian, Monastery of St.
Catherine, Mount Sinai. Ph.D. dissertation, University of Michigan. University Microfilms.
Ann Arbor 1971 9 ff., 82 ff. See esp. 139 ff., discussion of Philostorgios, Hist. eccl.
3.10 on the Nile as one of the Four Rivers of Paradise.
274
chapter nine
western parts of the Empire.24 It may be presumed that in Egypt as
well as in other parts of the Empire the decoration of roof beams
with reliefs and the casettes of the roof with painted scenes had originally been a feature of the decoration of the houses of the pagan
aristocracy, as is indicated by some fifth-century carvings with busts
in tondi and/or harvest/vintage scenes (Chapter VIII.3). The aquatic
as well as the harvest/vintage scenes could be read with a pagan as
well as a Christian meaning in the mind. The openness of their
interpretation was, however, obviously restricted as soon as they were
complemented with Christian images and symbols, which turned
them into Christian allegories and symbols.25
A similar form of exegetic interpretation may have prevailed in
other media, too, in the case of many other mythological scenes,
personifications, and allegorical images.26 Taking the most popular
medium, the expensive figural orbiculi, tabulae and clavi of late antique
dresses displayed the wearer’s paideia and Hellenic identity, gave
expression to his/her moral ideals and integrity and also possessed
protective power (cf. Chapter VIII.4). Dionysiac scenes and figures
symbolized virtue in life, which also explains why isolated Dionysiac
figures survived in the decoration of costumes until the Middle Ages,
“Christianized” occasionally by added crosses.27 The symbolic interpretation of various conversation groups consisting of a male and a
female figure and of other male-female couples is rather obvious,
too: from the Imperial period, the depiction of the married couple
was rich in positive connotations, on an elementary level standing
for civic order en miniature,28 while mythological couples symbolized
ethical values and presented an ideal image of the earthly couple.29
24
Cf. Grabar 1963 70, on a late 4th-early 5th-cent. stone console with the relief
representation of sea animals (his Pl. XXII/2) from Constantinople.—For the varied use of wooden reliefs on beams and panels built into the walls of the late period
“south church” at Bawit, see Rutschowscaya 1986 102–106.
25
Cameron, Averil 1991 48.—For the plants, quadrupeds, birds, and fishes in
the vault mosaic in the presbitery of S. Vitale as a representation of the created
world and illustration of Revelation 5,13, see Engemann 1997 134 ff.
26
The Christian themes represented on late antique and early medieval dress
cannot be discussed here: cf. Maguire 1990.
27
For 6th- and 10th-century examples, see Thompson 1971 Cat. 21 and 36,
respectively.
28
Brown 1998b 12.
29
T. Hägg: The Novel in Antiquity. Oxford 1983 81 ff. and passim; cf. also Nauerth
1993 96.
275
1.2. Creating new narratives
. . . when we came to the village called Anautha, we saw a lighted lamp
and, upon enquiring, were informed that there was a church in that
place. Having entered [the church] to perform a prayer, we found at
the door a dyed curtain upon which was depicted some idol in the form
of a man. They alleged that it was the image of Christ or one of the
saints, for I do not remember what it was I saw. Knowing that the presence of such things in a church is a defilement, I tore it down and
advised that it should be used to wrap up a poor man who had died[,]
accounts Epiphanius of Salamis in one of his letters, where he also
adds the warning:
Do not depict Christ (for that one act of humility, the incarnation,
which he willingly accepted for our sake is sufficient unto Him), but
bear in your spirit and carry about with you the incorporeal Logos.30
In another letter written to the Emperor Theodosius I, he asked (in
vain) for more radical measures:
Seest thou not, O most God-loving emperor, that this state of things
is not agreeable to God? Wherefore I entreat thee . . . that the curtains which may be found to bear in a spurious manner—and yet they
do so—images of the apostles or prophets or of Lord Christ Himself
should be collected from churches, baptisteries, houses and martyria
and that thou shouldst give them over for the burial of the poor, and
as [for the images] on walls, that they should be whitewashed.31
The Egyptian contemporaries of Epiphanius, too, may have been upset by church curtains of the sort he mentioned. Remains of such
curtains have been found in Egyptian late antique burials where they
were used to wrap up the body of the dead—yet not necessarily the
bodies of the poor.32 The great Dionysiac tapestry of the Abegg
Stiftung (Chapter VIII.2.2, Pl. XII) comes from a burial in which it
was used for wrapping the body together with another textile. Attached
to the splendid pagan hanging were the remains of a fine silk textile33
30
Epiphanius, Letter to John, bishop of Aelia. Mango 1972/1986 42 f. Epiphanius
was bishop of Salamis in Cyprus between 367 and his death in 403, cf. W. Schneemelcher: Epiphanius von Salamis. RAC V (1962) 909–927.
31
Epiphanius, Letter to the emperor Theodosius, Mango 1972/1986 42.
32
See, e.g., the textiles from the late 4th cent. “tomb of Euphemiâan” at Antinoe,
now in the Musées Royaux d’art et d’histoire, Bruxelles, Lafontaine-Dosogne – de
Jonghe 1988 9 f., Pl. B; M. Rassart-Debergh: Textiles d’Antinoé (Égypte) en HauteAlsace. Donation É. Guimet. Colmar 1997 44, 47; Schrenk 1998 339, fig. 1.
33
Riggisberg, Abegg Stiftung, Kötzsche 1993 fig. 1.
276
chapter nine
dating from the first half of the fifth century, decorated with friezes
containing scenes from the life of Mary according to the Apocryphon
of James,34 viz., Mary in the Temple, the election of Joseph, the
Annunciation to Mary at the source, Nativity, the first Bath of the
Child (fig. 112).
This silk textile was produced in the period of the unfolding of
mature Christian art. The Classical models used for the iconography of the episodes from the life of the Virgin (see, e.g., the Nymph
of the spring inserted into the Bath scene) are obvious and the Greek
legends accompanying the scenes indicate the interdependence of
scriptural text and image.35 The decoration of the basilica of Nola
in southern Italy is frequently cited to characterize the nature of this
particular interdependence. In the early fifth century, Paulinus, bishop
of Nola, created a complex iconographic programme consisting of
narrative and iconic images in the basilica he built for the martyr
St Felix. According to Paulinus’ poems inscribed in the basilica’s
walls,36 the paintings and mosaics were meant to function as a didactic “visual theology”37
. . . explained by inscriptions, so that the script may make clear what
the hand has exhibited.38 . . . If God’s lessons from the light of the
Word do not open up understanding, let us then at any rate obtain
examples from the buildings themselves and let stone and wood be
teachers to us dullards, so that we may achieve such a work in faith
as we have accomplished by our handicraft.39
The meaning and purpose of art in the period of the formation of
Christian imagery in Egypt is not attested in texts of a similar clarity.
The unfolding of Christian painting in the second half of the fourth
and in the fifth century is illustrated by much-cited paintings from
the necropolis of el-Bagawat in the Khargeh Oasis and the Wescher
Tomb in Alexandria and by a number of woven, resist-dyed and
painted textiles made originally for the decoration of churches.
34
O. Cullmann: Kindheitsevangelien 1. Protevangelium des Jakobus. in: W. Schneemelcher (ed.): Neutestamentliche Apokryphen. Tübingen 1990; Kötzsche 1993.
35
Cf. E. Hennecke: New Testament Apocrypha. English trans. ed. R.M. Wilson.
London 1963–1965 374 ff.; R.E. Brown et al. (eds): Mary in the New Testament. London
1978 243 ff.; Cameron, Averil 1991 98 ff., 165 ff.
36
Paulinus of Nola, Ep. 32; Carmina 27.
37
Elsner 1998b 254 ff.
38
Paulinus of Nola, Carmina 27.585, quoted by Elsner 1998b 255.
39
Paulinus of Nola, Carmina 28 258–262, translation: P.G. Walsh: Poems. New
York 1975.
277
The late fourth-century paintings covering the dome of the “Tomb
of the Exodus” at el-Bagawat in the Great Oasis (the modern Oasis
of Khargeh), a funerary edifice in which memorial services might
also have been conducted,40 display a remarkable iconographic complexity.41 The complexity of the programme with its carefully calculated interconnections between the individual scenes is strangely
contrasted by the extremely poor quality of the execution: although
he obviously tried to copy pictorial models of some sort, the “painter”
was certainly not a professional artesan. The centre of the dome is
decorated with vine tendrils inhabited by birds. Two circular friezes
run around the dome. The upper one represents the Exodus. The
Israelites move towards a building complex opposite the entrance of
the chapel. It is labelled [ IERO]U%ALEM and represents the city of
Jerusalem, with the Constantinian Anastasis Rotunda enclosing the
Holy Sepulchre in its centre, as an image of Paradise made possible.42 The heavenly Jerusalem is coordinated with the image of Noah’s
Ark in the lower frieze register, which displays, besides the Ark of
Noah, three other principal themes, viz., the story of Jonah (south),
Abraham’s sacrifice (east), the three Hebrews in the fiery furnace
(west). All of them are powerful images of deliverance. The spaces
between the principal scenes are filled with the figures of Adam and
Eve in, and expelled from, the terrestrial paradise, further Daniel,
Susanna, Job, Rebecca, Isaiah, Jeremiah, Thecla, and the procession
of the wise virgins in a garden of paradise (from the parable of the
wise and the foolish virgins, Mt. 25.1.13). The representations on
the dome thus present a complex visual discourse on salvation. The
scenes drawn from the Old and the New Testament are, however,
not directly juxtaposed and do not form counterparts. The events
from the Scriptures nevertheless point clearly towards the sacraments
of the Church: e.g., the crossing of the water of the Red Sea alludes to
the sacrament of baptism.43 Special Egyptian features are also prevalent, such as the appearance of Thecla. It can also be noted that the
40
Grossmann 2002 332 f.
A. Fakhry: The Necropolis of el-Bagawat in Kharga Oasis. Cairo 1951; J. Schwartz:
Nouvelles études sur des fresques d’el-Bagawat. Cah. Arch. 13 (1962) 1–11; Thérel
1969; H. Torp: El-Bagawat. EAA Supplemento. Roma 1973 131–133.
42
For the original building of the Church of the Holy Sepulchre, see Eusebius,
Vita Constantini 3.29–40, Mango 1972/1986 11–14.
43
Cf. Thérel 1969 251 f. quoting Origen’s homilies on the Exodus and see
Grabar 1969 128 ff.
41
278
chapter nine
painter inserted a Roman military signum into the representation of
Pharaoh’s army while one of the Israelites has a shield bearing the
Christogram.44
The decoration of the dome of the chapel no. 50 (“Tomb of Peace”)
at el-Bagawat displays a better, though still rather poor, artistic quality. It was painted some decades after the “Chapel of the Exodus”.
In the circular frieze covering the lower zone of the dome are representations of Adam and Eve, Abraham’s sacrifice in the presence of
Sarah, Daniel in the lions’ den, further Jacob, Noah and his family
in the Ark, and Paul and Thecla in conversation in the presence of
St Mary. Daniel in the lions’ den is flanked by personifications: Peace
(whence the traditional name of the chapel in the literature) on the
one side, and Prayer and Justice on the other.45 The personifications
are allegorical for the principal elements of the prophet’s story. The
names of the frontally standing or seated figures are inscribed in
Greek. As an allusion to Paradise, the background of the figured
frieze is filled with four-petalled flowers such as frequently occur on
Egyptian late antique woven textiles. Noah’s Ark has the shape of a
traditional Nile barge. The personifications—which also frequently
occur in the paintings decorating the monastic chapels at Saqqara
and Bawit—emphasize the exegetic purpose of the iconographic programme centred around the promise of salvation, adapted to the
mortuary context.
If we want to form an idea of the quality and style of fifth-century painted church decoration in Alexandria and other urban centres, we have to turn, however, to other monuments. The paintings
in the now destroyed Wescher Tomb in Alexandria, a pagan hypogeum
reused by Christians, present valuable clues for the inventiveness of
Egyptian art in this formative period of Christian iconography and
testify to the cosmopolitan quality of the decoration of middle class
burials. The wall of the exedra opening from the open court of the
tomb was decorated with three scenes, two illustrating the Gospels,
the third a symbolic genre scene (fig. 113).46 From left to right: the
marriage at Cana, the feeding of the five thousand from five loaves
of bread and two fishes, and finally a scene representing a mortu44
M.H. Stern: Les peintures du mausolée de l’Exode à el-Bagawat. Cah. Arch.
11 (1960) 93–119 112 f.
45
Fakhry 1951 67 ff.; Severin 1977a 252 f. no. 290.
46
Venit 2002 fig. 159.
279
ary repast or sacred agape at a tomb.47 The scenes are divided from
each other by trees; the figures are labelled in Greek. The first scene
represents the standing Christ and six reclining figures, among
them St Mary. A figure at the right end of the scene is represented
semi-draped and from the back; above this figure and its neighbour
an inscription reads tÉpaid¤a, “the children”. In the centre of the
second scene the enthroned Christ is represented. The apostle Andrew
runs towards Christ from the left, and Peter from the right. Andrew
carries fish, Peter bread. The third scene depicts three reclining
figures. One of them is semi-draped and shown from the back. Above
– §sy¤ontew, “eating the
them an inscription reads tãw eÈlog¤aw toû xx
blessed bread of Christ”. It has been suggested that this inscription
continued tÉpaid¤a in the first scene and was to be read together
with it: “the children who are eating the bread blessed by Christ”.48
The juxtaposition of the Miracle of Cana with the mortuary repast
and the association of these symmetrical scenes with the central scene,
which visualizes the sacrament of the Eucharist, presents a particularly
successful attempt at the creation of an exegetic representation. The
frontal figure of the enthroned Christ in the centre of the painting is
an iconic image inserted into a symbolic-narrative context. The composition anticipates the structure of sixth- and seventh-century paintings
discovered in the monasteries of Bawit and Saqqara (Chapter IX.2.3).
We have seen above that traditionalist clerics like Epiphanius were
irritated by the figured curtains and hangings used for the decoration of churches. Epiphanius’ letter to the Emperor Theodosius I
clearly indicates that this sort of church decoration was general by
the second half of the fourth century. Finds from Egypt give us an
opportunity to form a more precise idea of the appearance, quality,
and significance of the textiles condemned so fiercely by the bishop of
Salamis. Let us first discuss a remarkable new acquisition of the
Abegg Foundation in Riggisberg, viz., a painting in tempera on canvas, measuring 4.50 m by 1.65 m (fig. 114).49 The canvas originally
47
C. Wescher – G.B. de Rossi: Notice sur une catacombe chrétienne à Alexandrie
(Égypte). Bullettino di archeologia cristiana 3/8 (1865) 57–64; T. Schreiber et al.: Expedition
Ernst Sieglin, Ausgrabungen in Alexandria I. Die Nekropole von Kôm-esch-Schukâfa. Leipzig
1908 18 ff.; Venit 2002 183 ff.
48
T.D. Neroutsos: L’ancienne Alexandrie. Étude archéologique et topographique. Paris 1888
44. Venit 2002 257 note 1217 points out that tÉpaid¤a is neuter plural and §sy¤ontew
masculine, yet she maintains that Neroutsos’ suggestion may nevertheless be correct.
49
Riggisberg, Abegg Stiftung, Kötzsche 1995 figs 1–2.
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decorated a church wall. It represents scenes from the books of
Genesis and Exodus arranged in three registers.
The scene sequence, running in each register from left to right,
includes the creation of Adam and Eve, Adam and Eve in the
Paradise (Genesis 2.7, 2.21 f.), the offering of Abel and Cain (Genesis
4.4 f.), Lot’s flight (Genesis 19.24–26), Noah’s Ark (Genesis 7.7–8.10)
in the first register. In the second register we see Abraham hosting
the three angels (Genesis 18.8); the sacrifice of Isaac (Genesis 22.10–12),
Jacob in Laban’s house (Genesis 29.18), Jacob’s dream (Genesis
28.12–15), and an episode of the Joseph story (Genesis 37.25). The
third register consists of two further scenes of the Joseph story (Genesis
37.14 and 27.18–23, respectively), and three scenes of the Exodus:
the provision of manna (Exodus 16.14–16), the crossing of the Red
Sea (Exodus 14.23–28), and Moses and Aaron (Exodus 16.13).
The painting is of an excellent quality. Its style—as far as one
may form an idea of it from the poor illustration of the preliminary
publication—indicates that the painter was educated in the tradition
of Hellenistic narrative representation. His work is a significant early
attempt at the creation of a Christian narrative cycle. The flow of
the pictorial narrative is cleverly supported not only by the directions of the movements and glances of the figures but also by the
last figures in the first and second registers, who were “sent forward”
from the first scene of the next register in order to interconnect the
superimposed registers with each other.
The scene composition—in which the narrative sequence of the
Old Testament is repeatedly altered50—seems to have been determined by the intention to present a visual articulation of theological concepts. The first and last scenes in the first and second registers
correspond symmetrically with each other. In the first register the
creation of Adam and Eve is paralleled with the preservation of
Noah during the flood. In the second, the hosting of the three celestial visitors by Abraham under the oak at Mamre is juxtaposed with
the repast of Joseph’s brothers after they had thrown Joseph into
the well. Stylistically as well as iconographically, the painting presents a paradigmatic illustration of the most important processes in
50
Before the final publication of the painting it cannot be decided if these changes
are determined by similar considerations as, e.g., the changes in the chronology of
the narrative in the nave mosaics of the Sta Maria Maggiore in Rome, cf. Engemann
1997 39 f.
281
late antique art; instead of terminating it, Christian art emerges from
the mainstream of Classical art.
Besides this superb hanging, the sands of Egypt also preserved the
remains of other paintings on canvas. From the circle of the stylistic and technical predecessors of the Christian paintings, I mention
a fine piece with the representation of a Victory: it is probably a
military flag from the late third or the early fourth century.51 Four
fragments in the collection of the Archaeological Institute of the
University of Trier (Pls XXIII, XXIV)52 date from the late fourth
or the early fifth century. They indicate the production of high-quality monumental paintings representing historical themes or illustrating narrative literature. The inscriptions on two fragments, reading
STRATON and DHMO% YAUMAZON, respectively, name the “army”
and “the amazed people”, and refer to the lost (?) text in the background of the composition. A large painting measuring 5.75 × 1.23
m in a British private collection, dated to the late fifth or the early
sixth century, belongs, in turn, in a Christian context. It represents
the figure of St Collouthos.53 As also indicated by the drapery behind
Collouthos, the painting adorned the interior of a church. The orant
gesture of Collouthos gives expression to the concept of intercession.
Images of praying martyrs and saints interceded for man54 and
received veneration from the late fifth century in Egypt as in other
Christian countries. While the painting with St Collouthos may be
interpreted as an iconic image, other paintings such as the fragments
discovered by Gayet at Antinoe55 indicate that narrative paintings
on canvas representing Old (?) and New Testament scenes continued
to play an ambitious role in the “visual theology” of sixth-century
churches (fig. 115).56
But let us return for a moment to the period of the formation of
Christian iconography. We have seen in Chapter VIII that the developments and changes in the pagan iconography of fourth- and fifthcentury textiles show a shift from more complex, many-figured
51
Moscow, Pushkin Museum I 1a 5800, Parlasca – Seemann (eds) 1999 Cat. 89.
Trier, Sammlung des Archäologischen Instituts der Universität OL 1986.11c,
OL 1986 11e, OL 1986.11a, OL 1986.11d: Grimm 1998 57 and figs 52a, 52b,
52c, 52 d, respectively.
53
Buckton (ed.) 1994 Cat. 72.
54
Ihm 1960 115 ff.; Grabar 1969 74 ff., 94.—For the iconography of martyrs
and representations in martyria, see Grabar 1946/1972 II.
55
Rutschowscaya 1992 Cat. 56–58.
56
52
282
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narrative scenes to the representation of episodes and isolated individual figures that stand symbolically for the whole of a myth.57 This
process started in the late third-early fourth century with the emergence
of symbolic representation in official art (cf. Chapters III.3, VII.1,
VIII.2.2, 4). Yet, as in the case of the mythological reliefs, so we
must be cautious with the interpretation of the mythological hangings
as testimonies of a supposedly linear process, for there are also contemporary textiles which attest to the production of more complex
narrative representations side-by-side with symbolic representations. To
illustrate the manner in which narrative representations were created
in the fourth and fifth centuries, the silk textile with scenes from the
life of Mary and the hanging with Old Testament representations
in Riggisberg were discussed above. Let us add here further examples.
In the first century Pliny the Elder described a special Egyptian
technique of textile decoration in which a linen cloth was painted
with a colour-repelling substance and then submerged in a bath of
dye.58 The design appeared in the light colour of the undyed linen
on the dark—usually blue (indigo) or, more rarely, imitation purple—background of the dyed surface.59 The technique described by
Pliny was revived for luxury textiles in the second half of the fourth
century, as is documented by a very fine fragment with representations of wild animals from the “tomb of Euphemiâan”.60 Around the
turn of the fourth century a series of luxurious resist-dyed textiles
with ambitious figured patterns were produced in outstanding workshops for aristocratic houses as well as for the decoration of churches.
The designs indicate first-class models which were copied and combined by well-trained artists in a competent manner. Though the
preserved hangings and hanging fragments may be attributed to
different workshops and hands, certain mannersisms such as the rendering of human faces and especially the graphic stereotype of the
57
See also Nauerth 1993 91–95.
Pliny, NH 35.42.
59
Late antique resist-dyed textiles should not be mixed up with post-Conquest
block-printed textiles. Cf. E. Kühnel: Islamische Stoffe aus ägyptischen Gräbern in der
Islamischen Kunstabteilung und in der Stoffsammlung des Schlossmuseums. Staatliche Museen zu
Berlin. Berlin 1927 85 ff.; Cat. Hamm Cat. 415.
59
E. Kühnel: Islamische Stoffe aus ägyptischen Gräbern in der Islamischen Kunstabteilung
und in der Stoffsammlung des Schlossmuseums. Staatliche Museen zu Berlin. Berlin 1927 85
ff.; Cat. Hamm Cat. 415.
60
Lafontaine-Dosogne – de Jonghe 1988 figs 5, 6.
58
283
large, round eyes and continuous eyebrows, or the rendering of the
haloes with double lines in both the pagan and Christian representations, show the powerful impact of a particular workshop, or rather
a particular artist, whose works were copied directly or through the
mediation of pattern books. The chronological range of the preserved
monumental hangings decorated in this manner is quite narrow, indicating again a rather short-lived fashion generated by a famous work
of art or by the products of a prestigious artist/workshop.
The iconography and style of both the pagan and Christian textiles
with resist-dyed decoration derive from outstanding models in late
antique “great art”, i.e., monumental relief, wall painting and mosaic.
The famous “voile d’Antinoe” in the Louvre (fig. 116)61 represents
the orgiastic feast of Dionysos and his mother Selene in its central
field which is framed with an inhabited vine scroll62 and with scenes
from the god’s infancy arranged in narrower frieze bands above and
below (?) the feast scene. The figures are masterful reproductions of
the traditional images associated with the Dionysiac revel. The physical realism and vigorous plasticity of the sculptures, mosaics and
wall paintings which were used as models by the designers of these
resist-dyed images is clearly shown through the radically simplified
linear rendering of the body forms and draperies. We have seen a
similarly successful translation of plasticity in linear drawing in the
case of the fourth- and fifth-century monochrome textiles discussed
in Chapter VIII.4.
The main scene on the “voile d’Antinoe” is a harmonically composed list of the protagonists of the myth rather than an episode of
a visual narrative. The narrower frieze, however, presents a real narrative whose sequential episodes are interconnected by figures looking towards the centre of one episode but moving towards the next
one (see the scenes of Dionysos’ birth and his first bath). Columns
standing between scenes seem to mark the end of one longer thematic
unit of the narrative and the beginning of another. The painted
canvas in the Riggisberg collection displays similar techniques of
61
Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. pp. 28–29. Preserved size 3.47 × 1.30 m.
62
A similar border on the fragment of a textile with hunting scenes: Paris, Musée
du Louvre, Département des Antiquités Égyptiennes AF 12749, Santrot et al. (eds)
2001 Cat. 25.
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interconnecting episodes of the same story with each other and separating different stories from each other.
The splendid Artemis hanging of the Abegg Stiftung (fig. 117)63
is closely associated stylistically with the “voile d’Antinoe”.64 According
to Katherine Dunbabin,65 the Artemis hanging shows close similarities
in composition with late fourth- and early fifth-century mosaics such
as the mosaic with the “Offering of the Crane” from Carthage66 and
hunting mosaics from Antioch.67 The figured central field of the Artemis
hanging is bordered with a particularly fine peopled acanthus scroll.68
In the centre of the figured panel a sanctuary is represented from
which the goddess Artemis/Diana emerges in vigorous movement.
To the left of the sanctuary stand four mythological hunters: Meleagros,
Akteon, Narcissus and Adonis. The figures of two (?) further mythological hunters69 are lost.70 The hunter figures which fill the entire
height of the frieze are juxtaposed with two registers of realistic hunting scenes to the right of the sanctuary of Artemis. While Akteon
turns in the posture of the successful hunter towards the sanctuary
and is thus related conspicuously to Artemis and the realistic hunting
scenes, the rest of the mythological hunters stand passively and turn
towards each other in postures associated traditionally with “conversation groups”—postures whose original meaning and visual context
is disregarded here. The mythological hunters thus incorporate their
own myths but do not enact them.71 The accent of the representation
63
Riggisberg, Abegg Stiftung 1397, Baratte 1985 figs 1, 2, original size c. 8.0 ×
1.60 m.—Cf. also the fragment of a textile with Aphrodite Paphia and Adonis in
the same collection, Baratte 1985 fig. 18.
64
The border friezes of the two hangings occur together on the hunting textile
fragment Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des Antiquités Égyptiennes AF
12749, Santrot et al. (eds) 2001 Cat. 25.
65
Dunbabin 1999 329.
66
Dunbabin 1978 57 f., Pls 35–37.
67
Levi 1947 Pls LXXV–LXXX ( Yakto Complex), LXXXVI/b, XC,
CLXX–CLXXIII, CLXXVI/b, CLXXVII (Worcester Hunt).
68
Baratte 1985 figs 4–6. For an analogous treatment of the acanthus, see the
painted decoration on an Egyptian ivory comb found at Qustul, Lower Nubia, in
a princely burial dated to c. 380–390, Török 1988 101 f., Pl. 47 no. 83.—For a
comb with painted decoration in a similar style, found at Karara, see H. Ranke:
Koptische Friedhöfe bei Karâra und der Amontempel Scheschonks I bei el Hibe. Berlin-Leipzig
1926 23, Pl. XVI/7, 8; Cat. Hamm Cat. 202.
69
Probably Hippolytos and Tiresias, cf. the Megalopsychia mosaic from Antioch,
Yakto Complex, Levi 1947 323 ff., Pls LXXV–LXXX (450s or 460s, cf. Dunbabin
1999 180 ff.).
70
Baratte 1985 44.
71
Raeck 1992 93 f.
285
is laid on the realistic hunting scenes and not on the mythological
heroes who are there to function as symbolic devices which elevate
the realistic images of an aristocratic hunt into the sphere of ethical
ideals.72 The conceptual symmetry of the composition is also articulated
visually through the glances and movements of the figures directed
towards the centre, i.e., the sanctuary of Artemis.
The monumental composition structure of the “voile d’Antinoe”
and the Artemis hanging also occurs on two Christian curtains or
hangings in Berlin. Both are incompletely preserved. From the main
register of the larger fragment (Pl. XXV)73 one scene is preserved
showing Daniel between two lions. The prophet Habakkuk arrives
from the left with a dish on which, besides the bread mentioned in
the Old Testament (Dan. 14.33–37), a wine bowl is also placed, presumably to hint at the Eucharist.74 To the right of Daniel stood perhaps King Kyros (?). The main scene is bordered by two narrow
friezes representing sanctuaries divided from each other by trees and
named in Greek inscriptions: martÊrion toË èg¤ou Mixahrow, martÊrion
tou èg¤ou Stefãnou, ÉEkklhs¤a megãle, martÊri[on] toË èg¤[ou . . .], the
Martyria of St Michael and St Stephen, the “Great Church”, the
Martyrion of ? (top border); martÊrion t∞w èg¤aw Svsãnnaw and
martÊrion [. . .], the Martyria of St Susanna and St ? (bottom border).75
These topographical borders recall the topographical border frieze
of the mid-fifth-century Megalopsychia Hunt mosaic from Antioch
representing the towns of Antioch and Daphne76 as well as Paulus
Silentiarius’ description of the woven “veil dipped in the purple dye
of the Sidonian shell” covering the altar of Justinian’s St Sophia:
72
See also the fragment of a reserve-dyed textile with hunting scenes Hermitage
11658, Mat’je – Ljapunova 1951 Cat. 6, Pl. III.
73
Berlin 9658, Illgen 1968 27 ff.; Cat. Hamm Cat. 420b, preserved size 1.60 ×
1.975 m.
74
S. Schrenk in: Cat. Hamm 367.
75
The arguments of A. Papaconstantinou are not compelling. According to her
paper Antioche ou l’Égypte? Quelques considerations sur l’origine du “Danielstoff ”.
Cah. Arch. 48 (2000) 5–10 9 f. the term martyrion does not occur in papyri before
the end of the 5th century. Cf. Grabar 1946/1972 passim and J.B. Ward-Perkins:
Memoria, Martyr’s Tomb and Martyr’s Church. JThS 17 (1966) 20–37.—Cf. also
H. Leclercq: Martyrium. DACL X (1932) 2512–2523.
76
J. Lassus: Antioche en 459, d’après la mosaïque de Yakto. in: J. Balty (ed.):
Actes du Colloque Apamée de Syria, Bilan de recherches archéologiques 1965–1968. Bruxelles
1969 137–147, Pls LXIII–LXVI.—For the survival of the iconographic tradition of
the topographical border, see, e.g., the 8th-century floor mosaic in the nave of the
Church of St Stephen, Kastron Mefaa, Transjordan, Dunbabin 1999 203, fig. 217.
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. . . on the hem of the veil shot with gold, art has figured the countless deeds of the Emperors, guardians of the city: here you may see
hospitals for the sick, there sacred fanes.77
The church(es) and martyria on the textile in Berlin may well have
represented sanctuaries of the same Egyptian town, for one of which
the actual textile was made. The figure of the apostle Peter and the
lower half of the enthroned Christ are preserved from the main register of the smaller Berlin fragment.78 They remain from a traditio legis
scene representing Christ giving the law to Peter, an iconographic
type created in the mid-fourth century in Rome, probably for the
apse mosaic of St Peter’s.79 In the preserved part of a narrow border frieze running above the main register there are five amphorae
between two trees. The accompanying Greek inscription identifies
the representation as a symbolic rendering of the Miracle of Cana.
A now lost fragment of the border frieze represented the Multiplication
of the Loaves.80 The stylistic affinities between the Berlin textiles, the
“voile d’Antinoe”, and the Artemis hanging are quite obvious. The
identical patterns occurring on the draperies or the analogous rendering
of trees and architectural forms suggest an attribution of the designs
of these pagan and Christian textiles to the same master or workshop.
A group of resist-dyed textiles with Old and New Testament scenes
show the impact of narrative book illumination. A fine blue-dyed
linen textile in Cleveland (fig. 118)81 was decorated with three or
more picture zones. From the first zone the scene of the Adoration
of the Magi is preserved; from the second the figure of John (from
the baptism of Christ?) and the Multiplication of Loaves and Fishes;
from the third a small fragment of the scene of Jonah being vomited by the ketos, further Jonah under the bower of gourds and Moses
receiving the Law. Not only are the individual scenes separated from
each other by columns with spiral fluting, but the figures in the
scenes of the Adoration of the Magi and the Multiplication of Loaves
and Fishes also stand in individual areas framed by columns, showing that the images were intended to serve as starting points for ver77
Paulus Silentiarius, Descr. S. Sophiae 755, Mango 1972/1986 89. Cf. Strzygowski
1901 91 ff.
78
Berlin 9658 (a), Illgen 1968 27 ff.; Cat. Hamm Cat. 420a.
79
Ihm 1960 33 ff.; J. Engemann: Gesetzübergabe. Lexikon des Mittelalters IV (1989)
1391–1392; Engemann 1997 75 ff.
80
S. Schrenk in: Cat. Hamm 367 f.
81
Cleveland, The Cleveland Museum of Art, John L. Severance Fund 51.400,
Illgen 1968 49 ff.; Age of Spirituality Cat. 390, preserved size 0.978 × 1.04 m.
287
bal exegesis and not as illustrations presenting continuous pictorial
narratives composed in the tradition of Classical representations. The
decoration of another Christian hanging in the Victoria and Albert
Museum (fig. 119)82 copied, however, a model whose master had
used a traditional narrative device resembling the painted canvas in
Riggisberg, viz., the individual scenes are interconnected by the direction of movements or glances or by figures acting “at the same time”
in two neighbouring scenes. The tradition of Classical pictorial narrative is apparent in both scenes preserved on this textile. In the
right half of the upper register Moses receives the law in the form
of a roll out of the arc of heaven. Behind him stands a cross-nimbed
figure raising his right hand in the gesture of speech, looking toward
Moses but moving in the opposite direction toward another figure
at left. The cross-nimbed figure is Christ, who represents here the
Voice of God in the burning bush speaking to the figure at left, i.e.,
to Moses. The direction of the narrative is of course from the calling of Moses at the burning bush to the receiving of God’s command. A similar conflation of the two scenes, yet without a figure
impersonating God’s Voice appears on another resist-dyed fragment
formerly in Berlin83 and in a relief on the fragment of a Constantinopolitan sarcophagus front from the first half of the fifth century.84
On one of the panels of the wooden door of the Church of Sta
Sabina in Rome representing Moses scenes, the Voice of God is represented by an angel.85 In the lower register of the textile in the
Victoria and Albert Museum Christ is represented in the centre of
a double scene. Turning to right, he moves towards Lazarus in an
open tomb niche. To the left of Christ stands a woman identified
by a Greek inscription as EMARO%A, the woman with the issue of
blood, grasping the garment of the Lord. On this textile as well as
on the Cleveland piece typologically unrelated Old and New Testament
scenes are represented in separate picture zones. While they share
this feature which also characterizes many other contemporary Christian representations, the modes of narrative representation employed
in the two compositions are radically different, indicating the eclectic selection of iconographic models used in the same workshop.
82
London, Victoria and Albert Museum 722–1897, Illgen 1968 43 ff.; Age of
Spirituality Cat. 391.
83
Effenberger – Severin 1992 fig. 58.
84
85
Jeremias 1980.
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288
1.3. Portraying the holy
The young man recognized the Saint because he
had often seen his portrait on images.86
“What . . . made a Christian work of art into an icon?” asks Averil
Cameron in her much-quoted study on “The Language of Images:
The Rise of Icons and Christian Representation”.87 She sets forth as
follows:
By the seventh and eighth centuries the argument over eikones was understood to refer to holy images which received special veneration, and
particularly to images depicting Christ, the Virgin, or the saints, usually
in non-narrative representations, that is, in the familiar frontal poses
adopted in the great Sinai icons . . . Similar images . . . might also appear
in fixed form on the walls of churches, whether in mosaic or fresco
—and, we may add, on painted canvas and vowen textile. “In addition”, continues Professor Cameron,
there is plentiful evidence for small images owned by private individuals, either fixed in their houses or capable of being carried around . . . If
we wish to discover what it was that made these particular images
[i.e., the icons] ‘holy’ in a sense which set them apart, even, perhaps,
at this period, from other sorts of religious art, we must . . . consider
both their subject and the sense of divine presence; the images in question were taken to be not ‘works of art’ in the modern sense, but
depictions of objective reality, and, as such, were held to bring the
very presence of the divine to the worshipper. Images ‘recalled’ the
Gospel narrative or the saint who was depicted, but they were also
regarded as having all the power of the personage represented. Looking
at the great Sinai icons, with their intense gaze, it is easy to see how
this could be so.88
Cameron’s study explores the textual evidence for the “intellectual
and imaginative framework” in which images functioned in seventhand eight-century Byzantium as a “means of demonstrating doctrine
even more exactly than could be done in words”.89 From this viewpoint, the images themselves appear fairly unproblematic: they seem
to have been direct, even if specially abbreviated and concentrated,
86
St Nilus of Sinai, Letter to Heliodorus Silentiarius. Mango 1972/1986 40.
Cameron, Averil 1992.—For the problems discussed in this chapter, see also
the magisterial work of Henry Maguire: Maguire 1996.
88
Cameron, Averil 1992 7–15.
89
Cameron, Averil 1992 40 f.
87
289
visual translations of written doctrine—the unfolding of their “holiness” and veneration being determined by the interaction between
theology and personal piety.
For the art historian, however, the rise of icons and Christian representation is a somewhat more complex, more ambivalent, and at
points a poorly understood or hopelessly undocumented process. The
chronology of this process may differ markedly, too, from what is
suggested by the historian. The art historian discerns the course of
this process in a far broader and more complex context of genres,
forms, and functions than is usually taken into consideration by the
historian or the theologian when s/he turns to the subjects of Christian
image making and iconoclasm.
In this chapter I shall discuss some special formal and functional
aspects of Egyptian late antique and early Byzantine painting from
an art historical stance. I shall also present examples for the correspondences and discrepancies between the textual and visual evidences.
Let us start with an overview of the relevant texts. The first quotation is from the late second-century apocryphal Acts of the Apostle
John. The Acts describe how Lycomedes, a disciple of John, asked
a painter to make a portrait of the apostle without his knowledge.
Lycomedes put the portrait in his bedroom, crowned it with garlands, placed an altar and candles in front of it. Discovering the
painting, but not identifying its subject, John asks his pupil:
Lycomedes, what meanest thou by this matter of the portrait? can it
be one of thy gods that is painted here? For I see that thou art still
living in heathen fashion.
Lycomedes replies:
My only God is he who raised me up from death with my wife: but
if, next to that God, it be right that the men who have benefited us
should be called gods—it is thou, father, whom I have had painted
in that portrait, whom I crown and love and reverence as having
become my good guide.
John’s comment is:
. . . this that thou hast now done is childish and imperfect: thou hast
drawn a dead likeness of the dead.90
90
In: R.A. Lipsius – M. Bonnet (eds): Acta Apostolorum apocrypha post Constantium
Tischendorf I.1. Leipzig 1891; English translation: M. Rhodes James: The Apocryphal
290
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In a recent study91 Thomas Mathews also quotes a passage of Irenaeus
so far ignored, according to which a certain Marcellina, who lived
under Pope Anicetus (c. 154–166), venerated the icon of Christ,
hanging wreaths on it and observing
other rites that are just like those of the pagans.92
As is demonstrated by the paintings from the synagogue and the
Christian building at Dura Europos93 and by the wall paintings in
the catacombs of Rome,94 the third century witnessed the formation
of narrative representation based on the Scriptures. In their role as
visual supports of teaching in cult places and as images of salvation
in mortuary contexts, these third-century paintings also contained
elements that may be interpreted as incipient iconic representations
with a possible liturgical function. I cite a remarkable example: the
central place in the hierarchically organized iconographic programme
of the Baptistery at Dura, viz., the niche wall behind the font, is
occupied by the interconnected iconic images of Adam and Eve and
the Good Shepherd. In the context of the liturgy of baptism, the
two-register painting presents a concentrated visual representation of
the dogmas of original sin and redemption.95
In the mid-fourth century, official church attitude towards iconic
representations was still rather negative, as is shown by Eusebius’
theological considerations on the basis of which he refused the request
of Constantine’s sister Constantia when she asked him for a portrait
of Christ. Eusebius argued that God cannot be portrayed accurately
in human form.96 Yet, what is now more important for us, Eusebius’
letter to Constantia as well as his reference to paintings of Christ
New Testament. Oxford 1960 232 ff., quoted by Grabar 1969 66 f.—Sande 1993 77 f.
interprets the portrait of John in terms of the Roman tradition of having one’s
benefactor’s portrait made.
91
Mathews 2001 166 f.
92
Irenaeus, Adv. Haereses I.25.6, ed. D. Unger – J. Dillon: Irenaeus of Lyons, Against
the Heresies. New York 1972 90.
93
C.H. Kraeling: The Excavations at Dura-Europos . . . Final Report VIII.1. The Synagogue.
New Haven 1956; id.: The Excavations at Dura-Europos . . . Final Report VIII.2. The
Christian Building. New Haven 1967.
94
V. Fiocchi Nicolai – F. Bisconti – D. Mazzoleni: Roms christliche Katakomben.
Geschichte, Bilderwelt, Inschriften. Regensburg 1998; Zimmermann 2001.
95
Grabar 1969 Pls 40, 41.
96
Eusebius, Ep. ad Constantinam. Mango 1972/1986 16 ff. Cf. H.G. Thümmel:
Eusebios’ Brief an Kaiserin Konstantia. Klio 66 (1984) 210–218; Mathews 1999b 506.
291
and the apostles in his Ecclesiastical History97 indicate a growing demand
for and production of iconic images that had devotional functions.
Eusebius clearly sees the pagan roots here:
I have examined images of the apostles Paul and Peter and indeed of
Christ Himself preserved in [colour] painting: presumably, men of
olden times were heedlessly wont to honor them thus in their houses,
as the pagan custom is with regard to saviours.98
The conservative opposition against images is still maintained by
Epiphanius of Salamis (cf. Chapter IX.1.2) who writes thus to the
Emperor Theodosius:
Which of the ancient Fathers ever painted an image of Christ and
deposited it in a church or in a private house? Which ancient bishop
ever dishonored Christ by painting him on door curtains? Which one
of them ever made an example and a spectacle of Abraham, Isaac,
Jacob, Moses and the other prophets and patriarchs, of Peter, Andrew,
James, John, Paul and the other apostles by painting them on curtains
or on walls?99
In his above-quoted recent study on the emperor and the icon,
Mathews strongly emphasizes that
[m]odern art historians have enthusiastically subscribed to a theory
crediting the emperor with a major role in the development of icons,
brushing aside all evidence to the contrary, whether archaeological or
literary. But early sources on the Christian icon consistently parallel it
not with emperor cult, but with the private icon cult observable among
the pagans.100
Some literary sources concerning the sanctity of the emperor’s image
are nevertheless worth recapitulating here.101 According to the late
fourth-century polytheist Themistius, the emperor was akin to God,
97
Eusebius, HE 7.18.4. Cf. M.E. Frazer: Iconic Representations. in: Age of
Spirituality 513–516 514; Elsner 1998a 757.
98
Mango 1972/1986 16.
99
Epiphanius of Salamis, Letter to the Emperor Theodosius, Mango 1972/1986 41 f.
100
Mathews 2001 163.
101
H.P. L’Orange: Studien zur Geschichte des spätantiken Porträts. Oslo 1933; id.:
Apotheosis in Ancient Portraiture. Oslo 1947; id.: Das römische Herrscherbild. Diokletian bis
zu den Konstantin-Söhnen 284 –361 n. Chr. Berlin 1984; N. Hannestad: The Ruler
Image of the Fourth Century: Innovation or Tradition. Acta IRN 15 (2001) 93–107.—
For Athanasius’ use of the imperial image in theological discussion, see Athanasius,
Orations against the Arians 3.5, Pelikan 1990 38.—Cf. also Kitzinger 1954 122 f.; for
the magic powers possessed by imperial images, see Sande 1993 80 ff.
292
chapter nine
his kingship descended from heaven and he was living law.102 In his
view, the emperor’s divinity and the sanctity of his image followed
from his godlike acts and virtues. Themistius argues in a remarkable manner for Theodosius’ godlike features:
. . . mark well, exalted Emperor, that neither beauty nor stature, neither speed nor prowess make a good ruler, if he does not bear in his
soul some form of being like God. Therefore let us enquire ourselves
and call upon the poet [i.e., Homer] to teach us how a being walking on the earth and clothed in flesh can be thought to have the form
of him who is enthroned above the highest vault of heaven . . .103
According to Themistius’ contemporary, Gregory of Nazianzus,104
[i]t is an axiom of royal practice that the rulers should be publicly
honoured by their statues. Neither their crowns and diadems and bright
purple, nor the number of their bodyguards, nor the multitude of their
subjects is sufficient to establish their sovereignty; but they need also
adoration in order to seem more supreme: not only the adoration directed
to them personally, but also that made to their images and portraits,
in order that a greater and more perfect honor be rendered to them.
An important aspect of the Christian attitude towards ruler worship
is added in a Coptic homily attributed to the Patriarch Theophilus
who occupied the see of Alexandria between 385 and 412 (cf. Chapter
IV.2.2). Theophilus speaks about imperial images
painted and set up in the midst of the marketplace [i.e., the Alexandrian
agora], becoming a protection to the whole city.
Moreover, the patriarch also explains the sanctity of the image of
the Theotokos, the Mother of God, through the example of the imperial image:
. . . if violence is committed against anyone, and he goes and takes
hold of the image of the emperor, then no man will be able to oppose
him, even though the emperor is naught but a mortal man; and he
is taken to a court of law. Let us therefore, my beloved, honor the
eikon of Our Lady, the veritable queen.105
102
Themistius, Or. 19, cf. MacCormack 1981 206, for an English translation of
the passage, see Maas 2000 4.
103
Themistius, Or. 15.188c–189a, translation after MacCormack 1981 206 f.
104
Or. 4.80, quoted after Maas 2000 8. Cf. F.W. Norris: Faith Gives Fullness to
Reasoning: The Five Theological Orations of Gregory Nazianzen. Leiden 1991.
105
Theophilus, Homily on the Virgin 90 cols 1 ff., ed. H. Worell: The Coptic Manuscripts
in the Freer Collection. New York 1923 308 f.; quoted by MacCormack 1981 67 f.;
cf. also Haas 1997 83 f.
293
Some decades later, the charismatic abbot Shenoute condemned the
pagan worship of images in the provincial town of Plewit, a community which may stand for many other polytheist communities in
and outside Egypt:106
Woe upon those who will worship wood and stone or anything made
by man’s handiwork (with) wood and stone, or (molded by putting)
clay inside them, and the rest of the kind, and (making from these
materials) birds and crocodiles and beasts and livestock and diverse
beings! . . . Consider your foolishness, O pagans who serve and worship (things) that have no power to move whatsoever (and) especially
(no power) to do something prodigious!
In another sermon (quoted above, p. 137), Shenoute prescribes that
a pagan temple should be transformed visually into a place of Christian
worship by portraying on the walls inscribed formerly with evil hieroglyphs and images “His son Jesus Christ and all His angels, righteous men and saints”.
Turning to another kind of portrait, a passage from the vita of
the Syrian Daniel Stylites (c. 490–493) written around 500 relates
that an exorcised heretic dedicated to the saint
as a thankoffering . . . a silver image, ten pounds in weight, on which
was represented the holy man and themselves [i.e., the exorcised heretic
with his family] writing these words below, “Oh father, beseech God
to pardon us our sins against thee.” This memorial is preserved to the
present day near the altar.107
I conclude the survey of the textual evidence with a brief quotation
from the account of the miracles performed by the saints Cyrus and
John in the pilgrimage sanctuary at Menouthis near Alexandria. The
account was written by Sophronius, patriarch of Jerusalem, who lived
between c. 560–638. Miracle no. 52 relates that Zosimus, a paralytic from Constantinople, prayed to the saints for three days. Then
he went to be bathed, and at the bath St Cyrus appeared to him
dressed in a monk’s garment
not in a dream, as he appears to most people, but in a waking vision,
and just in the manner that he is represented.108
106
Shenoute, The Lord Thundered 47, 49, Amélineau 1909–1914 I 379 ff. Translation
after Frankfurter 1998 78.
107
E.A. Dawes – N. Baynes (trans.): Three Byzantine Saints. Oxford 1948 (repr. edn.
Crestwood 1977) 42, quoted by Vikan 1995 569 f.
108
Sophronius, Miracles of SS Cyrus and John no. 52, J.-P. Migne (ed.): Patrologia Graeca
294
chapter nine
The procedure was similar in many other healing shrines which drew
pilgrims from all over the oikumene. The patient needed a vision of
the saint during an incubation or as a “waking vision”, whereas “the
figure seen in the epiphany seems usually to have matched in features and costume the saint as he was portrayed in art, presumably
around the shrine”.109 It was these portraits that were reproduced in
votive images left by grateful pilgrims at the actual saint’s shrine and
in the eulogias brought back from their pilgrimages. “The saint was
recognized . . . because he appeared in his ‘usual form’ ”.110 It is essential for the understanding of iconographic tradition that it is not “the
image that resembles the saint, but the saint who resembles his
image”.111 The miracles described by Sophronius and other contemporary writers leave no doubt that these images of saints possessed sacred power.
By the early years of the sixth century the theological foundations
for the interpretation of Christian images as a means of the mystical contemplation of the divine were laid down.112 The writings of
Pseudo-Dionysos the Aeropagite gave an enormous impetus to the
unfolding cult of icons.113 In the period between the reign of Justinian
and the beginnings of iconoclasm in 726, little if any controversy
may be observed in the attitude of the Church towards visual theology and the worship of icons.114
How is the process leading from the rejection of the portrayal of
the holy to the rise of the icon reflected in the visual evidence from
Egypt? As we have seen, the painted portrait of the apostle was “a
dead likeness of the dead” for the late second-century author of the
87,3 3423–3675, quoted by D. Montserrat: Pilgrimage to the Shrine of SS Cyrus
and John at Menouthis in Late Antiquity. in: Frankfurter (ed.) 1998 257–279 271.
109
Vikan 1995 573.
110
Ibid.
111
A. Kazhdan – H. Maguire: Byzantine Hagiographical Texts as Sources on
Art. DOP 45 (1991) 1–22; Dagron 1991 passim and esp. 31; id.: Image du culte et
le portrait. in: Guillou – Durand (eds) 1994 121–150.
112
Pelikan 1990 passim.
113
On Pseudo-Dionysus’ De Ecclesiastica Hierarchia 1.2 and De Divinis Nominibus, see
Elsner 1995 97 ff.; on the dating of the rise of the icon cult in the reign of Justinian
ibid. 332 note 34, contra Kitzinger 1977 105 and Cameron, Averil 1992 who date
the rise of the icon cult to the late sixth and seventh centuries.
114
For the relationship between teaching by word and teaching by visual images,
see, however, the letter of Pope Gregory I (590–604) to Serenus, bishop of Marseilles,
C. Davis-Weyer: Early Medieval Art, 300–1150. Englewood Cliffs 1971 46, cf. L.G.
Duggan: Was Art Really the ‘Book of the Illiterate’? Word and Image 5 (1989) 227–251.
295
Apocryphal Acts of John. The text of the Acts also attests, however,
the domestic cult of painted images of pagan deities in polytheist
circles and it also describes an attempt at the Christianization of this
tradition.
Lists of pagan icons of the kind referred to in the Acts of John
and surviving from late second- and third-century Egypt and Syria115
have been presented by Thomas F. Mathews.116 Several panels painted
in tempera or encaustic found in the Fayum represent military gods.117
They may have functioned as votives offered by soldiers as well as
devotional images of domestic cult in a social milieu associated with
the Egyptian army of the Roman period. The votive character of
one of these icons, now in Brussels, is indicated by the small donor
figures represented on it.118 Panels with the representation of Isis,119
Isis, Suchos and Harpocrates,120 Suchos and Min,121 Nemesis,122 the
115
For two panels from a triptych from Palmyra, formerly in Berlin, see Grabar
1969 82 and fig. 215.—For the evidence concerning 3rd-century portraits representing the deified pagan philosopher and holy man Apollonius of Tyana and dedicated in temples, see J. Elsner: The Origins of the Icon: Pilgrimage, Religion and
Visual Culture in the Roman East as ‘Resistance’ to the Centre. in: S. Alcock (ed.):
The Early Roman Empire in the East. Oxford 1997 178–199 178 ff. The art historian
may find it unjustified that instead of speaking about “image” Elsner extends the
term “icon” to cover coin portraits, engraved gems, terracottas, reliefs and sculpture in the round.
116
Mathews 1999a 179 ff., 218 ff. note 17 (22 items); Mathews 2001 175–177
(30 items).
117
Oxford 1922.237 (lost), Rostovtzeff 1933 fig. 2, Mathews 2001 fig. 2; Oxford
1922.239 (lost), ibid.; Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des Antiquités Egyptiennes
P 207, Mathews 1999b ill. p. 506; Cairo JE 87181, Parlasca 1966 273 and Pl.
21/3; Hartford, Wadsworth Atheneum 1934.6, D.L. Thompson: The Hartford
Horseman. CdÉ 50 (1975) 321–325 fig. 1; Berkeley, Phoebe Hearst Museum of Anthropology 6.21384, 6.21385, D.L. Thompson: A Painted Triptych from Roman Egypt.
The J. Paul Getty Museum Journal 6–7 (1978–1979) 185–192; for further unpublished
pieces in the latter collection: Mathews 1999a 219; Providence, Rhode Island School
of Design Museum 59.030, G. Nachtergael: Trois dédicaces au dieu Hérôn. CdE
71 (1996) 138–142, Friedman (ed.) 1989 Cat. 98; private collection, Étampes, France:
M. Rassart-Debergh: Plaquettes peintes d’époque romaine. BSAC 30 (1991) 43–47.
118
Musées Royaux d’Art et d’Histoire E 7409, M. Rassart-Debergh: Masques de
momies, portraits et icones. MC 14–15 (1988) 28–30 Cat. 43, fig. 25.
119
Oxford 1922.238 (lost), Rostovtzeff 1933 fig. 2.
120
Berlin, Ägyptisches Museum 15978, now destroyed. O. Rubensohn: Aus
griechisch-römischen Häusern des Fayum. AA 1905 1–25; Mathews 1999a fig. 139.
121
GRM 22976, V. Rondot: Min, maître de Tebtynis. in: W. Clarysse et al. (eds):
Egyptian Religion, the Last Thousand Years II. Louvain 1998 241–255.
122
Ann Arbor, Kelsey Museum of Archaeology 88723, T.F. Mathews in:
S. Walker – M. Bierbrier (eds): Ancient Faces: Mummy Portraits from Roman Egypt. New
York 2000 (rev. edn. of Walker – Bierbrier et al. [eds] 1997) 126 f.
296
chapter nine
child god Dionysos-Harpocrates123 or Ares and Aphrodite124 may
equally come from the contexts of temple, mortuary, or domestic
cult. The icon of Isis, Suchos and Harpocrates was provided with a
sliding lid which revealed the sacred image when in use.125 Harpocrates
was a popular god of the domestic cult in Roman Egypt. He was,
similarly to Dionysos, also associated with the mortuary cult. In the
figures of Ares and Aphrodite we may also identify a mortal couple
consecrated into the image of the divine consorts. If this is correct,
this icon may have belonged in the realm of mortuary religion. In
turn, the iconic images of the goddess Isis suckling her son Harpocrates126 or the military god Heron,127 who also appears on painted
icons, were subjects of domestic cult, represented on the back walls
of niches in Roman period houses at Karanis128 and Soknopaiou
Nesos in the function of divine protectors of the household.129
Evidently, the domestic cult and the mortuary cult were closely
associated with each other. A small aedicula with the commemorative
portrait of an ephebos, dated to the first half of the third century,
in all probability comes from a domestic cult shrine.130 Another commemorative portrait, painted around 200, was reused as the central
panel of a triptych: the flanking panels, painted by a different hand,
represent Serapis and Isis.131 Obviously, commemorative-religious acts
of private mortuary cult were performed before the opened triptych,
perhaps in a similar manner as before mummies provided with the
painted portrait or the portrait mask of the deceased.
There are good reasons for believing that in the period between
the first and fourth centuries mummies with or without painted porCairo 3369, Doxiadis 2000 36 fig. 5.
Moscow, Pushkin Museum 4233/I 1a 5786, Parlasca 1966 67 no. 8, Pl. 10/4.
125
Mathews 1999a 180 identifies the function of the grooves in the frame of the
icon which were prepared for the lid and quotes three Sinai icons with similar
grooves.
126
Karanis: Boak – Peterson 1931 fig. 49; Doxiadis 2000 43 fig. 15.
127
Karanis: Boak – Peterson 1931 fig. 48; Soknopaiou Nesos: A.E.R. Boak:
Soknopaiou Nesos: The University of Michigan Excavations at Dime in 1931–32. Ann Arbor
1935 9; for the religion of the veterans living at Roman Karanis cf. R. Alston:
Soldier and Society in Roman Egypt. London-New York 1995 138 f.
128
For a wall painting from Karanis representing enthroned and standing gods,
see Grabar 1969 Pl. IV.
129
Frankfurter 1998 136 ff.
130
Cairo CG. 33269, Seipel (ed.) 1998 Cat. 58.
131
Malibu, J. Paul Getty Museum 74 AP.20–22, Walker – Bierbrier et al. (eds)
1997 Cat. 119.—Mathews 1999a 181 suggests that a third of the pagan icons as
well as a third of the Sinai icons come from triptychs.
123
124
297
traits or portrait masks132 were kept at home, where they were displayed in the portico or the court or the domestic shrine and where
they were venerated by the family for several years before they would
have been buried in a family or communal vault.133 As Silius Italicus
says in his poem Punica,
[t]he Egyptians enclose their dead, standing in an upright position, in
a coffin of stone, and worship it; and they admit a bloodless spectre
to their banquets.134
While Silius is mistaken as to the material of the coffins, the essence
of his testimony is also supported by Lucian who writes in his De
luctu that the Egyptian
after drying the dead man makes him his guest at table.135
We also may quote, besides Diodorus136 and Cicero,137 the Life of Antony
attributed to Athanasius,138 according to which the saint forbade his
pupils to bring his body back to the valley after his death “in order
to place it in a house”.
Instead of a stone coffin, as Silius erroneously writes, the mummy
may in fact have been displayed in an aedicula-like wooden coffin139
132
For the mummy portraits, see Borg 1996, with earlier literature; for the
mummy masks, see G. Grimm: Die römischen Mumienmasken aus Ägypten. Wiesbaden
1974. For the cultural context of the portrait mummy cf. L.H. Corcoran: Evidence
for the Survival of Pharaonic Religion in Roman Egypt: The Portrait Mummy. in:
ANRW II.18.5. Berlin-New York 1995 3316–3332, according to whom “Rather than
being incongruous examples of a compromised, hybrid culture, these mummies
embody the dynamic, symbiotic relationship between the indigenous religion of
ancient Egypt and the sepulchral art in which that theology was actualized. Rather
than being works commissioned by the Greek and Roman aristocracy who adopted
native burial customs, these mummies probably belonged to the ethnically diverse,
but culturally homogeneous, Egyptian upper-class known for its restrictiveness and
resistiveness. Although open to critically absorbing foreign influences, these individuals placed their hope in a very traditional ancient Egyptian idea about the afterlife and produced funerary furnishings that provide clear documentary evidence for
the survival of pharaonic religion in Roman Egypt”, ibid. 3331.
133
Borg 1996 196 ff.; Borg 1997; Parlasca 1999 26.
134
Silius Italicus, Punica 13.475, ed. and trans. J.D. Duff, Loeb edn. vol. II.
Cambridge Mass.-London 1961, quoted by Borg 1997 26.
135
Lucian, De luctu 21, ed. and trans. A.M. Harmon, Loeb edn. vol IV. Cambridge
Mass.-London 1961, quoted by Borg 1997 26.
136
Diodorus 1.92.6.
137
Cicero, Tusc., 1.108.
138
Quoted by Dunand – Lichtenberg 1995 3276 with note 271.
139
E.g., Berlin, Staatliche Museen zu Berlin-Preussischer Kulturbesitz Ägyptisches
Museum 17039, Seipel (ed.) 1998 Cat. 15.
298
chapter nine
the doors of which were opened during mortuary repasts or other
commemorative rites held in the context of domestic cult.140 Paintings
on third-century mummy shrouds from Antinoopolis represent in an
illusionistic manner the deceased standing “in the door” of a coffin.141
The triptych with a commemorative private portrait in its centre
and the famous third-century tondo with the portrait of two brothers
from Antinoopolis142 show the direct iconographic and stylistic impact
of contemporary mummy portraits. In all probability, they were
painted by painters who were active in workshops producing mummy
portraits. It would be tempting indeed to interpret them in favour
of the old hypothesis, according to which the Christian icon derives
stylistically143 and/or iconographically and as a genre from the tradition of the mummy portrait as a commemorative private portrait
that was the subject of devotion,144 a hypothesis argued for by Hans
Belting, who also emphasizes, however, the supposed imperial ancestry
of the Christian icon.145 No doubt, the techniques of both the tempera and the encaustic icons correspond with the techniques applied
in mummy portraits.146 Moreover, there are also conceptual, functional,
and iconographic affinities between the commemorative portraits of
private persons and the portraits of martyrs and saints.147
140
Walker – Bierbrier et al. (eds) 1997 36 bring the coffins of this type into connection with the Roman Republican tradition of keeping ancestral busts in cupboards at home.
141
Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des Antiquités Egyptiennes AF 6486
(shroud of a boy), AF 6484, 6487 (shrouds of women): Parlasca – Seemann (eds)
1999 Cats 199, 200; Walker – Bierbrier et al. (eds) 1997 Cat. 180.
142
Cairo CG. 33267, Doxiadis 2000 211 and photo on the title page.
143
Fleischer 2001 58 ff. suggests that early Byzantine icon painters may have
had access to some mummy portraits and might have borrowed from them the
frontality of the representation and the “large, wide open eyes that seem to gaze
into the next world”. He also supposes that “. . . there was an interaction of styles
in the context of painting on panels and the production of late Egyptian funerary
masks made of plaster and painted; this may even extend to the Coptic funerary
stele”. The masks are divided from the early icons by a similar chronological gap.
A relationship between the distorted proportions in the early icons and the (expressionist) distortions of the human face in theatrical masks, as suggested by Fleischer,
is tenable as a conceptual metaphor but does not function as a proof for the impact
of funerary masks (!) on icons. The reference to figural stelae seems, in view of the
fairly well-known history of the genre in Egypt, completely irrelevant.
144
Weitzmann 1976 x; R. Cormack: Painting the Soul: Icons, Death Masks, and Shrouds.
London 1997 65 ff.; Doxiadis 2000 90 ff.
145
Belting 1990 103 ff.; cf. Kitzinger 1954.
146
E. Doxiadis: From Eikon to Icon: Continuity in Technique. in: Bierbrier (ed.)
1997 78–80. Cf. also Cormack 2000b 132.
147
P. Brown: A Dark-Age Crisis: Aspects of the Iconoclastic Controversy. The
299
A direct stylistic and conceptual derivation of the Christian icon
from the genre of the mummy portrait cannot be postulated, however, since the production of the latter ceased by the late third century.148 The main sources for the genre of the Christian icon were
iconographically as well as functionally not the mummy portraits but
pagan icons and imperial portraits. A striking illustration for the latter source is the painted tondo with the portrait of Septimius Severus.149
I shall return shortly to the impact of the imperial portrait.
Around 400, Sulpicius Severus wrote a letter to his friend and
colleague Paulinus of Nola, asking him for his portrait, which Sulpicius
intended to exhibit in the baptistery of his church besides a portrait
of Martin of Tours, who had died shortly before. In his reply150
Paulinus refused the request saying that the homo coelestis cannot, the
homo terrestris should not, be portrayed. His arguments not only show
that he distinguished portrait from commemorative image and commemorative image from cult image, but also indicate that these distinctions were problematic for the theologian.151
His contemporary, the Alexandrian Patriarch Theophilus explained
the sanctity of the portrait of the Mother of God expressly with reference to the worship of the emperor image. From time to time, art
historians raise doubts as to the influence of the sacrae imagines, i.e.,
the official images of the sovereigns and consuls, on the iconography
English Historical Review 346 ( January 1973) 1–34 suggests that icon cult derives from
the cult of the “holy man”. According to Sande 1993, “[t]he icon has its roots in
the Graeco-Roman portrait . . . and its significance lies in its power to represent the
archetype directly, since the icon retains something of the archetype. This idea does
not pertain solely to the icon; it characterizes the ancient portrait in general”.
Considering first of all the concepts connected to the imperial image, Sande does
not discuss iconographic and stylistic aspects.
148
The chronological gap of about three centuries may be eliminated, however,
with some verbal magic. According to Flescher 2001 53 f. “The fact that the custom of using mummy portraits died out some time before the appearance of the earliest icons cennot be ignored. According to Walker . . . the 3rd century AD marks
the end of the tradition. Barbara Borg . . . suggests the middle of the same century
as the closing phase, whereas Klaus Parlasca . . . and others claim the end of the
4th century to be the period of decline. As the question is still open for discussion,
we can only conclude that the custom of using mummy portraits died out before the 5th century.
And since the earliest icons can be dated to the end of the following century, we
are definitely facing a gap.” (My Italics.)
149
Berlin, Staatliche Museen Preussischer Kulturbesitz Antikensammlung 31329,
Seipel (ed.) 1998 45, fig. 10.
150
Paulinus of Nola, Ep. 32.2; R.C. Goldschmidt: Paulinus’ Churches at Nola. Text,
Translations and Commentary. Amsterdam 1940 35 ff.; cf. Belting 1990 110.
151
Belting 1990 ibid.
300
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and theology of the Christian icon. In his book on the origins of
Christ’s iconography, Thomas Mathews argues for an iconographic
and functional continuity between pagan icons and the Christian
icon and strongly contests the impact of the sacrae imagines.152 The
comparison of early sixth-century consular diptychs with the earliest
Sinai icons153—which seem to have belonged to the original equipment of the church of Justinian154—may, however, reaffirm the traditional hypothesis of the connection between the sacred image of
the enthroned emperor or empress and the enthroned Christ or
Mary.155 It suffices to illustrate the impact of the official consular
effigy type156 with the icon of St Peter at Mount Sinai (Pl. XXVI).157
The Byzantine Book of Ceremonies describes the adventus of the images
of the Western Emperor Anthemius in Constantinople in 467 and
the subsequent dispatch of the joint images of Anthemius and his
eastern colleague Leo to the cities of the Eastern empire. The Book
also presents a vivid description of the joyful reception and acclamation
of the sacred images and the proscynesis of the population before
them.158 According to Gregory the Great, the painted portraits of
the Emperor Phocas and the Empress Leontia which were sent in
602 from Constantinople to Rome were displayed first in the Lateran
basilica and then on the Palatine, where they were incensed and
adored.159 The life-size late sixth-century icon of St Peter was similarly carried in processions, kissed, incensed, and worshipped as a
visual embodiment of the divine. Its function as a vehicle of intercession is articulated through the small images of Christ, Mary, and
John (?) in the upper register.160 The same concept is also expressed
by the iconography of the famous sixth-century icon of Christ and
152
Mathews 1999b 506.
Effenberger 1986 252; Belting 1990 125 ff.; Elsner 1998b 258.
154
Weitzmann 1976 6.
155
Grabar 1969 77 ff.
156
E.g., Anastasius, Constantinople, 517, Volbach 1976 no. 21; Orestes, Rome,
530, ibid. no 31; for the small tondi in the upper register cf. esp. Justinus, Constantinople, 540, ibid. no. 33, etc.
157
Weitzmann 1976 23 ff. no. B 5, Pls VIII–X, XLVIII–LI.
158
De Cer. 1.87; MacCormack 1981 68.
159
Belting 1990 119, 629 note 16.
160
Cf. these images with the small tondo portraits of Mary and an angel in
Cairo, CM 9104, 9105, Cat. Paris-Agde Cat. 203a, 203b, and of Christ in Mainz,
Landesmuseum, Prinz Johann Georg-Sammlung des Kunsthistorischen Instituts der
Universität 134, Cat. Hamm Cat. 111.
153
301
St Menas from Bawit (Pl. XXVII)161 or by the hierarchical composition that interconnects God’s hand, Mary, the Child, the angels,
and the figures of the saints in the splendid contemporary icon of
the enthroned Virgin (Pl. XXVIII).162 Large-size processional icons
painted on both sides were produced for local churches too. An
incompletely preserved icon with St Theodore (recto) (Pl. XXIX)163
and an archangel (verso) presents an impressive example of the artistic quality of the icons displayed and venerated in late sixth- and
seventh-century local churches.
The chronological gap between the third-century pagan icons and
these sixth-century Christian icons can be filled, however, only with
the texts quoted in the first part of this chapter. Nevertheless, some
sixth-century and later icon types strongly suggest that the art historical gap is accidental or is a result of the Byzantine tradition
which prescribed the burning of old icons. E.g., early (?) sixth-century votive icons from Antinoe as a genre clearly derive from the
pagan votive icon.164 Another genre, represented by the icon of Bishop
Abraham of Hermonthis (Pl. XXX) painted around 590–600,165 takes
us back for a moment into the realm of the official portrait. In their
role as high functionaries of the empire, the bishops received the
right of official portraits which were displayed on their consecration
in their basilicas and which received prayers for intercession and
became subjects of veneration.166 The display as well as the destruction of bishops’ portraits follows imperial patterns, as is indicated in
the description given by John of Ephesus of what had followed the
Council of Chalcedon (451, cf. Chapter IV.2.5):
161
Cat. L’art copte Cat. 72.
162
Weitzmann 1976 18 ff. no. B 3, Pls IV–VI, XLIII–XLVI.
163
CM 9083, P. van Moorsel – M. Immerzeel – L. Langen: The Icons. Catalogue
Général du Musée Copte. With the Collaboration of Aida Serafeem. Cairo [1991] Cat. 8.
Cf. Z. Skalova et al.: Looking through Icons: Note on the Egyptian-Dutch Conservation
of Icons Project 1989–1996. in: Emmel et al. (eds) 1999 375–387 379 f., figs
1/a–d, 2/a, b.
164
Florence, Museo Egizio 13137, 13138, Del Francia Barocas (ed.) 1998 Cat.
84, 85; Cairo J 68825, Age of Spirituality Cat. 496; Cairo JE 68824, JE 68826, M.
Rassart-Debergh: De l’icône païenne à l’icône chrétienne. MC 18 (1990) 39–70 59 f.
nos 5/2, 5/3, figs 18, 19.
165
Berlin 6114, Effenberger – Severin 1992 Cat. 84.
166
Ihm 1960 71 ff.
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302
The name of the synod was written up, and proclaimed in them [i.e.,
in monasteries], and the pictures of all the orthodox [i.e., Monophysite]
fathers taken down, and those of John himself [i.e., John III Scholasticus,
patriarch of Constantinople, 565–577] everywhere set up. But as he
had done, so was he requited of God. For after his bitter and painful
death, and the succession of Eutychius, his predecessor, upon the throne,
his pictures in all places were utterly destroyed, and those of Eutychius
fixed up in the churches in their stead.167
The painters of the official portraits, identical with the painters of
the icons of the saints, created the same non-individualised sacred
portrait types for bishops and saints.168 The influence of the sacred
imperial image in the creation of these sacred types is obvious. It is
important to note that, as is also demonstrated by the Sinai icon of
Mary and the Child, sacred portrait types created at different times
or in different stylistic milieus were frequently united within the same
iconic composition.169
2. Ecclesiastical display and delight in the good things
Truly praise the Lord, all you peoples, who have
been deemed worthy to be given such skill, who
delight in such good things.170
2.1. The city of St Menas
The tomb of St Menas and the shrines built above and around it
belonged to the most important pilgrimage sites of the late antique
and early Byzantine periods. The city of St Menas171 in the region
of the Mareotis c. 45 km south-west of Alexandria received imperial patronage and was visited by pious pilgrims from all over the
oikumene, as is also shown by the Menas flasks, the small clay ampullae decorated with the image of the saint which were filled with oil172
167
John of Ephesus, Eccles. Hist. 1.36, Mango 1972/1986 133 (6th century).
Belting 1990 110, 148 ff.
169
Belting 1990 150 ff.
170
Theodoret, Bishop of Cyrrhus (c. 393–c. 466) on figured textiles, De providentia oratio IV. PG LXXXIII col. 620A, quoted by Maguire 1993 159.
171
The ancient name of the settlement remains unknown. In the textual evidence
it appears as “the church of St Menas in the [region of Lake] Mareotis”, Grossmann
1998c 282.
172
At the altar of the Justinianic Tomb Church “a vessel of alabaster was placed
168
303
and taken home as eulogia by the pilgrims. Menas flasks were found
throughout the Mediterranean, the Balkans, in France, Spain, Germany,
Bulgaria, and Hungary.173
According to the encomium on St Menas written by the Patriarch
John,174 Menas was a Roman soldier of Egyptian origin who suffered
martyrdom in Phrygia around 308. His body was taken to Egypt by
his former army comrades who were transferred temporarily to the
region of Lake Mareotis. On their return to Phrygia, the camels carrying the coffin containing Menas’ relics stopped at a village called
Este (?) and refused to proceed any further. The soldiers thus buried
the relics of the saint at a place near Este. After a while the villagers
noted the healing power of Menas’ tomb and built an oratory in
the form of a “tetrapylon” covered by a dome. According to an
anonymous martyrdom, however, Menas’ relics were collected by his
sister and taken first to Alexandria and then to a place called Nepaeiat
where she buried them in a crypt which seems to have been their
family tomb. For a time Menas’ burial place was forgotten, but
miraculous healings brought about its rediscovery and then the development of a pilgrimage centre around it.175 From the first half of
the fifth century, the martyr church of St Menas in the Mareotis
was a famous healing place where incubation was employed as an
important form of healing176—a form of healing, it may be added,
which derived from a pagan practice and which was disapproved of
into the ground with a narrow upper opening at floor level . . . Apparently, oil was
poured through that opening into the vessel. There it became consecrated through
the vessel’s proximity to the earth around the tomb . . . Later the oil was taken
out . . . It is very likely that this practice led to the invention of the . . . Menas bottles”. Grossmann 1998c 285.
173
B. Kötting: Peregrinatio religiosa. Wallfahrten in der Antike und das Pilgerwesen in der
alten Kirche. Regensburg-Münster 1950 189 ff.; P. Lopreato: Le ampulle di San
Menas e la diffusione del suo culto nell’Alto Adriatico. Antichità Altoadriatica 12 (1977)
411–428; I. Barnea: Les monuments paléochrétiens de Roumanie. Città del Vaticano 1977
232 f.; M. Krause: Karm Abû Mena. RBK III (1979) 1116–1117; Z. Kádár: Die
Menasampulle von Szombathely. Akten des 12. Internationalen Kongresses für Christliche
Archäologie, Bonn 22.–28. September 1991 ( JbAC Ergänzungsband 20) 886–888.—For the
typology and chronology of the Menas flasks, see Z. Kiss: Les ampoules de Saint Ménas
découvertes à Kôm el-Dikka (1961–1981). Varsovie 1989.
174
John III (681–689) or John IV (775–789), Encomium on Apa Mena, Drescher
1946 35–72, 126–149.
175
Bibliotheca Hagiographica Graeca. Third edn. Bruxelles 1977 1254 (Greek); Drescher
1946 1–6, 100–104.
176
Miracles of Apa Mena and Encomium on Apa Mena, Drescher 1946 30 ff., 64 f.,
119, 123.
304
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by many influential clericals, including Athanasius and Shenoute.177
The story of the anonymous martyrdom is supported by the archaeological evidence.178 It was found that the nucleus of the pilgrimage
site, i.e., the tomb of the saint, was in a hypogeum built originally
for pagan burials, a part of which was probably the ancestral burial
place of Menas’ family.179 Menas’ original burial place was transformed
later into an arcosolium niche. On the ground level above the tomb
first a small cenotaph, then a mud brick mausoleum—the “tetrapylon” of the encomium—was built.180 The first church above the tomb
was a three-aisled basilica erected in the first half of the fifth century
(Tomb Church).181 In the second half of the fifth century it was
enlarged into a five-aisled basilica with annexes, a staircase to the
saint’s tomb, and a baptistery. In the late fifth century a large threeaisled transept basilica (the Great Basilica)182 was added to it (fig.
120).183 Its ground plan repeats a type created in the fourth century
and associated especially with pilgrimage shrines in the fifth century
(e.g., Thessalonica, St Demetrios, cf. Chapter VI.3). In the first half
of the sixth century the Baptistery was also rebuilt with an octagonal ground plan in a monumental style.184
The complex of Tomb Church, Great Basilica and Baptistery
underwent considerable alterations under the reign of Justinian I
(527–565). The Tomb Church was replaced by a double-shell tetra-
Frankfurter 1998 187 ff.
Preliminary reports on the excavations conducted at Abu Mena were published by P. Grossmann and others in MDAIK 19 (1963) 114–120, 20 (1965) 122–137,
21 (1966) 170–187, 22 (1967) 206–224, 26 (1970) 55–82, 33 (1977) 35–45, 36 (1980)
203–227, 38 (1982) 131–154, 40 (1984) 123–151; AA 1967 457–480, 1991 457–486,
1995 389–423; and see Grossmann 1989; Pensabene 1993 289 ff.; Grossmann
1998b, 1998c. For the settlement history of Abu Mena, see recently H.-C. Noeske:
Münzfunde aus Ägypten I. Die Münzfunde des ägyptischen Pilgerzentrums Abu Mina und die
Vergleichsfunde aus den Diocesen Aegyptus und Oriens vom 4.–8. Jh. n. Chr. I–II (Studien zu
Fundmünzen der Antike. SFMA 12). Berlin 2000 16 ff., 93 ff., 188.
179
K.M. Kaufmann: Die Menasstadt und das Nationalheiligtum der altchristlichen Aegypter.
Ausgrabungen der Frankfurter Expedition am Karm Abû Mînâ 1905–1907 I. Leipzig 1910
71 ff.; id.: Zur Ikonographie der Menas-Ampullen. Cairo 1910 110 ff.
180
P. Grossmann in: P. Grossmann – H. Jaritz – C. Römer: Abû Mîna. Zehnter
vorläufiger Bericht. Kampagnen 1980 und 1981. MDAIK 38 (1982) 131–154 137 ff.,
figs 3–5.
181
Also called Martyr Church, Small Basilica, Gruftkirche. Grossmann 1989;
Grossmann 1998b fig. 1; Grossmann 2002 401 ff.
182
Basilica of Arcadius in the earlier literature.
183
Grossmann 1998a fig. 3; Grossmann 2002 405 ff.
184
Grossmann 1998b 282 ff.; Grossmann 2002 141 ff.
177
178
305
conch in which the tetraconch was formed actually by inner colonnades (fig. 121).185 The transept and the sanctuary of the Great
Basilica were rebuilt in an enlarged form (fig. 122).186 The Tomb
Church, the altar of which was placed in front of the east conch,
was connected with the Great Basilica through a transversal room
with exedrae formed by colonnades at its north and south ends (fig.
121). This special transitory room also functioned as the narthex of
the Great Basilica and was modelled on the same (Alexandrian?)
architectural type as the western narthex of Shenoute’s “White
Monastery” (see Chapter VI.2). The colonnades of the Tomb Church,
the transitory narthex and the wide, monumental central door of the
Great Basilica secured visual contacts between the individual parts
of the entire monumental compound formed by the Baptistery, the
Tomb Church and the Great Basilica. The originality of the architecture of the tetrachonch and the “narthex” is questioned.187 Quite
independently from the typological origins of its individual parts or
from certain detail solutions which may be interpreted in different
ways,188 the compound represents nevertheless a remarkable architectural achievment. The spatial sequence of the central Tomb
Church—which was typologically influenced by monumental martyr
sanctuary types (cf. Chapter VI.2)—the transversal “narthex”, and
the longitudinal Great Basilica is well-considered aesthetically as well
as liturgically. The long views from the east door of the Baptistery
to the apse of the Great Basilica189 and vice versa, which were theatrically impeded, but not obstructed, by the colonnades of the Tomb
Church and the “narthex”, must have been spectacular.
The alternation of the vertical (Tomb Church), transversal (“narthex”), and longitudinal axes (Great Basilica) as well as the extraordinarily long views which were intended to visualize the functional/
Grossmann 1998b fig. 6, below.
187
Severin–Severin 1987 16; P. Grossmann: Die zweischaligen spätantiken Vierkonchbauten in Ägypten und ihre Beziehung zu den gleichartigen Bauten in Europa
und Kleinasien. in: Grimm et al. (eds) 1983 167–173; Grossmann 1998c 284.
188
E.g., according to H.-G. Severin in Severin-Severin 1987 16 it is a weakness
of the Tomb Church that its tetraconch-type structure could be realized only from
the interior while the exterior had the appearance of an unarticulated square block.
Severin also finds that the connection between the colonnades and the perimeter
walls of the church must have been visually awkward.
189
The distance between the east entrance of the Baptistery and the apse of the
Great Basilica was more than 100 m.
185
186
306
chapter nine
theological unity of the scenes of baptism, martyr worship/healing,
and Eucharist indicate that the sixth-century rebuilding was directed
by first-class architects who were instructed by a learned clergy and
were equally familiar with traditions of Alexandrian Hellenistic architecture and spatial solutions in monumental late Roman architecture. The alternation of axes is also prevalent, e.g., in the early
5th-century palace of Lausus in Constantinople, in which a circular
hall was followed by a transversal vestibule and a longitudinal great
hall.190 The buildings of the sanctuary compound at Abu Mena were
decorated with marble column bases, shafts, capitals, wall revetments
and screens which were partly reused and/or recarved pieces from
earlier (Alexandrian?) buildings191 and partly produced for the buildings erected or rebuilt in the reign of Justinian.192 The fragment of
a vault or apse (?) mosaic with the representation of acanthus foliage
and the figure of an aquatic bird on a yellow (for gold) background
dates from the first half of the sixth century.193
The mosaic fragment from Abu Mena is considered to be the
only larger mosaic fragment of early Byzantine date which was probably made by Egyptian artists. In the view of Hjalmar Torp,194 however, the great Transfiguration mosaic in the church of the Monastery
of St Catherine at Mount Sinai,195 commissioned by Justinian I and
laid in 550 or 565,196 may also have been made with the participation of Egyptian (Alexandrian) artists.197 The Sinai mosaic represents
Moses at the Burning Bush and receiving the Law, Mary and John
the Baptist and the eucharistic lamb adored by two angels on the
triumphal arch, the Transfiguration in the conch, medallion portraits
190
Cf. J. Bardill: The Palace of Lausus and nearby Monuments in Constantinople:
A Topographical Study. AJA 101 (1997) 67–95; Mundell Mango 2000 950, fig. 52.
191
E.g., Severin – Severin 1987 nos 4–8, 10, 11; Pensabene 1993 296 nos 1–19
and the Cat. nos listed on p. 297.
192
E.g., Severin – Severin 1987 nos 12–14; Pensabene 1993 297 nos 20–26.
193
It was found at the Baptistery. Severin 1977 253 no. 291/b.
194
Torp 1965a 371, and reaffirmed in a conversation with the author in Oslo,
May 2003.
195
For the church, see Forsyth – Weitzmann 1973; P. Grossmann: Neue baugeschichtliche Untersuchungen im Katharinenkloster im Sinai. AA 1988 543–558 553 ff.
196
K. Weitzmann in: Forsyth – Weitzmann 1973 11 ff. and see the penetrating
iconographic analysis presented by Elsner 1995 100–124. For the dating on the
basis of the Greek inscription in the mosaic containing the mention of Abbot
Longinus and Deacon John and the date “indiction 14” cf. Cormack 2000a 910
with note 56.
197
Such a possibility is neither excluded, nor argued for by Cormack 2000a 910 f.
307
of Old Testament prophets and New Testament apostles, and portraits of Abbot Longinus and Deacon John around the rim of the
apse (fig. 124).198 In Ja≤ Elsner’s words, the mosaic
was made and intended as an image for the present, with a message
for the present, representing Christ as the eternal God-man (the second
person of the Trinity), as the sacrificial-eucharistic lamb and as the Sinaitic
vision proffered to Moses twice, to Elijah, to the apostles at Tabor
and to the congregation here and now in this church199 . . . The liturgy
of the eucharist, performed before the images of the lamb and of Christ
transfigured, is the ultimate ritual act of mediation between the worshipper at Sinai and the God . . . It is revealing that in the mosaic,
apart from transfigured Christ, none of the figures within the narrative
scenes addresses the viewer with a frontal gaze. The narrative panels
are paradigmatic and prescriptive but not intercessory in the way that
frontal images and icons are. However, John the Baptist and the Virgin
Mary on the triumphal arch and the apostles and prophets in the rim
of medallions around the apse-conch all engage the viewer frontally.
There is a genealogy of intercession here. The movement is from the
prophets represented beneath Christ (David, of whose seed he was
born [Romans 1.13], is in the significant position immediately below
him) through Christ himself to the apostles in the medallions on the
rim. John the Baptist, the “forerunner”, and the Virgin (the immediate
predecessors of Christ) are specially emphasised by being placed in the
triumphal arch. Christ himself is the supreme link—uniting the intercessional signification of the mosaic with its theophanic programme . . .
The very enactment of the liturgy and the eucharist . . . in the presence
of the worshipper is the final stage of this development, for the worshippers at Sinai are Christ’s living Church.200
As Elsner acutely observes, the mosaic is a “text” on its own right rather
than the illustration of a text,201 adding that by the sixth century
Byzantium was an “exegetic” culture, in which every event, text and
image could be read as an exegesis of the one fundamental and real
event—namely, the Incarnation as represented by the narrative of
Christ’s life and Passion.202
Elsner 1995 fig. 17.
Elsner 1995 123.
200
Elsner 1995 121 f.
201
On the issue, see also P. Brown: Images as a Substitute for Writing. in: I.
Wood (ed.): East and West: Modes of Communication. Proceedings of the First Plenary Conference
at Merida. Leiden-Boston-Köln 1999 15–34.
202
Elsner 1995 124.
198
199
308
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The variety of capitals in the nave of the church of St Catherine is
regarded as an indication of a local architect and masons (and hence
obviously as an indication of “provincial” style) and is contrasted
with the high quality of the mosaics, which must thus have been
carried out by Constantinopolitan artists.203 The mixing of capitals
of various types in the same colonnade is, however, a meaningful
feature of late antique architecture that cannot be viewed from the
aspect of (modern) quality principles alone.204 E.g., different types of
reused capitals and shafts of different heights were mixed, almost as
a rule, in the great early Christian basilicas of Rome.205 The excellent
quality or the non-illusionistic style of the mosaic should not be interpreted as a compelling argument for non-local artistry, either. There
are no reasons for assuming that complex and sophisticated iconographic programmes such as that of the Sinai apse mosaic could not
have been conceived and executed in early Byzantine Egypt. The
opposite is indicated by the monuments reviewed in Chapter IX.1.2,
yet, for the time being, the continuity of the art of the mosaicist,
exemplified by splendid Hellenistic206 and Roman period207 monuments from Alexandria and other sites, cannot be proved.
The church complex above the tomb of St Menas was the centre of an imposing urban development. The excavated remains of
colonnaded streets and squares, street arches, city walls (late sixth
century), city gates, public buildings, shops and dwellings208 display
the typical features of a late antique Mediterranean city without any
particular local features. Monumental urban planning is prevalent in
the shaping of the spaces surrounding the church complex and the
street leading to it (fig. 123).209 The principal approach to the church
203
For the views in the literature, see the summary presented by Cormack 2000a
910 f.
204
B. Brenk: Spolia from Constantine to Charlemagne: Aesthetics versus Ideology.
DOP 41 (1987) 103–109; id.: Spolien und ihre Wirkung auf die Ästhetik der varietas.
Zum Problem alternierender Kapitelltypen. in: J. Poeschke (ed.): Antike Spolien in der
Architektur des Mittelalters und der Renaissance. München 1996 49–92.
205
Cf. the observations made by Fabricius Hansen 2001 76 ff.
206
For the monuments, see Daszewski 1985 and D. Said: Deux mosaïques hellénistiques récemment découvertes à Alexandrie. BIFAO 94 (1995) 377–380.
207
See, e.g., the geometric pavement with a Medusa shield centre emblem, dated
to the 1st half of the 2nd century, discovered in 1994 in Alexandria, A.-M. GuimierSorbets in: Cat. Petit Palace Cat. 245.
208
For a city plan, see Grossmann 1998b fig. 2.
209
Grossmann 1998c Diagram 1.
309
complex was through the north-south colonnaded main street.210 The
line of the main street was, however, repeatedly broken so that the
pilgrims could glimpse the destination of their journey only when
they reached the last section of the street. The spiritual drama of
the pilgrim’s progress towards the saint’s shrine was intensified by the
continuous narrowing of the street’s succesive sections until in the
final section the colonnades were also abandoned and the street took
the shape of a corridor leading to a narrow tripartite archway. The
tomb of St Menas was approximately in the line of the approach.
Behind the archway, a large colonnaded square opened with its main
axis perpendicular to the approach. The arrival at a square that
opens out sideways halted as if automatically the movement and
enhanced in the pilgrim the sensation of having reached at last the
threshold of the pilgrimage’s final aim.211
The main xenodochia or hospices opened on the north side of the
square.212 To the south of the Tomb Church and Baptistery, a large
two-storeyed exedral building stood. The semicircular piazza formed
by the exedra and the east front of the Tomb Church and the
Baptistery had a monumental and representative appearance which
was also enhanced by the exedra’s colonnaded front and the colonnade running along the east front of the Tomb Church, from which
a side entrance to the tomb shrine opened. According to Peter
Grossmann’s ingenious suggestion, the exedra was a nosokomion or
hospital and accommodated pilgrims who expected healing through
incubation. The particular layout of the exedral building, whose
rooms were all situated in an equal distance from the saint’s tomb213
may have been determined by this particular practice.214 Such a relationship between the exedra and the Tomb Church is also articulated
210
For the colonnaded or porticoed street in late antique urban architecture, see
A. Segal: From Function to Monument. Urban Landscapes of Roman Palestine, Syria and
Provincia Arabia. Oxford 1997; and cf. M. Mundell Mango: The Porticoed Street at
Constantinople. in: Necipoglu (ed.) 2001 29–51.
211
Grossmann 1998b 278 f. observes that similar effects of spatial composition
were also employed in the architecture of the pilgrimage shrine of Symeon Stylites
at Qal’at Sim’an (Telanissos) in Syria.
212
The Great Xenodochion (Grossmann 2002 fig. 15) was, according to the suggestion of T. Sternberg: Orientalium more secutus. Räume und Institutionen der Caritas des
5. bis 7. Jahrhunderts in Gallien. Münster 1991 185, a pandocheion, i.e., an inn for the
more wealthy pilgrims, cf. Grossmann 2002 233.
213
Grossmann 2002 236 f. compares this feature of the layout with the Roman
period sanatorium adjoining the Hathor Temple in Dendera.
214
Grossmann 1998c 288.
310
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by the colonnade at the east front of the Tomb Church, which
emphasizes the importance of this wall of the piazza and draws the
spectator’s attention to the very centre of the piazza, viz., the door
opening into the shrine containing St Menas’ relics.
From the Council of Chalcedon in 451 (Chapter IV.2.5) until the
Arab Conquest the shrines of the pilgrimage center were under the
authority of the Dyophysite (Greek) patriarchate of Alexandria. After
the Conquest the pilgrimage site was controlled by the Monophysites.
The Persian invasion of Egypt in 619–629 and the Arab conquest
wrought serious damages on the city and also caused changes in the
composition and structure of its population and a decline of pilgrimage. While the Tomb Church was rebuilt as a five-aisled basilica by the Patriarch Michael I (744–768),215 the urban structure
disintegrated in the course of the seventh and eighth centuries. The
shops and houses along the colonnaded streets gradually invaded the
porticoes, occupying more and more of the sidewalks and parts of
the pavement. Exactly the same process can be observed from the
seventh century in other late antique cities in the Mediterranean and
the Near East, where the colonnaded streets and squares likewise
turned into medieval suqs.216
2.2. Sculpture in the early Byzantine period
If God’s lessons from the light of the Word do not
open up understanding, let us then at any rate
obtain examples from the buildings themselves and
let stone and wood be teachers to us dullards, so
that we may achieve such a work in faith as we
have accomplished by our handicraft.217
In his “Notes on Early Coptic Sculpture”, Kitzinger asked two questions: First, did Alexandria remain “a stronghold of Hellenistic art
Grossmann 1989 173 ff.; Grossmann 1998b fig. 5.
The model of this change was put forward first by J. Sauvaget: Le plan de
Laodicée-sur-Mer. Bulletin des Études Orientales 4 (1934) 81–114. It was proved first
by excavations at Palmyra, cf. K. al-As"ad – F.M. Stepniowski: The Umayyad Suq
in Palmyra. Damaszener Mitteilungen 4 (1989) 205–223. Cf. also B. Ward Perkins:
Urban Survival and Urban Transformation in the Eastern Mediterranean. in: G.P.
Broglio (ed.): Early Medieval Towns in the Western Mediterranean. Mantova 1996 143–153;
H. Kennedy: Islam. in: Bowersock – Brown – Grabar 1999 219–237 231 f. For
Abu Mena, see Grossmann 1998b 274; Grossmann 1998c 297.
217
Paulinus of Nola, Carmina 28 258–262, translation: P.G. Walsh: Poems. New
York 1975.
215
216
311
throughout the Christian period, and . . . maintained the highest
Classical standard” or did Alexandrian art sink “as early as the fifth
century to the level of provincialism”? and, second, is “Coptic” art
to be explained as “some sort of violent reaction . . . against the Greek
tradition of Alexandria”? Kitzinger concluded that there is little evidence for the continuity of “a genuine Hellenistic tradition . . . through
all the crises of the Late Roman and Early Christian period” and
suggested that “Coptic” art represents an Egyptian form of “subantique”, a “blending of Classical, provincial, and oriental features”.218
Surveying sculptural evidence from Oxyrhynchos, Heracleopolis
Magna, Bawit, and Saqqara, Kitzinger sketched a linear process of
decline of the Classical tradition, allowing, however, for temporary
impulses from the court art of Constantinople. Extending the chronological limits set in Kitzinger’s work to include sculptures made in
the eighth to thirteenth centuries, John Beckwith argued for a similar picture in his influential 1963 book:
With regard to the representation of the human form Coptic sculpture
in the fifth and sixth centuries is merely the last stage of an Hellenistic
art. The subject matter was derived largely from the Greeks, the forms
were Greek: the patrimony just atrophied. The disintegration of the
classical canons of the human form prevalent throughout the Roman
empire in the fourth and fifth centuries became final in a province where
there was no constant and compelling metropolitan impetus. It would
seem, in fact, that whether Alexandria was capable or not of conserving
classical traditions up to the Arab Conquest, she was incapable of
reviving the arts in the hinterland. Such artefacts that may with some
plausibility be assigned to that city all show a conservative, classical
art steadily on the decline. Withut a court to keep up standards, to
initiate fashion, to create periods of renewal, there could be no progress,
only a contraction into abstract and rigid form . . . [ T ]he Coptic
Patriarchs, even less the abbots of the monasteries in the deserts, had
little interest in the maintenance of aesthetic standards. Consequently,
nothing grew out of the late antique style current in Egypt or from
the injections of court style from Constantinople.219
Kitzinger and Beckwith focused on style and they did so from the
dogmatic stance of an abstract Classical tradition. While acknowledging the debt art historical research owes to Kitzinger’s and
Beckwith’s pioneering style-critical analyses, in this book I have argued
218
219
Kitzinger 1938 181 f., 203 ff., 212 ff.
Beckwith 1963 32 f.
312
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for a more complex investigation of function, style, iconography, and
chronology, and for a more comprehensive comparison of the various branches and levels of artistic production. Surveying the evidence from the period between the late third and the late fifth
century, we have found that the survival of the Classical tradition
of Egyptian Hellenistic art was a complex process of transformation
that occurred in and was determined by changing cultural and social
contexts. It was a process of transformation that was articulated on
different interactive levels and in different forms evolving in the cosmopolitan context of the artistic production in the late Roman and
early Byzantine empire (Chapters V–VIII).
The evidence discussed in Chapter VIII.4 attests the interdependence
of style and iconography in the context of monochrome textiles, an
especially Egyptian—and paradigmatically late antique—genre. In
Chapter IX.1.2 we reviewed the alternative forms of visual narrative
emerging in the formative period of Christian art. The great painting representing Old Testament scenes in Riggisberg (fig. 114) as
well as the resist-dyed textiles with Old and New Testament scenes
(figs 118, 119, Pl. XXV) clearly indicate that the late fourth and the
fifth century witnessed the creation of ambitious Christian narrative
representations in Egypt, too. They were not restricted to subsidiary
church furniture such as painted and woven textile curtains, hangings
and covers, or toreutic objects. We may form an idea of the early
phases of narrative church decoration on the basis of the painting
with New Testament scenes from the Wescher Tomb (fig. 113) and,
however indirectly, the splendid carving representing “the liberation
of a city” in the Berlin collection.
On account of its size alone (height 0.45 m), the boxwood carving
in the Museum für Spätantike und Byzantinische Kunst (fig. 125)220
could not be called monumental: yet its form and function justify
the use of this term. Since its acquisition in 1900,221 the carving has
been dated variously between the late third and the sixth century
and interpreted as a representation of historical (e.g., Blemmyan
attacks against cities in the Thebaid) and Biblical events (e.g., the
liberation of Gibeon by Joshua, Josh. 10).222 The rendering of the
220
Effenberger – Severin 1992 Cat. 95; Cat. Hamm Cat. 91.
Allegedly in Ashmunein, ancient Hermopolis Magna.
222
Strzygowski 1901 65 ff.; Wulff 1909 Cat. 243; H. Schlunk: Kunst der Spätantike
im Mittelmeerraum. Berlin 1939 Cat. 179; Effenberger 1975 108; R. Brilliant in: Age
221
313
figures, the face and coiffure types, costumes, and weapons permit
any dating between the end of the fourth and the middle of the
sixth century. An early fifth century dating is preferred here, however, with reference to iconographic and stylistic affinities with monumental Constantinopolitan narrative representations on the obelisk
base of Theodosius (390–392) 223 and the honorific columns of
Theodosius (after 386)224 and Arcadius (402–421).225
The carving may be described as a historical relief which was
intended to function as a commemorative/votive monument. Its lower
half represents a series of action scenes which flow into each other;
in the upper half there are isolated scenes of a more static character. The general context is obvious: a city is besieged and relieved.
Arranged in two registers, in the lower half of the carving a rescuing
army arrives from the left. The soldiers are marching towards the open
city gate; their commander arrives there accompanied by a signumbearer who carries a labarum with the sign of the cross. The commander is greeted at the gate by the emerging defenders of the city,
while soldiers of the relief troops start fighting the enemy. The figures
of dead and wounded enemy indicate the outcome of the battle; the
rest of the enemy takes flight on horseback. These scenes of action
are placed in a broader historical context with the help of static representations placed in the upper half of the carving. To the right of
the city gate, four executed men, dressed in luxurious costumes, hang
on forked stakes226 that are set up in front of the bastions of the city
of Spirituality Cat. 69; Kiss 1984 91 f.; O. Kresten: Die Hinrichtung des Königs von
Gai ( Jos. 8,29). AÖAW 126 (1989) 111–129.
223
B. Kiilerich: The Obelisk Base in Constantinople: Court Art and Imperial Ideology.
Roma 1998 passim and 96 ff.
224
Kiilerich 1993 50 ff., 76 f.
225
G. Becatti: La colonna coclide istoriata. Problemi storici, iconografici, stilistici. Roma
1960; Kiilerich 1993 55 ff.; J.-P. Sodini: Images sculptées et propaganda impériale
du IVe au VIe siècle: recherches récentes sur les colonnes honorifiques et les reliefs
politiques à Byzance. in: Guillou – Durand (eds) 1994 41–94.
226
The Y-shaped stake occurs in Latin legal texts under the name furca. The
term furca takes the place of cross, crux, patibulum, as a device of capital punishment
after 533, cf. C.Just. IX.8.3. The traditional view according to which crucifixion
was abolished by an edict of Constantine the Great cannot be proved, see
E. Dinkler–von Schubert: “Nomen ipsum crucis absit” (Cicero, Pro Rabirio 5,16).
Zur Abschaffung der Kreuzigungsstrafe in der Spätantike. JbAC 35 (1992) 135–146.
By the early 5th century, however, the iconography of the cross of Christ had
taken shape and was not represented in profane “historical” contexts. Cf. Dinkler –
Dinkler–von Schubert 1991 22 ff.
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wall. Since their costumes, faces, coiffures and beards are similar to
those of the figures in the upper half of the carving, they may be
identified either as high dignitaries captured and executed by the
enemy or as aristocratic traitors punished by the victors. They may thus
belong equally to an earlier stage of the story and to its concluding
phase. Above the walls, in the upper half of the carving, the interior
of the city is shown. Originally it was visible through the openings of
a now-missing columned architecture. This, and the smaller scale of
the defenders of the city, further the perspectival rendering of the
buildings aimed at an illusionistic effect, similarly to the the lower
half of the carving where the undercutting of the relief and the overlaps give the impression of figures in the round placed in a deep space.
Variations in the scale of the figures peopling the city indicate hierarchic differences in a manner which strongly contrasts with the naturalistic rendering of the figures themselves. The left side of the
cityscape is dominated by three large male figures (or rather busts?).
They turn their gaze in the direction from which the rescuing troops
are expected. Their identity is obscure: their size and statue-like
appearance suggest that they represent the patron saints of the city
(?).227 Above the city gate an ornately dressed couple emerges from
an archway that opens towards the centre of the city. Though smaller
in scale than the three male figures to the left, their position, posture,
and costume indicate that they are the highest-ranking protagonists
of the story. Two buildings are shown to the right of the archway,
one of them a church with a round apse.
The master of the “liberation of a city” experimented with great skill
with both the sequential and non-sequential narrative modes that
are apparent on the great painted and resist-dyed textiles which we
discussed in Chapter IX.1.2. Moreover, he united the episodes of a
sequential narrative into a composition which appears at first sight
as if it were the representation of one single episode. This composite
scene is placed in the static framework of an architecture combining
the exterior of the besieged city with its interior. The figures and scenes
added in the interior of the city explain the story in a more symbolic
mode. No triumphal scene proper is included; the accent is laid on
the story instead of the victory of one of its protagonists. One is
tempted to believe that this is so because the story is about a city
being liberated not by men, but miraculously by God himself.
227
R. Brilliant in: Age of Spirituality 81.
315
The more common—and artistically less difficult—solution for the
representation of such a story would have been its reduction to a
depiction of the final outcome in the manner of many triumphal
representations and as it also occurs in quasi-historical representations
with religious contents. It suffices here to quote the Trier Ivory,228
a splendid early fifth-century (?) carving probably made in Constantinople. According to the most likely suggestion, the Trier Ivory commemorated the translation of the relics of St Stephen Protomartyr
from Jerusalem to Constantinople in 421.229 The ivory depicts one
single event, viz., the arrival of a procession in a city. The relics are
carried by two bishops on a wagon; the procession before the wagon
is led by an emperor (Theodosius II?) and received by an empress
(Pulcheria?). The empress stands in the company of dignitaries of
the court in front of a three-aisled basilica (the church constructed
inside the palace as depository for the relics of St Stephen?). The
relics are censed by spectators leaning out of the windows above the
colonnade flanking the route of the procession. In spite of the anecdotal richness of detail in the representation of the cityscape, protagonists and onlookers, the carving is symbolic rather than historical.
A similarly illusionistic-anecdotal cityscape frames yet another type
of narrative representation on an Egyptian ivory in the Louvre (fig.
126).230 In its centre is an enthroned saint holding a Gospel book.
He is surrounded by thirty-five men wearing richly decorated chlamydes over luxurious tunics. Josef Strzygowski suggested that the enthroned
saint is St Mark and the thirty-five men are his successors on the
patriarchal throne of Alexandria up to Anastasios Apozygarios, patriarch of Alexandria between 607 and 619.231 If Strzygowski’s interpretation is correct, the carving presents a remarkably successful
visual discourse on the legitimacy of the Monophysite patriarchs of
Alexandria based on their uninterrupted succession from the foundation of the see by the evangelist.232
228
Trier, Domschatz, Volbach 1976 no. 143.
Supposedly, it decorated the reliquary made for the actual relics the translation of which is depicted on the relief.—K. Holum – G. Vikan: The Trier Ivory,
Adventus Ceremonial and the Relics of St. Stephen. DOP 33 (1979) 113–133;
K. Holum: Theodosian Empresses: Women and Imperial Dominion in Late Antiquity. BerkeleyLos Angeles 1982 103 ff.; Elsner 1998b 231.
230
Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des Objets d’Art OA 3317, Volbach
1976 no. 144; Age of Spirituality Cat. 489.
231
Strzygowski 1901 73 f.; for Anastasios, see Müller 1981 330.
232
Strzygowski’s identification is contested, however, by other authors who either
229
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Sequential narratives of the complexity of the small boxwood carving were by no means typical of the mainstream production of later
fifth- and sixth-century Egyptian sculpture. A sketch of the developments in fifth-century sculpture was presented above in Chapters
VI.2 and VII.1.3–4. The study of sixth- and seventh-century sculpture is based primarily on carvings discovered in the early twentieth century at two monastic sites, the Monastery of Apa Apollo at
Bawit and the Monastery of Apa Jeremias at Saqqara (cf. Chapters
I, II.1). For a long time, the bulk of the (incompletely and insufficiently
published) carvings from these sites was regarded as paradigmatic
for the architectural sculpture of the sixth century,233 until it was
convincingly shown by Hans-Georg Severin and Peter Grossmann
that the decoration of the so-called north and south churches at
Bawit and the “main church” at Saqqara also includes great numbers of spolia originating from various earlier architectural contexts
and ranging in date from the fourth to the seventh century.234 The
chronological and stylistic assessment of the carvings from Bawit,
Saqqara, and other early Byzantine sites was greatly promoted by
the study of the marble capitals imported in a completed form from
Constantinople or carved from imported material in Egypt.235 In the
architecture of the the fifth and sixth centuries, marble capitals, column shafts and bases played an important role: the sheer quantity
of the marble carvings reused in medieval and later mosques of the
land is apparent, but their analytic corpus is still missing. The changes
occurring in the structure and details of the Corinthian capital in
the course of the fifth and sixth centuries may be followed in the
imported material and in the Egyptian capitals carved from local
stones. The absence of significant Constantinopolitan trends such as
the fashion of the fine-toothed acanthus remains to be explained (a
problem of expense?). Other early Byzantine inventions, such as the
assign an earlier date to the ivory on account of its relation to the composition of
the boxwood relief in Berlin or a later one with reference to the allegedly dry rendering of the draperies in it. For the different views, see Volbach 1976 96.
233
For the most conclusive analyses treating the sculptures from the “south church”
as originating from the same building period, see Kitzinger 1938 189 ff.; Torp
1968, 1971, 1981.
234
Severin 1977b; Grossmann – Severin 1982; Severin 1986.
235
The bulk of this material was reused in Islamic buildings, cf. Kautzsch 1936
passim; Severin 1998b; Pralong 2000. For the imported marble found at Abu Mena,
see Severin – Severin 1987.
317
various types of two-zoned and impost capitals, were imported in
large masses and imitated in various forms in local stones. The
Egyptian variants of the impost capital disregarded the actual structural
invention in the relationship between the kalathos and the abacus.
Displaying thus a complete disinterest in the harmony of form with
function as was visualized in early Byzantine architecture, the Egyptian
artesans treated the variants of the impost capital principally as decorative/symbolic elements of the architecture. Though their attitude
is interpreted frequently as a sign of ignorance, it is an attitude that
is not incomprehensible at all in the age of the replacement of postand-lintel architecture by post-and-arcade architecture.
The monastic community at Bawit,236 c. 25 km south of Hermopolis
Magna, was founded some time around 385–390 by the monk Apollo.237
236
The “Monastery of Apa Apollo” was a coenobitic community living under
the supervision of an abbot (cf. Chapter IV.2.3). Architectually a compound of
miniature monasteries scattered in an area encircled by an enclosure wall, it united,
however, features of the laurae of anchorites with features of the Pachomian monasteries (cf. Grossmann 2002 276). The monastery had its church where the monks
attended service once a week (?), or on the great feasts, yet each miniature monastery
consisted, besides cells and annex rooms, of a small church (in the modern literature: chapel) with an altar where the daily service could be performed (cf. Grabar
1946/1972 II 207 f.). Documents dating from the period between 833–850 attest
that the miniature monasteries were sold by the monastery to monks who were
able to resell them, cf. Krause 1998b 166 f. The monks said communal prayers in
large oratoria built for this purpose, cf. Maspero – Drioton 1931–1943 I 18 ff., II
Pl. I; Grossmann 2002 279 ff.; for the decoration of the prayer halls XVIII, XIX,
5 and 6, see Clédat 1904 103 ff.; Maspero – Drioton 1931–1943 I 18 ff., II Pls
XV–XXV; fragments from the decoration of the dado in Oratorium 6: Rutschowscaya
1992 Cat. 54, 55. For lack of evidence, however, we have no clear idea of the
actual organisation and rules of the monastery. Cf. Iacobini 2000 38 f. note 66.
237
For the vita of Apollo, see the Histora monachorum in Aegypto VIII.1–62, ed. A.
Festugière. Bruxelles 1961 46–71 (English translation N. Russell: The Lives of the
Desert Fathers. London-Kalamazoo 1980).—See also W.E. Crum: Der heilige Apollo
und das Kloster von Bawit. ZÄS 40 (1902–1903) 60–62; H. Torp: La date de la
fondation du monastère d’Apa Apollô de Baouît et de son abandon. MEFRA 77
(1965) 153–177; Iacobini 2000 17 ff. For the textual material discovered at the site
of the monastery, see M. Krause: Das Apa-Apollon-Kloster zu Bawit. Untersuchungen
unveröffentlichter Urkunden als Beitrag zur Geschichte des ägyptischen Mönchtums. Ph.D. diss.
Berlin 1958; id.: Bawit. RBK I (1966) 568–583; id.: Die ägyptischen Klöster.
Bemerkungen zu den Phoibammon-Klöstern in Theben-West und den ApollonKlöstern. in: Godlewski (ed.) 1990 203–207 205 ff.; R.-G. Coquin et al.: Bawit. CE
II 362–372.—For the latest dated graffito written in AD 961 by a monk on a wall
of the “south church”, see Clédat 1999 201 no. X.—For 7th-century wall paintings representing the enthroned Apa Apollo between the saints Phib and Anup, see
Clédat 1999 photos 105, 106 (Chapel LI) and CM 13090, Atalla n.d. I fig. p. 15,
top; Ashraf Nageh: The Restoration of the Wall Paintings in the Coptic Museum.
in: Emmel et al. (eds) 1999 297–302 298 ff., fig. 2.
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The buildings uncovered during the early twentieth-century excavations238 were scattered in a large area: the mound covering the ruins
of the Monastery of Apa (= Abbot) Apollo measured c. 780 × 720
m.239 In later times, besides a male community a female monastic
community also existed in the southern part of this area.240 Two
stone structures in the centre of the monastic complex were identified
by the excavators as sanctuaries and labelled “north church” and
“south church” (fig. 127).241 The carved and painted decoration found
in these buildings supports this identification, but the unusual layout
of the buildings requires further explanation. It was shown in the
1970s by Hans-Georg Severin that both edifices derived from nonChristian late antique structures, probably from elite mortuary buildings,242 and constituted part of a late antique necropolis the abandoned
buildings of which were occupied by Apollo’s community around
385–390. The contemporaneity of the two stone structures is suggested by their identical orientation. About the time and nature of
their first Christian use we can only speculate, however.
The “south church” functioned as a church at the latest from the
second third of the sixth century243 when it was rebuilt in an ornate
form (fig. 128).244 The rebuilt structure245 was decorated with architectural carvings of different origins, including pieces made for the
original late antique edifice and found in situ; dislocated carvings
from the original late antique edifice reused in the sixth-century
rebuilding; further spolia taken from other, unknown, late antique
buildings; and, last but not least, architectural members carved especially for the sixth-century rebuilding.
The extensive reuse of carvings from the original building and of
spolia from other buildings cannot be interpreted as a sign of the
lack of skilled sculptors in the first half of the sixth century,246 since
238
For an annotated bibliography of the literature on the site, see Rutschowscaya
1995.
239
Torp 1981 Plan; Clédat 1999 Plans I–IV.—For its enclosure cf. H. Torp:
Murs d’enceinte des monastères coptes primitifs et couvents-forteresses. MEFRA 76
(1964) 173–200.
240
Maspero 1913 288 f.
241
Clédat 1999 Plan I.
242
According to Grossmann 2002 524 the “south church” was originally a “mit
einem inneren Peristyl ausgestattete[r] Saal- oder Hofbau”.
243
For the dating, see Severin 1977b 120.
244
Severin 1977b fig. 1.
245
For the technical details, see Severin 1977b 113 ff.
246
Grossmann’s latest view on the “south church” is somewhat unjustified: “Die
319
high-quality architectural and figural carvings were also produced for
the rebuilt “south” and “north” churches and other edifices at Bawit
as well as for the Monastery of Apa Jeremias at Saqqara. It is more
likely that the prominent use of ornaments taken from earlier edifices,
first of all from the predecessor building of the “south church”, was
determined by the special prestige of these earlier building(s). In the
course of the time the buildings that had been occupied by Apollo
and his companions in the pagan necropolis at Bawit may have been
increasingly associated with the memory of the monastery founders
and may even have housed their relics. The reuse of elaborately
carved, richly decorated architectural sculptures taken from pagan
edifices of prestige in ecclesiastical buildings was an expression of
Late Antiquity’s complex relationship with the past: we have no reasons to suppose that no more than mere financial considerations lay
behind a use of spolia which appears aesthetically accidental only in
rare cases.247 The inclusion of spolia into new constructions at Bawit
and Saqqara (see below) also exerted an influence on the taste and
repertory of the sixth-century sculptors’ workshops: the master of a
neatly carved, yet otherwise mediocre door lintel from Saqqara
inscribed for Victor and his son Shoi (fig. 129)248 copied a fourthcentury peopled acanthus scroll (cf. Chapter VII.1.2).249
Photographs taken during the excavation of the “north church”250
indicate a late seventh- or early eighth-century building period of
what doubtless functioned then as a Christian church;251 yet the previous building- and functional periods also remain obscure here.252
Südkirche von Bawit gehörte . . . zu den am reichsten ausgestatteten Kirchen Ägyptens,
doch verdankt sie diesen Schmuck weder den klostereigenen Werkstätten noch einigen besonders spendierfreudigen Weltleuten, sondern einigen ehemals reich ausgestatteten Mausoleen einer im demselben Gebiet oder in der Nachbarschaft befindlichen
Nekropole, die abgetragen und deren Baudekor zur Wiederverwendung entnommen wurde”. Grossmann 2002 523 f.
247
B. Lindros Wohl: Constantine’s Use of Spolia. in: Fleischer – Lund – Nielsen
(eds) 2001 85–115, with literature.
248
CM 7381, Quibell 1912 139; Severin 1977a 250 f. no. 280/b; Atalla n.d. II
fig. p. 72.
249
Cf. also Quibell 1912 Pls XXXIV/1, XL/2, 3.
250
Severin 1986 Pls 16, 17; Clédat 1999 photos 184–206.
251
In the course of the rebuilding the naos was turned into a ¢urus with the erection of a screen separating the nave from the sanctuary. According to Grossmann –
Severin 1982 159 ff. this sanctuary type was introduced around the middle of the
7th century.
252
The poor archaeological record does not permit speculations about a simultaneus conversion of two neighbouring pagan mortuary edifices into Christian cult
320
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Limestone capitals dated to the fifth (fig. 130)253 and the sixth century254 were reused in the late seventh- or early eight-century “north
church”; it remains unknown, however, if they were part of an earlier period of the same edifice or taken from (an)other building(s).
Returning to the architecture of the more significant “south church”,
in its rebuilt form it consisted of a nave255 and a transversal sanctuary (fig. 128). It was surrounded by spacious corridor-like rooms
on the north, west, and south sides; the situation to the east of the
church is unknown. Measuring c. 9.60 × 9.60 m, the nave is fairly
small; yet in the form as it was rebuilt in the early seventh century,
the “north church” also had a nave of similar dimensions, although
its sanctuary was larger than that of the “south church”. The decoration of the interior and exterior walls of the “south church” and
the walls of the corridor-like rooms on its north and south side was
carried out in the early sixth century on the basis of a homogeneous
plan. The plan, the newly carved decoration, and the combination
of the spolia with the new carvings are equally remarkable; the “south
church” attests the high quality and inventiveness of sixth-century
architectural sculpture and it is a fine example of the quality of artistic display in the monasteries of the countryside.256
The central layout of the nave was articulated by shallow wall
niches in the centres of the north (fig. 131),257 west, and south walls;
the east wall of the sanctuary was articulated in a monumental manner by a wide central recess flanked by smaller wall niches.258 The
niches in the centres of the nave walls were framed by pilasters with
Corinthian capitals and archivolts resting on them. The archivolts were
composed of a frieze and a moulded cornice with acanthus interplaces of separate liturgical functions. Cf. the complexes of community church and
Eigenkirche in the Kellia, Grossmann 2002 50 ff.
253
Present whereabouts not known, Torp 1971 Pl. 31/4; Clédat 1999 photo 206.
254
CM 7179, Kautzsch 1936 no. 836/b, Pl. 48; Severin 1986 Pl. 17/2; Clédat
1999 photo 216.
255
The nave was divided into three aisles by two rows of three columns in a
later building period, cf. Grossmann 2002 524.
256
I do not share the view of Severin who suggests that the architecture of the
“south church” was “somewhat overrated” by the earlier literature (1977b 124); his
judgement is even more negative in a later study (Severin 1998a 300): “. . . neue
Analysen haben wahrscheinlich gemacht, dass die Süd-Kirche durch Umbau bereits
vorhandener Bausubstanz, die keine kirchliche Architektur gewesen ist, entstand, wobei
auch dieser Umbau nur eine relativ notdürftige Kirchen-Architektur ergeben hat”.
257
Severin 1977b Pl. 36/a, b.
258
Severin 1977b Pls 36/a, 37/b.
321
lace. The moulded cornice259 and the frieze260 of the niche archivolts
continued on the nave walls in the form of a string course running
at the height of the pilaster capitals. Wooden tie beams with carved
friezes were inserted under the string course and in the wall surface
below.261 It seems that all (?) the moulded cornice blocks with interlaced acanthus tendril decoration were reused parts of the original
late antique edifice.262
The decoration of the outer surfaces of the nave and sanctuary
walls was coordinated with the decoration of the other walls of the
rooms surrounding the church. The north wall of the hall east of
the church received wall niches and door frames that included reused,
mainly fifth-century, pilasters, jambs, and Corinthian-type capitals.263
The north and south doors leading into the nave were framed by
early fifth-century jambs with engaged columns supporting Corinthian
capitals.264 The shafts were elaborately decorated. The doors also
had ornately decorated inner thicknesses (fig. 132).265
The jambs and the capitals were produced, together with other
capitals of superb quality (fig. 133),266 by a workshop which had also
been active in the north of the land. Analogous jambs with engaged
columns and Corinthian capitals were also found at Saqqara, where
they were carved similarly for pagan (?) mortuary edifices and reused
later in the buildings of the Monastery of Apa Jeremias (figs 134,
135).267 Less gifted artesans in the workshop displayed a playful disrespect towards the Classical canon, as is shown by the human hands
grasping the acanthi replacing the corner volutes on a pilaster capital
from Saqqara268 and on a column capital of unknown provenance
(fig. 136).269
259
Severin 1977b Pl. 36/b.
Severin 1977b Pl. 37/b, right.
261
E.g., Severin 1977b Pls 36, 37/a; Rutschowscaya 1986 fig. p. 102.
262
Severin 1977b 122 f.
263
Severin 1977b Pls 32, 33.
264
The south door is now in the Coptic Museum, the north door in the Louvre.
265
Severin 1977b Pl. 35. For the south door, see ibid. Pl. 38/a.
266
Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des Antiquités Egyptiennes, Chassinat
1911 Pls XCII, XCIII; Pensabene 1993 444 no. 580.
267
Quibell 1912 Pls XXX (= Badawy 1978 fig. 3.169 = my fig. 135), XXXIII/4,
5 (= Pensabene 1993 445 no. 582), XXXVII/2 (= Badawy 1978 fig. 3.168 = my
fig. 134); CM 35281, Pensabene 1993 445 no. 583.
268
CM inv. no. not known, Quibell 1912 Pl. XXXIII/1; Pensabene 1993 445
no. 585.
269
GRM 21684, Pensabene 1993 445 f. no. 586.
260
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In the “south church” at Bawit, the door opening into the sanctuary
at the northeast was crowned with an ornamental lintel probably carved
for the rebuilding.270 In contrast to the other walls of the rooms surrounding the church on the north, west, and south, the outer wall
surfaces of the nave and the sanctuary also received a string course
consisting of a frieze and a moulded cornice with acanthus interlace.271
Here, as elsewhere in the “south church”, the friezes included reused
fourth- and fifth-century blocks as well as blocks carved for the early
sixth-century rebuilding,272 while the cornice blocks were taken from
the original building.
Wooden relief panels with figured and ornamental decoration were
inserted at the two sides of the north door leading into the nave.273
The richness of the decoration on the outer wall surfaces of the church
signalled the importance and sanctity of the room they enclosed.
The photographs taken during the excavations show a building ruined
almost everywhere above the level of the string course. The decorated door jambs with their Corinthian pilaster capitals indicate that
there must also have been decorated door lintels and door lunettes
with figured decoration;274 and the string course presupposes the existence of an entablature with a figural/ornamental frieze. That figural
carvings on the walls of the “south church” formed elements of a
comprehensive iconographic programme is indicated by the string
course on the east “front”, where the acanthus scroll frieze is interrupted by a figured block in the centre of the wall, exactly under
Torp 1968 fig. 3; Clédat 1999 photo 183.
Severin 1977b Pls 34/b, 35, 38/a. East “front”: ibid. Pl. 37/b; here the room
context is unknown.
272
Severin 1977b 123.
273
Panel from the east side of the door: Chassinat 1911 Pl. XXXVII/1; the
carving is now in a badly damaged condition, Rutschowscaya 1986 Cat. 349. The
panel believed to have been inserted at the west side of the door is of a later date,
see Rutschowscaya 1986 Cat. 350.
274
Torp 1971 39 suggests that sections of an archivolt and carved fragments of
lunette reliefs from the representations of an equestrian saint (Paris, Musée du
Louvre, Département des Antiquités Egyptiennes E 17075, Torp 1971 fig. 1; Clédat
1999 photos 207, 208) and Jonah vomited by the whale (Paris, Musée du Louvre,
Département des Antiquités Egyptiennes E 17071, Clédat 1999 photo 209) found
in a wall of the “north church” belonged to the decoration of the north and south
entrances of the “south church”. For further—non-figural—lunettes associated hypothetically with the “south church” complex, see Rutschowscaya 1998 293 f. (CM
6472, 6473, Chassinat 1911 Pls III–VI; Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des
Antiquités Egyptiennes E 17082, 17078, 16998, Rutschowscaya op. cit. figs 14, 15,
16, respectively).
270
271
323
the circular window which gave light to the altar standing on the other
side of the wall. The block bears the representation of two hovering angels carrying a wreath with an inscribed cross,275 alluding thus
to the liturgy performed on the other side of the wall—presenting
a Christian variant of the special iconographic device identified as
part of the “grammar” of pharaonic temple decoration and called
“wall transparency” in the modern literature.276
The master of the relief from the east wall of the “south church”
is also responsible for a relief block with a cross theophany from the
string course on the south wall (fig. 137).277 The iconography as well
as the style of his modest-quality carvings (he was probably trained
in ornamental decoration) reflect the impact of a group of betterquality reliefs which seem to have been carved similarly for the sculptural decoration of the “south church”. These reliefs include (1) an
unfinished frieze block with the enthroned Christ in a mandorla supported by two hovering angels (fig. 138),278 (2), (3) two closely related
reliefs with two angels supporting a cross in a wreath in Cairo (fig.
139)279 and in Paris (fig. 140),280 the latter found by Chassinat in the
area of the “south church”,281 (4), (5) two friezes with Old Testament
scenes in Cairo (figs 141, 142),282 and (6) a relief representing two
hovering angels carrying in a tondo the portrait bust of an evangelist in Cairo (fig. 143).283
The nearly identical height284 of reliefs (2), (3), (4) and (5) indicates
that they may have been part of the same entablature. Reliefs (1)
and (6) come from different architectural contexts: with their larger
height and length,285 they could have been part of elaborately decorated
275
CM 35838, Atalla n.d. II fig. p. 53, bottom, cf. the excavation photographs
Chassinat 1911 Pls LXIX, LXX; Severin 1977b Pl. 37/b.
276
D. Kurth: Treffpunkt der Götter. Inschriften aus dem Tempel des Horus von Edfu. München
1994 64; L. Török: The Image of the Ordered World in Ancient Nubian Art. The Construction
of the Kushite Mind (800 BC–300 AD). Leiden-Boston-Köln 2002 88, 126 ff.
277
CM 35843 (7158), Atalla n.d. II fig. p. 53, top; Effenberger 1996 fig. 12. For
the rest of the frieze, see the excavation photograph Severin 1977b Pl. 38/a.
278
CM 37798 (7110), Beckwith 1963 Pl. 96; Torp 1965b Pl. VI/a.
279
CM 7100, Atalla n.d. II fig. p. 52; Cat. Paris-Agde Cat. 84.
280
Torp 1965b Pl. VI/c.
281
Chassinat 1911 Pl. LXXXVIII.
282
CM 37083 (7139), Monneret de Villard 1923 fig. 102; Torp 1965b Pl. I/a;
CM 37797 (7125), Torp 1965b Pl. I/b.
283
CM 7102, Duthuit 1931 Pl. XIII/c; Cat. Paris-Agde Cat. 85.
284
Around 0.24 m.
285
(1): 0.30 × 1.20 m; (6): 0.35 × 1.02 m.
324
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door lintels or of entablatures. Friezes (4) and (5) represent episodes
of the stories of Daniel (fig. 141) and David (fig. 142). On the first
relief the scene of Nebuchadnezzar’s persuading Daniel to worship
the idol was followed by the scenes of the miracle of the diadem
performed by Daniel and the fall of the idol. The frieze ends with
a fragmentarily preserved figure, the rest of the frieze block being
broken off. The now-missing part of the frieze may be identical,
however, with a frieze fragment in Berlin showing the inclomplete
figure of Habakkuk and Daniel in the lions’ den.286 On the second
relief the master represented the scenes of Samuel anointing David,
David going to King Saul, David playing before Saul, David meeting Goliath, and Goliath prostrate.287 According to Hjalmar Torp,
the combination of the Daniel scenes is unique and reflects a knowledge of Jewish legends.288 Like the painted decoration in the monks’
“private” chapels (cf. Chapter IX.2.3), these reliefs bear witness to
the learning of the monks of the Monastery of Bawit and are characteristic of the ecclesiastical display emerging in Egyptian monastic
communities in the sixth century.
Except for the relief with Christ in a mandorla (fig. 138), all the
pieces represent disproportionate, large-headed figures. All the figures
display variants of the same coiffure with neatly arranged curls. Their
heavy draperies are arranged in thick, parallel folds, but the draperies
do not lack a certain Classical elegance. The postures of the figures
are well-balanced, their round faces are shown frontally or in threequarter view. The faces and hands are generally well-modelled, though
the eyes are overemphasized; in contrast, the feet are disproportionately
small and clumsily rendered. Disregarding the obvious quality difference,
the coiffures, faces, and draperies recall formal and stylistic features
of a series of Constantinopolitan consular and imperial diptychs from
the first decades of the sixth century.289 The iconographic types of
hovering angels carrying a wreath enclosing the bust of a personifica-
286
Effenberger – Severin 1992 Cat. 93, height 0.24 m, similar to friezes (4) and (5).
Torp 1965b 106 ff.
288
Torp 1965b 111.
289
E.g., Aerobindus, 506, Volbach 1976 nos 8 (Zürich, Schweizerisches Landesmuseum), 11 (St. Petersburg, Hermitage); Clementinus, 513, ibid. no. 15; Anastasius,
517, ibid. no. 18; Magnus (?), 518, ibid. no. 23; Empress Ariadne, ibid. 51 (Firenze,
Bargello), 52 (Wien, Kunsthistorisches Museum).
287
325
tion,290 or a clipeus with the portrait of Christ291 or the cross292 also
occur repeatedly on Constantinopolitan diptychs of the period.
This group of figural reliefs from Bawit represents the lower end
of the quality range of the architectural carvings produced in the
course of the sixth century for the Monastery of Apa Apollo. The
distance between these carvings and their stylistic models in Constantinopolitan sculpture was determined by the training and skill of
the master(s) of these carvings rather than by their knowledge or
ignorance of contemporary metropolitan sculpture. Other masters
working at the same time at Bawit were better prepared to absorb
and reproduce the style of early Byzantine court art. The highly
gifted master of the “Paris Pilaster” (see below) was probably trained
as a sculptor in an Alexandrian workshop where he had access to
accomplished works imported into Egypt as well as to high-quality
sculptures produced for a well-informed elite clientèle in Alexandria.
The “Paris Pilaster” and the closely related wooden door from the
Church of Sitt Barbara in Old Cairo (see below) are usually regarded
as isolated masterworks which do not permit generalizations concerning the influence of early sixth-century Constantinopolitan art. The
profundity of this influence should be judged, however, not on their
basis alone: at Bawit, the “Paris Pilaster” is part of a large, coherent
context of sixth-century architectural decoration which is, in turn, part
of an even larger context also consisting of the carvings from the
Monastery of Apa Jeremias at Saqqara and carvings produced in
other parts of the land.
The wide spread of the style of early sixth-century court art is also
exemplified by a remarkable relief in Copenhagen (fig. 144).293 It
represents two figures in an architectural frame that is characteristic of mortuary stelae produced in the Fayum.294 The orant figure
probably represents an ecclesiastical saint; the other is an archangel.
The representation does not exclude, however, that the carving was
290
Fragments from leaves of an imperial diptych, early 6th century, Volbach
1976 nos 49, 50.
291
Barberini Diptych, 1st half of the 6th century, Volbach 1976 no. 48.
292
Five-part leaves of a diptych with the representation of the enthroned Christ
and the Virgin and New Testament scenes in Yerevan, Volbach 1976 no. 142.
293
Copenhagen, Ny Carlsberg Glyptotek Æ.I.N. 884, Beckwith 1963 Pl. 90;
Severin 1981b 333, fig. 19.
294
D. Zuntz: Koptische Grabstelen. Ihre zeitliche und örtliche Einordnung. MDAIK
2 (1932) 22–38; Cat. Hamm Cats 64–68.
326
chapter nine
a mortuary stela. The figures of the “Paris Pilaster” are frequently
compared to the archangel on the great ivory panel in the British
Museum, attributed to an imperial workshop in Constantinople and
dated to the second quarter of the sixth century (fig. 145).295 The
closeness of the Copenhagen relief to the ivory in London is not less
obvious. It is associated with the London ivory through the Classical
treatment of the relationship between the bodies of the figures and
their draperies, the rendering of their faces, especially their eyes, and
their coiffure as well as by small, but highly significant details such
as longer second toes (again, a reference to Classical sculpture). The
spatial ambiguity of the representation also connects the Egyptian
stone relief with the Constantinopolitan ivory. In the same manner
as the archangel on the latter, the figures on the former also stand
inside and at the same time in front of the architecture that frames
them: they emerge from a sacred space, they are appearing. The
marked contrapposto of the figures on the stone relief already points,
however, towards the more outspoken Classicism of certain panels
of the somewhat later Chair of Maximian,296 the most celebrated
Constantinopolitan ivory of the mid-sixth century—a work of art
which must also be referred to in connection with the “Paris Pilaster”.
Yet before turning to the “Paris Pilaster”, we must briefly return
to the relief with the enthroned Christ in an aureole (fig. 138), a dogmatic image of Christ made man, the Word Incarnate,297 a theme also
frequently occurring in the wall paintings of the monks’ chapels in
the Monastery of Bawit (cf. Chapter IX.2.3). It was executed by a
master of a different background than the better-quality figural sculptures mentioned above. He followed the iconographic scheme faithfully,
but carved elongated, slender figures and graphically stylized draperies.
The way as he treated the draperies is characteristic of an artesan
trained in ornamental sculpture. A geometric transcription of Classical
foliage, interlace, and Greek key motifs is prominent in the architectural sculpture produced for the rebuilt “south church”. The stylized foliage, interlace, and Greek key motifs belonged to the Egyptian
decorative repertory of the fifth century (cf. Chapters VII.1.3, 1.4)
295
BM M&LA OA 9999, Volbach 1976 no. 109; Age of Spirituality Cat. 481;
A. Cutler: The Making of the Justinian Diptychs. Byzantion 54 (1984) 75–115; Buckton
(ed.) 1994 Cat. 64.
296
Ravenna, Archiepiscopal Museum, Volbach 1976 no. 140; Kitzinger 1977
94 ff.
297
Ihm 1960 42 ff. and passim.
327
and a precise, flat stylization of natural as well as abstract forms and
their use as surface decoration was characteristic of a dominant trend
that started around the middle of the century (see, e.g., the architectural decoration of the monasteries at Sohag, Chapter VI.2). This
trend may well have prepared for the reception of the early Byzantine
decorative repertory containing a wealth of stylized foliage, interlace,
and Greek key motifs.
One of the decorated sides of the “Paris Pilaster” (figs 146, 147)298
displays a geometric ornament which is closely related to the string
course friezes of the “south church”.299 The “Paris Pilaster” was found
at an unidentified place in the area of the Monastery of Apa Apollo.
Two of its sides are decorated with high relief: one with hexagons
combined with floral rosettes, the other with a vine scroll with fivelobed leaves issuing from a vase. There are figure representations
above these carvings, showing an evangelist above the hexagons and
an archangel above the vine scroll. Two other similar architectural
carvings were discovered in secondary use in the neighbouring village
of Bawit.300 One of these is now lost; the figure panel from the other
is kept in the Louvre.301 Considering their size (the “Paris Pilaster”
is 1.71 m tall), they were perhaps part of door frames or screens (?).
Their decorative scheme with figure panels on the top of pilaster
sides carved with vegetal/geometric ornaments recalls a type of sixthcentury figured marble chancel- and sanctuary-screen pillars found
in Istanbul, Bakirköy, and Izmit.302 The Hellenistic-type inhabited
vine scroll with delicately modelled five-lobed leaves on one of the
sides of the “Paris Pilaster” also appears on one of the marble screen
pillars of Constantinopolitan origin.303
298
Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des Antiquités Egyptiennes X 5031,
Kitzinger 1938 Pl. LXXVII/1; Christentum am Nil Cat. 79; Beckwith 1963 Pls 85–88;
Torp 1971 Pl. 32/4.
299
See Severin 1977b Pls 35 (= my fig. 132), 37/a, b, 38/a.—For the relationship between the “Paris Pilaster” and the architectural carvings of the “south church”,
see Torp 1965a 366 f.
300
J. Clédat: Notes archéologiques et philologiques. BIFAO 1 (1901) 87–91 90 f.;
Strzygowski 1902 39 ff.; Kitzinger 1938 213 note 2. Their decoration is described
by Torp 1965a 366.
301
Badawy 1978 fig. 3.102. Cf. Torp 1965a 366. The photographs of the two pilasters
mentioned by Torp are not published in Clédat 1999.
302
Firatli et al. 1990 Cat. 281–294. For the typological models in Roman architecture, see Wrede 1972 121 ff.
303
Firatli et al. 1990 Cat. 281.
328
chapter nine
The splendid vine scroll on the “Paris Pilaster” as well as the somewhat less exquisitely rendered inhabited tendril on the screen pillar
in Istanbul show the impact of the court art of the first half of the
sixth century. Their formal and stylistic analogues were identified on
sculptures from the Church of St Polyeuktos in Istanbul (524–527)304
and the Chair of Maximian, on the one hand, and on the wooden
door wings from the Church of Sitt Barbara in Old Cairo (fig. 148),305
on the other.306 The strong plasticity, elegant movement and contrapposto,
as well as the draperies—which, despite their heavy material and
thick, tubular folds, emphasize rather than conceal the body forms—
of the figures on the “Paris Pilaster”, the Sitt Barbara door, the
Copenhagen stela, and on a wooden corbel with an evangelist or saint
from Bawit (fig. 149)307 show the impact of the same idiom which
also characterizes the archangel figure on the London ivory and the
majority of the figures on the Chair of Maximian. The close stylistic
connection between the vine foliages of the Sitt Barbara doors, the
“Paris Pilaster”, the Dionysos panels on the pulpit of Emperor Henry
II in Aachen308 (cf. Chapter VIII.5) on the one hand, and the Church
304
R.M. Harrison: Excavations at Saraçhane in Istanbul I. Princeton 1986; Firatli
et al. 1990 Cat. 425–501.—Exemplars of a special type of monumental impost capital appearing for the first time in the Church of St Polyeuktos were also imported
to Egypt, see GRM 17013, from Alexandria, Pensabene 1993 463 no. 659; CM
1895, from Alexandria, Strzygowski 1904 77 f. no. 7352, fig. 105 (monumental);
Cairo, Mosque of Muhammad an-Nasir ibn Qalawun, Kautzsch 1936 no. 630, Pl.
38; Severin 1986 Pl. 20; Pensabene 1993 462 no. 656; GRM 3, 13475, ibid. 462
f. nos 657, 658 (normal). Cf. also Deichmann 1976 106 ff.; Severin 1986 107 f.—
McKenzie 1996b 140 ff. suggests that several types of decoration in the Church of
St Polyeuktos such as the monumental basket capitals with lotus motifs, the capital with grape vines emerging from a vase, and the niche head with a peacock was
influenced by Alexandrian prototypes (see, e.g., the basket capital CM 7178,
Strzygowski 1904 77 ff. no. 7352). This requires further investigation.
305
CM 738, A. Patricolo – U. Monneret de Villard: La Chiesa di S. Barbara. Cairo
1922 50; Kitzinger 1938 212 ff., Pls LXXV/3, LXXVI/1, 2; Christentum am Nil Cat.
144; Severin 1977a 252 no. 286/a–c; M. Cecchelli: Le più antiche porte cristiane:
S. Ambrogio a Milano, S. Barbara al Vecchio Cairo, S. Sabina a Roma. in: Le
porte di bronzo dall’Antichità al secolo XIII. Roma [1990] 59–69.
306
Kitzinger 1938 212 f.; Beckwith 1963 23 f.; Torp 1965a 366 f.—The arguments put forward by M. Trinci-Cecchelli for a dating to the first half of the 5th
century are not compelling, see M. Trinci-Cecchelli: Notes sur la porte de Sainte
Barbe au Vieux Caire. Enchoria 8 (1978) Sonderband (Internationaler Kongress für Koptologie
Kairo 08–18 Dezember 1976) 71–79.
307
Strzygowski 1904 121 no. 8775, Pl. VII/1; Beckwith 1963 Pl. 100; Christentum
am Nil Cat. 147; Torp 1965a 365. It is suggested that the corbel with Daniel in
the lions’ den in Berlin (Effenberger – Severin 1992 Cat. 96) comes, together with
the corbel of the Coptic Museum, from the “south church”: Bénazeth 1998 37.
308
Volbach 1976 nos 73, 74.
329
of St Polyeuktos and the Chair of Maximian on the other, is equally
significant. The “Paris Pilaster”, the Sitt Barbara door, the Copenhagen
stela, and the wooden corbel from Bawit attest both the impact of
court art on the art of Alexandria and the direct influence of
Alexandrian early Byzantine sculpture on local workshops engaged
in the construction of luxuriously decorated ecclesiastical buildings.
The sixth-century sculptures from Bawit discussed above thus fall
into three categories: figural and ornamental carvings of first-class
masters acquainted with the court style of the first half of the century;
figural carvings of less skilled artesans trained primarily in ornamental
sculpture and working under the influence of the first-class masters;
and architectural carvings made in large series by mostly well-trained
artesans. Connections in iconography, forms, motifs, and style between
the pieces of the different categories suggest that they are the products of the same, fairly large and complex workshop. This workshop
was active at Bawit for a rather long period of time (a decade or
longer) under the direction of sculptors like the masters of the “Paris
Pilaster” and the wooden corbel with the figure of an evangelist.
The quality range of the architectural carvings is less wide; although
not devoid of a repetitiveness and a precise dryness, all the carvings
produced for the “south church” are of an excellent quality and
there can be little doubt that they were executed under the supervision of the master of the “Paris Pilaster” or a similarly trained
leading master.309 However, in the case of the architectural carvings
it is the stylistic rather than the quality range that is significant.
Some time after its rebuilding in the first half of the sixth century, the nave of the “south church” was turned into a three-aisled
room by the addition of two rows of columns. They supported limestone capitals made for unidentified buildings in the middle decades
or second half of the sixth century. The capitals were modelled on
Constantinopolitan types developed in the reign of Justinian. The
original models were marble capitals imported in a finished form to
Alexandria where they were copied in marble in considerable numbers for buildings of good quality all over the country. Copies, or
309
The name inscription of a sculptor Joseph was discovered at the northwestern nave entrance, see P. du Bourguet: La signature sur son œuvre d’un sculpteur
copte du VIe siècle. in: Hommages à la mémoire de Serge Sauneron II. Le Caire 1979
115–120, Pl. IX. The dating of the inscription and its association with the decoration of the church is, however, quite uncertain.
330
chapter nine
rather variants, in Egyptian limestone were produced in still greater
numbers in workshops in Alexandria and the countryside.310
In the comments made on the Egyptian production in marble and
limestone the term “copy” is frequently overemphasized and the
differences are interpreted as signs of provincial quality. It is not selfevident, however, that all early Byzantine-type capitals were made
in Egypt as imitations: many of them were variants, in which the form
or the decoration of the original was used as starting point for new
forms and decorative patterns. Besides pieces such as, e.g., a folded
basket capital from the “south curch”311 imitating a marble capital
from the Church of St Sergius and Bacchus in Constantinople (dated
between 527 and 536),312 we also encounter more independent transformations of Justinianic prototypes. A splendid example (fig. 150)313
was found in the “south church”. Following the masters of the capitals of the Church of St Sergios and Bacchos and Justinian’s Hagia
Sophia, the master of the Bawit capital replaced the elements that
early impost capitals inherited from the Classical Corinthian type by
a web of repetitive ornaments; yet the playful transformation of the
core of the capital and the stylized acanthus foliage are independent
inventions. The transformation of natural forms into the “invented
nature” of geometrically rendered surface decorations which give a
two-dimensional impression through the Tiefdunkel of the carving and
the—in most cases now completely disappeared—polychrome painting of the carved motifs is also apparent on other capitals from Bawit.
A two-zoned basket capital from the “south church” (fig. 151)314 is
of excellent workmanship. It is based on a type created in Constantinople in the early years of the sixth century. Another fine capital
from Bawit (?) in the Berlin collection (fig. 152)315 has lions’ protomes
instead of widders and a more elaborate basket zone with vine tendrils. The widders, cross, eagle, and dove (?) on the capital from the
For the principal types, see Severin 1998b 97 ff.
Beckwith 1963 Pl. 79; Effenberger 1975 fig. 78. For other folded capitals from
Bawit, see Chassinat 1911 Pls XCVIII ff.
312
Kautzsch 1936 no. 591, Pl. 37.—For the development of the folded capital
in Constantinople cf. Deichmann 1976 111.
313
Beckwith 1963 Pl. 80; Torp 1971 36, Pl. 32/1; Pensabene 1993 464 f. no. 667.
314
Clédat 1999 photos 210–215.
315
310
311
331
“south church” and the vine, the lions’ protomes, the triumphal
crown with an inscribed cross and the initial X of Christ’s name,
and the fruit basket on the Berlin capital are symbols of Christ and
his triumph over the evil. The decoration of the capitals—which supported the roof over the scene of the Eucharist316—is part of the
iconographic programme of the churches, even if they are spolia. The
Berlin capital also bears a private monogram, probably that of the
patron of the building from which the carving comes: a proud form
of aristocratic display.
The leading artesans of the Egyptian workshops did not copy and
paraphrase the Constantinopolitan imports as isolated models picked
from a fashionable pattern book. They had an idea of their context.
Outstanding sculptors and artesans may have worked on outstanding
projects under the direction of architects of distinction, such as the
Alexandrian Chryses consulted by Justinian, “a skillful master builder
who served the emperor in his building operations”.317 A basket capital (fig. 153)318 and a frieze block (fig. 154)319 in Berlin and related
carvings in Paris320 and Cairo321 come from a building in which the
same decorative scheme returns on different elements of the architecture, recalling the coordination of decoration in the great Justinianic
churches.322 It must be stressed that, in spite of the great number of
spolia incorporated in it, the sixth-century architecture of the “south
church” also achieved a remarkable visual harmony.
The delicately modelled vine leaves on the Berlin carvings in figs
153 and 154 derive from Justinianic models, but the geometric treatment of the vine scroll represents an Egyptian development. The
leaf type as well as the decoration scheme of the Berlin carvings also
occurs on capitals and other architectural carvings from Saqqara.323
316
For the symbolism of the column in early Christian literature cf. J. Onians:
Bearers of Meaning. The Classical Orders in Antiquity, the Middle Ages, and the Renaissance.
Princeton 1988 70 ff.
317
Procopius, Aed. 2.3.1–26, quoted by McKenzie 1996b 138.
318
319
320
16934, Clédat 1999 photos 223, 224, respectively.
321
CM 7095, 7156, Duthuit 1931 Pl. LIII/c, e; Clédat 1999 photo 225; detail
of 7156: Atalla n.d. II fig. p. 85, bottom. From the same frieze as CM 7156: Berlin
4717, Badawy 1978 fig. 3.109/b.
322
E.g., on the order of the Church of St Sergius and Bacchus cf. F.W. Deichmann:
Studien zur Architektur Konstantinopels. Baden-Baden 1956 72 ff.
323
Quibell 1909 Pls XVI/2, XVIII, XXV.
332
chapter nine
The Monastery of Apa Jeremias at Saqqara324 was founded under
the reign of Emperor Anastasius (491–518)325 by a monastic community
moving into abandoned mortuary buildings at the southern confines
of the great necropolis of Memphis, which was used from pharaonic
times to late antiquity. The nucleus of the monastery seems to have
been a small quadrangular chapel (?) built of mud brick to which a
small (c. 10 × 20 m) basilical church with a return aisle was added in
the sixth century (Quibell’s “main church”). A pagan mortuary edifice
(a peristyle building with a subterranean hypogeum)326 with fine column327 and pilaster capitals dating from the first half of the fifth century was reused for the burial of monks (Quibell’s “tomb church”
or building 1823, cf. Chapter III.1).328 The “main church” was slightly
enlarged in the sixth century and then replaced some time later by
a larger (c. 20 × 40 m) and more representative three-aisled basilical church with a return aisle and narthex. Arguing on the basis of
a post quem presented by a painted vessel, Grossmann and Severin
date the new church after 641.329 The new church received richly
324
Quibell 1908, 1909, 1912; Leclercq 1913; Wiethger 1992; Rassart-Debergh
1981a.
325
According to the Chronicle of John, Monophysite bishop of Nikiu (d. in the
early years of the 8th cent.), H. Zotenberg: Chronique de Jean, evêque de Nikiou: Texte
éthiopien. Paris 1883 368. John’s dating seems to be confirmed by coins found at
the site, Quibell 1912 38 ff.
326
For the type, see Grossmann 2002 315 ff.
327
H.-G. Severin in: Grossmann – Severin 1982 171 ff., Pl. 27/a, b; Török 1998
fig. 36.
328
For the building, see Quibell 1912 9 ff., Pls XVII, XVIII; Grossmann 1972a;
H.-G. Severin in: Grossmann – Severin 1982 170 ff.; Grossmann 2002 249.
329
Grossmann – Severin 1982 158 ff. Besides general historical considerations which
are not compelling, their argument is based on a fine painted jar built in the function of a cupboard or the like in a wall of the predecessor structure: the jar (ibid.
Pl. 24/b, c), which seems to have been decorated by the same painter as a vase
in Berlin, Effenberger – Severin 1992 Cat. 105, a vase in Cairo, CM 8931, Quibell
1912 Pls XLVIII, LI, and a dish in Paris, du Bourguet 1967 fig. p. 139, is dated
on the basis of an oral communication by J. Engemann to c. 600 and is regarded
as a post quem for the new church. The distinct and fairly individual style of the
painting representing a vegetal scroll inhabited by birds and quadrupeds has its stylistic antecedents in the inhabited scrolls on the Artemis hanging (cf. Chapter IX.1.2
and fig. 117). Related animal figures and ornaments also occur in not less individual and high-quality vase paintings such as BM M&LA 1927,2–17,3, Buckton
(ed.) 1994 Cat. 56, where they are similarly associated with a vase form that is
characteristic for the 5th–6th-century “Fayum painted ware”, cf. J.W. Hayes: Roman
Pottery in the Royal Ontario Museum. A Catalogue. Toronto 1976 Cat. 261. A dating of
the jar from the “main church” to the early 6th cent. seems more likely; in this
case it could have been built into the predecessor building of the new “main church”
at an earlier time than suggested by Grossmann and Severin.
333
decorated limestone column- and pilaster capitals. From the 24 column capitals recorded by Quibell, four modified Corinthian-type
capitals came from two or three different fifth-century architectural
contexts. Four capitals330 are of the two-zoned palm-and-acanthus
capital type and may be dated similarly to the fifth century. They
represent an Egyptian transcription of the sedge-and-acanthus capital type occurring in Greece and Asia Minor.331 The type was treated
with great freedom, as is shown by a capital in the Coptic Museum,
which still retains its original painting that substituted for the carved
detail in a remarkably illusionistic manner (Pl. XXXI).332 The remaining capitals may be dated to the second quarter of the sixth century (fig. 155).333 They include folded and basket capitals of various
sizes decorated with neatly carved vine scrolls enclosing delicately
modelled vine leaves and small rosettes and crosses.334
Referring to the different sizes of the otherwise closely associated
folded and basket capitals, and also arguing with the mid-seventhcentury dating he assigned to the new “main church”, Severin suggested335 that all the capitals found by Quibell were reused carvings
from dismantled mortuary edifices and are thus accidental elements
of an architecture which was shaped by the lack of competent artesans in the period of the final decline of Egyptian early Byzantine
330
Quibell 1909 Pl. XXII/4–6; cf. also Kautzsch 1936 no. 746, Pl. 44.
Kautzsch 1936 210 f.; cf. T. Zollt: Kapitellplastik Konstantinopels vom 4. bis 6.
Jahrhundert n. Chr. Mit einem Beitrag zur Untersuchung des ionischen Kämpferkapitells. Bonn
1994 230 no. 656.—For the direct models, see marble capitals imported in a complete form or finished in Egypt, Pensabene 1993 467 f. nos 677–679A.—For an
example from Saqqara, see New York, Metropolitan Museum of Art, Rogers Fund
10.175.29, Friedman (ed.) 1989 Cat. 146.
332
CM 39817, Pensabene 1993 452 no. 606; colour photograph: Atalla n.d. II
fig. p. 96.
333
CM 8362, Atalla n.d. II fig. p. 74, right.
334
Quibell 1909 Pls XVI–XIX, XX/1–4, XXIV/1, XXV, XXVI, XXVII/2–6,
XXIX/3; cf. H.-G. Severin in: Grossmann – Severin 1982 186.
335
In: Grossmann – Severin 1982 186 ff.—Grossmann 2002 508 f. comments
rather anecdotically on the use of spolia: “Dem Neubau kam der Umstand zugute, dass
er inmitten einer spätantiken Nekropole zu liegen kam, in der mehrere reich ausgestattete, einst im Besitz vermögender griechischer und greco-ägyptischer Grossgrundbesitzer aus Memphis befindliche Mausoleen standen, deren Eigentümer nach der
arabischen Eroberung das Land verlassen hatten. Diese Mausoleen konnten daher
gefahrlos für den Neubau der Kirche abgetragen werden . . . Die Mönche werden
bei dieser Tätigkeit um so weniger Skrupel empfunden haben, als die Mehrzahl der
ursprünglichen Besitzer dieser Mausoleen sehr wahrscheinlich auch der von der
Koptischen Kirche als häretisch angesehenen chalkedonischen Kirche angehört
hatte.”
331
334
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sculpture.336 The painted vessel that provides a post quem for the building of the new church may date, however, from the first half of the
sixth century, which would mean that the new building could have
been erected around the middle of the century, i.e., the date of the
folded and basket capitals found in its ruins. If so, at least some of
these capitals could have been produced directly for the new church.
This may also be supported, however indirectly, by the high quality
and abundance of sixth-century architectural sculpture from Saqqara.
The basket capitals with vine scrolls from the “main church” are of
a rather mediocre quality, but other, unprovenanced finds such as
a Corinthian capital with windblown acanthus leaves (fig. 156)337
show a more attractive aspect of architectural display in the Monastery
of Apa Jeremias as it unfolded around the middle of the sixth century.
2.3. Images for higher contemplation
The wax, greatly daring, has represented the invisible, the incorporeal chief of the angels in the semblance of his form. Yet it was no thankless [task]
since the mortal man who beholds the image directs
his mind to a higher contemplation. His veneration is no longer distracted: engraving within himsef the [archangel’s] traits, he trembles as if he
were in the latter’s presence. The eyes encourage
deep thoughts, and art is able by means of colours
to ferry over [to its object] the prayer of the mind.338
The testimony of texts describing the utter simplicity of anchoritic
and semi-anchoritic life in the fourth and fifth centuries339 is also
confirmed by the archaeological evidence from recent excavations at
Kellia, “the Cells”, in the Libyan desert340 (cf. Chapter V.3). If there
336
According to Severin 1998a 320 “Nach der arabischen Eroberung Ägyptens
scheint für christliche Bauten gar kein Steindekor mehr gefertigt worden zu sein . . . die
antike Bauskulptur in Stein war ans Ende gekommen”.
337
CM 7978, Quibell 1912 Pl. XXXII/5; Kautzsch 1936 no. 476, Pl. 29;
Pensabene 1993 462 no. 655; Cat. Paris-Agde Cat. 80. For the type, see Kautzsch
1936 145 ff.
338
Agathias (c. 531–580), in: Anthologia graeca I.34, on an icon of the archangel
Michael in the quarter of Plate in Constantinople. Mango 1972/1986 115.
339
For the dating of the hermitages cf. F. Bonnet: La datation des ermitages. in:
Bridel–Bosson (eds) 1994 17–19; P. Bridel: Essai de synthèse chronologique. ibid.
469–472.
340
For the researches conducted from 1965 at the Kellia, see R. Kasser et al.:
335
was a visual image at all to direct the hermit’s mind to a higher
contemplation it was a simple cross painted in red on the whitewashed wall of the niche in the east wall of his bare subterranean
cell,341 in front of which he meditated and prayed:
We were not given a prescription to constantly work, watch, and fast,
but for us it is a law to pray without ceasing.342
From the turn of the fifth and sixth centuries, however, the hermits
abandoned their subterranean cells and started to erect more substantially built edifices consisting of an oratory opening from an anteroom, separate rooms for the monk and his disciple, and domestic
annexes.343 These rooms were situated, as a rule, in the northwest
corner of a spacious walled courtyard. From the first half of the sixth
century, the walls of the oratory and anteroom also received painted
decoration. It may seem that these changes were brought about by
the growing spiritual attraction and social prestige of the hermits,
holy men who were also able to provide guidance in wordly matters.344 However, neither can the radical alterations in the type of
stage of ascetic life and in the forms of contacts between the ascetics
and the world be separated from changes in the spiritual life of the
Kellia 1965. Topographie générale. Mensurations et fouilles aux Qouçoûr 'Îsâ et aux Qouçoûr
el-"Abîd. Mensurations aux Qouçoûr el-"Izeila. Genève 1967; R. Kasser et al.: Kellia Topographie.
Genève 1972; M. Egloff: Kellia. La poterie copte. Quatre siècles d’artisanat et d’échanges en
Basse-Égypte. Genève 1977; Survey archéologique des Kellia (Basse-Égypte). Rapport de la campagne 1981. EK 8184 I. Louvain 1983; Kellia [1984]; Kellia 1989; A. Guillaumont –
R.-G. Coquin – D. Weidmann – P. Grossmann – J.S. Partyka – M. Rassart-Debergh:
Kellia. CE V 1396–1410; A. Cody: Scetis. CE VII 2102–2106; Bridel – Bosson (eds)
1994; and cf. Le site monastique copte des Kellia. Sources historiques et explorations archéologiques.
Actes du Colloque de Genève 13 au 15 août 1984. Genève 1986.
341
See M. Rassart-Debergh: Quelques croix kelliotes. in: P.O. Scholz – R. Stempel
(eds): Nubia et Oriens Christianus. Festschrift für C. Detlef G. Müller zum 60. Geburtstag.
Köln 1988 373–385; Descœudres 1999 fig. 2.—For the furniture in the cells cf.
Melania’s description of the cell of the holy monk Hephestion, V. Mel. 38.
342
Evagrius Pont., Pract. 96 f., cf. 40, A. Guillaumont – C. Guillamont: Évagre le
Pontique. Traité pratique ou le Moine (Sources chrétiennes 170). Paris 1971. The Kelliote
monk Evagrius of Pontus died in 399. Cf. G. Bunge: Das Geistgebet. Studien zum
Traktat “De oratione” des Evagrios Pontikos. Köln 1987.
343
For the chronology and types of the hermitages excavated in the Kellia, see
Descœudres 1989.
344
For the prayers of the visitors inscribed on the walls of anterooms in the
Kellia cf. P. Cherix: Les inscriptions relevées en 1977; N. Bosson: Index du vocabuulaire des inscriptions publiées. in: Bridel – Bosson (eds) 1994 409–449, 450–468.—
In more general terms, see the the masterful survey of P. Brown: Holy Men. in:
CAH XIV 781–810.
336
chapter nine
ascetics. The gradual ritualization of monastic prayer345 led to the
conceptual and physical transformation of the monk’s cell as a scene
of incessant meditation and prayer into a scene of leitourg¤a, viz.,
the liturgical celebration of hour prayer which was embellished with the
singing of psalms and the recitation of troparies.346
A seventh-century Coptic inscription in the oratory of one of the
hermitages calls the prayer niche Tskyny nte Tmet mevre,
“Tabernacle of Witness”.347 This name derives from the skhnØ toũ
martur¤ou, tabernaculum testimonii, of the Scriptures. It refers in the
Scriptures to the tent in which the Ark of the Covenant was kept.348
In the Kellia, it was a metaphor for the hermitage in general and
the prayer niche in particular.349 The interior of the niche termed
skhnØ in hermitage QR 234 was decorated with a primitive and
sketchily painted representation of a church sanctuary with the curtains drawn aside and a lamp hanging “in front” of the sanctuary.350
In other oratories, the niches were framed with simple painted architecture and their interior was decorated with various types of painted
crosses appearing between sanctuary curtains351 and/or botanical and
zoological motifs referring to Paradise.352 Paintings with related subjects as well as in-scriptions commemorating deceased monks or eternalizing the prayers of the monks and their visitors—among them
the wealthy patrons of the monastic community—also occurred on
the walls of the reception rooms, indicating the spiritual and functional connections between the monk’s oratory and the visitors’ area.
The painted symbols in the cells and reception rooms incessantly
evoked the promise of salvation.353 Investigating the evidence for the
ritualization of monastic prayer, Georges Descœudres points out that
For the “Ritualisierung des monastischen Gebets”, see Descœudres 1999 110 ff.
Musical sequences.
347
Qusur er-Rubaiyat QR 234, Bridel – Bosson (eds) 1994 74 ff.
348
Ex. 17.21, 30.26, 33,7; Deut. 31.14, Acts 7.44, cf. J. Partyka – R. Kasser: Choix
d’inscriptions provenant d’autres ermitages des Qouçoûr er-Roubâ"îyât. in: Bridel –
Bosson (eds) 1994 443–449 449.
349
For the literary evidence, see Descœudres 1999 108.
350
Descœudres 1999 fig. 5.
351
See Chapter IV.1.
352
Hermitage Qusur er-Rubaiyat QR 258, oratory, east wall, Bridel – Bosson
(eds) 1994 Pl. 4/3.
353
G. Descœudres: Der Mönch und das Bild. Visuelle Umsetzungen von Glaubensvorstellungen im frühen Mönchtum Ägyptens am Beispiel der Kellia. in: Brenk (ed.)
1996 185–205.
345
346
337
[d]ie Malereien ebenso wie die Hymnen und Troparien sowie der singende Vortrag der Psalmen sind als Ausdruck des Lobpreises zu werten.
Die Repräsentationshaltung ist aber auch eine Sichtbarmachung der letzten
Dinge vor der Welt. Bild, Schrift und Zeremoniell stellen eine Sichtbarmachung bestehender Inhalte dar; denn wohlverstanden, weder die
Malereien noch die Inschriften oder die Gebete vermitteln—verglichen
mit den Anfängen des ägyptischen Mönchtums—inhaltlich wesentlich
Neues. Neu ist die Visualisierung, d.h. die Art der Wahrnehmung, dieser
Inhalte.354
Apart from isolated iconic representations of poor quality,355 the
painted decoration of the hermitages in the Kellia was restricted to
symbolic images deriving from the iconography of church decoration
but executed without any artistic pretensions by the monks themselves.
Outside the Kellia, the impact of monumental church decoration
manifested itself in an entirely different form. The walls of the cells
and communal buildings of the monasteries of Apa Apollo at Bawit
and Apa Jeremias at Saqqara were decorated by professional artesans with good, occasionally excellent, quality wall paintings.
The architectural and sculptural evidence discussed in Chapter
IX.2.2 indicates that ambitious building activities started in both the
Monastery of Apa Apollo at Bawit and the Monastery of Apa Jeremias
at Saqqara in the first half of the sixth century. The similarities in
the developments in the two monasteries are conspicuous. The
churches built or rebuilt in the course of the sixth and seventh centuries at Bawit and Saqqara display the same attitude toward the
artistic vestiges of the past of the place. At both sites, a rich variety of architectural carvings taken from late antique mortuary edifices
that had been usurped by the founders of the monasteries was carefully inserted into the framework of new decorative programmes.
Spolia were adopted at Bawit as well as at Saqqara to serve as objects
of prestige and were employed correctly structurally in decorative
contexts for which new, “modern”,356 carvings were also produced
by skilled artesans working under the supervision of masters arriving from outstanding metropolitan workshops.
354
Descœudres 1999 112.
E.g., M. Rassart-Debergh: La décoration peinte. in: Kellia [1984] 29–38, Pls
3/21 (bust of Christ in a tondo), 4/22 (military and monastic saints). RassartDebergh ibid. 33 also mentions unpublished representations of the enthroned Christ.
356
For the notion “modern” cf. Chapter III.3, note 73.
355
338
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Several dozen wall paintings were discovered and photographed
or copied in watercolour by the early twentieth-century excavators
of Bawit and Saqqara. The excavated paintings represent, however,
only a small portion of what remained uninvestigated. The paintings
excavated and left at the site are by now completely destroyed. Some
of the pieces rescued by the excavators may be studied in the collections of the Coptic Museum and the Louvre.357 Their preservation
is, however, not always satisfactory.358 Some recent publications permit the reconstruction of the decoration of individual cells or communal rooms as they looked at the time of their discovery.359 The
existing excavation records do not permit, however, the investigation
of the building history of the individual cells or their broader architectural/archaeological context. The chronological assessment of the
paintings thus remains based on style-critical considerations. In view
of the controversies concerning the developments in late sixth- and
seventh-century painting, this is not an easy task. Most modern writers date the paintings from Bawit and Saqqara in general terms to
the post-Conquest period.360 Some of the paintings from Bawit and
Saqqara display, however, iconographic and stylistic features which
strongly suggest that the decoration of the monks’ oratories and certain communal rooms with wall paintings started as early as the middle of the sixth century,361 concurrently with the (re)building of the
churches of the communities; and continued well into the eighth
century, when both monasteries belonged to the big taxpayers of
the land.362
357
For the paintings preserved in the CM, see Van Moorsel – Huijbers 1981;
for the pieces in the collection of the Louvre, see Rutschowscaya 1992.
358
For a careful survey of the preservation of the pieces in the CM, see van
Moorsel – Huijbers 1981.
359
See especially Rassart-Debergh 1981a; Clédat 1999. Iacobini 2000 focuses on
the prayer niche decorations.
360
See recently Severin 1977a 247; Wiethger 1992 74; Severin 1998a 334 and
cf. Torp 1965a, 1981 and H. Torp: Bawit. EAA Supplemento 1970. Roma 1973
139–141. The detailed study of the Bawit niche paintings by Iacobini 2000 does
not touch upon the problem of dating.
361
Cf. Wiethger 1992 73 ff.; 200 f.
362
J. Gascou: Monasteries, economic activities of. CE V 1639–1645; Alston 2002
304. For the economy of the Bawit monastery, see S.J. Clackson: Coptic and Greek
Texts Relating to the Hermopolite Monastery of Apa Apollo. Oxford 2000; ead.: Reconstructing
the Archives of the Monastery of Apollo at Bawit. in: I. Andorlini – G. Bastianini –
M. Manfredi – G. Menci (eds): Atti del XXII Congresso Internazionale di Papirologia,
Firenze, 23–29 agosto 1998 I. Firenze 2001 219–236; A. Boud’hors: Ostraca grecs et
coptes des fouilles de Jean Maspero à Baouit. O. Bawit IFAO 1–67 et O. Nancy (Bibliothèque
d’Études Coptes 17). Le Caire 2004.
339
As to the Monastery of Apa Apollo at Bawit, the masters of the
early paintings may well have arrived together with the masters of
the “Paris Pilaster” and other high-quality sixth-century sculptures
as associates of the same workshop. The dimensions, complexity, and
quality of the works at Bawit that are datable to the second half of
the sixth century indicate a workshop of manifold competencies,
hired for a large-scale construction campaign. The sixth-century constructions at Bawit also reflect the outlook of learned monks who
shared the pious, yet at the same time highly self-conscious, ambitions of contemporary monastic leaders of the stature of, e.g., Abbot
Longinos and Deacon John, whose dedication inscription in the great
apse mosaic at Mount Sinai (cf. Chapter IX.2.1) emphasizes monastic sponsorship without mentioning imperial patronage:
In the name of the Father, Son and Holy Spirit, this entire work was
made for the salvation of those who have endowed it, in the lifetime
of Longinos the most holy priest and abbot . . . with the help of Theodore
the priest and second in command, in indiction 14.363
The inclusion of architectural members carved from limestone for the
actual cell364 or the re-use of late antique architectural sculpture in
the decoration of monks’ cells at Bawit and Saqqara does not seem
to have been general.365 Prayer niches (see below) were framed, as
a rule, with (mostly strongly reduced) painted architecture. Painted
architecture also occurred on the walls and the vaulted or domed
ceilings of many cells at Bawit and at Saqqara. The prayer niche of
Bawit Chapel LV had a painted semicircular niche head with an
entablature consisting of two modillion cornices (fig. 157).366 With its
nicely painted birds, the lower modillion cornice is in the tradition
of Alexandrian Hellenistic architecture367 (cf. Chapters V.2, 3) and
indicates the metropolitan provenance of the skilled painter of the
363
Quoted after Cormack 2000b 51.
For an acanthus foliage frieze framing the prayer niche in Cell A, Saqqara,
see CM 8014, Quibell – Lacau 1908 Pl. XLIII; van Moorsel – Huijbers 1981 129
ff., Pls I–III.
365
Limestone niche-head and engaged columns, with capitals, in the prayer niche
of Cell 728, Saqqara: CM 7977, Rassart-Debergh 1981a Pl. XXIV/a, b.—Engaged
column with decorated shaft and dressed sandstone blocks framing the door of Cell
726, Saqqara: ibid. Pl. XXVI/1.
366
Clédat 1999 photo 132.
367
See, e.g., GRM 19909, limestone cornice from Theadelphia, Pensabene 1993
512 no. 937, 2nd–3rd century.
364
340
chapter nine
illusionistic niche architecture and the peacock figures flanking it. It
is important to note that the painter of the architectural frame is
not identical with the less skilled artesan who is responsible for the
representation of the enthroned Virgin and Child in the niche.368
With her usual acriby, Elisabetta Lucchesi-Palli investigated the
types of geometric and floral ornaments on the dados, framing friezes
and painted architectures from Bawit and Saqqara and identified
their analogues in fifth- to eighth-century mosaics and paintings from
all over the Mediterranean.369 With its eclecticism, the decorative
motif repertory from the two monasteries points towards the cosmopolitan art of early Byzantine Alexandria. Yet while the decorative
repertory may well have been transmitted by pattern books and it
is only the most outstanding decorative paintings that may sufficiently
support the hypothesis of their painters’ actual Alexandrian provenance,370 we can be more positive as to the metropolitan training of
the masters of the best figural paintings. Before turning to these,
however, let us see some of the iconographic themes which seem to
be indicative in themselves of the cosmopolitan milieu in which the
painters acquired their artistic experience.
Some time in the late fourth- early fifth century, the ascetic St
Nilus of Sinai wrote thus to the Prefect Olympiodorus:
Being, as you are, about to construct a large church in honour of the
holy martyrs, you inquire of me . . . whether it be fitting to set up their
images in the sanctuary . . . and to fill the walls, those on the right and
those on the left, with all kinds of animal hunts so that one might see
snares being stretched on the ground, fleeing animals, such as hares,
gazelles and others, while the hunters, eager to capture them, pursue
them with their dogs; and also nets being lowered into the sea, and every
kind of fish being caught and carried on shore by the hands of the fishermen . . . and lastly, to set up in the nave a thousand crosses and the
pictures of different birds and beasts, reptiles and plants. In answer to
your inquiry may I say that it would be childish and infantile to distract
the eyes of the faithful with the aforementioned. It would be, on the
other hand, the mark of a firm and manly mind to represent a single
cross in the sanctuary . . . and to fill the holy church on both sides with
pictures from the Old and the New Testaments, executed by an excel-
368
Clédat 1999 photos 131, 133, 134.
Lucchesi-Palli 1988; 1990.
370
See, e.g., the niche frame in Bawit Chapel VIII, Clédat 1904 Pl. XXX/B;
Lucchesi-Palli 1990 127, Pl. 26/8.
369
341
lent painter, so that the illiterate who are unable to read the Holy Scriptures, may, by gazing at the pictures, become mindful of the manly
deeds of those who have genuinely served the true God . . .371
Nilus’ views remained only partly accepted.372 Patrons of church decorations throughout the early Byzantine period continued to sponsor
mosaics and wall paintings representing themes that had been condemned by Nilus under the conviction that images of the glory of
nature present a most appropriate and edifying view.373 Praise of the
created world was associated with the Classical heritage through the
traditional symbolic iconography of Earth and Ocean and through
Classical literature that continued to be present in the education of
the literate and in the imagery surrounding the educated and uneducated alike in his/her everyday life (cf. Chapters VIII.4, 5).
The Nilotic landscape peopled with Erotes hunting hippopotami in
Chapel XXXVI at Bawit374 paraphrased a theme frequently represented
in late antique and early Byzantine mosaics, also including church
floors.375 In Chapel XXVIII an Erote riding a griffon was painted
on one of the side walls376 by a master who also decorated the
niche with the Virgin holding an oval medallion with the image of
the Child,377 enthroned between adoring angels dressed as courtiers,378
and the rest of the east wall with representations of St Cosmas and
Damian and the Egyptian St Pamoun.379
In the Monastery of Apa Apollo at Bawit, Chapel XVII was one
of the centralized oratories where the more ambitiously designed layout and the better quality of the architectural execution was associated with a more ambitious painted decoration. In Chapel XVII the
master of the two-zoned niche composition of the type also encountered
in Chapel VI (Pl. XXXII)380 represented groups of saints or New
371
Mango 1972/1986 32 f.
For the context of Nilus’ views cf. Elsner 1998a 756 f.
373
For this issue, see the masterful studies of Maguire 1987, 1993, 1999.
374
Clédat 1916 Pl. VIII.
375
Cf. et-Tabgha, Palestine, Church of Multiplication, Nilotic panel, Dunbabin
1999 fig. 207 and Maguire 1999 245 f.
376
Lucchesi-Palli 1988 Pl. 7/1.
377
For the early Byzantine models cf. Ihm 1960 64 f.—Cf. Saqqara Cell 1723,
CM 7982, Quibell 1912 Pl. XXV.
378
Clédat 1904–1906 Pl. XCVI/B.
379
Clédat 1904–1906 Pl. XCVI.
380
CM 7118, Bawit, Chapel VI, Maspero – Drioton 1931–1943 I 6, II Pl. XXI/f;
Ihm 1960 200, Pl. XXV/1; Severin 1977a 253 no. 291/a.—For the theological
backgrounds, see Iacobini 2000 173 ff. and passim.
372
342
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Testament scenes in the lunettes of the dome to which he added
birds and animal figures that were taken from the motif repertory
of early Byzantine mosaics. The representation of a snake attacking
a hart has an analogue in the floor mosaic from the Great Palace
in Constantinople.381 The frequently quoted gazelle hunt on the west
wall of Chapel XXXVII (fig. 158)382 was preserved from an excellently
executed decorative programme. It was part of a figural frieze which
ran along the side walls above a decorated dado. The dado was separated from the figural frieze by a band with medallions enclosing
busts of martyrs (?)383 and the rather surprising image of a man reciting the text of a book or a diptych.384 The costume of the hunters
and their distinctive belt with pendants as well as the fine composition in which the figures playfully transgress the borders of the panel
suggest that the painter was acquainted with Constantinopolitan models created in the late sixth–early seventh century. The same painter
or one of his workshop associates also seems to have been responsible
for the decoration of Chapel XVIII (see below).385 The gazelle hunt,
similarly to a fine lion hunt panel in Chapel XII,386 presented metaphors of the Christian’s fight against the evil and Christianized images
of the virtus of the pagan aristocrat (cf. Chapters VIII.1, 2.1, 4).
In the seventh century, masters possessing a knowledge of Constantinopolitan and Alexandrian iconographic models and cosmopolitan
stylistic trends continued to be employed by educated, well-to-do and
status-conscious monks at Bawit and Saqqara. Skilled painters at
Bawit (fig. 159)387 and Saqqara (fig. 160)388 produced both figural
381
J. Trilling: The Soul of the Empire: Style and Meaning in the Mosaic Pavement
of the Byzantine Imperial Palace in Constantinople. DOP 43 (1989) 27–72; LucchesiPalli 1988 Pl. 7/5.
382
Clédat 1904–1906 Pl. XVII; Lucchesi-Palli 1988 Pl. 5/3 (cf. Clédat 1999 photos 33, 34).
383
Cf. Chapel XVIII, Clédat 1904–1906 Pls LXI/B, LXIII.
384
Clédat 1916 Pl. XV, bottom; Clédat 1999 photos 33, 34.
385
Clédat 1904–1906 Pls LXIV, LXV. For the remains of the niche painting,
see ibid. Pl. LVIII; Ihm 1960 202.
386
Clédat 1904–1906 Pl. LIII. For the rest of the decoration in the chapel, see
387
Chapel LVI, west wall, Clédat 1999 photo 135. For the other walls, see ibid.
photos 136–145.
388
CM 7951, Saqqara, Cell A, north wall, Quibell – Lacau 1908 Pl. XLIV; RassartDebergh 1981a 39 ff.; van Moorsel – Huijbers 1981 131 ff., Pls IV, V; Bolman
(ed.) 2002 fig. 3.9.—Cf. also M. Rassart-Debergh – J. Debergh: A propos de trois
peintures de Saqqara. Acta IRN 9 (1981) 187–205 187 ff.
343
paintings in a distinctive style, characterised by large-headed, frontally
standing figures with large, staring eyes, graphically stylized facial
features and draperies, and extensive use of black or dark brown
outlines. The same style is also characteristic of several icons, e.g.,
the portrait of the Bishop Abraham of Hermonthis painted around
590–620389 (Pl. XXX), the icon with the representation of Apa Mena
under the protection of Christ (Pl. XXVII)390 and the icons of St
Mark391 and an archangel.392 The mannerisms of this style were
reduced in the later seventh century to routine stereotypes in the
work of less skilled masters such as the painter of a lunette taken
from Bawit to the Coptic Museum in 1976 (Pl. XXXIII)393 or the
painter of the early wall paintings discovered recently in the Church
of the Monastery of St Antony at the Red Sea (Pl. XXXIV).394
The iconographic types of Christ and Mary, the apostles and saints
represented on these wall paintings and icons were adopted from a
standard repertory deriving from monumental church decoration in
sixth-century Alexandria, where the sources of the associated style
may also be hypothesised. The quality and iconographic complexity
of the Alexandrian prototypes may be inferred from small fragments
of wall paintings found among the ruins of a rather poorly built
church at al-Akhbariya in the neighbourhood of Abu Mena. From
the fragments, H.-G. Severin and J. Witte-Orr reconstructed representations of prophets placed before a columned niche architecture
(fig. 161),395 New Testament scenes and scenes from the life of
Constantine.396 Opus sectile imitations in the latter scenes repeat patterns of wall panels in Justinian’s Hagia Sophia.397
389
Abraham was bishop of Hermonthis c. 590–610/20. For the dating of the
portrait, which was found probably together with the Luxor treasure (see above,
Chapter VI.1, end): Krause 1971. The portrait may have been painted on the occasion of Abraham’s consecration, but may also have been a commemorative portrait.
390
Paris, Musée du Louvre, Département des Antiquités égyptiennes E 11565,
L’art copte Cat. 144; Cat. Paris-Agde Cat. 72; Rutschowscaya 1992 Cat. 39.
391
Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Cabinet des Medailles Collection Froehner 1129a,
Age of Spirituality Cat. 498.
392
Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale, Cabinet des Medailles Collection Froehner
1129b, Age of the Spirituality Cat. 483.
393
CM 12089, Gabra – Alcock 1993 Cat. 39.
394
Bolman (ed.) 2002 fig. 3.4. Cf. also ibid. 31 ff., figs 3.1–3.3, 3.6, 3.8.
395
Severin 1977a 252 no. 288/a; Severin 1998a 326 ff., fig. 14.
396
Severin 1998a 326 ff., with reference to J. Witte-Orr: Die Wandmalereien von
Karm al-Ahbariya. Malereien des späten 6. Jahrhunderts aus der Umgebung Alexandrias. Unpubl.
Ph.D. dissertation, Bonn 1993.
397
Severin 1998a 327 f.
344
chapter nine
The rich decoration of the cells at Bawit and Saqqara does not
mean, however, that their function would have differed radically
from that of the contemporary monks’ oratories in the Kellia. On
the contrary: the similarity is indicated clearly by a Coptic/Greek
text inscribed on the east wall of the oratory by the inhabitant of
Chapel LI at Bawit:
Practice charity (égãph), pray (proseÊxesya), pray incessantly for the
cause of the angels of the holy offering (prosforã) and say the psalm
(cãllein) well (kal«w).398
Simple symbolic decorations of the kind of the skhnØ-representations
in the oratoria of the Kellia seem, however, to have been rare at
Bawit and Saqqara. An example from Saqqara is not without
significance, however. Cell 773 is a north-south-oriented room situated north of the “main church” of the monastery. Its large dimensions
and decoration indicate that it was a communal oratory or the oratory
of the abbot of the monastery. Referring to an inscription mentioning
one Jeremias inserted in the pavement at its entrance, Quibell suggested that it was built on the place of the monastery-founder’s cell.399
The painting on its south, end, wall represents a columned sanctuary screen with curtains drawn aside and tied up: in the central
intercolumnium, an ornate cross on a moulded base is visible.400 This
representation of a church sanctuary doubtless refers to the “main
church” of the monastery on the other side of the wall and relates
the liturgical prayer performed in the oratory to the liturgy of the
Eucharist celebrated in the church (for “wall transparency” of this
type see p. 323 on the cross theophany represented on the rear wall
of the “south church” at Bawit).
Let us turn now to the centre of the decorative programme in the
monks’ cells, viz., the prayer niche in the east wall. The decoration
of the niche interiors was modelled on church apse compositions. Functioning as devotional images in the framework of monastic piety,401
398
Clédat 1999 120 no. XV.
Quibell 1909 33 note 14, the inscription: Pl. XLIV/4.
400
Preserved fragment: CM 8419, Quibell 1909 11, 100, Pl. XII/1, 2; Van
Moorsel – Huijbers 1981 145 f., Pl. XII/c; for the identification of the cross in the
badly damaged painting cf. Rassart-Debergh 1981a 65, fig. 28/b.
401
For their various theological interpretations, see Grabar 1946/1972 II 207 ff.,
296 ff. (théophanie-vision); Ihm 1960 95 ff.; D. Kinney: The Apocalypse in Early
Christian Monumental Decoration. in: R.K. Emmerson – B. McGinn (eds): The
Apocalypse in the Middle Ages. Ithaca-London 1992 200–216; Iacobini 2000 171 ff.
399
345
the niche paintings derived from apse compositions probably created
in Palestine and re-formulated in Alexandrian churches.402 The most
important type was a two-zoned composition with the Ascension of
Christ formulated on the basis of Ezekiel’s vision in the upper zone
and the enthroned Virgin with Child and the apostles and the evangelists in the lower (Pl. XXXII). The composition visualizes the Incarnation, “God’s historical manifestation”, and the divinity of Christ
in the framework of a symbolic visual discourse on the ascent of
Christ towards God and of mankind towards Christ: a discourse on
salvation.403 This composition type is known from various renderings
in various media from the western as well as the eastern Mediterranean,
including splendid examples such as, e.g., the much-quoted miniature
from the Rabbula Gospels (dated 586)404 and representations on ampullae (pilgrim’s tokens) from Jerusalem.405 No two-zoned Alexandrian
church apse frescos are preserved from the early Byzantine period,
yet their appearance may be reconstructed on the basis of the niche
compositions from Bawit and Saqqara; their general impact is indicated,
e.g., by a remarkable large-scale406 textile hanging woven for a private
chapel some time in the late sixth (?) or early (?) seventh century
(Pl. XXXV).407
In the lower zone of niche paintings and on the side walls of the
oratories images of local saints frequently occur who were regarded
as isapostolos, equal to the apostles and worshipped as powerful intermediaries.408 Their iconography was shaped in monumental church
decoration. The impact of monumental church decoration is also
Iacobini 2000 182 ff.
Ihm 1960 102 ff. Ihm points out ibid. that the feasts of the Incarnation and
Ascension were united in Jerusalem into one feast and that Clemens Alexandrinus
as well as Athanasius, Contra Arianos 2.69 f. and Cyril of Alexandria, In Johannem
14.2–3, identify Mary with the Church.
404
Florence, Biblioteca Medicea-Laurenziana Cod. Plut. I, 56 fol. 13v, Ezekiel’s
vision of God combined with the Ascension of Christ, C. Cechelli – G. Furlani –
M. Salmi: The Rabbula Gospels. Olten-Lausanne 1959; Weitzmann 1977 Pl. 36, and
cf. K. Weitzmann: Loca Sancta and the Representational Arts of Palestine. DOP 28
(1974) 31–55.
405
E.g., Monza, Museo del Duomo, ampullae nos 11, 14, Iacobini 2000 figs 37,
38; cf. Grabar 1958; Grabar 1969 114 f.
406
Measurements: 178 × 110 cm.
407
Cleveland, The Cleveland Museum of Art 67.144, Age of Spirituality Cat. 477;
Rutschowscaya 1990 fig. p. 135; for its interpretation, see Pelikan 1990 4 f. and
passim.
408
Ihm 1960 101 f., 102 note 29.
402
403
346
chapter nine
prevalent in the decoration of the side walls of the oratories.409 In
Chapel III at Bawit the niche was decorated with a two-zoned composition. Christ in Majesty occupied the upper zone. In the centre
of the lower zone the enthroned Virgin was represented with the
Child, flanked by the archangel Michael and local saints (on the
right) and Apa Apollo, the archangel Gabriel and local saints (on
the left). An inscription under the lower zone names Apa Joseph
from Abôt, the sponsor of the paintings, and the painter Jacob.410
Above a decorative dado, a Greek key band ran along the rest of the
east, west, and north walls.411 An excavation photograph412 shows that
above this band there was a larger figural panel in the lunette of
the north wall, yet its theme remains unknown. The Greek key band
was interrupted by figural panels representing episodes from the life
of David according to 1 Sam. 16–17 and 30.413 The cycle starts on
the south end of the west wall with the scene of the anointment of
David, God’s elect, by Samuel and continues with scenes of David being
presented to Saul, David playing the harp before Saul (west wall);
David before engaging Goliath in battle appears before the enthroned
Saul (fig. 162),414 David and Goliath before the battle, and the death
of Goliath (north wall). After this follows an unidentified scene on
the north end of the east wall,415 and the cycle ends on the south
end of the east wall with David’s covenant with Jonathan (?).
Not unlike the David plates from Cyprus, made between 613–629/
630 in Constantinople,416 the scenes in Chapel III show the influence
of narrative manuscript illustrations. Yet while the masters of the
David plates seem to have altered their manuscript models with creative authority, the master of the Bawit wall paintings adhered more
closely to a pattern book or an illuminated Old Testament manuscript which contained abbreviated scenes.417 The Alexandrian origin of his model is indicated perhaps by the distinctive modillion
409
See, e.g., the decorative program of Chapel B at Saqqara, Quibell – Lacau
1908 65 f., Pls XLV–LII; Rassart-Debergh 1981a fig. 17.
410
Clédat 1904–1906 13 ff., 23 f.; Ihm 1960 199 f.
411
Clédat 1904–1906 13 ff., Pl. XVII; Clédat 1999 photos 2, 3.
412
413
Clédat 1904–1906 Pls XII–XVII.
414
Clédat 1904–1906 Pl. XVII; Badawy 1978 fig. 4.30.
415
Clédat 1904–1906 13 ff. suggests “David chez Abiméleq”.
416
Age of Spirituality Cat. 425–433 (H.L. Kessler).
417
For 7th–8th-century textiles with David scenes, see C. Nauerth: Evidence for
a David Cycle on Coptic Textiles. in: Godlewski (ed.) 1990 285–297.
347
cornice represented in one of the scenes (fig. 162). With their rigidity,
the Bawit scenes are, however, very remote from the Hellenistic style
of the Cyprus plates.
Chapel III at Bawit was part of a well-built room complex (with
later additions) resembling the large seventh- and eighth-century hermitages at the Kellia.418 It is tempting to regard the core of the “private monastery” around Chapel III and the fine wall paintings in
its oratory as results of the same ambitious building campaign.
Paintings of good quality are associated with ambitious architectural
layouts and constructions in other cases, too. Let me quote here
Chapels XVIII,419 XXXII,420 XLIII421 and LIV.422 Chapels XXXII
and XLIII were square rooms covered with domes. The dome of
XLIII (fig. 163)423 was supported by pseudo-pendentives; the structure of the interior was articulated by fine painted friezes and ornamental bands. In the pendentives were medallion busts of the saints
Phocas, Epimachos, Mercurios, Sergios, and Bacchos and the prophets
Isaiah (?), Ezekiel, Daniel and Jeremiah; in the lunettes of the four
wall niches there were representations of Apa Apollo and his companions Phib and Anoup, groups of saints, a pair of peacocks, and
a scene with Moses and Aaron (fig. 164).424 The layout of XXXII
and XLIII, their connection with other rooms, and the lack of eastern
niches in both of them indicate that they were representative rooms
accessible to visitors rather than monks’ oratories. Such a representative function is also indicated by the inscriptions in LXIII.425 Chapel
LIV was, in turn, the oratory of a monk who could afford competent
builders for the construction of a substantial building containing cells
for himself and his disciple, and could hire a good painter for the
decoration of the oratory some time in the first half (?) of the seventh
century. An interlace frieze enclosing finely executed busts of evangelists, martyrs (fig. 165),426 and the saints Apa Apollo and Phib is
418
Clédat 1999 Plan III.
Clédat 1904–1906 92 ff., Pls LXVI–LXXIII.
420
Clédat 1916 Pl. XI; Clédat 1999 photos 19–27. Chapel XXXII does not seem
to have been an oratory.
421
Clédat 1999 57 ff., fig. 16, photos 62–78.
422
Clédat 1999 141 ff., fig. 25, photos 121–130.
423
424
425
Esp. Clédat 1999 63 ff. nos II, IV–IX.
426
The martyr St Eudemon, Clédat 1999 photo 130.
419
348
chapter nine
recorded from the paintings.427 The faces and draperies are graphically
stylized. The use of black or dark brown outlines is also characteristic of the style of the master. In spite of the graphic stylization of
the facial features and the draperies, the paintings convey a naturalistic
impression due to the fine combination of dark and light lines in
the rendering of the eyes, nose, and lips. The distinctive stylization
of the coiffures of the figures (except for the evangelists, who were
represented according to the traditional canon) reflects court fashion,
indicating that the painter had access to high quality models, similarly
to his somewhat less skilled contemporary, the master of an interlace
frieze with busts of saints, personifications, birds, flowers, and fruit
baskets in Chapel XVIII.428 The metropolitan context of the art of
these two masters, on the one hand, and the stylistic- and workshop
connections between different artistic media, on the other, can be
illustrated with a fragment from a splendid painted pottery jar found
at Saqqara (fig. 166).429
These ambitious buildings and painted decorations attest the continuity of special monastic traditions of pious intentions, private euergetism, and social display in the seventh and eighth centuries. A
quasi-private monastic display is also reflected, however indirectly,
in the commemorative- and prayer texts inscribed on the walls of
the cells.430 The buildings, paintings and inscriptions reflect the spirit
of the dedication of Longinos and John at Mount Sinai and concur
with the dedication formula: “For the remission of sins of the person
whose name God knows” inscribed on images donated to churches
all around the Mediterranean in this age.431 The same conception of
private sponsorship is prevalent in the texts accompanying donations
of luxurious liturgical objects to Egyptian churches—I quote here
the Greek dedication engraved on the early seventh (?) century silver
processional cross from the Luxor Treasure:432
427
Clédat 1904–1906 Pls LXVI–LXXIII.
429
Cambridge, Fitzwilliam Museum E. 19.1971. The sherd measures 17.4 × 17.0
cm. Bourriau 1981 Cat. 184.—For the impact of monumental iconographical types
on vase decoration, see, e.g., the pottery wares illustrated by T. Górecki: Coptic Painted
Amphorae from Tell Atrib—Introductory Remarks on Decoration. in: W. Godlewski
(ed.): Coptic and Nubian Pottery I. International Workshop, Nieborów, August 29–31, 1988.
Warsaw 1990 34–48 figs 13b, 14c–e.
430
Quibell 1909, 1912; Quibell – Lacau 1908 passim; Clédat 1999 passim.
431
R. Cormack: The Byzantine Eye: Studies in Art and Patronage. London 1989 (I)
25; Cormack 2000a 915 ff.
432
For the treasure discovered in one of the churches at Luxor temple (see
428
349
Thank-offering (eÁxaristÆrion) of Taritsene for the repose of the soul
of Didyme.433
Patronage also developed its own iconographic types, as is demonstrated, e.g., by the standing image of “the Brother Ion the younger”
represented with a square halo in the painting on the north wall of
Chapel LI at Bawit at the side of Apa Apollo, Apa Phib, Apa Anoup
and other saints,434 or the two (?) prostrate patrons on the wall painting representing four saints in Chapel A at Saqqara (fig. 160).
Narrative cycles are altogether very rare among the seventh- and
early eighth-century wall paintings recorded from Bawit and Saqqara.
If besides the prayer niche the walls were also decorated with figural
paintings, these were mostly series of iconic representations with the
composition determined by local monastic traditions, theological
typologies, and individual devotional preferences.435 In a characteristic manner, the second-most important wall surface (the most important being the niche in the east wall) in Chapel LI at Bawit, i.e.,
the lunette of the north wall opposite the entrance, was decorated
with the iconic representation of the enthroned Apa Apollo, Apa
Phib and Apa Anoup in the company of angels, saints and the patron
of the painting.436 While scenes from the life of Mary (the Annunciation,
Visitation, journey to Bethlehem, Nativity)437 occupy a subordinate
position in a narrow frieze beneath the lunette painting, the side
walls and the south lunette of the chapel present a variety of iconic
images.438 It is worth noting that among the paintings of the chapel
the work of at least four different hands can be distinguished, trained
in different stylistic stereotypes but equally poorly skilled. The biographical scenes do not represent a real narrative cycle. The historical
Chapter VI.1) cf. Strzygowski 1904 340 ff.; M. Krause in: Cat. Hamm 260; Mielsch –
Niemeyer 2001 20.
433
Strzygowski 1904 340 f. no. 7201, Pl. XXXIX.—No doubt, dedications of
this kind have a pagan ancestry: they echo, however faintly, the pagan tradition
associated with healing shrines, especially those of Asclepios, cf. Vikan 1995 571.
434
Clédat 1999 113, photo 108.
435
See, e.g., Saqqara, Cell B, saints, Quibell – Lacau 1908 Pls XLV–LII; RassartDebergh 1981a fig. 17; Cell 709, crosses and personifications of virtues, Quibell
1909, Pls VIII–X; Rassart-Debergh 1981a fig. 21; for preserved fragments from the
latter, see CM 7989 (niche), 7952, 7954, 8443, van Moorsel – Huijbers 1981 137
ff., Pls VII–XI.
436
437
438
Clédat 1999 photos 101–104, 114–119.
350
chapter nine
scenes of the beginnings of Christ’s earthly life alluded to the dogma
of the Incarnation.439 The painter associated the visual discourse on
the Incarnation with the iconic images of holy intermediaries and
thus with the promise of salvation.
In the decoration of Chapel XLII at Bawit, the trend of “hanging”
the walls with devotional icons instead of treating them as surfaces
for monumental compositions is even more conspicuous. Here the walls
were covered with painted imitations of textile hangings, also including the east wall right and left of the prayer niche which contained
a traditional two-zoned apse composition.440 The north lunette surface
presents what one is tempted to describe as a trompe-l’œil representation of a wall “hung” with various types of icons441 (fig. 167).442
Grabar 1969 118 ff., 128 ff.
441
Among them medallion portraits of Adam, Abel, St Sybilla and various patriarchs and saints. Clédat 1999 47 f., photos 52–57. A preserved fragment:
Rutschowscaya 1992 Cat. 53.—For the veneration of iconic wall paintings in the
7th century, see Nordhagen 2000 120 ff.
442
Rutschowscaya 1992 fig. p. 77; Clédat 1999 photo 52.
439
440
EPILOGUE
PERENNIAL HELLENISM?
It seems proper to conclude a book on Egyptian late antique-early
Byzantine art with a discussion of one of those outstanding works
of art which made a particularly long journey in time. It was dated
in the learned literature first to the second quarter of the fourth century, then to the second half of the fourth century, the first half of
the fifth century, the sixth century, and finally to the second quarter of the eighth century1—and considered in turn to fit well into
the art of all these periods.
The object in question is the wooden lintel from the Church of
al-Mo"allaqa in Old Cairo, already mentioned in Chapter II.5. The
2.74 m long lintel (height of the figural relief 0.17 m) is carved with
the representation of the Entry into Jerusalem and the Ascension; above
the figural relief there is a Greek inscription consisting of a hymn
on Christ’s ascent in the presence of Mary, the Mother of God, a
dedication by the Abbot Theodore the Proedros and George, Deacon
and Steward, and the badly damaged dating “month of Pachon 12,
3rd indiction, year of Diocletian [.]51” (figs 168–176).2 The first three
lines of the text with the hymn are carved on a separate piece of
wood. The fourth line with the dedication and dating is carved on
the lintel with the relief. Its paleography differs slightly from that of
the first three lines.
The combination of the Entry into Jerusalem with the Ascension
repeats an iconographic formula emerging in the fourth century and
employed in various contexts in the East as well as the West.3 The
1
The late 8th century dating in Mathews 1999a 40 is probably a printing error;
Mathews 1993 40 dates the lintel 735.
2
CM 753, Sacopoulo 1957; Beckwith 1963 13 ff., Pls 41–43; Severin 1977a 252
no. 287; and see A. Grabar: Deux portails sculptés paléochrétiens d’Égypte et d’Asie
Mineure, et les portails romans. Cah. Arch. 20 (1970) 15–28.
3
Cf., e.g., the top and bottom scenes on a diptych in Yerevan (6th cent.) and on
the diptych from Saint Lupicin (6th cent.), Volbach 1972 94 f. no. 142, 97 no. 145.—
The central scenes of the two relief registers on the front of the Junius Bassus sarcophagus (Rome, 359), Age of Spirituality Cat. 386, confront Christ’s historical arrival
with his second coming, the eschatological arrival. Cf. MacCormack 1981 65 f.
352
epilogue
Entry into Jerusalem is presented in an abbreviated form, placed in
an unusual manner within the city walls. It shows Christ riding the
ass side-saddle according to an Eastern iconographic tradition.4 Christ
is greeted by a boy spreading a cloak before him, an elderly bearded
man carrying a book and waving a palm branch, and a dancing
woman: the “daughter of Zion” of John 12.15 (figs 168, 170, 171).
The accent of the scene is laid on the dramatically excited, festive
athmosphere of the epiphany of Christ. The scene is composed
according to a symmetrical scheme: ⁄ ⁄ \\. The meeting of the forward-bent figure of Christ, riding the swiftly moving animal, is placed
in the centre with the boy whose posture and movement mirror and
counterbalance those of the mounted Christ. The elderly man and
the dancing woman constitute with the buildings of Jerusalem a symmetrical frame for the mounted Christ and the boy and reinforce
the centreward dynamics of the scene—yet the “daughter of Zion”,
while moving towards Christ, turns her head to the right, establishing thus a visual link between the Entry scene and the scene of the
Ascension. The latter occupies the larger half of the relief panel. It
is placed in an architectural scene: a mandorla with the enthroned,
youthful, beardless Christ, carried by two hovering angels, appears
between curtains drawn aside and tied to columns with schematically rendered capitals (fig. 173). The representation follows the
iconography of the Ascension based on the vision of Ezekiel, which
one encounters in the apse compositions of the prayer niches at
Bawit and Saqqara (Chapter IX.2.3). From the four living creatures
of the vision, however, only the lion and the bull are represented
on the lower left and right sides of the mandorla. The absence of
the other two creatures remains unexplained.5
The witnesses of the ascent, viz., Mary (the first figure to the left of
Christ with the angels, fig. 172) and the twelve apostles (among them
Peter, distinguished by his cross-staff, is the first figure to the right
of Christ, figs 174, 175), stand before openings in a stone wall. They
are separated from each other by columns and bastions with windows,
yet a scenic unity is achieved by the slightly uneven rhythm of the
figures, their illusionistic relationship with the architecture, and, above
all, by the dramatically exaggerated interrelations of their movements
4
5
Mathews 1999 39 ff.
Iacobini 2000 201 ff.
perennial hellenism?
353
and postures. While all movements are directed towards the centre
of the scene, i.e., Christ appearing between the columns of a symbolic
sanctuary, the figures turn towards each other and exchange exclamations accompanied by expressive gestures. The Ascension scene is
connected with the Entry scene through the direction of the glance
of “the daughter of Zion” and by the leftward inclination of the first
five apostle figures (figs 171, 172); yet these five figures also close the
left end of the scene. On the right end, they are counterbalanced
by two apostles standing erect (fig. 174).
The figures are well-proportioned. The details of the oval-shaped
faces are simply yet clearly rendered, without any mannerisms in the
naturalistic treatment of the eyes, nose and mouth (figs 175, 176).
The coiffures of the apostles repeat forms occurring in traditional late
antique-early Byzantine apostle iconography, while the coiffure of
Christ seems to derive in both scenes from a late fourth- and fifthcentury fashion of long locks parted above the centre of the forehead
and combed back above the ears with longer locks hanging down
behind the nape.6 The draperies are treated in a remarkably elegant
and consistent Classicizing manner; they clearly articulate the body
forms and follow and emphasize the gestures and movements of the
figures.
In 1957 the dating in the Greek inscription of the lintel was read
as “year 51 of Diocletian”, i.e., AD 335.7 Albeit such an early date
could be reconciled with the iconography and the style of the lintel
relief only in a forced manner, Beckwith nevertheless felt compelled
to consider it—allowing at the same time, however inconsistently,
that the relief might also have been carved independently of the dedication (?) in the second half of the fourth century or in the first
half of the fifth century.8 The latter dating was based on stylistic
comparisons with ivories the dating of which is, however, far from
being certain.9 A dating before 431, i.e., the First Council of Ephesos,
was argued for, however, mainly on the basis of the references in
6
Cf., e.g., ivory plaques with miracles of Christ, Rome (?), first third of the 5th
cent., Effenberger – Severin 1992 Cat. 49 and Paris, Musée du Louvre OA 7876,
7877, 7878, Age of Spirituality Cat. 407.
7
M. Sacopoulo: Le linteau dit d’Al-Moallaqa. Cah. Arch. 9 (1957) 99–115.
8
Beckwith 1963 14 f.
9
Beckwith 1963 15 compares the lintel with an ivory of unknown provenance
in the Cabinet des médailles, Paris, representing Muses and Dionysiac scenes,
Volbach 1972 no. 70.
354
epilogue
the hymn to Christ as all divinity and the Virgin as YeomÆtvr and
not YeotÒkow—an argument which is not compelling here.10 Judging
the year date in the dedication unreadable, Severin suggested in
1977 that the relief with the dedication was a later addition to the
hymn inscription and dated the relief to the sixth century.11 Arne
Effenberger dated the relief to the seventh century, suggesting that
the first Church of al-Mo"allaqa, for which the lintel was supposedly
carved, was built after 642, i.e., the evacuation of the Byzantine
fortress of Babylon.12
In the catalogue of the exhibition Age of Spirituality H.L. Kessler
remarked that
[t]he vigorous, expressive figures show a fresh acquaintance with
Hellenistic conventions, but the sharp, brittle carving and exaggerated
gestures . . . suggest that the lintel may date as late as the sixth century.13
Yet, avoiding a decision, Kessler dated the carving to the “4th–6th
century”. A similarly permissive general dating appears in the 1991
Coptic Encyclopedia,14 which thus disregards the suggestion put forward in 1986 by Leslie MacCoull, according to whom the dating
would read “year [4]51 of Diocletian”, i.e., AD 735, and the Abbot
Theodore of the dedication would be identical with the Monophysite
Patriarch Theodore who occupied the see of Alexandria between
731 and 743.15
It was noted, however, that the title proedros may refer to a bishop
but not to a patriarch.16 Antonio Iacobini also pointed out that the
date could also be read as “year [1]51 of Diocletian”, i.e., AD
10
Beckwith 1963 14.—YeotÒkow, “the one who bore God”, was asserted at the
First Council of Ephesos and became the most important epithet for the Virgin in
the Byzantine world. It was especially associated with Constantinople, cf. G. Giambernardini: Il ‘Sub tuum praesidium’ e il titolo ‘Theotokos’ nella tradizione egiziana.
Marianum 31 (1969) 324–362; Cameron, Averil: The Theotokos in Sixth-Century Constantinople. JThS 29 (1978) 79–108; J. Hevelone-Harper: Theotokos. in: Bowersock –
Brown – Grabar 1999 723–724.
11
Severin 1977a 252.
12
Effenberger 1975 180, 210, 220.
13
Age of Spirituality Cat. 451.
14
M.-H. Rutschowscaya: Woodwork, Coptic. CE VII 2344.
15
L.S.B. MacCoull: Redating the Inscription of El-Moallaqa. ZPE 64 (1986)
230–234.
16
J.-M. Spieser: À propos du linteau d’Al Moallaqa. in: Orbis romanus christianusque
ab Diocletiani aetate usque ad Heraclium. Travaux sur l’Antiquité terdive rassemblés autour des
recherches de Noël Duval. Paris 1995 311–320 312.
355
434/435.17 Though this possibility was also considered by MacCoull,
it is the dating to 735 that has been accepted since 1986 by all wellinformed writers on Coptic art—albeit not without some apologetic
overtones. Severin writes thus about Egyptian early Byzantine sculpture in wood:
Eines der ansehnlichsten Zeugnisse ist eine zweiflügelige Holztür des
frühen 6. Jahrhundert, die in der Barbarakirche in Alt-Kairo wiederverwendet war: in ihrem reichen figürlichen und ornamentalen Dekor ist
Verwandschaft mit der Konstantinopler Kunst unübersehbar. Auch
nach der arabischen Eroberung des Landes ist die Übung—wohl im
Gegensatz zur Bauskulptur in Stein—nicht abgebrochen. Die verbesserte
Lesung der Inschrift eines . . . Türsturzes, der früher zumeist ins 6.
Jahrhundert gesetzt worden war, ergab eine Stifterinschrift des Jahres
735. Die bildliche Dekoration . . . führt die Formensprache der Kunst
der 1. Hälfte des 6. Jahrhunderts weiter.18
Although MacCoull’s reading of the date as “year 451 of Diocletian”,
AD 735, is just as uncertain as the alternative reading “year 151 of
Diocletian”, AD 434/435,19 the year date 735 has become a cornerstone in the research. The lintel from the Church of al-Mo"allaqa
seemed to attest the existence of a strong Hellenistic current in the
art of the post-Conquest period. Now assessing the wall paintings
from Bawit and Saqqara or the carvings in wood and bone, so far
only poorly understood, from the viewpoint of the eighth-century
dating of the al-Mo"allaqa lintel, a considerable corpus of works of
art in a Hellenistic style could be dated to the eighth century.20
Effenberger compared the style of the al-Mo"allaqa lintel to a
wooden relief with Daniel, St Menas and four apostles in the Berlin
collection.21 While the exaggerated movements of the figures indeed
recall the Cairo lintel, the Berlin carving is of mediocre quality. A
closer analogy is presented by an incomplete wooden relief in Cairo
which, though badly damaged and worn, retains some of its original painting as well as the elegance of the heads, movements, and
Iacobini 2000 201 ff. with note 61.
Severin 1998a 322.
19
Be it 735 or 434/435, it is completely unlikely that the dedication and the
dating would have been re-carved. Nevertheless, the reason for the differences in
the letter forms in lines 1–3 and 4, respectively, remains obscure.
20
J. Engemann: Elfenbeinfunde aus Abu Mena/Ägypten. JbAC 30 (1987) 172–186;
Severin 1998a 322, 329 ff.
21
Effenberger – Severin 1992 Cat. 98/b, cf. Effenberger 1975 180.
17
18
356
epilogue
draperies (Pls XXXVI, XXXVII).22 It represents the youthful Christ
enthroned before a colonnaded architecture, receiving the adoration
of male saints approaching swiftly from the left and the right. It
seems that the saints carried crowns and the composition was based
on adoration scene types such as the adoration of the Cross by martyrs on fourth- and fifth-century sarcophagi23 or the adoration of the
apostles before Christ on a printed linen textile from Egypt24 and
on the dome mosaic of the Baptistery of the Orthodox in Ravenna
(c. 458), or the adoration of the apostles before the Cross on the
dome mosaic of the Baptistery of the Arians (c. 500) in the same
city.25 As in the al-Mo"allaqa lintel, the carving gives a sharp and
brittle impression, yet this is also a matter of the material and the size.
The angularity of the draperies in both carvings was softened by the
now-lost painting.
It would be rather unfair to argue against the eighth-century dating of the al-Mo"allaqa lintel by reference to the almost total absence
of Hellenistic conventions in the style of figural carvings such as two
late sixth (?) century limestone reliefs in Cairo representing the
enthroned Virgin with the Child in the company of saints/apostles
and angels,26 a seventh-century relief with the Virgin and Child
enthroned between two angels (fig. 177),27 or a Berlin relief with the
iconic representation of the Entry into Jerusalem (fig. 178).28 The
reliefs with the Virgin and Child, though they follow fine early
Byzantine prototypes, are of a poor quality. This is also the case of
the Berlin relief with the Entry, a work of art which deserves the
art historian’s attention only because it presents a remarkable example
of the transformation of a narrative theme into an iconic image that
was intended for devotion. Yet these reliefs, and especially the last
one, take us back to the stylistic and iconographic developments and
changes that we noted in the discussion of the wall paintings from
Bawit and Saqqara (Chapter IX.2.3).
The chronological range of the paintings recorded from Bawit and
Saqqara seems wide enough to be considered more or less repre22
CM 7245, unpublished.
E.g., Grabar 1969 Pl. 300.
24
Kendrick 1922 67 no. 789.
25
Kitzinger 1977 Pls 103, 104; cf. Engemann 1997 143 ff.
26
CM 7814, Beckwith 1963 Pl. 111, Severin 1977a 250 no. 280/a; CM 7815,
Beckwith 1963 Pl. 112.
27
CM 8704, Beckwith 1963 Pl. 113; Effenberger 1975 Pl. 44.
28
23
357
sentative for the entire period in which monks’ private chapels,
churches, and certain communal rooms were traditionally decorated
with wall paintings. We can form an idea of certain developments
and changes in late sixth-, seventh-, and early eighth-century painting on the basis of the evidence from Bawit and Saqqara—however
problematic the chronological assessment of this evidence may remain.
It appears that the main trend in the creation of iconographic programmes led from complex decorations also consisting of narrative
representations and modelled on monumental church decoration to
“hanging the walls” with devotional images. Stylistic changes seem
to be characterized by a general process of simplification leading
from Hellenistic conventions to a decorative stylization. These trends
correspond, of course, with more general processes in the Egyptian
art of the early Byzantine period. Yet the long process of moving
away from the Hellenistic traditions of representation was halted
from time to time by new stylistic and iconographic impetuses imported
by artists arriving from a cosmopolitan artistic milieu inside or outside
Egypt. On the whole, the general process was irreversible, yet, as a
result of these impetuses, different interpretations of Hellenistic traditions of representation existed side-by-side in decorations executed
during the seventh and early eighth centuries. A closeness to and
understanding of Hellenistic style as it was transcribed in early
Byzantine works of art of the second half of the sixth and the first half
of the seventh century—such as the Stuma and Riha patens (565–
578),29 the silver dish of the Hermitage with Silenos and a dancing
Maenad,30 the plates with the David cycle (613–629/30) and a silver
bowl with St Sergios or St Bacchos (641–651),31 all from Constantinople, the miniatures of the Rabbula Gospels (586) from Syria and
the Cotton Genesis (sixth century) from Alexandria (?)32—does not
seem to have been achieved by, nor to have been ambitioned by
the painters working after the middle of the seventh century at Bawit
and Saqqara. The achievment of the artist who was responsible for
the decoration of Chapel XLVI, where he presented in the lower
zone of the apse composition a dramatic scene placed in an illusionistic
space and full of movements, talkative gestures, and expressions of
29
Stuma paten: Istanbul, Archaeological Museum, Age of Spirituality fig. 82; Riha
paten: Washington, Dumbarton Oaks Collection 24.5, ibid. Cat. 547.
30
Kitzinger 1977 Pl. 192.
31
BM 99,4–25,2, Age of Spirituality Cat. 493.
32
London, British Library Board Cotton Otho B. VI, and 17th-cent. copies in
Paris, Bibliothèque Nationale ms. français 9530, Age of Spirituality Cats 408, 409.
358
epilogue
emotions in the manner, but not quite on the artistic level of the
Rabbula Gospels,33 is not repeated by later painters (figs 179, 180).34
Would the possibility not be there that the al-Mo"allaqa lintel may
be dated by an inscription to the year 735, it could be interpreted
as a carving executed by an excellent master some time in the middle
decades of the sixth century, and as a significant and characteristic
product of the stylistic current starting with the doors of the Church
of Sitt Barbara and the “Paris Pilaster”. But, however unlikely it
may appear, the possibility cannot be excluded that the impressionistic Hellenism which is considered by Ernst Kitzinger as part of the
mainstream of Byzantine art35 and which is best manifested in Pope
John VII’s fresco decoration of the chancel of Sta Maria Antiqua
in Rome (705–707),36 also reached some artists working in postConquest Alexandria. We know that in the seventh and early eighth
centuries icons continued to be taken from Constantinople to St
Catherine’s Monastery at Mount Sinai.
The reading of the date in the dedication of the al-Mo"allaqa lintel
will perhaps never be established beyond any doubt. It is paradigmatic
for “Coptic” art history that its splendid decoration leaves open several likely options: the scholar may choose to believe the reading AD
434/435 and feel a little puzzled about the exaggerated Hellenism of
its style; or s/he may disregard the hopelessly ambiguous dating in
the inscription and follow his/her instinct in placing the piece into a
sixth-century context—or s/he may accept the AD 735 date and admire
the al-Mo"allaqa carving as a splendid, though fairly unexpected, testimony of another, late transfiguration of Hellenism in Egyptian art.37
33
For the iconographical type of the orant Mary turning towards the vision, see
the ampullae in Monza, nos 14, 16, Grabar 1958 Pls XXVII, XXIX.
34
Clédat 1904 Pl. 524, fig. 2; Ihm 1960 204, Pl. XXIV/1; Clédat 1999 photos
85–94.
35
Kitzinger 1977 119 f.
36
P. Romanelli – P.J. Nordhagen: S. Maria Antiqua. Roma 1964; P.J. Nordhagen:
The Frescoes of John VII (A.D. 705–707) in S. Maria Antiqua in Rome (Acta IRN 3). Roma
1968; Nordhagen 2000 120 ff.; for the questions of dating cf. id.: S. Maria Antiqua:
the Frescoes of the Seventh Century. Acta IRN 8 (1978) 89–142; (= Studies in Byzantine
and Early Medieval Painting. London 1990 177–296).
37
Cf. E. Kitzinger: The Hellenistic Heritage in Byzantine Art. DOP 17 (1963)
95–115; K. Weitzmann: The Classical in Byzantine Art as a Mode of Individual
Expression. in: Byzantine Art —An European Art. Athens 1966 151–177; E. Kitzinger:
The Hellenistic Heritage in Byzantine Art Reconsidered. Akten des XVI. Internationalen
Byzantinologenkongresses. I.2. Wien 1981 657–675; B. Kiilerich: The Byzantine Artist
and his Models: The Constantinian Mosaics at Nabeul (Tunisia) and perennial Hellenism.
in: A.C. Quintavalle (ed.): Medioevo: i modelli. Milano 2002 211–220.
ABBREVIATIONS
Abbreviations used in the text and the footnotes
b.
Berlin
BM
Brooklyn
Cairo
CM
d.
edn.
Fs
GRM
n.d.
P. Oxy.
r
rev.
SB
trans.
v
born.
Berlin, Museum für Spätantike und Byzantinische Kunst (with
inventory number).
[London,] The British Museum (with inventory number).
Brooklyn, New York, Brooklyn Museum of Art, Department of
Egyptian, Classical, and Ancient Middle Eastern Art (with inventory number).
Cairo, Egyptian Museum (with inventory or Journal d’Entrée
number).
[Cairo,] Coptic Museum (with inventory number).
died.
edition.
Festschrift.
[Alexandria,] Graeco-Roman Museum (with inventory number).
no date.
see Bibliographical abbreviations.
recto.
revised.
see Bibliographical abbreviations.
translated by.
verso.
Periodicals and series
AA
Archäologischer Anzeiger, Berlin.
Acta Ant. Hung. Acta Antiqua Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae, Budapest.
Acta Arch. Hung. Acta Archaeologica Academiae Scientiarum Hungaricae, Budapest.
Acta IRN
Acta ad archaeologiam et artium historiam pertinentia. Institutum
Romanum Norvegiae, Universitas Osloensis, Roma.
Aegyptus
Aegyptus. Rivista italiana di egittologia e di papirologia, Milano.
AfP
Archiv für Papyrusforschung, Stuttgart-Leipzig.
Äg. Lev.
Ägypten und Levante. Internationale Zeitschrift für ägyptische
Archäologie und deren Nachbargebiete, Wien.
AJA
American Journal of Archaeology, Baltimore, from 1897 Norwood.
AM
Mitteilungen des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts Athenische
Abteilung, Mainz.
Anc. Soc.
Ancient Society, Leiden.
ANRW
W. Haase – H. Temporini (eds): Aufstieg und Niedergang der
Römischen Welt, Berlin-New York.
AnTard
Antiquité Tardive. Late Antiquity—Spätantike—Tarda Antichità—
Antigüedad Tardìa. Revue internationale d’histoire et d’archéologie (IVe–VIIIe s.) publiée par l’Association pour l’Antiquité Tardive,
Paris.
AÖAW
Anzeiger der Österreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, Wien.
Arch. Ephem.
Archaiologike Ephemeridos, Athens.
360
ASAE
BAR
BASP
BCH
BdE
abbreviations
Annales du Service des Antiquités de l’Égypte, Cairo.
British Archaeological Reports, Oxford.
Bulletin of the American Society of Papyrologists, New York.
Bulletin de la correspondence hellénique, Athens.
Bibliothèque d’Étude, Institut français d’archéologie orientale, Le
Caire.
BIFAO
Bulletin de l’Institut français d’archéologie orientale, Le Caire.
BiOr
Bibliotheca Orientalis, Leiden.
BJb
Bonner Jahrbücher, Bonn.
BMOP
British Museum Occasional Paper, London.
BSAA
Bulletin de la Societé archéologique d’Alexandrie, Alexandrie.
BSAC
Bulletin de la Societé d’Archéologie Copte, Le Caire.
BullBAHongr Bulletin du Musée Hongrois des Beaux-Arts, Budapest.
BZ
Byzantinische Zeitschrift, München.
CAH
see Bibliographical Abbreviations.
Cah. Arch.
Cahiers Archéologiques. Fin de l’antiquité et moyen âge, Paris.
CdE
Chronique d’Égypte, Bruxelles.
CRAIBL
Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres. Comptes-rendus des
séances, Paris.
CRIPEL
Cahier de Recherches de l’Institut de Papyrologie et d’Égyptologie
de Lille, Lille.
DOP
Dumbarton Oaks Papers, Washington.
Enchoria
Enchoria. Zeitschrift für Demotistik und Koptologie, Wiesbaden.
ÉtTrav
Études et Travaux. Travaux du Centre d’Archéologie Méditerranéenne
de l’Academie Polonaise des Sciences, Varsovie.
FuB
Staatliche Museen zu Berlin. Forschungen und Berichte, Berlin.
Ist. Mitt.
Istanbuler Mitteilungen, Mainz.
JbAC
Jahrbuch für Antike und Christentum, Münster.
JARCE
Journal of the American Research Center in Egypt, Boston.
JdI
Jahrbuch des Deutschen Archäologichen Instituts, Berlin.
JEA
Journal of Egyptian Archaeology, London.
JESHO
Journal of the Economic and Social History of the Orient, London.
JNES
Journal of Near Eastern Studies, Chicago.
JÖB
Jahrbuch der Österreichischen Byzantinistik, Wien.
JRA
Journal of Roman Archaeology, Ann Arbor.
JRS
Journal of Roman Studies, London.
JThS
Journal of Theological Studies, Oxford.
MC
Le monde copte. Revue semestrielle de culture égyptienne, Limoges.
MDAIK
Mitteilungen des Deutschen Archäologischen Instituts Abteilung
Kairo, Berlin, Wiesbaden, from 1970 Mainz.
MEFRA
Mélanges de l’École Française de Rome, Série Antiquité, Rome.
MIFAO
Mémoires publiés par les membres de l’Institut français d’archéologie orientale, Le Caire.
Mon. Piot
Fondation Eugène Piot, Monuments et Mémoires publiés par
l’Académie des Inscriptions et Belles-Lettres, Paris.
PAM
Polish Archaeology in the Mediterranean. Polish Centre of Mediterranean Archaeology Warsaw University, Warsaw.
RA
Revue Archéologique, Paris.
REA
Revue des Études Anciennes, Paris.
REB
Revue des Études Byzantines, Paris.
Rendiconti
Rendiconti Pontificia Accademia Romana di Archeologia, Rome.
RM
Mitteilungen des Deutschen Archäolgischen Instituts Römische
Abteilung, Rome.
SAK
Studien zur Altägyptischen Kultur, Hamburg.
abbreviations
TMByz
WZRostock
ZÄS
ZPE
361
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Wissenschaftliche Zeitschrift der Universität Rostock, Rostock.
Zeitschrift für ägyptische Sprache und Altertumskunde,
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Zeitschrift für Papyrologie und Epigraphik, Bonn.
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INDEX OF NAMES
Aaron 280, 347
Abel 280, 350
Abimelech 346
Abraham 261, 277–278, 280, 291
Abraham (bishop of Hermonthis) 301,
343
Abu’l-Hagg

Transfigurations of Hellenism

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