Pentcheva, Performative Icon

The Performative Icon
Author(s): Bissera V. Pentcheva

Source: The Art Bulletin, Vol. 88, No. 4 (Dec., 2006), pp. 631-655
Published by: College Art Association
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The Performative Icon
Bissera V. Pentcheva
Icon in Greek is understood as enameled cover, which floods the eye with its radiance and
(ikon, eiKcov) image, repre
sentation, and portrait.
In Byzantium the word alsoacquired
shimmer. When illuminated by the trembling flicker of can
a very
specific meaning
as a
portable portrait
of Christ, the dles and oil lamps rather than the steady and harsh spotlights
and saints with scenes from their lives on wood panels of museum on the revetted
Virgin, displays, the painted holy face
or surfaces such as enamel, mosaic, and icon sinks and in the shadow. These oper
precious ivory, metal, disappears panels
steatite (Figs. 1-4).* The icon was
perceived
as matter im ate at the brink of the extramission and intromission models of
bued with charis (âpi?), or divine grace.2 As matter, this visuality. They deny the tangibility and even visibility of the
object
was meant to be
physically experienced. Touch, smell, sacred image, while they appeal to the sense of touch through
taste, and sound all contributed to the of "seeing" the textured surface of their and enameled-filigree
experience repouss?
the Over the years, this sensory and sensual metal revetments.7
portable portrait.
experience (aesthesis) of the image has been lost from view in Because they
are
luxury objects, relief icons are now con
the
scholarship.3
sidered exceptions among an otherwise largely panel-painted
The icon is in fact a surface that resonates with sound, icon However, the way relief icons in metal,
production.
wind, touch, and smell. This thus offers us a enamel, steatite, and the of
light, object ivory integrate iconophile theory
into what vision meant in
Byzantium:
a
synesthetic images and the way they sensorially engage the faithful
glimpse
the whole body is engaged. The term
in which through their tactile representations suggest that these ob
experience
as rather than lead us instead to a
synesthesia employed in modern art theory and psychology jects, being exceptions,
refers to concomitant sensation: the of one sense fundamental and of icons as textured
experience expectation experience
through the stimulation of another, such as color experi surfaces in Byzantium. The relief icon, which dominated
enced as sound. Instead, I will use the word synesthesis (syn-,
artistic production in the ninth and tenth centuries, most
together, plus aesthesis, sensual

apprehension)
to focus atten closely fulfilled the qualities of Byzantine tactile and sensorial
tion on consonant sensation: the simultaneity of senses. This visuality.
is very characteristic of Byzantium. Yet In its original setting, the icon performed through its
synesthetic experience
it is rarely discussed in medieval studies. Whenever a link materiality. The radiance of light reflected from the gilded
between the senses and the
spiritual
is made, it is often drawn surfaces, the flicker of candles and oil lamps placed before
primarily on the basis of the writings of Abbot Suger.4 the the incense, the sounds of prayer
image, sweetly fragrant
According to Byzantine image theory as it emerged in the and music?these inundated all senses. In saturating the
ninth century, the icon is the imprint (in Greek, typos) of material and sensorial to excess, the experience
of the icon
Christ's visible characteristics on matter. The led to a transcendence of this very materiality and gave access
(appearance)
to the intangible, invisible, and noetic.8 This phenomenolog
quintessential Byzantine image ideally should not be thought
of as a painting created by brushstrokes but as an imprint? ical aspect of the icon has been largely overlooked inmodern
a typos impressed on a material surface. The relief icon it as art, confining it to a glass-cage
scholarship. By treating
most closely conformed to this theoretical model; it defined museum display, subjecting it to uniform and steady electric
as the culture of the mold, or seal the icon has been of life?its surface,
Byzantium imprint, lighting, deprived
dead.9
(Figs. 1-3).
The relief icon also best responds to the prevailing theory In
Byzantine culture, mimesis is the word closest to the
of vision known as extramission.5 to this model, the definition of It stands for an admixture of
According "performance."
eye of the beholder is active, constantly moving and sending presence and absence.10 The icon exemplifies just such an
light rays that touch the surfaces of objects. The eye seeks the admixture. While itself an absence
(appearance),
the Byzan
tactility of textures and reliefs. Sight is understood and expe tine icon enacts divine presence (essence) in itsmaking and
rienced as touch.6 Not surprisingly, Byzantine icons address in its interaction with the faithful.11 A person's approach,
this tactile desire with their rich decoration, varied materials, movement, and breath disrupt the lights of the candles and
and reliefs. They employ a baroque pastiche of metal re oil lamps, making them flicker and oscillate on the surface of
pouss?, filigree,
cloisonn? and champlev? enamels, pearls,
the icon, This glimmer of reflected rays is enhanced by the
and gemstones. Some of these panels also contain poetic rising incense in the air, the sense of touch and taste, and the
inscriptions embedded in the metal surface (Fig. 21). sound of prayer to animate the panel.12 The icon thus goes
The later and better-known production of wood panel through a process of becoming, changing, and performing
paintings covered with metal revetments (Fig. 4) differ sig before the faithful,
nificantly from the Middle Byzantine relief icon. In the latter, These shifting sensations triggered through sight, touch,
the holy figure projects in relief, whereas in the former, the sound, smell, and taste stir the faithful. They are then led to
sacred form recedes in darkness. It is painted on the flat project their whirling psychological state and sensual experi
surface of the wood and surrounded by a raised silver-gilt or ence (pathema, Tr?diq/xa) back onto the object to make the
ART BULLETIN VOLUME LXXXVIII NUMBER 4
532
1 Icon of the Archangel late 10th enamel on 2 Icon of the Archangel Michael, late llth-12th century,
Michael, century,
17% X 14V6 X 3/4 in. (44 X 36 X 2 cm). Treasury of the enamel on gold, 85/s X 7V4 in. (22 X 18.5 cm). Treasury of the
gold,
basilica of S. Marco, Venice in the public basilica of S. Marco, Venice (artwork in the domain;
(artwork domain; public
photograph by Cameraphoto, provided by Art Resource, NY) photograph by Cameraphoto, provided by Art Resource, NY)
icon alive. Animated the human clastic The definition of the icon as absence has
appear by projected period.
7r?0T)/xa, it turns into a
living painting:
an
empsychos graphe paradoxically heightened the materiality of this object. A
(e/xi/fuô? ypa</>ff). A new meaning of "living painting" tension lurks on the icon's surface between absence and
from a tension that will be resolved in the icon's

emerges my analysis.13 presence, perfor
The
Byzantine
icon has a
legacy
of tactile visuality,
sensu mance (mimesis) : the way it plays with appearances before the
Because the Eastern Orthodox main faithful. In contrast to our Western notion of mimesis as the
ally experienced. liturgy
tained its late antique
tradition of saturating
the senses, the imitation of form, Byzantine mimesis is the imitation of pres
embedded in its rite gave rise to a sensorially rich ence. The icon is just an imprint of form, but it simulates
objects
performance.
While all five senses are
engaged,
a subtle divine essence through the interaction of its imprinted sur
hierarchy is established. Sight, touch, and sound emerge as face with the changing
ambience.
the senses through which the materiality of the icon as the Byzantine image theory emerged during the Iconoclastic
imprint of the divine appearance is empirically formed. At period, 730 to 843. At the very center of this controversy lay
the same time, smell and taste access to divine essence the tension between matter and Can the icon represent
give spirit.
through an almost Eucharistie participatory knowledge of Christ's divinely human nature? The eighth-century defense
God. of icons an essentialist model. Its major proponents
presents
were John of Damaskos (ca. 675-749) and Patriarch Germa
Byzantine Mimesis: Essence and Appearance nos (ca. 634-732).15 Using Christology, they drew a connec
The Byzantine icon is a surface that has received the imprint tion between the icon and the incarnate Christ. The Incar
of divine form. This nonessentialist definition of the icon nation manifests the divine acquiring a human form, lending
developed in the ninth-century writings of Patriarch Nike validity
to the visible and representation. By extension, the
of Stoudios. Charles Barber has al icon shows the process through which the Logos acquires a
phoros and Theodore
ready reconstructed their theory in his excellent study Figure visible human shape.
and Likeness:- On the Limits of Representation in Byzantine Icono The original seventh-century mosaics at Nikaia offer an
clasm.14 What remains to be

explored
is how this nonessen
example of this incarnational dialectic (Figs. 5, 6).16 The
tialist model affected the icon production of the post-Icono pr?figurai divine, represented by the throne, book, dove, and
THE PERFORMATIVE ICON
533
3 Harbaville late 10th century, X WA

triptych, ivory, 9V? in.
(24.2 X 28.5 cm). Mus?e du Louvre, Paris (artwork in the
public domain; photograph by Erich Lessing, provided by Art

Resource, NY)
?ir>#?^*Z&1*xz?.
5 Mosaic of the Hetoimasia, late 7th or

early 8th century.
Church of the Koimesis of the Theotokos, Iznik, Turkey
(Nikaia) (artwork in the public domain; photograph provided
by the Theodore Schmit Archive, ? The State Hermitage
Museum, St. Petersburg)
inscription, is transformed into the Child held in the arms of

the in the apse. We witness a fol
Virgin metamorphosis by
lowing the central ray of light, most likely made of silver
tesserae.17 catch and reflect as lead us to the
They light they
carnal the Child in arms.
light: golden-clad Mary's By equat
ing the icon with the body of Christ, making it participatory
in the divine essence, this essentialist model itself to
exposed
of The at Nikaia
charges idolatry.18 figurai representation
shows traces of such an iconoclastic intervention, for the
image of the Virgin and Child in the apse was replaced by the
aniconic of the cross sometime in the cen
shape mid-eighth
tury. With the reestablishment of veneration in 843,
image
the was restored.
figurai representation
To counteract the of in the incarnational
charges idolatry
model, the iconophiles of the later part of the eighth and
ninth centuries a nonessentialist
early developed interpreta
tion of the icon.19 Patriarch Nikephoros (ca. 750-828) de
fined the icon as the imprint (typos) of the visible character
i ftl J; istics of Christ on matter, or
appearance imprinted
on
matter: the form of the one
"Painting represents corporeal
4 Double-sided icon of the
processional Virgin Hodegetria,
3rd of the 13th century, on wood, silver-metal depicted, impressing its appearance (schema) and its shape
quarter tempera
revetment, 38V? X 26% in. (97 X 67 cm). Icon Gallery, Ohrid, (morphe) and its likeness (empheria).'"20
Macedonia (artwork in the domain; ? Schema, morphe, empheria (oxrj/xa, jmop</>Tj, e^?peta) all
public photograph
Scala, provided by Art Resource, NY) converge on the sense of appearance/likeness and empha
534 ART BULLETIN VOLUME LXXXVIII NUMBER 4
7 Seal attached to the memorandum of a of

judge
Thessaloniki written in 927, lead, 7% X 6% in. (19.8 X 17.4
cm). Iviron Monastery, Mount Athos, Greece in the
(object
from cat. no.
public domain; Treasures ofMount Athos, 508,
13.1)
6 Apse mosaic of the Virgin and Child, late 7th- early 8th and
mid-9th century. Church of the Koimesis of the Theotokos,
Iznik, Turkey (Nikaia) (artwork in the public domain;
photograph provided by the Theodore Schmit Archive, ? The appearance of the prototype has been impressed onto the
State Hermitage Museum, St. Petersburg) next
memory of the artist. In the step, this form is
impressed
imprinted (literally impressed like a die) for a second time on
the material surface (bronze or marble or encaustic).
gold,
The making of the icon becomes a process of double imprint
size the nonessentialist relation between copy and prototype.
The two are connected not essence. The icon as (typos).
by form,
This nonessentialist of the icon does not account for
of no in Christ's sa theory
imprint appearance longer participates
miraculous As in any other culture, the theoretical
cred and therefore does not reveal his hypostasis images.
energy model exercised some but not total control over artistic
human essence). In the visible charac
(divinely bearing only a
and ritual It gave line
teristics and the miraculous production practices. conceptual
lacking essence, the icon be
comes the imprint of absence on matter. This object is thus through which to defend the validity of icons.
At the same time, a belief in miraculous icons did exist in
set to simulate presence (essence) appearance.
through this went
Byzantium, and belief against the theoretical defi
A similar definition of the icon as an imprint of likeness on
nition of the icon as absence. Because these
matter emerges in the writings of Theodore of Stoudios thaumaturgie
were as of divine
images perceived repositories presence, they
(759-826):
functioned in a way similar to relics. These icons offered
access to sacred enclosed in containers
The crafted icon modeled after its prototype brings the energy. Habitually
and covered silk the miraculous were
likeness of the prototype into matter and participates in its by veils, images kept
from sensual in contrast to the
form by means of the thought of the artist and the impress away grasp, regular icon,
of his hands. This is true of the the stone which was always fully visually and tangibly available. The
painter, carver,
were revealed at swift cli
and the one who makes images from gold and bronze; miracle-working images fully only
each takes looks at the receives the mactic of the ritual.22
matter, prototype, points
imprint of that which he contemplates, and presses it like

a seal into his matter.21 Typos and Sphragis
The nonessentialist model of the icon as a double imprint, I
In this passage, the icon is likeness that participates only in believe, originates
from the very image production practices
the form, not the essence, of the The act of available to men of letters in
prototype. ninth-century Constantinople
looking at the model is understood as a primary imprint. The and from the
stronghold of the extramission theory
in
Byzan
THE PERFORMATIVE ICON 535
8 Seal blank, lead, diameter IVs in. (2.9 cm). Dumbarton

D.C. in the public
10 Seal of Peter, bishop of Thebes, with the Virgin Episkepsis,
Oaks, Washington, (object domain;
11th century, diameter 1 in. (2.5 cm). Dumbarton Oaks,
photograph provided by Dumbarton Oaks, Byzantine
D.C.
Collection, Washington, D.C.) Washington, (object in the public domain; photograph
provided by Dumbarton Oaks, Byzantine Collection,
Washington, D.C.)
11 Coin with the impressed images of Christ and Emperor

Constantine VII (r. 945-59), gold, diameter % in. (1.8 cm).
Dumbarton Oaks, D.C. in the public
Washington, (object
domain; photograph provided by Dumbarton Oaks, Byzantine
Collection, Washington, D.C.)
The typos/sphragis concept is not new. It has been explored

most prominently by Herbert Kessler in connection with the
acheiropoietos of Christ (miraculous image not made by human
9 Pliers with intaglio relief of a saint, iron, 6% X 6V6 in. the
hands, a-, without, heir, hand, poietos, made): imprint
(17.4 X 15.5 cm). Arthur Sackler Museum, Mass.,
Cambridge,
1951.31.6 (object in the (typos) of the Holy Face on a material surface.25 This thauma
bequest of Thomas Whittemore,
public domain; photograph provided by the Arthur Sackler turgie object is allegedly the product of a single imprint of
Museum, Harvard Art Museums, the divine form and essence. It is created like a coin or seal.
University Cambridge)
Christ's body functions like an intaglio impressed on the
material surface (Figs. 10, 11). As an extension of the divine
form, which bears the divine touch, the
acheiropoietos partici
tine documents, once their was con in the essence.
visuality. Many writing pates
cluded, were secured with a seal.23 For instance, in a memo Yet the typos/sphragis concept has never been applied to the
randum by a judge of Thessaloniki written in 927, the seal is regular icon. In contrast to the
acheiropoietoi,
the icon is
still in its original position, affixed with a cord at the edge of created through a double imprint and participates only in the
the parchment. It completes the writing and ensures the appearance of the prototype. Again, the making of a seal or
inviolate state of the letter (Fig. 7) .24The characteristic Byz a coin exemplifies this process. The die and its imprint
antine sealing practice was to use lead blanks with a channel (eKTweojULa, twos, a<j>payU) furnish not
just
a
metaphor for
going through their diameter (Fig. 8). The silk cords were the relation between Christ and the icon but also a process
first threaded through the parchment and then strung that entirely maps the concept of the icon as absence,
lacking
through the seal's channel. After being heated, the lead essence. The sacred body leaves a
physical imprint. By dis
blanks were placed between the valves of iron pliers (Fig. 9). placing matter, it produces a
negative space, a shell in which
The pliers were struck shut with a hammer, impressing a a body once resided but no longer remains. This shell is
relief on the softened surface of the lead (Figs. 10,11). While equivalent to the negative intaglio on the heads of the pliers
creating the metal relief, the pliers embedded the silk cord (Fig. 9). It is this form of absence that is then imprinted on
in the lead and closed the parchment. Writing and sealing the warm metal surface, reifying in relief the shape of ab
thus became linked in Byzantium. The graphe (encompassing sence (Figs. 10, 11). Here, absence turns into a projection,
writing and painting) was understood as a seal (sphragis, penetrating the physical space. The relief paradoxically is
for the seal it. By the icon as a transformed into the materialization of the form of absence.
ar<f>payi<;), completed analogy,
manifestation of graphe also became a The icon then becomes a reified, sensual, manifesta
sphragis. sensory
536
tion of absence. It
self-consciously
draws attention to absence, the chancel barrier Sophia, Paul the Silentiary men
in Hagia
making it tangible, apprehensible through
the senses.26 As tioned metal-repouss? disks with the figures of Christ, the
Apostles, and the Virgin.32 Similarly, after
present absence, the imprint neutralizes the icon and makes
angels, prophets,
it immune to of idolatry. It access to appear icons in metal adorned the of
charges provides Iconoclasm, repouss? epistyle
which is realized and the foundation called Nea Ekklesia
ance, materially sensually experienced. imperial (the New
The understanding of the icon through the seal-making of Basil I .33Enamel medallion
Church) Emperor (r. 867-86)
model also an on versus
places emphasis tangible intangible icons of Christ appeared in the Chapel of the Savior in the
absence, rather than on the visible versus the invisible. In its a
These instances demonstrate tradition
palace.34 continuing
relief, the icon materializes the absent sacred
imprinted fig of luxury relief icons in both Hagia Sophia and the churches
ure. It it Therefore, medieval in general
gives shape. objects and chapels of the Great Palace.
and icons in to express the
Byzantine particular attempt The most important icon in this period was the Chalkites
of the versus the rather than the
paradox tangible intangible Christ set atop the Brazen Gates of the imperial palace. Its
visible versus the invisible (in which my analysis differs from
story summarizes the entire Iconoclastic period (730-843). It
that of the existing scholarship on medieval image theory) .27 was allegedly taken down on the orders of Emperor Leo III in
The tangible appeals to and mobilizes all five senses, while
730, and this act of public aggression against images signaled
the visible addresses itself just to the eye. It is our modern
the outbreak of Iconoclasm in the capital.35 Since this story is
culture's obsession with making things visible, fueled by op not mentioned source
tical that makes us a similar framework onto by any contemporary eighth-century
visuality, project
and in the written record after 800, it casts some
medieval art.28 the Byzantine icon an appears only
By contrast, presents
doubt on the existence of a Chalke Christ in about 730.
of tactile
eloquent example visuality sensually experienced.
to the of vision in
Marie-France Auz?py has correctly argued that the legend
According preferred theory Byzantium,
was in order to Eirene's
extramission, the its seeks a form developed justify Empress placement
eye casting rays tangible
that can be "touched with the and
of such an icon for the first time during the iconophile
eyes, hands, lips."29
the same desire for is present in the interim period, 787-814.36 Through the invention of a leg
Moreover, materiality
passage quoted from Theodore of Stoudios: "[the artist] endary past for the Chalkites, it acquired legitimacy. Then
takes matter, looks at the receives the of again in 814 Emperor Leo V removed this image from the
prototype, imprint
that which he contemplates, and presses it like a seal into his gates in an attempt to emulate the actions of his
legendary
matter."30 In the of an the active of the artist iconoclast Leo III. a new Chalkites was
making icon, eye predecessor, Finally,
casts
optical rays over the saint. They touch the sacred form set up in 843. The Chalke Christ marked the final triumph of
and return, impressing
the gathered shape
into the memory orthodoxy and celebrated the renewed alignment of imperial
of the craftsman. This first image (the imprinted vestige of power with image
veneration. As the gate to the Great Palace,
touch) is thus internal. Like a

negative intaglio,
it is subse the Chalke visually and tangibly defined and propagated
quently impressed by the hands of the artist into a material imperial policy.
It was
probably
this same
image that reap
peared on imperial coinage in 843.37

surface.
The sacred can be seen to function in What did this icon look like? Could it have been a metal
Byzantine portrait
terms. It presents a material manifestation of to copper
Neoplatonic relief icon?a Its name, Chalkites^ refers and
typos}
what is immaterial and ineffable (divine essence). The image but is this a reference to the Brazen Gates over
bronze,38
is a internal. Its external manifestation is the icon. The
priori which it hung or to the fact that the image itself was made of
its surface reaffirms the of the internal
eye "touching" reality metal? Scholars, notably, Cyril Mango in 1959, have argued
prototype. Touch authenticates this internal The
imprint. that the Chalkites was a because the iconoclasts
painted panel
validity or truth of the image is itsmatter; its surface, having sent it to the fire.39 However, is not suited for
panel painting
received the imprint (typos) of absence, offers it in turn to the
the exterior of a building; ultraviolet light, humidity, and
touch of the "eyes and lips" of the faithful.
temperature shifts would all wreak havoc with egg tempera
the icon as reified absence is imbued with
Paradoxically, on wood.
the most Its lack of essence is compen
profound materiality.
By contrast, if we identify the Chalkites as a metal relief
sated by the materially manifested likeness: palpable, tangi
icon, all of these issues are resolved. A bronze or icon
copper
ble, and sensual. It is this materiality of the icon that is
overlooked in the recent studies of Byzantine
(a typos) would have easily been burned in accordance with
image theory.31
the incident of 730 or 814. In fact, fire would have been the
The Relief Icon only and perhaps best way to destroy it.Moreover, its burning
from the ninth to the eleventh would have had a strong symbolic value by alluding to the
For the period centuries,
relief icons in metal, and steatite survive in
biblical Golden Calf (Exod. 32:20). Burning, indeed, would
enamel, ivory,
numbers than So this imbalance have justified the icon's destruction in the eyes of iconoclasts
greater panel paintings. far,
to wood's to deterioration. as an orthodox act of down the idols.
has been attributed vulnerability pulling
a different which takes into account Further confirmation of this hypothesis can be found in
Perhaps interpretation,
of icons in the ninth and the written record. In one of the two earliest
tradition, theory, and the function Byzantine
tenth centuries, is in order. In this the seal sources describing the Chalke incident of 730, the Life of Saint
interpretation,
and-coin-based model at the core of Byzantine image theory Stephen the Younger (written about 809), the icon appears as a
furnishes an into the art after Iconoclasm. copper relief The passage mentions the icon and its
insight produced image.
Already in his discussion of the sixth-century decoration of location at the

gates:40
In these days [the patriarch Anastasios,] having become holy face was rendered as a relief, while the epigram
as letters
the leader of heresies, immediately attempted to take incised on matter. Both draw attention to the textured and
down and throw into the fire the authoritative icon of imprinted surface. Finally, Michael Glykas in the twelfth cen
Christ our Lord, hanging above the imperial gates, at the tury reinforces the idea of the Chalkites as a metal relief icon
place, where due to its relief character, it [the icon] is called by calling it an imprint (ekt?tt?uiio) .47
the Chalke (the Copper One).41 What is the importance of identifying the Chalkites with a
metal relief icon? This was the most prominent icon in Con
The syntax of the dependent clause is rather difficult to stantinople during and after Iconoclasm. It symbolized pro
interpret. It is introduced by a relative pronoun (kv oicnrep), image policy. Therefore, its form would have been under
which refers to the gates, yet the rest of the sentence has a stood as the ideal icon. If my interpretation of the written
subject in the feminine singular, and the only other word in sources is correct, the Chalkites served as the model for the
the feminine singular in the main clause is "icon" (eiKC?v). Byzantine metal relief icon. As a typos, the Chalke Christ also
While the Greek for gate (pyle, 7r6kr?) is in the feminine fulfilled Byzantine image theory. According to its nonessen
gender,
a switch from the
plural
to
singular and the subsequent tialist definition, a
the ideal icon is representation in relief:
description of this object as holy suggest that the subject of an imprint (typos) left by an intaglio (Figs. 10, 11).
the relative clause is not the Brazen Gates but the Chalkites It is quite possible that the Chalkites was medallion-shaped.
icon. The relative pronoun
can then be translated as refer In Byzantine iconophile writings the legitimacy of the icon is
ring
to the locale, where the icon is set.42 frequently argued on the basis of the imperial coin. A reci
The word used to describe the metal object in the quoted procity
is established between the emperor and his represen
passage is charakter (xotpoLKTr\p). It means an

imprint, relief, tation on the gold solidus (Fig. 11), Both are linked by one
and engraved surface. In fact, its first definition is connected identity yet separated by natures.48 The same
reciprocity
to the of an on a metal surface in order to between the icon and Christ. Both the same
stamping intaglio reigns represent
a coin. The same word also in th? but differ in nature: a material substance versus a
produce appears descrip identity
tion of the Chalkites in Theophanes' Chronographia (early divinely human hypostasis. The roundel icon evokes in its
ninth century), The passage narrates the events of 602 CE, shape the very arguments used to defend its legitimacy. The
when Emperor Maurice (r. 582-602) dreamed of his judg medallion panel thus becomes an ideal devotional object
ment by Christ, which resulted in his deposition. Theophanes protected by form and theory from charges of idolatry.49
embellished the story by ahistorically inserting the Chalkites Similarly, the majority of icons depicted in the mid-ninth
icon?the very object that was most likely first placed ?t the century Khludov Psalter (State Historical Museum, Moscow,
gates almost two centuries later, in the period 787-814. The cod. gr. 129) have a round
shape that evokes coins and seals
icon became the medium through which Christ appeared (Fig. 12).50 These images do not resemble what we consider
and judged the emperor: "One night as [Emperor Maurice] to be the canonical look for an icon: a
rectangular wood
was he saw a vision; he was before the icon In the of coins and seals, the
sleeping, standing panel painting. employing shape
of the Savior at the Chalke and ? crowd was in the Khludov Psalter activate the nonessen
gates standing representations
around him. A voice from the relief icon of our Lord and tialist definition of the icon as
imprint of absence on matter.
Savior Christ came and Hence, the circular form validates th? veneration of
Jesus spoke."43 images.
Later sources also indicate a
copper relief icon for the The manuscript begins with a depiction of a youthful
Chalkites. In the Patria (a compilation of various sources on Christ set within an arch (Fig. 12). Underneath the tympa
the topography of Constantinople, edited about 995), we num, King David dressed in imperial attire sits on a throne
read the following: "In the so-called Chalke Gates a copper and strums the strings of his lyre. Divine and imperial are
stele of our Lord Jesus Christ was erected by Constan tine the joined through the seal of the icon. King David emerges as a
Great. The emperor Leo [III], father of Kavallinos, took it protector of and vice versa: as a of the icon's
images recipient
down. Now decorated with mosaics, this icon is restored This idea captures the climate of
by protection. ninth-century
the [empress] Eirene the Athenian."44
Constantinople, where imperial policy had just firmly em
icon is called a copper relief slab (stele chalke, ottj?tj
The braced icon veneration. The Chalkites Christ established the
XakKrf). These words have hitherto been interpreted as a seal of affirmation in 843.
bronze statue and discredited as
corrupt information because The medallion icon and its setting in the Khludov Psalter
did not three-dimensional statues of within the of an arch recall the of
Byzantium produce tympanum imaginary shape
Christ or the saints.45 Yet the Byzantine choice of words is a
gate. Given the manuscript's
polemical depiction of current
quite clear. Just as the Greek word stele presents figures in low political events and its avid defense of irhages, it is likely that
relief, so, too, the Byzantine Chalkites icon displays a bas the preface miniature of the Khludov Psalter is not just a
relief of Christ on a metal surface. The rest of the passage visualization of an author portrait (King David as the poet of
states how this icon was decorated with mosaics by Empress the Psalms) but is possibly meant to configure in two-dimen
Eirene, which could be interpreted as a metal icon adorned sional form a memory image of the Chalke gate and Chalke
with tesserae or even enamel. Christ. Such a commemorative would be
glass image quite appro
Similarly, the epigram written by Patriarch Methodios priate for the particular patron of the manuscript: most likely
sometime between 843 and 847 identifies the orthodox im Patriarch Methodios.51 His epigram adorned the Chalkites,
ages as typoi: "I am representing [Christ] with imprints [ty and, by extension, his Psalter
begins with a miniature emu
poi]."46 This poetic inscription most likely surrounded the lating his most
prominent public
act of
image veneration. If
Chalkites icon, thereby linking image and text visually. The this
reading
of the preface miniature as a vision of the
12 Khludov Psalter, preface miniature,

medallion icon of Christ and King
David, mid-9th century. State Historical
Museum, Moscow, cod. gr. 129, fols,
lv, 2r (artwork in the public domain;
photograph ? by the State Historical
Museum, Moscow)
Chalkites at the Bronze Gates is correct, then all medallion

Painting as Imprint
icon depictions in this manuscript acquire greater signifi In modern Western culture we are
predisposed
to conceive of
cance as in the Chalkites's tradition, form, and as the markings of the brush on a material surface.
copies sharing painting
legitimacy. The ideal Byzantine icon emerges as a Chalke Traced to its source, this perception derives from the Natural
icon: a medallion metal relief.
History of Pliny the Elder (23-79 CE). In one of his anecdotes
Finally, a dominance of relief icons over panel paintings in the painter Zeuxis creates a virtuoso mimetic picture of
the ninth and tenth centuries is also evident in the contem grapes, which deceives the birds. His Parrhasios,
competitor,
porary function of images. In this period icons were not in turn paints a curtain so skillfully that Zeuxis himself is
carried in public processions (litaniai), so they were not the deceived as he
attempts to draw the curtain in order to see
focal point of public ceremonies. The small size and luxury the supposed painting behind it.54 The same definition of
materials of these relief icons conformed to a more intimate as the marks of the brush on a surface a
graphe creating
system of use. mimetic image of the world also obtains in the Renaissance
The situation changed in the late tenth century when icons theory of Leon Battista Albert! written in 1436.55 In recent
appeared in imperial and liturgical processions and led to a times, Ernst Gombrich has offered the best-known discussion
new demand for the larger size and accessibility of the image of painting as a naturalistic, mimetic pictorial copy of the
in large public gatherings.52 Wood panel paintings allowed world.56 Although
Norman Bryson and other scholars have
for unlimited expansion of size. The sacred figure painted in challenged his perceptualist theory, they have not questioned
tempera lacked relief and functioned primarily optically (Fig. the understanding of painting as a pictorial form of art:
4). Only the revetment preserved the aesthetic of the luxury brushstrokes on a material surface.57
metal relief icon. In the best this metal cover contrast, in what in the and
examples, By emerges Byzantine theory
consisted of an enameled silver-gilt surface decorated with practice, painting (graphe) is best understood as imprint (ty
filigree designs, pearls,
and gemstones. pos and sphragis). The image is not the imitation of form but
The of Constantinople's most famous icon, the rather the of form. This Eastern of
history imprint perception paint
Hodegetria (the One Who Leads the Way), exemplifies this ing?and, by extension, the icon?as
imprint gives
an
insight
development (Fig. 4). Until the late tenth century, the icon into Byzantine culture. As mentioned earlier, Byzantine mi
without the name occurred mesis is understood as the simulation of presence the
ographie type toponymie mostly through
on small
luxury relief icons. Once the
Hodegetria became the interaction of the imprinted form (typos) with the changing
focus of a cult and its own ambience.
acquired weekly liturgical proces
sion, it established the first example of a monastery in Con Typos in Byzantium encompasses
a
range of definitions
stantinople investing its identity in an icon rather than a relic spreading from individual mark, standard pattern, and state
of the Mother of God.5S Consequently, Marian devotion in decree to ritual.58 The dictionary entries are as follows: im
the Byzantine capital was shaped through icons and icon pression, imprint and mark, mold, representation, image,
These icons (later referred to as exact form, model,
processions. processional replica, shape, type, pattern, example,
signa) had the effect of shifting the perception of the ideal decree, and, finally, rite. One gradually proceeds from the
image in Byzantium from a medallion relief (typos) to a individual mark to the state, from the private to the public,
from the to the cultural. All are inter
painted panel (signori). particular meanings
linked through the model of the imprint of an intaglio on fossils: contact relics giving tangibility to the angel's present
as is an as a
metal. Just the icon imprint
of visible characteristics absence.62 For this reason, the relief icon typos becomes
on matter, so, too, the rite becomes the imprint
of a set of the only truthful form of representation for the Archangel.
gestures and speech
acts in time and space. Both icon and By its definition, it is the imprint of absence. His enamel icon
ritual endless faithful rather than imi in S. Marco is even closer to the truth, for it is an imprint of
present reproduction
tation of form.59 The as a cultural ensures fire on Its saturated surfaces inundate the
imprint practice glass. materially
and secures traditions. as the senses and simulate the angel's presence.
uniformity Byzantium emerges
culture of the typos:, the image understood as the impression, The icon belongs to a group of luxury objects looted from
mold, form, and decree, all authentic and
limitlessly repro the palace in Constantinople when the city fell to the Cru
ducible, linking image production to ritual practices and saders in 1204. Andr? Grabar and Michelangelo Muraro have
cultural commented on the "unusual" medium and of this
identity. technique
The coin or seal model (typos/sphragis) of the icon explains icon. Their reaction betrays
once
again
our modern precon
why
after Iconoclasm enamel became the medium par excel ception that icons should be primarily identified with paint
lence. It, too, gives theory a palpable shape by displaying the ings.63 As discussed earlier, the relief icon of the Archangel
imprint
of divine appearance in a material form. The enam
might have been more characteristic of the Middle Byzantine
el's underlying metal foundation of cells functions like a period than wood panels painted with tempera. The S. Marco
negative intaglio. The glass powder poured into this grid enamel is one of the few extant
examples
of this exquisite
becomes the imprint (typos). Once the powder is fired into production.
It
displays
a
mastery of metal
techniques (enamel
glass,
it
acquires mass, giving shape
to divine absence. The filigree, repouss?) and lavish use of materials (Figs. 13-15).
congealed glass
forms the
materiality of the enamel image.
As The Archangel stands frontally, dressed in an imperial
with the relief icon, matter fills an empty shell and gives purple
tunic covered with a
gem-studded sash called a loros
materiality
or substance to what is no longer there, to what is (Fig. 13). With one hand he holds a scepter and lifts the
the a absence. Both enamel and re other in a gesture of intercession. His enormous press
beyond tangible: present wings
lief icons display
divine appearance through textured matter. to the sides (Fig. 15). A subtle tension emerges between the
While enameled relief icons best embody the concept of figure projecting in relief and the sunken central plaque. The
the icon as imprint, panel painting continued to be produced face extends outward the most, yet this projection
is imme
in the period right after Iconoclasm, as attested by

the pre diately checked by the palm turned to the viewer. It stops
served collection of icons at St. Catherine's on movement and arrests the
Monastery projection.
Mount Sinai.60 However, the graphe
of tempera could not The body is outlined, but its materiality is rendered as a
compete with the perfect reciprocity of theory
and produc multiplicity of surfaces. Imitation-pearl strings delimit all
tion the metal icon, because the latter shapes and frame the enamel and gemstones (Figs.
practices signaled by plaques
displayed
in its
making
the actual materialization of the typos. 13, 14). The gold repouss? surface is enlivened by thin,
Nor could tempera compare to encaustic, a form of relief undulating filigree with a pearly dot profile. This is one of the
that a vivid sensation of The surface of the most in existence.
imparts imprint. exquisite Byzantine filigree examples
warm wax is pushed, and incised the The excess of matter functions as dissemblance, set to
impressed, by palette
knife, "imprinting" a figure in relief. oppose a desire to
depict in a naturalistic
style.64
Rather than
This understanding of graphe as imprint simultaneously a mimetic

figuration
of the
angel's appearance, the enamel
engages touch, sight, and sound. Touch, because grapheis

the icon of the one who is fire and spirit offers a dissemblant
actual made on a material surface: it of the nature. It is made of
physical impression re-presentation angel's glass
leaves a relief, a texture that has tactile presence. Sight and powder, placed in a metal mold, and fired to a high temper
sound, because both are modes of of as ature. As an the enamel icon to the
perception graphe: imprint, responds Byz
both and unites and letter. Just antine definition of an a
painting writing, graphe image angel's representation: symbolic
as the is an imprint of visible characteristics on matter, that allows for the contemplation of higher heav
image impression
so is the of letters incised, inscribed, matter.65 The enamel icon itself is thus a
script impression/trace enly reality beyond
imprinted
onto a surface
(Fig. 21). Only through
matter can dissemblant material imprint of the unfigurable created by
abstract ideas be realized and accessed. fire?a dissemblant semblance of the imprint.
perceptually They symbolic
need to be embodied, incarnated. as The nature of fire and is nonmimetically
Graphe imprint prede Archangel's spirit
termines the of the material surface in the and on the diverse surfaces of
importance Byz reproduced hapticly enfigured
antine of the icon. this icon. The textures are and
perception ample sensually sensorially
available to the gaze, touch, and taste. combats the
Tactility
The Icon's Materiality and the Sense of Touch optical experience. Alois Riegl referred to the tactile qualities
The textured surfaces of the Byzantine icon engage the five as the true aspect of an object as opposed to the illusion
senses, as demonstrated by the sensual appeal of the late generated through the optical frame.66 It is this hap tic aspect
tenth-century enamel relief of the Archangel Michael (Figs. (relief and textured surfaces) that engages both the Byzan
1, 13) .61By nature, the angel is fire and spirit; no materiality tine theory
of vision (extramission) and the
practical
vener
rests in him. Human beings can grasp him only through the ation of the icon. The viewer's gaze seeks the tactility of the
he leaves on matter. For instance, Saint Michael's icon's textures. The active eye sends off rays that touch the
imprint
shrines at Chonai and Monte S. Gargano are
perceived
as surfaces of objects. At the same time, the glitter of light
imprints left by him on the landscape. A chasm (Chonai) and emanating from the
gold
surface visualizes the rays that the
a shrine carved in the rock (S. Gargano), they form giant "animated" image itself sends off to touch and in a sense
540
13 Icon of the Archangel Michael, late

10th century, central (artwork in
panel
the public domain; photograph by
Cameraphoto, provided by Art
Resource, NY)
th? viewer. The space between icon and beholder of color. It is glass in a metal mold. After
capture teriality packed
becomes activated the of and touch. it becomes a mass. Not
through exchange gaze firing, congealed, gemlike surpris
The desire to touch is also in the manner in enamel became the signature Byzantine
medium in the
expressed ingly,
which a icon is expected to be venerated: tenth
Byzantine aspasmos century.
(kiss) and proskynesis (lighting of candles, making the sign of As we learn from an Arabic source, the eleventh-century
the cross, and prostration),
both defining
a
body-centered Book of Gifts and Rarities, enamel and purple silk were the two
ritual.67 The proskynesis sets off the optical dazzle of the icon most highly valued Byzantine exports.70 A description of one
as the approach of the faithful disrupts the air with their such gift, a set of enamel bracelets given by Emperor Michael
breathing and movement, making
the wicks tremble. The VII to the Fatimid caliph's mother in the 1070s, reads: "five
agitated lights dance off the metal revetments. This shimmer bracelets inlaid with glass in five colors: deep red, snow white,
ing, glittering effect gives rise to a sense that the image is jet black, sky blue, and deep azure. They were fashioned with
animated. The body of the worshiper is thus fully engaged in the best goldsmith's work. Their inlaid design was of the
the of the icon's finest While this text us the
spectacle performance/mimesis. craftsmanship."71 gives perspec
tive of the Arab rather than the Byzantine export
importers
Color and Light and the Sense of Sight ers, it still attests to the high quality and craftsmanship of the
In color, as visible traits on matter, is
Byzantium, impressed Constantinopolitan production.
the most material of or, as Suida, the tenth in the sources, such as the twelfth
aspect light, Similarly, Byzantine
century announces, "color in appearance is century Akritis, enamels decorate the borders of
encyclopedia, epic Digenis
what is visible and vision receives this."68 Looked at in this luxury clothing, saddles, and armor.72 Being
on the fringe of
color is an of form?the material the garment, these were to the most

light, equivalent corporeal, sparkling objects subject
of the The enamel best this ma intense movement, where a
aspect image.69 exemplifies they gave dynamic coruscating
54I
14 Icon of the Archangel Michael, late 10th century, head (artwork in the public domain; photograph by Cameraphoto, provided
by Art Resource, NY)
effect. The colored glass mimics the look of gems and is Words for color in Byzantium describe the brilliance and
set into a metal As such, the medium of a substance rather than its hue. A
always glittering plaque. light-emitting qualities
combines the two most
important elements of the perception characteristic passage in Digenis Akritis relates: "the glittering
of color in Byzantium: form and radiance. violets were the color of the sea with its calm ruffled by a light
542
15 Icon of the Arch
angel Michael, late 10th

century, porphyreos wing
(artwork in the public
domain; photograph by
Cameraphoto, provided
by Art Resource, NY)
breeze."73 These words do not define the hue, instead con flowers emerge in their radiance, their colors
shimmering
juring a picture of the shimmer of ruffled water. The chang constantly fluttering and changing. Color becomes the re
ing vibrancy denotes the visible characteristics of this surface. flected light from surfaces: a polymorphous sight paired with
Radiance is most highly valued. In the same passage the the sweet sense of smell and sound.
garden is described as gleaming and shining: "a meadow The glitter of surfaces betrays the "jeweled inflation" that
bloomed brilliantly beneath the trees with its many colors surfaced in
Early Christian art and ceremony and remained
with flowers, sweet-scented narcissus, roses and dominant in Byzantine aesthetics.75 Gold and contin
gleaming purple
The roses were a ornament on the ued to be the two most elements in it. Both appear
myrtles. purple-tinted significant
earth, the narcissus reflected in turn the color of milk."74 The in the celestial and terrestrial courts, as both
prominently
embody radiance. Gold and purple are employed in imperial

silks, such as an at Auxerre
eleventh-century fragment kept
(shroud of Saint Germanus, St-Eus?be, Auxerre) and the
contemporary depiction of such cloth in the miniature from
the Homilies of John Chrysostomos (Biblioth?que Nationale
de France, Paris, Coislin cod. gr. 79, fol. 2r) showing Emperor
Nikephoros III Botaneiates (originally Michael VII Doukas)
(Figs. 16, 17).76 The contrasting textures of the fabric in
crease the visibility of the eagle design in the Auxerre frag
ment. At the same time, the alternation of and
gold purple
enhance the radiance of the silk. With each and
step gesture,
the body dressed in the purple silk will animate the fabric,
its vibrancy of hues and shimmer. The
revealing coruscating
effect of purple complements the glitter of gold.
This fascination with gold can easily be explained by its
radiance and but has a more
glitter, purple culture-specific
in Like it has a muta
meaning Byzantium.77 gold, changing,
ble character that imitates both fire and turbulent waters.
The was derived from the murex, a ma

highest-quality dye
rine mollusk, and each batch could differ in hue and satura
tion.78 The Greek word for purple (porphyreos or pyravges,
TTop(j>vpeo<; or this Por
irvpetvyri?) captures changing quality.
derives from the colors of the waters
phyreos heaving, surging
of a stormy sea or blood, while expresses the
gushing pyravges
luminous of fire. Therefore, unlike the limited
spectacle
term, the word a of
English Byzantine encompasses spectrum
hues from rosy red, green, and to blue and
ranging purple
black.79 The iridescent, and nature of
fiery, polymorphous
porphyreos exemplifies the Byzantine love for glitter and
change and makes it a actor in Byzantine mimesis.
fitting
The affinity between purple and gold ismade prominent
16 Imperial silk with eagle designs, 11th century, gold and
in the way they are paired on luxury objects. Besides silks and
silk. Church of St-Eus?be, Auxerre in the public
purple (object
imperial accoutrements, enamel icons and chalices Art
liturgical domain; photograph by Giraudon, provided by Resource,
from the same period employ the fiery splendor of gold and NY)
A late bowl known as the chalice of
purple. antique sardonyx
the Patriarchs (in the treasury of S. Marco) is set in a tenth
century Byzantine gold enamel mount (Figs. 18, 19).80 De

pending on the intensity and position of light, the body of the likened to fossilized tongues of fire contained in a golden
chalice can glow like burning ambers (Fig. 18) or coagulate armature. The icon is paradoxically an iridescent imprint of
into a deep blood color (Fig. 19). Through its changing fire on matter. The as?malos (bodiless) angel, who is fire and
appearance, it
performs divine presence. For instance, when spirit, is reified in enamel and gold. This icon constantly
empty, its translucent fiery body of sardonyx gives the impres transforms before the viewer as
light
into matter, matter into
sion of live flesh: the body of Christ. When filled with wine, light, the whole dematerialized by the scintillating glitter of
the deepened purple color is overwhelmed by the dazzle of gold.
gold, suggesting the presence of divinity. Finally, as one lifts The word enameled in Greek, chimevtos (;\a>u.evT?<?), derives
the cup to drink the wine, the diminishing liquid gradually from chimio (xvfJbeio)), "to alloy," yet it could also be phonet
reveals an enamel icon of Christ at the bottom of the bowl ically linked to chimeo (êt/xeco), "to freeze."82 According to
(Fig. 20) .81As it is consumed, the wine becomes visually the latter, the medium imitates the effect of the shimmering
equated to the human body of Christ. The worshiper is and reflective surface of ice. This appearance is
paradoxically
whirled through the many changes of the sardonyx under the achieved through
its opposite: fire. Enamel thus presents
spectacle of light and gold, experiencing it as flesh, blood, matter

purified through fire. The S. Marco icon uses a dis
body, and divinity. semblant substance frozen through fire and dappled
in cor
The enamel icon of the Archangel ex and in order to the angel's

late-tenth-century uscating purple gold perform
ploits the same shifting fiery vibrancy of the Byzantine por kinetic essence: a
dynamic, energetic, ever-moving being
phyreos (Figs. 13-15). The tunic and feathers of the wings play (fc?kro?, evepyov&o?, ?eiKiWjro?) .83
with the mutability of Byzantine purple: the deep green of The polymorphy of this glittering metal and enamel is also
the dalm?tica is picked up in the outer rim of the feathers, captured in the Greek word metallaxo (fieTaWaCo)), describ
which are followed in turn by feathers dappled in ruby red ing metal's reaction to temperature changes.84
Metallon
and emerald green (Fig. 15). The spectrum of hues is ar (?jL Ta\X.ov) is another term used to
designate gems and
ranged to perform, to act like fire. The enamel could be mosaic cubes, again with the idea of change introduced by
surfaces (filigree, cloisonn?, and repouss?) (Figs. 13-15).

The icon before the gaze and touch, trans
changes subtly
muting the effect of ambient light. In fact, in one of

under
the catalog descriptions of this object, Grabar remarked that
the Archangel's was under enormous
image photographed
difficulties because
of the shimmering multiple reflections of
light that constantly changed the expression of the face.86
This kinetic effect of the Byzantine relief icon defies modern
and and rise to the icon's mimesis.
photography display gives
A similar synesthetic vision (pikilia) emerges in the ekphra
seis of churches, in whose architectural
palatial surroundings
this enamel icon resided.87 In the description provided by
Photios (ca. 810-after 893) of the Pharos church in the Great
Palace, the visitor is transfixed the incessant
imaginary by
whirl of aesthetic sensations. The spectator is first enchanted
by the diversity of veins in the exterior marble revetment:

and towards themselves the
"Arresting turning spectator's
gaze, they make him unwilling to move further in; but taking
his fill of the fair spectacle in the very atrium, and fixing his
eyes on the sight before him, the visitor stays as if rooted [to
the with wonder."88
ground]
The of the interior escalates the sensory
approach only
overload. The spectator is stirred the of shimmer
by diversity
and textures:
ing materials
It is as if one had entered heaven itself with no one barring

the way from any side, and was illuminated by the beauty
in all forms all around like so many stars, so is one
shining
amazed. ... It seems that is in ecstatic
utterly everything
17 Homilies of John Chrysostomos, Emperor Nikephoros III and the church itself is circling around. For the
motion,
Botaneiates, 3rd quarter of the 11th century. Biblioth?que
Nationale de France, Paris, Coislin cod. gr. 79, fol. 2r (artwork
spectator,through his whirling about in all directions and
in the public domain; photograph provided by the Biblio being constantly astir, which he is forced to experience by
th?que Nationale de France, Paris) the variegated spectacle on all sides, imagines that his
condition is transferred to the
personal object.89
The rich aesthetic of marble

scintillating gold, mosaic, silver,
the scintillating quality of light and the transformative nature revetments, silks, and gemstones is orchestrated in order to
of metal. The icon of the Archangel exemplifies this poly perform

before the spectator reeling
avision of change. The
substance that melts into fire and freezes into effect of this vision on the subject causes a
morphous glass reciprocal projec
before the gaze. tion of his or her experience back onto the object, making it
appear animate. The visitor is continuously astir, spinning
Pikilia (HoLKi\ia) as Synesthetic Vision round in a whirl, sensations that arise from the polymor
Although only a symbolic imprint, dissemblant in both form phous and polychromatic vision (pikilia).
and essence, the icon of the
Archangel
enacts presence. Its Pikilia seduces the moving eye. In trying to grasp the ob
light-emitting, glimmering, and shimmering surfaces imbue ject, the eye, according
to the extramission model of vision,
this icon with life. Through its performance (mimesis) of moves
energetically
across the surface, scanning, spinning
in
it conveys the kinetic essence an to take in more of the In a similar

changing appearances, angel's attempt spectacle.90 way,
of fire and spirit. The diversity of textures that appeals to the agitated spectator of the Archangel icon is dazzled by the
touch also gives rise to a
dynamic polychromacity of matter, diversity of sensations triggered by this object. The whirling
surfaces, and shimmering light.85 This changing effect of spectacle of this mimesis makes the
worshiper reproduce
in
sight and touch is captured in the Greek word pikilia his/her own excited state the very essence of the
subject
(ttoikiXIol), an of varied in enamel: a
meaning "diversity," arresting sight depicted living, energized, ceaselessly moving
and shifting sensual impressions, all gained through chang angel. The spectacle of the icon equates the essence of the
ing colors, textures, and smells.

being depicted to the psychological state of the subject expe
Pikilia is at the core of both the spectacle (mimesis) of the riencing
the
image.
enamel icon of the Archangel and the description of the These sensations are
materially generated. The perfor
dazzling and fragrant meadow in Digenis Akritis. On the S. mance of shimmer and radiance is fulfilled on the surface of
Marco icon, this diversity is optically and hapticly configured the relief icon. The gems and gold enamel mutually reinforce
through the use of gold, enamel, glass (with hues ranging each other in
creating
a vision of splendor: photismos,
a spec
from green to dark

purple), gemstones, and a
variety of metal tacle of light (Figs. 13, 14). It is in this splendor that a vision
545
18 Chalice of the Patriarchs, 10th

century, sardonyx glowing in amber
shades, enamel, 8% X 6% in.
gold
(22 X 17 cm). Treasury of the basilica
of S. Marco, Venice in the
(object
public domain; photograph provided
by the Procuratoria di San Marco,
Venice)
of emerges. It is encoded in the and written as an for an icon: "I the

paradise gold repouss? again epigram contemplate
raised
filigree
of the enamel revetments of icons.91 On the Golden Eden of the icon, which the plants fashioned by art
Archangel icon they display vegetal and flower motifs. The seem to surround the creator of Eden."93
pearly dot profile of this delicate gold file coruscates, enliv In the icon, the verdant paradise is
materially reconfigured
ening the background and halo of the angel with vibrant as gold, for both are connected through brilliance. Gold
glitter (Fig. 14). (chrysos, ^ptxr?c) and green (chloros, ^?copo?, but especially
The blossoms evoke the evergreen of chloe, Âon, which means "the radiant first of
sparkling gardens green spring")
for the icon is a material incarnation of the ineffa radiate shimmer and Since the
paradise, light. They sparkle. Byzan
ble paradise. This connection between Edenic and tines color to brilliance rather than
gardens categorized according
the icon's decoration is fully explained in the metric prayers hue, fresh green (chloe) and gold were for them equivalents.
(epigrams) written on the surfaces of some
Byzantine icons Like the first green of spring that appears in its brightness
(Fig. 21). They draw attention to the material gifts, silver, as
gold,
or the leaves of the ginkgo
tree in autumn, half
and gemstones, and ask in for these half vibrant green, the surface of
gold, pearls, exchange golden yellow, Byzantine
tangible riches to be granted a place of rest in the imagined icons stirred the faithful to imagine in the radiance of gold
evergreen of Eden: me in the ver the verdant of divine Another enamel
gardens "give enjoyment paradise delights.94
dant radiant
green of divine delights [deia? rpv<\rr\<;?o? icon of the Archangel (also in the treasury of S. Marco)
evTpvtyav fie rp ^?o-n]."92 The shining gold on the material displays a more literal enameled image of Eden: a peristyle
surface of the icon as a dissemblant material vision of with blue, and red blossoms set in a
appears garden green, golden
the verdant paradise and the means through which to
imag
armature (Figs. 2, 22). In its pikilia, the icon emerges as a
ine this ineffable place of rest and delight. The same idea is vision of paradise.
voiced in the fourteenth-century poem of Manuel Philes, The image of gemstones shimmering on a glittering gold
546
?. . vt* .wn** *.* ?'*

î?t?^;^1^^^^?
?3?rfV
*r*:s*
*m*^M*
V o!* -3\\
19 Chalice of the Patriarchs, sardonyx
glowing in purple shades (object in
the public domain; photograph
provided by the Procuratoria di San
Marco, Venice)
surface appears in many of the

tenth-century
visions of par The floors are of immaterial gleaming gold tiles outlined by
adise such as the Life of Basil the Younger (Vita Basilii Iunioris). ineffable plants. The blossoms of these flowers fill the space
Yet, while the synesthetic vision (pikilia) ismaterially gener with an
extraordinary perfume:
ated on the icon, the same is the in
spectacle beyond tangible
the celestial realm. There, color exists without form, as radi
We came to a which was wondrous and incom
The tents of the saints radiate with courtyard,
ant, self-generated light.
parable. And its floor was flashing like lightning, adorned
immaterial light:
with tiles, and there was no dirt at all on it, and the
golden
And arising from there we journeyed to the abodes of the air which was like lightning illuminated it, and in the joints
these were not to enumer of those tiles there were of
saints; very, very many, subject golden flowering plants every
ation, the brightest as if from the sun's sort, and in fruits, culti
flashing gleam rays, fragrant abounding beautifully
and immaterially, and spiritually flashing inexplicably by vated, and
they
were
sending forth inexpressible and in
the hand of God with many colors as if of linen-white and describable pleasure
and
joy and filling
those who saw
divine purple light.95 them with divine

happiness.96
20 Chalice of the Patriarchs, medallion with Christ at the

bottom of the bowl (artwork in the public domain)
The table decked out for the feast, quarried of scintillating

emerald, is laid with ruby dishes framed in gold:
[The table was] 30 pech?is large, itwas beautifully quarried

and constructed from emerald, ...
emitting flashing rays, 21 Enkolpion (pectoral pendant) of the Virgin with an epigram
and on this table there were also visible red gemstones inscribed on the frame. Basiliek van Onze Lieve Vrouwe,
lying like dishes set with gold like lightning, which were Maastricht (artwork in the public domain; photograph
similar to all the precious stones and gold that come from provided by Basiliek van Onze Lieve Vrouwe, Maastricht)
paradise.97
The angels appear in scarlet tunics with loroi radiating the

In contrast to this immaterial celestial light, the tenth
colors of paradise. On their heads they carry luminous gold
century icon of Michael exploits a material splendor of light
crowns:
that is reflected from the metal and surfaces?a
glass photis
mos that bounces off bodies. Paradise is
[The servants/angels were] clad
immaterially in cloaks materially "en-fig
ured" in the Archangel's icon. An imperfect embodiment
dyed scarlet and filled with all beauty, their feet snowy, girt
in belts like loroi with color from heaven's rainbow and that evokes the immaterial perfection of heaven (Figs. 1,13),
on the icon falls short of the celestial exactly in itsmateriality.
flashing like lightning, and their heads they were wear
diadems of which were the realm of paradise is ineffable, within the Vita
ing gold exceedingly glorious and Although
Basilii Iunioris, which seeks to make it tangible, an extraordi
variegated with gems and precious pearls like sunbeams.98
nary effort is on sensual All five senses are
placed experience.
The images that emerge in this vision are polymorphous, engaged in the pikilia. This whirling vision is addressed to the
changing their shape under flashing iridescence and radi eyes, fingers, ears, mouth, and nose, but the effect is titillat
ance. About thirty words for light come up in this ekphrasis.
ingly invisible to sight, inaudible to hearing, intangible to
They derive from light (</>a>?:TTpL<t>o)T?(rixevo<;9 <J>o>toi?tj?, touch, and beyond taste and smell. A list of words and phrases
"
(?HuTeiv??, </>?)to/3o?o?, (?xoTotvy??); fire (itvp: imp?iao-iia, reveals how this immaterial pikilia affects the body: [visions]
VTwp<?<;); ray (avy?j: (?xoTavy??, xpwavy?C?), irepiavy?C?), noetic; unseen; im
inexperienced; unspoken, inexpressible;
?Lavy??a, ?ktx?, aKTtvoei?ff?, a?yX.% OL<rr?)p,r??MH^?yyo?) ; possible to render in human words; beyond description; be
sun (rf?to?: r??ux^?yyo?, ir??iaKO?); gold (xpwr??: human reason and words; immaterial that can
yond beings
XpwoâTj?, xpwavyi??)) ; lightning (aorpair?}, aoTpairo not be held by human hands; beauty and pleasure
lxop<t>os, aaTpairro), e?aorpairT?)); and radiance (X.afi7rpvv?)9 inexpressible by human voice and inaudible for hearing;
?a/uLirry?ovo?, Av^wraibc). Light conveys the ineffable es richly nuanced taste beyond expression and recount; fra
sence of souls, buildings, and surfaces in paradise." The grance of violets and roses beyond human knowledge and
polymorphous and polychromatic vision (pikilia) reifies out experience; perfume beyond recount; indescribable sweet
of light immaterially created. fragrance; inexpressible sweetness."100 This synesthesis lacks
548
The icon thus sets a circle: a mirror the faithful

up reflecting
in their process of prayer and response.
imagined
In Byzantine culture, the Psalms of David represent the
of prayer. These poems, like the icon,

quintessential example
are Illustrated Psalter books furnish
corporeally experienced.
a record of this In the miniature of the
perception. preface
Khludov Psalter, sight and sound are linked (Fig. 12). Music
and writing coexist as King David strums the chords on his
The sound of his tune grows in the of
lyre. accompaniment
the musicians him. Two more above
flanking figures appear
the arch. One the audience into the space of the open
brings
book and directs its gaze above and across the to the
page
beginning 1 on the facing folio. The other figure is

of Psalm
about to sound his trumpet to initiate the reading of the
Psalms. Music emanates from this miniature, associ
visually
ating the act of praying with the sonorous sound of the lyre
and the imagined melodious human voice.
The the memory of a a prayer
image triggers performance:
The sound of this its music, is
pronounced. performance,
then linked to the The letters on the then be
script. page
come transformed from a silent of characters to a
string
record of a of sound and that can
corporeal experience sight
be activated the moment the to pronounce the
lips begin
poem. The the
multisensory experience triggered by perfor
mance of the Psalms resembles the sensual of
experience
other genres of writing. For instance, in letters
Byzantium,
were often sent with so that the sound of the
gifts, reading
letter was linked to the smell and taste of the gifts.102 The
22 Detail of Fig. 2: the garden of paradise (artwork in the
was
public domain; photograph by Cameraphoto, provided by Art resulting experience simultaneously aural, visual, tactile,
Resource, NY) and olfactory.
The link between music and prayer, established through
the Davidic Psalms, also materializes in the of icons
epigrams
(Fig. 21 ).103Most of these poems are written in the frame of

icons, and the central to re
material stimuli. and encircling customizing image
Ineffable, immaterial, inaudible, testing
to a Even when the does not
this overload of sensations in the way it spond particular request. panel
teasing, gains reality
contain an it does not lose its music, for it continues
is so so epigram,
profoundly bodily experienced, yet beyond expres
sion and articulation.
to avail itself of the sound of the faithful praying before it.
Poetic are are meant
inscriptions performative; they prayers
to be similar to literature in
pronounced, high Byzantium,
The Sound of Prayer: The Circuit
which was meant to be read aloud (Fig. 23).104 All epigrams
While all five senses are engaged in the pikilia of paradise, this
on icons are of twelve which means that
composed syllables,
sensorial agitation is created by ineffable stimuli. By contrast,
everyone will the stresses at the same
uniformly put point,
the icon this experience material,
replicates through tangible and all prayers will create the same sonorous framework. This
means. Its lush decoration and demonstrate a de
epigrams
standardized form generates the
sire to imagine the ineffable. Both being a graphe, letter and repetitive, prayer's perfor
mative its efficacy.
form a prayer. While the visualizes the magic, ensuring
image image perfor
sound reverberates in the vaulted interiors of
mance of the reinforces this action sono Similarly,
prayer, epigram by
churches, off the curves of arches,
rously replicating it. The poetic inscription contributes a Byzantine bouncing
domes, and semidomes 24). The same is
visceral, material of sound, the icon (Fig. perception
presence transforming
found in Photios's of the Pharos church: "It seems
into a sonorous ekphrasis
body.101
The faithful's needs and wishes for help materialize in the that everything is in ecstatic motion, and the church itself is
of the sacred this the Arch around."105 Robert Nelson has defined the
shape depicted figure?in case, circling recently
is shown raising his hand in a gesture icon's of as circular and
angel (Fig. 13). He of system signification tautological.106
intercession. The not receives the of architecture the same circular
Archangel only prayer Byzantine exploits paradigm
the faithful, but with his own stance and hand movement he insofar as it captures in the confines of the
meaning sphere:
the and action of the Simulta the arch, the vault, and the dome. These forms con
replicates position supplicant. spatial
the ensures the continuation of the tinue to essence as the culture of the
neously, image prayer express Byzantium's
because the angel transfers the received request
to a
higher imprint, shaping matter by impressing its circular seal of
level and it through his own of intercession.
supports power signification.
W:??W~?
wm
''MMj
mi
i*y
?*?
23 Homilies of John Chrysostomos,
g^fe&^
monk reading the homilies to the
emperor. Biblioth?que Nationale de
France, Paris, Coislin cod. gr. 79, fol. 1
(2 bis)r (artwork iri the public domain; :;??pp
photograph provided by the
Biblioth?que Nationale de France,
Paris)
Smell and Taste: The Transformation emerges in the vision of the Vita Basilii Iunioris. The souls of
The sonorous icon brings the two aspects of graphe, painting the saints are
gathered
at an Edenic symposium. They pass
and writing, together: graphe as the imprint of form on mat around a glowing chalice with a nectar of ambrosia. Drinking
ter. Figure and letter, one translates into scintillating light, this divine substance, the face of each participant transforms
the other into a sound carried in space. And through the into the gleam of budding roses:
voice the melody in space, the sense of taste
bearing emerges.
As Theodore Hyrtakenos wrote in a letter to his friend in the The mixed wine in those immaterial and sun-bright cups
fourteenth century: "gazing at the letter, I feel I see you in was gleaming intensely like burning hot coals, and when
front of me and fill up with your sweet traits like honey, I hear someone received in his hands that wondrous and flashing
the echo of the musical tones of this wonder."107 This con cup, filled with nectar of ambrosia and brought it near his
nection between the pleasure of reading/hearing the voice of own mouth to drink, he was filled with the sweetness of the
the writer, drinking, and music is a topos in letter writing.108 Holy Spirit..
.. His face gleamed and he was more illumi
The oral performance of letters and prayers (epigrams) de nated, like a rose
emerging from the
calyx.110
on a In both cases, it tries
pends multisensory experience.109
to reconstitute presence of an absent
entity through sensual The synesthetic experience described in Vita Basilii Iunioris
stimuli. In the case of letters, this absent referent is the writer. could also be demonstrated by the Eucharist cup at S. Marco.
In the case of prayers, it is the invisible and intangible God. It can show how sight, touch, and sound could be linked to
For the Byzantines, empsychos graphe becomes the performa smell and taste (Figs. 18, 19). An inscription is enameled on
tive image/writing that stirs the five senses and triggers syn the golden rim. The letters imprinted on the metal surface
esthesis. announce: "Drink ye all of it, for this ismy blood of the New
A similar synesthetic experience of hearing and taste Testament, which is shed for many for the remission of sins"
550
psalter easily and quickly and had learnt the whole of it by

heart in a few
days.113
According to Paul Speck, the excerpt about the icon that

caused the sensation of honey after the saint had prayed to it
was in this Iconoclasm: the asso
interpolated passage during
ciation of the icon with psalms and prayer was established
during that period.114
The becomes the channel of direct divine response.
panel
The role of the icon is equated to the effect of prayer. Sacred
translates into the sensation of in the mouth
presence honey
of the faithful. Like the Davidic poems, the sonorous icon
the sense of taste: the sweetness of At the
triggers honey.
same time, the reference to in the Psalms (Pss. 18:11,
honey
118:103) indicates the moment when God's voice directly
reaches the supplicant and grants him or her forgiveness.
Similarly, in the climactic moment of the liturgy, the Com
munion, the supplicant is exhorted with Psalms 33:8: "taste
and see that God is good."115 Taste leads to participatory
knowledge of God.
Saint Theodore of Sykeon participates in the sweetness of
God. The verb used, (metalamvano, fJi TOikafx?av(o), is
"partake"
associated with the Eucharist.116 It refers to this trans
usually
formative moment when the worshiper loses his or her iden
tity, dissolving into the sacred presence and sharing in the

sacred essence. The of the icon is equated to
performance
that of the bread and wine transformed into body and blood
24 Domed interior of the monastery church of Hosios Loukas,
during the liturgy. This metamorphosis of the icon, or better,
Greece, late 10th century (photograph by Erich Lessing,
of the takes in the
provided by Art Resource, NY)
this metamorphosis worshiper place pro
cess of prayer. He or she then this
projects experience (path
ema, 7r?0T)/xa) back onto the icon.
ven
(Matt. 26:27-28).m As these words are pronounced and the Sight and touch, triggered by proskynesis (prostration,
fills eration, prayer) and aspasmos (kiss) give rise to sound in the
lips touch the surface of the chalice, the wine up the
enunciation of Sound in turn the sensa
mouth. Then words become Sounds become taste and prayer. precipitates
body.
tion of taste and smell. The of the icon
smell. The recipient of the wine, agitated in the synesthetic olfactory experience
vision of these becomes trans is more difficult to gauge, yet it is linked to taste and the
(pikilia) corporeal sensations,
formed in this climactic moment of the liturgy. The partici Eucharistie ritual and stems from the integration of the icon
in the rite. Incense prayer. As
in the Eucharist the de liturgical burning accompanies
pation replicates metamorphosis
Susan has the smoke of incense a
scribed in the vision of Vita Basilii Iunioris where the saints' Harvey argued, provides
faces alight as they feel the sweetness of the Holy Spirit after visual and olfactory bridge between the human and divine
Like taste, incense affords a
the nectar of ambrosia. spheres. participatory, experien
imbibing
In a similar way, the hands touching the icon and the lips tial approach to God. Divine knowledge becomes sensorially
kissing its surface link words with taste. The textures of the apprehended through the body.
icon a and This sensual aspect of the Byzantine rite is fully integrated
trigger synesthesis: sight, touch, hearing, smell,
in the the icon Like taste, smell es
taste are This knowl way operates. engages
engaged simultaneously. experiential
sence, not and this ensures divine
edge of God, this intuition of presence is achieved through appearance, knowledge.
an almost Eucharistie of the icon.

Smell is affective yet intangible. While burning, incense be
experience
comes transformed from material substance into smoke: an
An account of such a spectacle of senses is found in the Life
ineffable essence. As such, smell be
of Saint Theodore of Sykeon (d. 613) (Vita Theodori Syceotae).112 yet sensorially present
The saint, frustrated in his attempt to learn all the Psalms, comes a perfect means through which to experience divine
resorts to an icon of Christ. After praying for help, he expe presence: intangible yet palpably present through the olfac
riences the taste of honey in his mouth, followed by his tory sense.117
new ability to learn all the Psalms by heart in a Perfumes, incense, and
miraculous spices traditionally accompanied
matter of days: imperial and liturgical ceremonies.118 It is in such aromatic

settings that luxury icons like the enameled panel of Arch
For as the boy got up from the ground and turned to the angel Michael performed. The sweet smells are part of the
icon of our Savior in prayer, he felt a sweetness more
synesthetic vision (pikilia), which is addressed to the partici
Book reveals instances where a
pleasant than honey poured
into his mouth. He recog pant. The of Ceremonies many
nized the grace of God, partook of the sweetness and gave variety of smells and spices
are distributed to the court, or are
thanks to Christ, and from that hour on he memorized the carried by the crowd, or simply waft in the ceremonial
THE PERFORMATIVE ICON 55!
The most elaborate account in the section way, the icon uncovers a divine vision it a material
space.119 appears by giving
on The extensive list of aromat that can be and
imperial military campaigns. being?textures grasped sensorially experi
ics includes "ointments, various mastic, frankin enced. Its rich surfaces function as the material veil
perfumes, affirming
cense, sachar, saffron, musk, amber, bitter aloes moist and the of the underneath. The icon as sur
presence intangible
cinnamon of first and second cin face becomes the sensual of absence. It rises as
dry, pure ground quality, "givenness"
namon wood, and other This rich assortment the saturated the
perfumes."120 phenomenon synesthetically performing
served a
variety of functions: medicinal, political,
even
diplo
invisible and intangible to the faithful.127
matic, because some of these rare scents and spices
were In its original context, the icon's instability, polymorphy of
offered as gifts. This fascination with aromatics betrays the shimmering light, reverberating sound, and redolent fra
sensually rich environment in which both the imperial and grance imbue it with life, making it an
empsychos,
an
"inspir
liturgical
ceremonies were set. ited" image. The Byzantine icon is dependent on a living
Unlike our in to in space in order to The reconstitutes
contemporary olfactory neutrality regard body perform. object
in was linked to aromatic itself before the human gaze, touch, smell, and taste.
power, authority Byzantium hearing,
scents.121 The enamel icon at S. Marco with its
imperial attire This mimesis of surfaces changing by the shifts in ambient
of the Archangel and the court chapel in which it resided light, air, smells, and sounds creates a
synesthetic vision
likely shared the same aromatized air of scents, perfumes, (pikilia) that affects the faithful. This performance inundates
incense, and spices (Fig. 13). Power in the Middle Ages and saturates the human corporeal apprehension.
The effect
manifests itself in a complex synesthetic vision (pikilia).122 of sight and touch is coupled with hearing and smell. The last
These also enhanced the sensual effect of the sense to be activated is taste. it emerges the climax:
fragrances Through
Moreover, the elaborate and enameled the It is in this crucial moment that the
panel. golden filigree metamorphosis.
lozenges
with flowers conjure
an
image
of the
fragrant gar individual, the corporeal, and the tangible dissolve into a
dens of the palace and of paradise (Fig. 21). Similarly, the spiritual vision of partaking in the sacred. This sensual, phys
Greek word usually employed to designate "colors" isflowers ical agitation (ir?Qîia) experienced by the faithful is simul
(avOa). The polychromatic surface of the enameled icon is, taneously transferred onto the object. The icon becomes an
in Greek, "enflowered": virtually filled with the complex per empsychos graphe. From
being
a mere
imprint of visual char
fume of blossoms. The visual and of acteristics, a reified absence, the icon
fragrant haptic aspects materially performative
the icon tease out form and color the memory thus stages the most rich of divine pres
subtly through sensually experience
of aroma into This or real, ence.
wafting space. perfume, imagined
brings to the faithful the scent of salvation.123
A Circle Completed Bissera V. Pentcheva is assistant at

professor Stanford University.
As the worshiper approaches the icon and begins praying, the Her work focuses on medieval
theory and Byzantine
image icons. Her
five senses These an intu
alight. corporeal pleasures trigger hook Icons and Power: The Mother of God in Byzantium
ition of sacred While and sound stem
presence. sight, touch,
(Pennsylvania State University Press, 2006) explores the interaction
from matter and the of the divine, smell between imperial power and the cult ofMary [Department ofArt and
perform appearance
and taste the essence and make a
engage possible participa Art History, Stanford University, Stanford, Calif. 94305, bissera@
tory, sensorial of the Both taste and smell
experience holy. stanford.edu].
are embedded in the liturgy. The icon operates like other
liturgical objects, such as the Eucharist chalice of the Patri
archs at S. Marco. As wine pours from the cup, sight, touch, Notes
and sound transform into smell and taste. Taste itself be
This article presents an excerpt from my forthcoming book, Sensual Splendor:
comes the seal or affirmation of of The Icon in Byzantium (University Park: Pennsylvania State University Press).
participatory knowledge
Unless otherwise indicated, translations from the Greek are mine.
God.124
As a result of the performance/mimesis of the icon, this 1. For the definition of icon as a portable devotional object, see Ernst
Kitzinger, "The Cult of Icons in the Age before Iconoclasm," Dumbar
materially triggered synesthetic pleasure experienced by the ton Oaks Papers 8 (1954): 83-150; and most recently Thomas Mathews,
faithful leads to something like Eucharistie transformation. "Isis and Mary in Early Icons," in Images of theMother of God: Perceptions
touch, and sound, the three of the of the Theotokos in Byzantium, ed. Maria Vassilaki (Aldershot, U.K.: Ash
Sight, aspects experience
gate, 2005), 3-9. Another, broader definition, which includes repre
of graphe, a vision of and a prayer. sentations in all media, from frescoes and mosaics to coins, is also
display paradise present
Taste and smell form the answer to this and current in Byzantine studies. Yet it is problematic, for many of the
request provide
a proleptic access to divine images included in this definition, especially monumental painting
delight. The circle of human and mosaic, the intimate engagement of proskynesis (reveren
preclude
request and divine response is completed, the tial bowing) and aspasmos (kiss) that is tied up with the identity of a
preserving
Byzantine icon. This broader use of the term arose from Otto De
Byzantine tautological, closed system of signification. The
mus's concept of "spatial icons"; Demus, Byzantine Mosaic Decoration:
icon's magic thus resides in the circular dynamic it elicits.125 Aspects ofMonumental Art in Byzantium (London: K. P. T. Trubner,
This dynamic begins with the icon's surface, with its con 1948; reprint, New York: A. Caratzas, 1993).
centration of rich excess of materiality that 2. Bissera V. Pentcheva, "Epigrams on Icons," in Art and Text in Byzantine
materiality?an
Culture, ed. Liz James (New York: Cambridge University Press, forth
reveals a vision of the immaterial. The .
paradoxically concept coming)
of the icon as surface resembles Martin Heidegger's defini 3. Earlier studies on sensual apprehension in medieval art focused on
tion of truth. Starting with the Greek word alithia or alathia the depiction of the five senses, such as Carl Nordenfalk, "The Five
Senses in Late Medieval and Renaissance Art," fournal of theWarburg
(a-, without, lathia, aAfjfleia, akaQeia), he argues
covering, and Courtauld Institutes 48 (1985): 1-22. By contrast, recent work has
that truth is the unconcealedness of In a similar drawn attention to the sensual effect of art and architecture: Liz
being.126
552
James, "Sense and Sensibility in Byzantium," Art History 27, no. 4 20. Patriarch Nikephoros, Antirrheticus II, in Patrolog?a cursus completus: Se
(2004): 523-37; and Rico Franses, '"When All That Is Gold Does Not ries graeca (hereafter, PG), ed.J.-P. Migne, 161 vols. (Paris: Migne, 1857
Glitter," in Icon and Word: The Power of Images in Byzantium; Studies Pre 66), vol. 100, col. 357D: "En tj ypa<j>i) t? crc?iiariK?v eXSo? r?V
sented toRobin Cormack, ed. Anthony Eastmond and Liz James (Alder ypa(j)ovevov 7Tap?o-Tr?cri, o-^rfjLia te Kai fxop^v avr?v
shot, U.K.: Ashgate, 2003), 13-24. See also the collection of essays / evrvTTovpievr} Kai tj]v kyn^?peiav.
cinque sensi, ed. Natalie Blanchardi, Micrologus, vol. 10 (Florence: Sis
21. Theodore of Stoudios, Antirrheticus II, sec. 11, in PG, vol. 99, col.
mel, 2002). 357D: ri?vTC?c ?? tj eiKOiv tj ?7]fXLovpyov[jL?v% fX Ta(f) poii?vr} arrb rov^
4. Dominique D. Poirel, ed., L'abb? Suger, le manifeste gothique de Saint TTpC?TOTVTTOV, 6L? TT/VV?.TfV e'i'?TJê KUl /XeTeCT^Ke T??
T7)V b?JLO?(?(TlV
Denis et la pens?e victorine (Turnhout: Brepols, 2001); Conrad Rudolph, XOLpaKTffpo? ?ke?vov ?l? Tff? T?T?T6XV?TOV?iavoia? Kai x LP0<>
Artistic Change at St.-Denis: Abbot Suger's Program and theEarly Twelfth vaTT?ixay?xa' ovt(o? b ?wypaQo?- ovt?o? 6 kidoykvQo?, ovtw? ? t?v
Century Controversy over Art (Princeton: Princeton University Press, Xp?xreov Kai t?v x???.k ov avbpi?vTa 8T)iuovpy6$v, eXa?ev v\j\v,
1990); and Jean-Claude Bonne, "Pens?e de l'art et pens?e th?o ?ireT?ev el? to 7Tp?)T?TVTrov,otve\a?e ro?? reQeu)py)fxevov t?v tvttov
logique dans les ?crits de Suger," in Artistes et philosophes: ?ducateurs? kva7r (T(f)payiaaTo t??tov kv Tff v^-XI
ed. Christian Descamps (Paris: Centre Georges Pompidou, 1994), 13 22. For instance, the famous icon of the "usual miracle" at the Blachernai
50. was always covered with a silk
Church of the Virgin in Constantinople
5. No systematic study of vision in Byzantium exists. This is a subject that veil. When on some Fridays the Holy Spirit allegedly descended on
needs to be addressed in the future. Robert Nelson's pioneering essay the image, this veil lifted itself to reveal the animated (empsychos) im
suggests that while both intromission and extramission were known in By age of the Virgin beneath. Bissera V. Pentcheva, Icons and Power: The
extramission to be the dominant Mother of God in Byzantium
zantium, appears prism through (University Park: Pennsylvania State Univer
which vision was perceived to operate. Nelson, "To Say and to See: See also idem, "The Performance of Relics,"
sity Press, 2006), 154-60.
Ekphrasis and Vision in Byzantium," in Visuality before and beyond the in Mullett, Performing Byzantium.
Renaissance (New York: Cambridge University Press, 2000), 143-68;
and Gervase Mathew, Byzantine Aesthetics (London: John Murray,
23. For the wide use of seals in Byzantine society, see Gary Vikan and
John Nesbitt, Security in Byzantium: Locking, Sealing and Weighing,
1963), 29-31. For ancient Greek thought on vision, see David Lind Dumbarton Oaks, Byzantine Collection, 2 (Washington, D.C: Dum
berg, Theories of Vision from Al-Kindi toKepler (Chicago: University of
barton Oaks Center for Byzantine Studies, Trustees for Harvard Uni
Chicago Press, 1976), 1-17.
versity, 1980).
6. Sight as touch resonates with Maurice Merleau-Ponty's ideas ex
24. A. Karakatsanes, ed., Treasures ofMount Athos (Thessaloniki: Organiza
pressed in "The Intertwining?the Chiasm," in Merleau-Ponty, The
tion for the Cultural Capital of Europe, 1997), 508, cat. no. 13.1.
Visible and the Invisible (Evanston, 111.:Northwestern University Press,
25. Herbert Kessler, the Invisible by Copying the Holy
1968), 130-55. "Configuring
Face," in The Holy Face and theParadox of Representation, ed. Kessler and
7. The revetted icon is explored at length in Bissera V. Pentcheva, Sen
Gerhard Wolf, Villa Spelman Colloquia, 6 (Bologna: Nuovo Alfa,
sual Splendor: The Icon in Byzantium, forthcoming. For preliminary find
1998), 129-51, reprinted in Kessler, Spiritual Seeing: Picturing God's
ings, see Pentcheva, "Epigrams on Icons"; and Glenn Peers, Sacred
Shock: Framing Visual Experience in Byzantium Invisibility inMedieval Art (Philadelphia: University of Pennsylvania
(University Park: Pennsyl Press, 2000), 64-87.
vania State University Press, 2004), 101-31.
26. The way the icon self-consciously draws attention to matter, thus can
8. Jean-Luc Marion, Being Given: Towards a Phenomenology of Givenness,
celing any claims for the presence of sacred energy (essence), resem
trans. Jeffrey Kosky (Stanford: Stanford University Press, 2002). I
bles the way images were fashioned and displayed in the Latin West
thank Robert Harrison for introducing me to this work.
before 1140. See Herbert Kessler, "Real Absence: Early Medieval Art
9. Only isolated voices have expressed concern about the draining of and the Metamorphosis of Vision," inMorfologie sociali e culturali in
the icon's meaning when subjected to the standard museum display. Europa fra tarda antichit? e alto medioevo, 2 vols., Settimane di Studio
See Sharon Gerstel, "The Aesthetics of Orthodox Faith," Art Bulletin del Centro Italiano di Studi sull'Alto Medioevo, 45 (Spoleto: Centro
87 (2004): 331-41, esp. 332. Italiano di Studi sull'Alto Medioevo, 1998), vol. 2, 1157-213, re
10. For the Byzantine definition of mimesis as performance, see the article printed in Kessler, Spiritual Seeing, 104-48.
on the self-fashioning of Michael Psellos in
by Eustratios Papaioannou 27. Kessler, Spiritual Seeing. See also idem, Seeing Medieval Art (Toronto:
Performing Byzantium, ed. Margaret Mullett (Aldershot, U.K.: Ashgate, Broadview Press, 2004).
forthcoming). 28. For a discussion of Western culture's privileging of sight, see Martin
11. Concepts that are again surprisingly close to the notion of the embod
Jay, Downcast Eyes: The Denigration of Vision in Twentieth-Century Thought
iment of ideas and the interaction of viewer and viewed are in Mer
(Berkeley: University of California Press, 1993), 1-148. I thank Lela
leau-Ponty, "The Intertwining," 130-55. this study to me.
Graybill for introducing
12. Pavel Florensky, "The Church Ritual as a Synthesis of the Arts" 29. The "to touch with the eyes and lips*' is recorded in the
expression
(1918), in Beyond Vision: Essays on thePerception of Art / Pavel Florensky, liturgical treatise of the Mandylion, mid-tenth century. See Ernst von
trans. Wendy Salmond, ed. Nicoletta Misler (London: Reaktion, Christusbilder: Untersuchungen zur christlichen Legende, 3 vols.
Dobschutz,
2002), 95-111. (Leipzig: J. C. Hinrichs, 1899), 112**.
13. For an understanding of empsychos graphe as images inhabited by the 30. See n. 21 above.
Holy Spirit or as pictorial equivalents to figures of speech, see Bissera
31. Barber, Figure and Likeness, 107-37.
V. Pentcheva, "The Icon of the 'Usual Miracle' at the Blachernai,"
Res: Journal of Anthropology and Aesthetics 38 (2000): 34-55; and idem, 32. Paul the Silentiary, "Descriptio Sanctae Sophiae," in Prokop. Werke, ed.
"Visual Textuality: The Logos as Pregnant Body and Building," Res 45 Otto Veh, 5 vols. (Munich: Heimeran, 1977), vol. 5, 306-58, esp.
(2004): 225-38. 340-42, lines 691-720; trans. Cyril Mango, The Art of the Byzantine Em
pire 312-1453 (1986; reprint, Toronto: University of Toronto Press,
14. Charles Barber, Figure and Likeness: On the Limits of Representation in
Iconoclasm (Princeton: Princeton University 1993), 87-88. See also S. Xydis, "The Chancel Barrier, Solea, and
Byzantine Press, 2002).
Ambo of Hagia Sophia," Art Bulletin 29 (1947): 1-24.
15. Ibid., 70-81.
33. Vita Basilii Imperatoris, bk. 5, sec. 83, in Theophanes continuatus, ed. Im
16. Oskar Wulff, Die Koimesiskirche inNic?a und ihreMosaiken (Strassburg: manuel Bekker, Corpus Scriptorum Historiae Byzantinae (hereafter
Heitz und M?ndel, 1903); and Theodor Schmit, Die Koimesis-Kirche von CSHB), 33 (Bonn: Impensis ed. Weberi, 1838), 326; trans. Mango, The
Nikaia: Das Bauwerk und die Mosaiken (Berlin: W. de Gruyter, 1927). Art of the Byzantine Empire, 194. The sanctuary, synthronon, altar tables,
were all covered in gilded-silver re
17. Wulff, Die Koimesiskirche inNic?a, 246, 271; and Schmit, Die Koimesis templon barrier, and epistyle
Kirche von Nikaia, 39, described the ray as gray (grau and hellgrau). pouss? work and adorned with pearls and gems.
Most likely the tesserae were silver, still covered in soot and dirt, hav 34. Vita Basilii Imperatoris, bk. 5, sec. 87, in Bekker, Theophanes continuatus,
ing lost their luster and shimmer. Only metal could have created the 330; trans. Mango, The Art of the Byzantine Empire, 196.
glimmer and flicker in the early morning light that would have actual de l'ic?ne du Christ de la
35. Marie-France Auz?py, "La destruction
ized the prophecy of the mosaic inscription into a visual reality: "I
Chalc? de L?on III: Propagande ou r?alit?," Byzantion 60 (1990): 445
have begotten thee in the womb before the morning star" (Ps. 109:3).
see Cyril 92; Robin Cormack, "Women and Icons, and Women in Icons," in
For a discussion of the Incarnation symbolism at Nikaia,
"The Chalkoprateia Annunciation and the Pre-eternal Women, Men and Eunuchs: Gender in Byzantium (London: Routledge,
Mango, Logos," of
1997), 24-51; Leslie Brubaker, "The Chalke Gate, the Construction
Deltion tes Christianikes Archaiologikes Hetaireias 17, no. 4 (1993-94):
the Past, and the Trier Ivory," Byzantine and Modern Greek Studies 23
165-70.
(1999): 258-85; and Cyril Mango, The Brazen House: A Study of the Ves
18. Barber, Figure and Likeness, 72-81. tibule of the Imperial Palace of Constantinople B. L. Bog
(Copenhagen:
19. Ibid., 107-23. trykkeri, 1959), 108-42.
36. Auz?py, "La destruction de l'ic?ne du Christ de la Chalc?," 445-92. Mass.: MIT Press, 1990); and Georges Didi-Huberman, Devant Vimage:
Question pos?e aux fins d'une histoire de l'art (Paris: ?ditions de Minuit,
37. Philip Grierson, Catalogue of Byzantine Coins in theDumbarton Oaks Col
lection and in theWhittemore Collection, 5 vols. (1966; reprint, Washing 1990).
ton, D.C: Dumbarton Oaks, 1992), vol. 3, pt. 1, 160-61, 454-55. 58. Liddell and Scott, Greek-English Lexikon, s.v. "typos."
38. The Greek word chalkeos (x?AKeos) does not distinguish between cop 59. In the eyes of outsiders Byzantium has been identified correctly as the
per and bronze. Henry George Liddell and Robert Scott, eds., Greek culture of the imprint. See the recent discussion of Alexander Nagel
English Lexikon (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1996); and Liddell, Scott, and Christopher Wood, "Interventions: Toward a New Model of Re
and H. Stuart Jones, Greek-English Lexicon: A Supplement (Oxford: Clar naissance Anachronism," Art Bulletin 87 (2005): 403-15, esp. 407 and
endon Press, 1968). See also Simon Hornblower and Anthony Spaw note 28 (referring to the writings of Theodore of Stoudios).
forth, eds., The Oxford Classical Dictionary (Oxford: Oxford University 60. Konstantinos ed., Sinai: Treasures of theMonastery of Saint
Manaphes,
Press, 1996), s.v. "bronze." Catherine (Athens: Ekdotike Athenon, nos. 6-7, 10-15;
1990), 140-46,
39. Mango, The Brazen House, 108-42, esp. 116. and Kurt Weitzmann, The Monastery of Saint Catherine onMount Sinai:
The Icons (Princeton: Princeton University Press, 1976), nos. 50ff; with
40. The second source, the Chronographia of Theophanes, simply states: a recent revision of the dating of some of these icons in Leslie
"They also killed a few of the emperor's men who had taken down
the Lord's icon which was [set] above the great Bronze Gates,"
Brubaker and John Haldon, Byzantium in the Iconoclast Era (ca. 680
850): The Sources; An Annotated Survey, Birmingham Byzantine and Ot
Theophanes, Chronographia, ed. Immanuel Bekker, 2 vols., CSHB, 41 toman Monographs, 7 (Aldershot, U.K.: Ashgate,
42, vol. 1, 623; trans, and ed. Cyril Mango and Robert Scott, The 2001).
Chronicle of Theophanes Confessor: Byzantine and Near Eastern History, AD 61. See Antonio Pasini, II tesoro di San Marco in Venezia, 2 vols. (Venice:
284-813 (Oxford: Clarendon Press, 1997), 559. F. Ongania, 1886), vol. 1, 73-74, cat. no. 4; Michelangelo Muraro and
Andr? Grabar, Treasures of Venice (Milan: Skira, 1963), 65-69; Klaus
41. Vita Stephani Iunioris, bk. 10, in La vie d'Etienne leJeune par Etienne le
Diacre, trans, and ed. Marie-France
Wessel, Byzantine Enamels from theFifth to the Thirteenth Century (Green
Auz?py, Birmingham Byzantine
wich, Conn.: New York Graphic Society, 1968), 89-91, cat. no. 28;
and Ottoman Monographs, 3 (Aldershot, U.K: Variorum, 1997), 100:
'ev ToirroL? oiw eôixnariKO? Grabar, catalog entry in // tesoro di San Marco, ed. H. R. Hahnloser
?pa??iievo? tff? aip?creaj?, ireip?tTai
(Florence: Sansoni, 1971), 25-26, cat. no. 17; and The Treasury of San
TrapevOv rr}v ? o-7Totiktjv eiK?va XpiaTd??To??(deoi?r}iL&v ri)v
Marco (Milan: Olivetti, 1984), 141-47, cat. no. 12. The central plaque
iopv?jL6vriv virepdev tQv ?acrikiK?iv ttvXQv, ev olcnrep ?i? t?v
is dated to the late tenth century. The transverse bands are Byzantine,
XapaKTrfpa 7] ?yia Xo??.kt? keyerai, KareveyKai kql? rrvpi
as are the enamels, but they no longer form their original sequence.
irapaot?vPai.
The outside frame is Venetian, thirteenth century. The reverse side is
42. Auz?py has offered a similar translation in La vie d'Etienne leJeune,
possibly Byzantine; the cross is part of the original back of the icon.
193. The medallions are out of sequence. The daisy-pattern frame around
43. Theophanes, Chronographia, ed. Bekker, vol. 1, 439-40: ev ?x?q: the plaque with the cross ismodern.
KOipL?)yLVOV CiVTCfi} 6??6V OTnOKJlCtV, i? TTp ^??K'?fV TwXj]V T?V 62. Glenn Peers, Subtle Bodies: Representing Angels in Byzantium, Transfor
TTOtkOLTLOV V T^f LK?VLT?? (T?)Tr]pO<?eOiVTOV 7Tap OT?T?!, KCi? kdOV mation of the Classical Heritage, 32 (Berkeley: University of Califor
Trapecrrc?TOLavrtj^' k ? (?xuvt) yeyove ck TotrâpaKTffpo? roi) nia Press, 2001), 167-71, 177, 191.
liey?\ov dedv Ka? auyfrfpos thaGjv 'lâduXpiar?i? keyovaa. The
sense of an icon in metal 63. Muraro and Grabar, Treasures of Venice, 65.
relief is lost in Mango's and Scott's
translation, The Chronicle of Theophanes Confessor, 410. 64. Georges Didi-Huberman, Fra Ang?lico: Dissemblance and Figuration,
trans. J. M. Todd (Chicago: University of Chicago Press, 1995), 3, 5,
44. Scriptores Originum Constantinopolitarum, 2 vols., ed, Theodor Preger
45-60.
(Leipzig: B. G. Teubner, 1901), vol. 2, 219: ev rff keyofx?vxi Xa?Ktf
OTTJATJ XahK*?? ^\v TC???
KVplOV 7]jJiiuVTTjaO^XpiOT?tT TTCip? TOIT 65. Patriarch Nikephoros, Apologeticus pro sacris imaginibus, in PG, vol. 100,
puey?kov Kcjvo-ravT?vov KTiad?l& ? de Kecav o TTcnj)p to?T col. 777C: r?? tBv imepovpav??ov ovv?fie?ov evTVTrcuTLK?iqcru/ui?oAotc
Ka?akkivov ravrr)v Kcnr\yayev. 'H be vvv ?i? if/riî?wv bpejpi?viq 6K(j)aivea6aL. See Peers, Subtle Bodies, 89-125, esp. 113.
eiKoov T?iTXpio-Totr ?vi(TTop7)dr) trapa E?pr)vr?<; Trf? 'Adiqvaias.
66. Alois Riegl, "Late Roman or Oriental," in Abis Riegl: German Essays on
45. Mango, The Brazen House, 108-9. Albrecht Berger has also translated Art History, ed. Gert Schiff, the German Library, 79 (New York: Con
the passage using "bronze statue." Yet, relying on the evidence of the tinuum, 1988), 173-90, esp. 181: "Whereas the optical qualities disap
Life of Saint Stephen the Younger, he has suggested that the original pear in the dark, the tactile qualities remain. Extent and delimitation
Chalke image was a bronze relief, which was replaced after 843 by a are thus the more objective qualities, color and light the more subjec
mosaic. Berger, Untersuchungen zu den Patria Konstantinupoleos, Poikila tive ones, for the latter depend to a great degree on those chance
Byzantina, 8 (Bonn: Dr. Rudolf Habelt, 1988), 252-55. circumstances in which the perceiving subject finds itself."
46. Patriarch Methodios, epigram for the Chalkites icon, in Mango, The 67. Robin Cormack, Painting the Soul: Icons, Death Masks, and Shrouds
Brazen House, 126-27: odev irepiypatytov ere kol? yp?<?)0)v tOttol?. (London: Reaktion, 1997), 26-27.
47. Michaelis Glycae Annales, ed. Immanuel Bekker (Bonn: Impensis ed. 68. Suidae lexicon, ed. A. Adler, Lexicographi Graeci, 1, 4 vols. (1928-38;
Weberi, 1836), 623. reprint, Leipzig: Teubner, 1971), vol. 4, 828-29: tovto 8? ?art to
48. Basil of Caesarea, De Sancto Spirito 18.45, 45, in PG, vol. 32, col. 69D; Xpf?p<a' t? y?p ev tyf emp?vela xp?l?a t?vto ?ori t? bpaT?v, Kai
TOVTOval ?if/eic avTika\x?avovTai. The passage is discussed in Liz
and John of Damaskos, De imaginibus, I, in PG, vol. 94, col. 1264A;
both are discussed in Barber, Figure and Likeness, 74-76, 122. James, Light and Color in Byzantine Art (Oxford: Clarendon Press,
1996), 74-75.
49. In fact, the medallion image came to be understood as the canonical
icon of Christ already in the late seventh century. See Kathleen Corri 69. Liz James, "Color and Meaning in Byzantium," Journal of Early Chris
of John the Baptist on an Early Byzantine Icon in tian Studies 11, no. 2 (2003): 223-33.
gan, "The Witness
Kiev," Dumbarton Oaks Papers 42 (1988): 1-11, esp. 10. 70. Book of Gifts and Rarities: Kitab al-Hadaya wa al-Tuhaf trans, and ed.
50. Marfa V. Scepkina, Miniatjury Khludovskoi Psaltyri (Moscow: Isskustvo, Ghada al Hijjawi al-Qaddumi, Harvard Middle Eastern Monographs,
29 (Cambridge, Mass.: Harvard University Press, 1996), no. 62 (a belt
1977); and Kathleen Corrigan, Visual Polemics in theNinth-Century Byz
with gold enamel), no. 73 (rock crystal vessels caged in gold enamel,
antine Psalters (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1992). There
are roughly seventeen depictions of icons, fourteen of which display gemstones, and pearls), no. 82 (enamel vessels), no. 86 (enameled
the image in a medallion shape. Only three show a rectangular icon; gold vessels), no. 97 (enamel bracelets).
two of these depict Saint Peter, the other the Virgin and Child. 71. Ibid., no. 97.
51. Corrigan, Visual Polemics, 131-34. 72. Digenis Akritis, trans, and ed. Elizabeth Jeffreys, Cambridge Medieval
52. For the evolution of processions with icons, see Pentcheva, Icons and Classics, 7 (Cambridge: Cambridge University Press, 1998), 1.164
Power, 37-59. (gilded spear with blue enamel), 4.220-22 (golden hems enameled
with pearls), 4.239-40 (saddle and bridle), 6.555 (saddle and reins).
53. Ibid., 109-43.
73. Digenis Akritis 7.28-29: t?l Xa iracrTpaTTTOvTa xpoGv etyov 0ak?aar?<;
54. Pliny, Natural History bk. 35, lines 64-66.
/ ev yakr\vr\ Wo ? tttt]<? aakevo?JLevr)<; avpa?.
55. On Painting/Leon Battista Alberti, 1436, trans. Cecil Grayson (London: o AeijLLwv </>ca?p?<?edakke t?Sv 8?v?po)v
74. Digenis Akritis 7.23-27:
Penguin, 1991). mroKaTu) / TroiK?kr)v eycov TT)vxpo?v, toT$ avQediv aCTTpaTTTCuV, / Ta
56. Ernst Gombrich, Art and Illusion: A Study of thePsychology of Pictorial li?v v?)07] v?pKMj&a, p?oa Te Kai ?ivpaivai' / Ta p??a yff? eTvyxavov
Representation (New York: Pantheon Books, 1960). Trop(j)vpo?a(j)o<; KO0710?, / y?kaKTO? e&TLk?ov xpo?v o? v?pKiaaou ev
57. Norman fiepet.
Bryson, Vision and Painting: The Logic of the Gaze (New Haven:
Yale University Press, 1983), 163; Jonathan Crary, Techniques of the Ob 75. Dominic Janes, God and Gold in Late Antiquity (Cambridge: Cambridge
server: On Vision and Modernity in theNineteenth Century (Cambridge, Press, 1998), 126. "Jeweled inflation" refers to the appropri
University
554
ation of imperial splendor in church ritual in the course of the fourth 90. On the concept of the moving eye in extramission, see Mathew, Byz
century. antine Aesthetics, 30. On the wandering gaze in ekphraseis, see Wulff,
76. Helen C. Evans and William D. Wixom, "Das Raumerlebnis des Naos," 534-35.
eds., The Glory of Byzantium:
Art and Culture of theMiddle Byzantine Era, A.D. 843-1261 (New York: 91. Pentcheva, "Epigrams on Icons"; and Jannic Durand, "Precious-Metal
Metropolitan Museum of Art, 1997), cat. nos. 143 (Coislin 79), 149 Icon Revetments," in Byzantium: Faith and Power, 1261-1557, ed.
(Auxerre silk), with bibliography. For Auxerre, see also Danielle Ga Helen C. Evans (New York: Metropolitan Museum of Art, 2004), 243
borit-Chopin, ed., La France Romane au temps des premiers Cap?tiens 51.
(987-1152) (Paris: Mus?e du Louvre/?ditions Hazan, 2005), no. 128. 92. "OMapKiavos 8
Spyridon Lambros, k&?l? 524," Neos Hellenomnemon
77. For a similar use of the dazzling effect of gold to emphasize power (1911): nos. 73, 109. For a discussion of the role of these metric
and divinity, see Janes, God and Gold, 3, 23, 26-27, 84-86, 89, 121, prayers, see Pentcheva, "Epigrams on Icons."
139-52. See also Peers, Sacred Shock, 107-17, 126-31; and Franses, 93. Manuelis Philae Carmina, ed. Emmanuel Miller (Amsterdam: Hakkert,
"When All That Is Gold," 13-24.
1967), vol. 1, 65-66: Xpv&ffv de pG? tt/i> JE?e/x Tff? eiK?vos, / ev tjt?
78. On Byzantine purple, see Alexander Kazhdan, ed., Oxford Dictionary (f)vT?:TexvLKB? rfpfxoo-fx?va / boKoVcri KVKkoVv Tf/? JE??p< t?v
of
Byzantium, 3 vols. (Oxford: Oxford University Press, 1991), vol. 3, epy?TT\v. Discussed in Andr? Grabar, Les rev?tements en or et en argent
1759-60, with bibliography. For the association of purple with gold des icones byzantines du Moyen ?ge, Biblioth?que de l'Institut Hell?nique
and the link it preserved between imperial power and divinity, see d'?tudes Byzantines et Post-Byzantines de Venise, 7 (Venice: Institut
Janes, God and Gold, 20-21, 28, 37, 84, 86, 89, 129-30, 150-51. Hell?nique d'?tudes Byzantines et Post-Byzantines, 1975), 6; and Du
see also rand, "Precious-Metal Icon Revetments," 247.
79. James, Light and Color, 50, 74, 99. For porphyreos and pyravges,
the entries in Liddell and Scott, Greek-English Lexicon. 94. For the association of gold and green with paradise in late antiquity,
see Janes, God and Gold, 100.
80. The Treasury of San Marco, 159-65, cat. no. 16; and Wessel, Byzantine
Enamels, 72-73, no. 20. 95. Trans. Denis Sullivan, Stamatina McGrath, and Alice-Mary Talbot,
81. In fact, by the late tenth and early eleventh centuries, usually only the
from Aleksandr N. Vesselovskji, "Razyskanija v oblasti russkago du
to receive Communion hovnago stiha," Sbornik' Otdelenija russkago jazyka i slovesnosti Imperators
patriarch and the emperor would continue
directly from the chalice. Robert Taft, "Byzantine Communion koj akademii nauk' 46 (1889-90), suppl., 3-89 (henceforth, Vita Basilii
Iunioris), 39: 'Air?pavTes oltv 6K T0ev km r?? T??v ayi&v crevas
Spoons: A Review of the Evidence," Dumbarton Oaks Papers 50 (1996): avrai
was re eiTopevdrjixev. be rjcrav irokkal cr<f>?8pa crty?bpa ?jlt]
209-38. Thus, the chalice's exquisite synesthetic experience
served for the select few. Political power in Byzantium translated into \moK???xevai ?pidpA$, axnrep e? r)kiaKr?<; aKtTvos <f>ai8poT?Tiqv
a?ykr)v acrTpaTTTOwai, al be ?k [ivpio?a^cov o>? k ?ixraov Kai
the fullness of sensual delight.
TToptyvpa? deia? a?y?rj? onDAco? Kai votjtS?? acnp?movcrai. I
82. On a twelfth-century icon from Sinai, an image of the Virgin is identi thank Alice-Mary Talbot for allowing me to use their draft transla
fied as êi/iei/n], a word that conflates the roots of both "to alloy" tion.
and "to freeze." For this icon, see George Sotiriou and Maria Sotiriou,
Eikones tes mones Sina, 2 vols., Collection de l'Institut Fran?ais
96. Trans. Sullivan et al, ibid., 42: Eio-r?k0oiiev eis Tiva irepiavkov ??vov
Kal iravTekSs k^rjkkayfjb?vov Kai r\v to b?irebov avro?r eâarp?irrov,
d'Ath?nes, 100 (Athens: Institut Fran?ais d'Ath?nes, 1956-58), vol. 1,
125-28, vol. 2, figs. 146-49; and Nicolette Trahoulia, "The Truth in TrepiKeKO(T?jLr)iJLvov xpwaV; irka?l, Kal pimoq ev avtQS ov Trpoafjv to
ovvokov, Kal ar)p aaTpaTr??JLOp^)o<;Trepir\vya?,ev amo, ev be toV;
Painting: A Refutation of Heresy in a Sinai Icon," Jahrbuch der ?ster
apixov?ais t?JSvxpvo~o<j)av?j5v eKeiv v irkaKBv vTff\pxov <j>vr?
reichischen Byzantinistik 52 (2002): 271-85.
k^r?vdLO-jxeva T?avTt??a tBv r\bvrrv?(x)v Kal ?ykaoKap v (?pai s
83. Patriarch Nikephoros on the nature of cherubims, in PG, vol. 100,
TTe(f)VTovpyriii va.
col. 776D.
97. Trans. Sullivan et al., ibid., 43: eyyiora b? tQv ?v?biov avrBv loraTo
84. Eve Borsook, "Rhetoric and Reality: Mosaics as Expressions of Meta
Tp?ire?a jmey?oTTfTrr?xe(?v Tpi?Kovra, Kal avTr\ r\v ?k kiOov
physical Idea," Mitteilungen des kunsthistorischen Instituts in Florenz 44,
o~iLap?ybov oip??ox; kekaToyLT\?x?vr\ Kal KaTeaKevao-fx?vri, ??KTlVa?
no. 1 (2002): 3-18, esp. 4-5; John Gage, Color and Culture: Practice and . . . crel ?X??'ol TTpoKeifievoi bi?xpvo'oi
kKTrefXTTOvaa(fxoTo?okovs,
Meaning from Antiquity toAbstraction (Boston: Bulfinch Press, 1993), ?o-TpairoeubeV; kvxvi>TO?CbiKal <W??? ?k iravTwv TBv evTijxojv kiO v
39-64; and Franses, "When All That Is Gold," 13-24. So far, the dis Kal xpvo~6iv tQv ck toI? irapabeiaov k?epxojJL?vcjv Kal b?xoio^>epeV;.
cussion has focused only on mosaics. Yet enamel presents the same
98. Trans. Sullivan et al., ibid., 44-45: 01 b? vrn)percfvVTe<s avroV;
polymorphous glitter and privileges dazzle over hue.
veavicTKOL (?pd?Oi iraw kivyxavov, eveubeV; toV; 7rpoo"?>7roi?, kevKol
85. Pikilia (ttoikiXiol) has a long tradition in Byzantium. Already in late &el x??v, ci ?paxeioves avrtSv Kal ci b?KTvkoi, w? ?v Tt? euroi
antiquity, ordinary body remains were transformed into spiritual ob tovtov? ib?)v, ?K y?kaKTO? oit? (frvpa??vTos KaTao-ev?ada?, k?kklvov
jects (relics) by being staged in sensually enhanced environments. See
oto?t/v ?vkco? ?e?afjbfxevriv Kal 7r?errjc wpai?rrjToc
r?ijL<l>ieo-iJL?voi
Patricia Cox Miller, "'The Little Blue Flower Is Red': Relics and the
Treirkripwixevriv, ol b? Trabes avtBv xwvoetbeV;, irepLe?(uo~p,?voi ?wvaq
of the Body," Journal of Early Christian Studies 8 (2000): 213 K T?&ovpaviov
Poetizing (ocnrep kcjpovs to?ov tt]v evxpoiav KeKTrux?vov? Kal
36.
airao-TpaTTTOvTac, em be toV; KopwfraV; avf&v xpwfx: e<f>epov
86. Grabar, II tesoro di San Marco, 25. ev kidois koI fxapy?poic TrokvT??xoLs cocrei ?okal k?av
catalog entry in Hahnloser, biabr\ixaTa
87. In Byzantium, a of a building written TTavevrrpeireo-TaTa Kal TTOiK?kavrr?pxovTa.
ekphrasis presents description
and received from the point of view of a subject moving through 99. For the scriptural tradition of associating whiteness and transparency
space. Oskar Wulff, "Das Raumerlebnis des Naos im Spiegel der Ek with paradise, see Janes, God and Gold, 72-74, 84-86.
phrasis," Byzantinische Zeitschrift $? (1929-30): 531-39; and Ruth 100. Trans. Sullivan et al., Vita Basilii Iunioris, 36-46: ??Treip?crTo?;
Webb, "The Aesthetics of Sacred Space: Narrative, Metaphor, and Mo
ctKaTav?riTo?; ?<j>pao-T?)?; ?v?K<f>pacrTO<;;?d?aTov; ovbel? bvvaTai
tion in Ekphraseis of Church Buildings," Dumbarton Oaks Papers 53 s;
k?yos ?p?Teis bir\yecrao~Bai'y ?ireipo?; aveKk?kr\Toc\ ?vepixiqvevT
(1999): 59-74. On the creation of the visual equivalent of this genre vor\T?<;; voV? koX koyo? oC bvvaTat ?v$p6)7nve<; bir\yr\o~ao,Qai\
of literature in the twelfth century, see Pentcheva, "Visual Textuality," odaai
?pprfro?; ?vkai ?>? ai T/?iaKai aKTTve?', KpaTeTcrdai irap?
225-38. cr piaTiK?dv x^P^v abvvaTov; evfypocrvvr) Kal eimp?rreLav
88. Mango, The Art of the Byzantine Empire, 185; Photios, Homily X, sec. 4, T Kal T)bovr)V yk?)craxi ?vdpo)7rivxi
?ovyKpLTOv wpat?TT/T?
in Photiou Homiliai, ed. V. Laourdas, Hetaireias Makedonikon Spou ?vep[Xf}V VTOV Kal O?KOX? avT?KOVO~TOV,y??m? /XVptOjLLtKTW?
don, 12 (Thessaloniki: Hetaireias Makedonikon Spoudon, 1959), 101: ?v pp,T)vevT?)<; tc Kai ?v K?iT)'yf/T?)?; TravT?Ta ?wv Kal p?bcjv
?? odrrep r?? ?ipeis ovv?xovcrai koli 7rpo? eaur?? kiricrTpefyovcrai v?crp,(x)v Ib?ai eTreKeivro; kv k?yq> ?(j)paaTov; kv oo-<f>pr)cr i Kal
ovK kdeXeiv iroidvcrai tov ?earrjv iL Tax(opr}aai irpo? r? aicrdr)o- Lavdp?)Trivr?<; biavo?as ?KaTavor)To? Kal avekbir)yr\Tov
kvS?repa, ?XX' kv otvr? irporepiev?o-fiaTL toV KaXXd?? Oeajutaro? ? tt\v evocrpXav; a(/)pao"To? t/?vtt/to?; r?bovrJ<; Kal 6vpiiqb?a<; aireipov
TTpoai?v kjJLTTLTrX?^jievo^ Kai toV; bp iL?vois kpei?ojv r? ?jipbara Trkr)povp, voi.
?HTTTep Tt? kppL???lx?vO? T? QOLVILOLTI ?CTT7]K?V. 101. See Pentcheva, on Icons." Here, I am concerned with the
"Epigrams
89. Mango, The Art of the Byzantine Empire, 185; Photios, Homily X, sec. 5, epigram's performative aspect and circular structure.
in Photiou Homiliai, 101: 'fk elavrbv y?p tov ovpavbv pL7}8evb<; 102. Margaret Mullett, "Writing in Early Medieval Byzantium," in Uses of
kiMTpoa?dvPToc ?jnr)Oa?ji?dev kp,?e?ir}Ku)<; Kai toT? TToXvp,?p<\>oi<; Literacy in Early Medieval Europe, ed. Rosamond McKitterick (Cam
Kai iravTax?dev wrofyaivoyLevois K?XXecriv <w?aorpoi?
bridge: Cambridge University Press, 1990), 156-85, esp. 179-85.
TTepiXa?j?TTOixevo<;oXo? kKTTeTrXr\yixevo<; ylverai. AoKeT?? Xonrbv
103. The connection between the icon and the Davidic Psalms will appear
kvrevOev r? re ?XXa ev eKcrravei elvai kol? avrb irepL?iv??&dai to
again in the discussion of the sense of taste.
t?/x ?>o?*toV; y?p otKeiai? Kal 7rai^To?a7raT^ irepicrTpoâV; Kai
ovvex?crL KLvqaecriv, ? 7r?vT0)q iraOeTv t?v 0eaTJ)v r? iravrax?Bev 104. On the performative nature of epigrams, see Amy Papalexandrou,
TToiKiX?a ?iaCerai to?? Be?jiaToc, ei? avrb t? bp(?p,evov to oiKeTov "Text in Context: Eloquent Monuments and the Byzantine Beholder,"
<j>avT??eTai Tr?BiqfjLa. Word and Image 17, no; 3 (2001): 259-83. On the orality of Byzantine
literature, see Guglielmo Cavallo, "Trace per una storia d?lia lettura ? 115. This and the following biblical quotations follow the text and num
Bisanzio," Byzantinische Zeitschrift 95, no. 2 (2002): 423-44; idem, "Le bering of the Greek Septuagint, Septuaginta, ed. Alfred Rahlfs (1935;
en Occident,"
rossignol et l'hirondelle: Lire et ?crire ? Byzance, An reprint, Stuttgart: Deutsche Bibelstiftung, 1935).
nales: Histoire et Sciences Sociales 4, no. 5 (2001): 849-61; and Mullett,
116. Geoffrey Lampe, ed., Patristic Greek Lexicon (1961; reprint, Oxford:
"Writing in Early Medieval Byzantium," 156-85.
Clarendon Press, 2001).
105. See nn. 88-89 above.
117. Susan A. Harvey, "St. Ephrem on the Scent of Salvation," Journal of
106. Robert Nelson, "Byzantine Art vsWestern Medieval Art," in Byzance et Theological Studies 48, no. 1 (1998): 109-28; and idem, "Incense Offer
le monde ext?rieur: Contacts, relations, ?changes; Actes de trois s?ances du XXe in Ancient
ings in the Syriac Transitus Mariae. Ritual and Knowledge
Congr?s International des ?tudes Byzantines, Paris, 19-25 ao?t 2001, ed. Christianity," in The Early Church and Its Context: Essays inHonor of Ever
Michel Balard et al., Byzantina Sorbonensia, 21 (Paris: Publications de ett Ferguson, ed. Abraham Malherbe, Frederick Norris, and James
la Sorbonne, 2005), 255-70. to Novum Testamentum, 90 (Leiden: Brill,
Thompson, Supplements
107. Theodore Hyrtakenos, quoted in Fran?ois Jean Gabriel de la Porte-du 1998), 175-91. Harvey will offer an extensive study on the role of
Theil, "Notice et extraits d'un volume de la Biblioth?que Nationale, scent in late antiquity in her forthcoming monograph, Scenting Salva
cot? MCCIX parmi les mansucrits grecs et contenant les Opuscules et tion: Ancient Christianity and the Olfactory Imagination, Transformation of
letters anecdotes de Th?odore l'Hyrtakc?nien," Notices et Extraits des the Classical Heritage, 42 (Berkeley: University of California Press,
Manuscrits de la Biblioth?que Nationale et Autres Biblioth?ques 6 (1800): 2006). For an anthropological point of view, see Constance Classen,
1-48, esp. 42, letter no. 75: 'Eyc? 8', kvavTevi?c?v toV; yp?pifxacnv, David Howes, and Anthony Synnott, Aroma: The Cultural History of
avrbv cr? ?Xeireiv T)yo?p,iqv, Kai Tff? ?xeXixp&s oifs kpLcfropeTtrdai Smell (London: Routledge, 1994).
creipijVoc, Kal T&v kp,fxeXBv a.KpO?to~Bai <$>Qbyyo)vTff? dva?iacr?aq 118. For an excellent
into Italian and discussed in Cavallo, "Trace per analysis revealing how the lavish imperial ceremonial
TjôiT?.Translated see Liz James, "Art and Lies:
una storia della lettura ? Bisanzio," 426. shaped the imagined realm of paradise,
Text, Image and Imagination in the Medieval World," in Eastmond
108. Mullett, "Writing in Early Medieval Byzantium," 179, discusses Symeon and James, Icon and Word, 59-71.
Metaphrastes on writing and drinking (letter no. 89) and John Mavro 119. Constan tine Porphyrogennetos, De ceremoniis aulae byzantinae, ed. Jo
pous on writing and music (letter no. 1). See also Cavallo, "Trace per
hann Jacob Reiske, 2 vols., CSHB, 9-10
una storia della lettura ? Bisanzio," 425-26. (Bonn: Impensis ed. Weberi,
1829), 160 (bk. 1, chap. 28), 438 (bk. 1, chap. 96).
109. On the role of orality in Byzantine literature, see n. 104 above.
120. Constantine VII Porphyrogenitus: Three Treatises on Imperial Military Expedi
110. Trans. Sullivan et al., Vita Basilii Iunioris, 44: ??v 8e b krrl t?ls ?vXoi?
tions, trans. John F. Haldon, Corpus Fontium Historiae Byzantinae, 28
eKeivoL? rfXioêyyecn irornpioi? KLpv?fievo? oivo?, t tf XP0La (Vienna: ?sterreichischen Akademie der Wissenschaften, 1990),
kpvOp? TJVpaK?o~iiaTi Xiav evTrvpio? aTrao-TparrTC?v, Kal birr?v?Ka 108-9; Constantine De ceremoniis, ed. Reiske, 468:
Porphyrogennetos,
rt? avTc5v ?m x??jt>a? k???aTo ttjv dav?iaaT7]v eKe?vr\v Kal Hapap,r]pLOv ev akeiTTT?, KaTrv?crjxaTa Oi?ôpa, dv?jiia?jba, (xao-T?xr)v,
<j)?)To?bXov KvXiKa, v?KTapo? api?pocriac Tr TrXr)pa)pi?vr?v, Kal t@
. . . ki?avov, cr?xap, Kp?KOv, fi?crxov, apuTrap, ?vkakor)v vyp?v Kal ?,r\p?v,
?O?q)ar? fian Tairrr\v irpocrfiyaye to?j meTv. rfiya?e 8e t?
KLvv??x(?fxov akr)Qiv?v TTp?dTovKal bevrepov, Kal ^vkoKLvv?pLCjpiov,
Trpbo~(?Trov avroV Kal ?ri rrXeov kXap,7rpvveTo, (oairep pb?ov ?pTi terms, see also Charles Du
?jLVp?criiaTakoiu?. For the specialized
tG>v KaXvK(ov vire?eXdc?v.
Cange, Glossarium ad scriptores mediae et infimae graecitatis (Lyons: Anis
111. The Treasury of San Marco, 159, cat. no. 16: Iltere e? avrd? navres' son, Posuel, Rigaud, 1688; reprint, Graz: Akademische Druck, 1958).
T?VTOpuOi) kcTTlTO ?LjUL?,TO Tff? KOUV?f??taOTJKTJ?T? VTTepVp,i?v KO.I
121. On the contemporary perception of power and smell, see Classen et
iroXXGv eKXvv?pLevov et? ?êaiv appuaTiBv. The translation comes
al., Aroma, 161-79. Similarly, the modern utopia created by Hollywood
from the King James Version.
is "totally inodorate, existing only in the sensory domain of sight and
112. Vie de Th?odore de Sykeon, ed. A.-J. Festugi?re, Subsidia
175, in contrast to the complex
Hagiographica, hearing," fragrance of the Byzantine
48 (Brussels: Soci?t? des Bollandistes, 1970), 11. imperial and liturgical ceremonial and the concomitant image of par
113. Vita Theodori Syceotae, bk. 13, trans, in Elizabeth Dawes and Norman H. adise.
Baynes, Three Byzantine Saints (Oxford: B. Blackwell Press, 1948), 95; 122. See n. 81 above.
A.-J. Festugi?re, ed., Vie de Th?odore de Syke?n, Subsidia Hagiographica,
123. On the association of perfume with salvation and paradise, see Har
48 (Brussels: Soci?t? des Bollandistes, 1970), 11: 'Avaor?im yo?v
avrt$ 6K toV e??Qov?, Kal TfjeiKbvi To?rX(uff?po<; TTpoa?xovTi Kal vey, "St. Ephrem," and idem, "Incense Offerings"; and Suzanne Evans,
"The Scent of a Martyr," Numen 49 (2002): 193-211. On the connec
8eo???v?), i) adeTo yXvKvrr)Ta r)8vrepov jut??lto? kyxvd?ttrav kv rQ
tion between odors and dreams and the imagined world of the be
or?/mcm avrcfi?. 'O 8? yvov? rrfv x?nv To?Tdeo?r Kal p.eTaXa?oiv Tff?
yXvKVT7)Tos Kal vxapio-Tr)0~a<; Tc$Xpio~T<$airo Tff? ?opa? eKeiviq? yond, see Classen et al., Aroma, 155-58.
evK?X??s Kal etyiadid? ?ireo'T'qdLê to ipaXTr?piov, kv bXiyai? Tj/x?pai? 124. Pss. 33:8: "Taste and see that God is good."
airav avrb eKpiadcjv.
125. Conforming to the conclusion of Nelson, "Byzantine Art vs Western
114. Paul Speck has contested the seventh-century date of the passages Medieval Art," 269-70.
about icons in this life and argued instead that these references were
or early ninth century. His 126. Martin Heidegger, "The Origin of the Work of Art," in Poetry, Lan
interpolated in the mid-eighth theory
guage, Thought, trans, and ed. Albert Hofstadter (New York: Harper
brings the date of the text closer to the context and use of the S. and Row, 1971), 36, 62.
Marco enamel icon. Speck, "Wunderheilige und Bilder: Zur Frage des
Beginns der Bilderverehrung," in Poikila Byzantina, vol. 11, Varia III 127. On the saturated phenomenon, see Marion, Being Given: Towards a
(Bonn: Dr. R. Habelt, 1991), 163-247, esp. 245-46. Phenomenology of Givenness, 199 -221.

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The Performative Icon

Author(s): Bissera V. Pentcheva

together, plus aesthesis, sensual

from a tension that will be resolved in the icon's

clasm.14 What remains to be

3 Harbaville late 10th century, X WA

public domain; photograph by Erich Lessing, provided by Art

5 Mosaic of the Hetoimasia, late 7th or

inscription, is transformed into the Child held in the arms of

7 Seal attached to the memorandum of a of

imprint of that which he contemplates, and presses it like

8 Seal blank, lead, diameter IVs in. (2.9 cm). Dumbarton

11 Coin with the impressed images of Christ and Emperor

The typos/sphragis concept is not new. It has been explored

touch) is thus internal. Like a

peared on imperial coinage in 843.37

Already in his discussion of the sixth-century decoration of location at the

passage is charakter (xotpoLKTr\p). It means an

12 Khludov Psalter, preface miniature,

Chalkites at the Bronze Gates is correct, then all medallion

in the period right after Iconoclasm, as attested by

This understanding of graphe as imprint simultaneously a mimetic

engages touch, sight, and sound. Touch, because grapheis

13 Icon of the Archangel Michael, late

color is an of form?the material the garment, these were to the most

15 Icon of the Arch

angel Michael, late 10th

embody radiance. Gold and purple are employed in imperial

The was derived from the murex, a ma

century Byzantine gold enamel mount (Figs. 18, 19).80 De

spectacle of light and gold, experiencing it as flesh, blood, matter

The enamel icon of the Archangel ex and in order to the angel's

surfaces (filigree, cloisonn?, and repouss?) (Figs. 13-15).

muting the effect of ambient light. In fact, in one of

by the diversity of veins in the exterior marble revetment:

It is as if one had entered heaven itself with no one barring

The rich aesthetic of marble

of metal. The icon of the Archangel exemplifies this poly perform

it conveys the kinetic essence an to take in more of the In a similar

ing colors, textures, and smells.

from green to dark

18 Chalice of the Patriarchs, 10th

of emerges. It is encoded in the and written as an for an icon: "I the

?. . vt* .wn** *.* ?'*

surface appears in many of the

divine purple light.95 them with divine

20 Chalice of the Patriarchs, medallion with Christ at the

The table decked out for the feast, quarried of scintillating

[The table was] 30 pech?is large, itwas beautifully quarried

The angels appear in scarlet tunics with loroi radiating the

The icon thus sets a circle: a mirror the faithful

of prayer. These poems, like the icon,

beginning 1 on the facing folio. The other figure is

(Fig. 21 ).103Most of these poems are written in the frame of

psalter easily and quickly and had learnt the whole of it by

According to Paul Speck, the excerpt about the icon that

tity, dissolving into the sacred presence and sharing in the

an almost Eucharistie of the icon.

matter of days: imperial and liturgical ceremonies.118 It is in such aromatic

brings to the faithful the scent of salvation.123

A Circle Completed Bissera V. Pentcheva is assistant at

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?. . vt* .wn** . ?'*