Travel Reference
In-Depth Information
iambic distich which once read in full: “These icons the deceivers
once cast down / The pious emperors have again restored.” The apse
mosaic was first unveiled by the Patriarch Photius on Easter Sunday
in the year 867: a most momentous occasion, for it signified the final
triumph of the Orthodox over the Iconoclasts, and celebrated the
permanent restoration of sacred images to the churches of Byzantium.
The two pious sovereigns referred to here are Michael III, the Sot,
and his protege, Basil I, whom Michael had made co-emperor the
previous May, and who would the following September murder his
benefactor and usurp the throne for himself.
Three other mosaic portraits are located in niches at the base
of the north tympanum wall and are visible from the nave. They
portray three sainted bishops of the early church. In the first niche
from the west we have St. Ignatius the Younger, in the central niche
St. John Chrysostomos, and in the fifth from the west St. Ignatius
Theophorus. All three figures are nearly identical except for the faces;
each is clad in sacerdotal robes, the most striking item of which is
the wide omophorion, or stole, with two large crosses below the
shoulders and a third just below the knee; each holds in his left hand,
which is concealed below his cloak, a large book with bejewelled
binding; the younger St. Ignatius appears to be touching the top of
the topic with his right hand, while the other two have their right
hands raised in blessing. The faces get older the farther east one goes:
the first Ignatius, as his name suggests, is a young man but with a very
ascetic face; St. John is in early middle age and his small, compressed
lips hardly suggest the”Golden Mouth” from which he receives his
name, Chrysostomos; St. Ignatius Theophorus is an old man with
white hair and a beard. Chrysostomos and the elder Ignatius were
two of the most powerful and contentious patriarchs in the history of
Byzantium; each would have seen both Church and Empire wrecked
rather than compromise his principles. It was said of Chrysostomos
in his time that “he was merciless to sin but full of mercy for the
sinner.”
The only other mosaics which are visible from the nave are the
famous six-winged seraphim or cherubim in the eastern pendentives.
(Those in the western pendentives are imitations in paint done by the
Search WWH ::




Custom Search