Celestial Hierarchies and Earthly Hiearchies in the Art of the Byzantine Church

TI-IE BYZANTINE WORLD

Edited by

Paul Stephenson

aa RoutledgeTaylor&-Francis Group

LQNDON AND NEW YORK

CHAPTER TWENTY-THREE

CELESTIAL HIERARCHIES ANDEARTHLY HIERARCHIES IN THE

ART OF THE BYZANTINE CHURCH

Warren T. Woodn

ln my opinion a hierarchy is a sacred order, a state of understanding andan activity approximating as closely as possible to the divine. And it isuplifted to the imitation of God in proportion to the enlightenmentsdivinely given to it. The beauty of God - so simple, so good, so much thesource of perfection — is completely uncontaminated by dissimilarity. ltreaches out to grant every being, according to merit, a share of light andthen through a divine sacrament, in harmony and peace, it bestows oneach of those being perfected its own form.‘

INTRODUCTIONThe idea that earthly things are reections of heavenly realities was part of the

package of Neoplatonic ideas that Byzantium inherited from late antiquity. Theidea of the resemblance between earthly and heavenly realms was intensied andgiven specic content by the biblical tradition and its interpretation by the GreekFathers. To give a somewhat idiosyncratic example, the sixth-century ChristianTopography that has traditionally gone under the name of Cosmas Indicopleusteszseeks to explain the visible universe in terms of a heavenly prototype. The authorrejects the old Ptolemaic notion of the universe as a series of concentric spheres.Instead, he bases his model of heaven and earth on the Tabemacle, the plans forwhich were revealed to Moses on Mt Sinai, for this is the divinely revealed model ofthe entire world (to navtog xoopou to é|cpayeiov).’ The inhabited world isdescribed as at and rectangular, something proved to the author of the ChristianTopography not only by his own travels, but by the dimensions of the Table of theShewbread, which is twice as long as it is wide, and surrounded by a border of a

palm’s breadth, corresponding to the narrow margin of earth surrounding the ocean.just as the curtain divides the tabemacle between the outer sanctuary and the Holy ofHolies, so the firmament divides the world and the visible heavens from the Kingdomof Heaven that is above the rmament. Although the specic application of suchthinking in the Christian Topography is far from typical‘ — most educated Byzantinescontinued to believe in antipodes - the idea that the visible world and its institutionsreected the realities of the invisible, heavenly sphere, was both widespread andlong-lived in Byzantium.’ This mirroring of earth and heaven was present equally in

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the intellectual world both of the Church and of the court, but its visual expressionemerged most prominently through a dialogue between the two. It is thanks to theencounter with imperial expressions of this ideology, both ceremonial and visual,that the Byzantine Church arrived at a uniquely forceful artistic statement of its owncontinuity with the heavenly hierarchy.

TI-IE IMPERIAL REALM AS IMAGE OF HEAVEN

Despite Pseudo-Dionysios’ early articulation of the ecclesiastical hierarchy as a

reection of the heavenly one, in the middle Byzantine period such parallels betweenearth and heaven were developed most clearly in the art and rhetoric of the imperialcourt.‘ Panegyrics recited at imperial audiences make the comparison between theheavenly court and its earthly counterpart explicit. Paul Magdalino has likenedofficial encomia to the images impressed on Byzantine coins, which show theemperor on the obverse and Christ on the reverse side. By insisting on the mimeticrelationship between the ruler and Christ, such oratory depicts the emperor as thelegitimate representative of the divine power.’ In his oration at the accession ofManuel I, Michael ltalikos puns on the emperor’s name and its resemblance to thename Emmanuel:

You dwell here below as a living and moving statue of the King above who madeyou king, O emperor . . . If God is expressed in both names, he is the rst andheavenly God, while you are the second and earthly one.‘

This topos of the emperor’s God-like status on earth, although given a special flavorby the opportunities to play on his name, is by no means conned to Manuel’s reign.Nor was the resemblance between heaven and earth conned solely to the person ofthe emperor. In an elaborate series of metaphors, the eleventh-century author johnMauropous compares being introduced into the emperor’s presence to Moses’glimpse of God on Sinai, and the path to the emperor’s throne, guarded by courtiers,to the way into Eden, blocked by the cherubim with aming sword.’

Although we are much poorer in textual sources that treat imperial ceremonialdirectly, in these also we see an emphasis on the mimetic aspect of court ritual. In Decerimoniis we are faced with the rather startling fact that the loros, the imperial scarfdecked with gems and pearls and the imperial symbol par excellence in the visualarts, was in fact also wom by courtiers on certain occasions such as the imperialEaster banquet.'° Its shared use at court serves a mimetic function, symbolizing theburial clothes of Christ and his glorious resurrection:

We deem the magistrates’ and patricians’ wearing of loroi on the festal day of theresurrection of Christ our God to be a type of his burial, while their being gildedis for the brilliance of this day, beaming sunlight as from the sun of Christhimself when he rose. And they, both the magistrates and the patricians, wedeem to act as types of the apostles, and the worthy emperor to correspond,inasmuch as it is possible, to God."

The text goes on to describe the other insignia of the emperor, the silk handkerchief

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— CHAPTER 2.3: Hierarchies in the art of the Byzantine Church —

full of earth, called anexekakia, and the buskins on his feet, as representing respect-ively the teaching of Christ to his disciples and his death and resurrection. Howeverarbitrary the symbolic links may seem to us, in De cerimoniis the imperial garmentsare assigned specic aspects of the emperor's role as the image of Christ.

Ceremonial dress also structures the parallels between the earthly and heavenlycourts in the visual arts. Depictions of costume differ from actual ceremonial andpanegyrics in one critical respect: whereas written sources, whether ceremonialmanuals or encomia, tend to stress the analogy between the emperor and God,imperial art tends to avoid such direct comparisons. The emperor and Christ may be

functionally equivalent, but art always maintains a distinction between them informal terms. One may compare this reticence with the boldness of the Byzantinizingmosaic portrait of Roger ll crowned by Christ in the Martorana in Palermo, whereChrist’s lineaments are assimilated to Roger’s own features. William Tronzo has

contrasted this “self-sufcient” Christomimesis, observable within a single image,with the more indirect approach favored in Byzantium proper.“ In the imperial artof Constantinople, the presentation of Christ’s image and the imperial imagemay approach asymptotically, but they never precisely coincide. To take a particu-larly close brush between the two as an example: the twin leaves of a tenth-centuryivory diptych, now divided between Dumbarton Oaks in Washington, DC and theGotha Schlossmuseum, bear crosses in relief, each centering a roundel (Figures 2.3.1aand 2.3.1b)." On one side appears the bust of the emperor, on the other, that ofChrist. In terms of pose, only the slight tum in the emperor's gesture - a markof deference — indicates that he is not fully co-equal with Christ, who is perfectlyfrontal in his pose.

We see a similar juxtaposition of the emperor and Christ on opposite faces ofanother ivory object connected to court ceremonial. Long known to scholarship as

the Scepter of Leo VI, it has recently been identied as a ceremonial comb." Theivory shows the emperor in the company of an archangel and the Virgin Mary, whoadds a pearl to his crown." On the reverse side, Christ appears anked by SS Peter

and Paul. The scalloped arches that frame the heads of the gures recall thesemi-domes that radiate from the central space of Hagia Sophia or perhaps even

the apsidal reception rooms of the Great Palace." One could interpret the space

represented as the actual interior of Hagia Sophia, into which the heavenly gureshave descended to appear in the company of the emperor, or one could view thespace as an evocation of the heavenly architecture (built, of course, on the Byzantinemodel) into which the emperor has ascended to join the company of Christ andthe saints." The ambiguity is doubtless deliberate, for it allows the viewer to read the

image two ways, both equally attering to the imperial dignity.In both the diptych and the comb, Christ and the emperor are juxtaposed in

similar settings on opposite sides of the same ivory. Yet, in both objects, there are

more subtle tactics of visual triangulation between earthly and heavenly realms

accomplished by means of dress. On the ivory comb in Berlin, the Archangel Gabrieland the emperor wear identical costumes, notably the imperial Ioros. The ceremonialdress of the emperor} shared with the archangels in art, expresses the ruler’s ambigu-ous hierarchical position between heaven and earth - rst in rank on earth, but a

servant of Christ in heaven." Similarly, the emperor on the ivory diptych leaf inWashington wears the Ioros; Christ on the corresponding leaf in Gotha appears, as

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Schlossmuseum.

usual, in antique dress. Whereas the panegyrists of Manuel l’s court could pundaringly on the likeness of his name to Christ’s own, imperial art avoided too literal a

resemblance, thanks to the retention of the ancient costume of tunic and mantle forChrist. As no one would have wom such clothing in medieval Byzantium, Christ’sdress renders him semantically neutral, outside the sartorial hierarchies of the courtand the Church." Thus imperial art expresses more obliquely than court panegyricthe emperor’s quasi-divine status on earth.

If explicit imperial Christomimesis was avoided in the visual arts, the emperor’sresemblance to the archangels was embraced and elaborated.” Not only do theemperor and the archangels share the costume of the Ioros, they frequently appear inone another’s company. ln one of the frontispiece miniatures of the Paris Homilies of

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— CHAPTER 2.3: Hierarchies in the art of the Byzantine Church -St john Chrysostom, for example, the emperor appears anked by St john Chrysos-tom and the Archangel Michael.“ Although the imperial gure is labeled asNikephoros III Botaneiates, loannis Spatharakis has argued that the image originallyrepresented Michael VII Doukas - and the presence of his angelic namesake wouldbe a logical form of attery.” In the miniature, the archangel actually acts in the roleof a courtier z/is-a-vis the emperor, presenting to him the prostrate scribe (the tinygure next to the imperial footstool) just as a court eunuch would have presentedsuppliants to the emperor. The emperor is thus, according to his central position inthe miniature and his placement on an elaborate footstool, accorded a superiorposition to that of the anking saint and angel, who tum in toward him as in aDeesis.“ The miniatures of the Paris Homilies are not alone in placing the emperor alittle higher than the angels. By the mid-fourteenth century, the headgear of certainhigh-ranking courtiers showed an image of the emperor on the front, anked by anangel on each side.“ On occasion, coins and other images of the emperor evenportrayed him winged like an archangel — a natural extension of the idea that he

stood among them as a messenger and intermediary between God and mankind.”The idea of the emperor’s elevation above the visible world was also conveyed in

ceremonial, such as the public audience known as the prokypsis. On such occasions,securely documented in the fourteenth century but possibly practiced earlier, theemperor and his courtiers would assemble on a special platform following the liturgyon great feast-days. The emperor and his attendants would be hidden from publicview by curtains while the entourage assembled. Twelve banners — with representa-tions of archangels, holy bishops, warrior saints, and the emperor on horseback -would be carried into position anking the tribune. These were arranged in pairs, sixof each image to a side. When all was ready, the protovestiarios would give a signalfor the curtains to be lowered, and the emperor would appear in full regalia, ankedby insignia held by his courtiers: a great lighted candle and a sword. The curtainswere only dropped as far as the emperor’s knees, so that he would appear to levitateon the dais, and the anking courtiers remained unseen except for their handsholding his insignia. The assembled crowds shouted acclamations, and the curtainswere raised again, the banners departed, and everyone moved on to the palace for a

state banquet.“ The ceremonial appearance on the tribune seems designed to treatthe emperor’s person like a vision appearing from on high, and his being cut off atthe knees recalls the Byzantine habit of portraying Christ at bust length to emphasizehis divinity." The twelve banners with images of saints and angels that ank theemperor in pairs further recall the composition known as the Great Deesis, in whichChrist is anked by pairs of saints grouped according to class.“ The ceremonialappearance of the emperor thus models the heavenly hierarchy as pictured in the artof the Church.

With this model in mind, we can retum to one of the most famous images ofthe imperial majesty, the frontispiece portrait of Michael VII Doukas, altered torepresent Nikephoros III Botaneiates after the latter’s usurpation in 1078, enthronedamid courtiers in the frontispiece to the Paris Homilies of St john Chrysostom(Figure 23.2).” The emperor appears seated on a lyre-backed throne, pictured twiceas large as the gures who accompany him. From either side of the back of his throneappear the personied virtues of Truth and justice, while four courtiers ank hisfootstool. They appear ranged to the emperor’s left and right in accordance with

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Figure 2.3.1 Courtiers and personied virtues surround the throne of Michael VII Doukas1r. |o"1—8). altered to represent the usurper Nikephoros lll Botaneiates (r. lo-8-8 l ). Paris,

BnF. ms. Coislin -'9, fol. z. Bibliorheque Nationale de France.

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— CHAPTER 2.3: Hierarchies in the art of the Byzantine Chuygh —

their respective ofces, given in minute inscriptions above their heads: prot-osproedros kai protovestiarios, proedros kai epi tou Izanilzleiou, proedmg Imidelzanos and proedros kai megas primikeri0s.’° The image is a locus classicus indiscussions of imperial art precisely because it is so rare: few preserved images shgwemperors accompanied by actual courtiers, and no other work presents thg mm»; insuch iconic fashion.“ As Annemarie Weyl Carr has pointed out, in the vastmajority of depictions the emperor is accompanied by saints or archangels, whosubstitute for the earthly servants of the court.” The epigram accompanying thefrontispiece image compares the emperor to the sun as bringer of light, and, as HenryMaguire has noted, the courtiers tum inward toward him like heliotropes followingthe sun.” We can compare the composition to the expanded Deesis mosaic partiallypreserved in the patriarchal rooms of Hagia Sophia, and dated to the late ninthcentury.“ There we see Christ seated on a lyre-backed throne, anked by the \i-ginand, one presumes, john the Baptist (the gure is almost entirely lost). The ranks ofthe Deesis are lled out with apostles, sainted bishops and SS Constantine andHelena. We may consider the leaf from the Paris Chrysostom manuscript as a Deesis

with the emperor and courtiers substituting for Christ and the heavenly hierarchy,a specically imperial modication of an ecclesiastical composition. One can com-pare the manuscript leaf with another commission of Michael VII, the enamels of theHoly Crown of Hungary, which show a conventional Deesis on the front of thecrown and an “imperial Deesis,” including King Géza of Hungary in subordinateposition, on the back.” While the crown preserves a place of honor for Christ — he

alone is shown enthroned — the parallel positions of the enamels on each side implya similar role for the emperor. The frontispiece image in the Paris manuscript goes

a step further, taking the model of Christ in the midst of the celestial hierarchy as a

model for an exceptional image of the imperial glory.The imperial court, for its part, fumished a model for envisioning the heavenly

realm. We have a tenth-century description of Paradise via a near-death experience,

narrating the vision of Kosmas the Monk. Kosmas, a monk in Asia Minor, aftersuffering from a long illness, falls asleep on 3 June 963 and experiences a vision ofParadise.“ In his vision, Kosmas travels through a paradisiacal landscape with a

luxuriant garden and olive grove. Beyond these, he encounters a city girded withtwelve walls of precious stone and protected by gates of gold and silver. These

walls clearly echo the twelvefold foundations, also crafted from a variety ofgemstones, that underpin the heavenly city in Revelation.” Within the walls Kosmas

nds streets of gold and golden houses with golden fumishings, but he encounters nomortal inhabitants until he reaches the upper part of the city, where he enters a

palace with a marvelous reception hall. This, in contrast to the empty city without, is

lled with people: a host of banqueters being waited on by shining eunuchs. Thespace of the hall, we are told, communicates via a spiral staircase with an equallysumptuous balcony. The text spells out the architectural features of the palace insufcient detail for us to identify its earthly prototype, the Palace of the Kathisma,that is, the portion of the Great Palace adjoining the hippodrome in Constantinopleand the site of imperial banquets and receptions.” The angelic eunuchs that waittables in Kosmas’ vision are, of course, heavenly versions of the very real eunuchs

who served the equally real banquets in the court of the emperor in Constantinople.Just as petitioners would approach the emperor at court via the mediation of

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courtiers, who spoke on 0ne’s behalf, so petitions were presented to Christ throughthe intercession of the Mother of God and saints. The parallelism with courtceremonial is given visual form in a number of images that show the patron or donorintroduced to Christ by the Wrgin and saints. In each case, the saint holds the donorby the wrist, echoing the gesture of courtiers who would hold the petitioner atcourt by the arm.” In a thirteenth-century Gospel book at Mt Athos, the donor,holding the book like an ofcial gift, is introduced by the Virgin to Christ. The Virginacts as logothetes, holding the donor’s petition, for the remission of his sins. On theleaf opposite, St john Chrysostom, standing next to the enthroned Christ, takes therole of notarios, recording on a scroll Christ’s formal response granting to the donorlong life and the pardon of his sins.‘° The intimate drama of personal salvation is

thus given a visual form lifted from the ofcial ceremonial of the Byzantine court.One could multiply the examples, but it is clear that images of the imperial court andthe image of the celestial hierarchy drew repeatedly one on the other in ways thatreinforced the notion of the court as the image of heaven, and vice versa.

REFLECTIONS OF HEAVEN IN THE CHURCHThe analogy of heavenly and ecclesiastical ofces was already established very earlyin the patristic period and continued to exist alongside the idea of the earthly court asthe mirror of the celestial hierarchy. Ignatius of Antioch, writing around the yeartoo, could already refer to the bishop in the assembly of his priests as the equivalentof Christ in the company of the apostles, long before such a role was applied to theemperor and courtiers by Constantine VII.“ The paired works of Pseudo-Dionysios,The Celestial Hierarchies and The Ecclesiastical Hierarchies illustrate the ideologicalpossibilities of pairing the earthly order with a heavenly counterpart. There are a fewtraces from the early Byzantine period of the impact of such thinking on the visualarts. We can see its impress most clearly in a handful of works from the KaperKoraon treasure, a hoard of liturgical silver of the sixth and seventh centuries fromnorthem Syria.“ Two vessels from this treasure, the Riha and Stuma patens, showChrist distributing communion to the apostles, not as a participant in the LastSupper, but as ofciant at a liturgy.“ Both patens, dated by stamps to late in the reignof Justin II (565-78), show Christ standing at an altar covered with a cloth andholding the Eucharistic vessels. The scene is set within the sanctuary of a church, ,

dened on one paten by the domed canopy of the altar, on the other by a chancelscreen. The images thus blur the line between the historical institution of the Eucha-rist and its continuous, mystical unfolding as the feast at which the ascended Christpresides.“ The intrusion of heavenly realities into earthly liturgies is emphasized alsoby the engraved decoration of silver liturgical fans (rhipidia) from the same treasure.These had a practical function, to keep ies from alighting on the Eucharistic elem-ents, but quite early their decoration emphasized a symbolic interpretation. The Rihaand Stuma fans bear engraved images of cherubim with four faces - human, leonine,bovine and aquiline — derived ultimately from the throne-chariot vision of Ezekiel.“The images on the fans emphasize rst of all the connection between the Christianaltar and the Mercy Seat on the Ark of the Covenant, the latter overshadowed byimage of the cherubim.“ Furthermore, they link the ofce of deacons — among whosefunctions it was to wield these fans at the altar — to the ministry of the angels.” The

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connection was already established in patristic sources: the deacons’ liturgicalfunction was to act as intermediaries or messengers (angeloi) between the people inthe nave and the priests in the sanctuary. Various texts further connect the deaconsand the liturgical gestures made with their stoles to the waving of the wings of theangels around the throne of God." The decoration of the fans waved by the deaconsfurther assimilates their ministry to that of the angels.

These sorts of works of art, which freely draw associations between earthly andheavenly realities, t awkwardly into the apologetic discourse for the veneration oficons. After all, the iconophile denition (horos) achieved at the Second Council ofNicaea (787) stipulated that the icon’s validity is based in the reality of the prototypeand the artist’s more-or-less faithful rendition of that reality in an image.“ Whilewe may attribute to lconoclasm the scarcity of surviving works of art of this typefrom the early Byzantine period, the further development of this iconography afterlconoclasm was, ironically, suppressed by the very arguments used to maintain theorthodoxy of icon veneration. It is thus only after the crisis of lconoclasm hadreceded into historical memory, in the eleventh and twelfth centuries, that we see

works of art once again beginning to draw explicit parallels between the earthlychurch and the heavenly realm. The development of iconographic themes linkingthe realms of the Church and of heaven in a tight parallelism is one of the keyinnovations of later Byzantine art.

At least one impetus for this development was the visual and rhetorical connectionthat we have already examined, linking the imperial court and the heavenly king-dom. The sartorial influence of the imperial court on the ecclesiastical hierarchy wasalso critical in giving visual form to the parallels between the heavenly realm andthe Church. Prior to the eleventh century, the system of liturgical vesture in theByzantine Church distinguished only the order of the wearer, whether he was a

bishop, priest or deacon. This meant that, when vested for the celebration of theliturgy, the patriarch of Constantinople would appear in exactly the same garmentsas the bishop of a minor provincial diocese. Over the course of the eleventh andtwelfth centuries, however, new insignia were introduced at the highest levels of thehierarchy that helped to distinguish prelates not only by order, but by the rank oftheir see. The transformation is dramatically illustrated in two superimposed layersof fresco at the church of the Holy Anargyroi at Kastoria (Figure 2.3.3). St Basil is

shown in the tenth-century fresco wearing plain vestments, the only omament beingthe dark crosses on the broad stole (omophorion) that is the sign of his episcopalofce. When the image was renewed in the twelfth century, the vestrnents werebrought into line with what, by then, would be tting for the dignity of Basil'srank as metropolitan of Caesarea. The later fresco shows his outer garment, thephelonion, covered with crosses (hence called the polystaurion), a privilege restrictedto the four Orthodox patriarchs and the metropolitans of Caesarea, Ephesus,

Thessalonika and Corinth by the rst author to mention the polystaurion, johnZonaras.’° Eventually the polystaurion was itself supplanted as the vestment of high-est rank by the sakkos, a garment that seems to be modeled on the ceremonial tunic(sakkos) of the emperor himself." St Basil's later image also shows him wearinggold-embroidered insignia, the epimanikia and epigonation, also introduced in thisperiod as the special regalia of bishops and archbishops. These new insignia eventu-ally ltered down to lower ranks of clerics, as is illustrated by the history of the

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Figure 2.3.3 St Basil in the simple vestments of the tenth century (above) and the moreelaborate episcopal insignia of the twelfth century (below). Superimposed frescoes in the

church of the Holy Anargyroi, Kastoria, Greece. Velissarios Voutsas.

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— CHAPTER 2.3: Hierarchies in the art of the Byzantine Church -epimanikia, or liturgical cuffs. In the rst written notice of the cuffs, an eleventh-century letter of Patriarch Peter of Alexandria to Michael Keroularios, they appearas specically patriarchal insignia. The canonist Theodore Balsamon, writing in thelate twelfth century, describes the epimanikia as restricted to bishops; nally, in a

thirteenth-century diataxis, or book of liturgical rubrics, they are mentioned as wornby priests as well.“ The spread of originally exclusive insignia to lower ranks ofclergy in turn spurred the creation of still more distinguishing vestments for thehighest prelates. The effect of these additions to the repertoire of liturgical vestments

was to introduce visible distinctions into the hierarchy of ecclesiastics comparable, insome respects, to the established distinctions among the ranks of courtiers surround-ing the emperor. It also allowed for a more complex series of visual cross-references

between the earthly Church and the heavenly realm than had previously been

possible.A key to this series of cross-references was the introduction, toward the end of

the twelfth century, of embroidered gural imagery on liturgical vestments. Whilethe earliest Greek theology asserted that the bishop or priest ministered in persona

Christi, it was only at this point that the vestments of the clergy began to make thisfunction of representing Christ concrete through embroideries of his image and

scenes from his life. By wearing Christ’s image, both in the form of his iconic portraitand as the pictorial synopsis of the Gospels, the clergy assumed the role not just ofrepresentatives of Christ, but literally representations of him. Thanks to the wide-spread popularity of mystagogical interpretations of the liturgy that mapped each

action of the celebrant onto an event from the Gospels,” the sequence of narrativeimages covering a vestment such as the Major Sakkos of Photios, dating between

1414 and I417, expressed the wearer’s role as the living symbol of Christ(Figure 23.4).“

This development was complemented by contemporaneous developments inwall painting. Programs of fresco painting increasingly embraced subject matterthat blurred the line between heavenly and earthly liturgies.“ From the fourteenthcentury, depictions of the Communion of the Apostles begin to depict Christ stand-

ing at the altar, not in antique dress, but in the distinctive vestments of a Byzantinepatriarch. The earliestexamples are found at St Nicholas Orphanos in Thessalonikaand at St Nikita in Cucer, both dating to the second decade of the fourteenthcentury.“ In both cases, Christ appears vested in the patriarchal salzkos and theomophorion, and angels dressed as deacons assist him at the altar. We have alreadyseen the connection between angels and deacons exploited in the liturgical fans fromthe Kaper Koraon treasure. In post-iconoclastic art angel-deacons appear in some ofthe earliest representations of the Communion of the Apostles, at St Sophia in Kiev

and St Sophia in Ohrid, both of the eleventh century.” In the Palaiologan period, the

hierarchy of angel-clergy was lled out with angel-priests in addition to angel-

deacons. At the Peribleptos church at Mistra, the frescoes depict a Great Entrance

procession enacted by angels vested both as priests and as deacons. The angel-priests

carry veiled chalices, while the angel-deacons balance veiled patens on their heads as

they process toward an altar where Christ himself presides.” The postures, peculiaras they may seem to modem eyes, are precisely those stipulated in late Byzantine

diataxeis, or books of liturgical directions.” As with the images based on courtceremonial, the heavenly gures act according to earthly ritual norms. Here, the

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Figure 2.3.4 Scenes from the life of Christ, gures of saints and the embroidered text of theNicene Creed: the “Major Sakkos” of the metropolitan Photios, a Byzantine liturgical

vestment of about 14 14-1 7. Kremlin Armory, Moscow.

difference is that the heavenly gures dress exactly as do their earthly counterparts.What is more, the action of the celestial liturgy is depicted at monumental scale in thesame space in which its earthly model (or, as Byzantine theologians would insist, itsearthly copy) takes place/’°

These images of Christ as bishop and angels as assisting clergy that appear inmonumental painting in the nal centuries of Byzantium eschew the indirect linkagesof earth and heaven favored by imperial imagery to present a vision of the heavenlyhierarchy as an exact mirror-image of the earthly Church. Perhaps the most strikingexample of the interchangeability of the heavenly and ecclesiastical hierarchies in late

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Byzantine art is the iconostasis curtain from Chilandar monastery on Mt Athos,embroidered in I 399 (Figure 2. 3. 5 ).°‘ On this textile, Christ appears as a patriarch inthe short-sleeved vestment - the sakkos — and the distinctive crossed broad stole of a

bishop, anked by SS Basil and john Chrysostom, the reputed authors of the Byzan-tine liturgy. The dress and pose of the anking saints imitate that of bishops assistinga patriarch at mass. Angels act as deacons, waving liturgical fans behind them. Incontrast to painted scenes of the Communion of the Apostles, there is no altardepicted on the textile, which would have hung in the central doors of the icon screen

between the nave and sanctuary. When the curtain was drawn aside at the GreatEntrance and at the Communion, it would have revealed the human celebrant stand-ing in Christ’s place at the altar table.“ The veil and its embroidered imagery stress

the very thinness of the division between the heavenly hierarchy and that of theChurch on earth.

AFTER THE FALL OF CONSTANTINOPLE

The system of visual correspondences between the hierarchy and ritual of the earthlyChurch and that of the Kingdom of Heaven was comprehensive, but it never entirelydisplaced the system of imperial references. The archangels continue to wear theloros in Palaiologan and post-Byzantine painting, often alongside images of angels inliturgical dress. To judge from the textual sources, Palaiologan court ceremonialbecame more, not less, Christomimetic than that of the middle Byzantine period. We

leam from Pseudo-Kodinos, for instance, that the emperor washed the feet oftwelve of the poor on Holy Thursday, in imitation of Christ’s washing the feet of thedisciples." ln this case, though, the ritual was a borrowing from the ecclesiasticalsphere, having long been the practice of bishops and monastic superiors.“ Whileecclesiastical art and ceremonial continued to take cues from the imperial court and

vice versa, it is clear that by the mid-fourteenth century the Byzantine Church had

taken the lead in crafting visual assertions of its continuity with the heavenly sphere.

There was a fundamental difference, however, in the structures of the parallelhierarchies of the Church and of the imperial court. The imperial system was strictlypyramidal, with the emperor standing at its peak as the intermediary with the realmof divinity. Ceremonial manuals and lists of precedence carefully ensured that the

unique rank of each office at court was expressed in its costume, creating an orderlychain of authority descending from the emperor. Despite the introduction of gar-

ments of rank into liturgical dress from the eleventh century on, the ecclesiastical

vesture never developed such a degree of differentiation among the ranks of clergy.

The ecclesiastical hierarchy claimed universal authority, but it did not vest these

claims in a single ofce. While apologists for the privileges of the patriarchate ofConstantinople could claim that the Church has “Christ as its head and the patriarchas his image,”‘5 their claims were counterbalanced by the equal insistence that each

bishop fully represents Christ in the liturgy.“Despite this intemal tension, the hierarchy articulated by vestments, painting and

ceremonial of the late Byzantine Church managed to express its claims to reect

heavenly realities with greater immediacy than ever possible in the imperial sphere.

Whereas the emperor and archangels could pass back and forth across the permeable

barrier between the court and heaven, their dress and rank changed depending on

315


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4

,

J.,.

.E,

I

Figure 2. 3.5 Christ vested as a Byzantine patriarch, attended by SS Basil and johnChrysostom and by angels vested as deacons. lconostasis curtain of 1399, Chilandar

monastery, Mt Athos. Dumbarton Oaks Photo and Fieldwork Archive, used by permission ofthe heirs of lvan Diordjevié.

316

a

FI -


which realm they occupied ‘7 The ecclesiastical hierarchy on th th h- , e o er and, wasable to present itself as a direct mirror of the heavenly one. Distinctions between thetwo collapsed further as the empire drew toward its own dissolution Ther '. e survivesa sizeable group of Ottoman textiles from the fteenth through seventeenth centuriesth h . . . .

at s ow, in repeated roundels, the image of Christ as High Priest clad in '9 Pam‘archal vestments and blessing with both hands (Figure 2.3 .6).“ Such fabrics may havealread bee ' ‘ 'y n imported into Constantinople before 1453, as we know to have beenthe case for Italian textiles.“ Their decoration echoes that seen on the sakk 'OI wornby Christ in Palaiologan painting, with all-over pattems of crosses and circles.Wh . . . . .

ereas the earlier, embroidered liturgical vestments create links between the celcg

brant and Christ by triangulating between the vested clergy, liturgical mystagogy and. . . .

presentations in wall painting, these vestments collapse such distinctions. Neitheroutside visual cues not prior knowledge of limrgical mystagogy is necessary to read

Figure 2.3.6 Christ vested as a Byzantine patriarch. Ottoman woven silk and metallic-threadtwill, sixteenth or seventeenth century. Dumbarton Oaks Byzantine Collection.

3 I 7


such images: they make visible in the plainest possible terms the hidden identity ofthe clergy with Christ their head.

NOTES1 Pseudo-Dionysios, Celestial Hierarchies, lII.1, PG 3: 164D; trans. Luibheid 1987: 1 53-4.2. The name Cosmas lndicopleustes rst appears in catenae of the eleventh century; an attribution of

the CIm'stian Topography to Constantine of Antioch has been suggested: Wolska-Conus 1989: 2.8-30.

3 (Ilrristian Topography V.2.0, ed. Wolslta-Conus 1968-73, ll: 39; cf. Exodus 2. 5:40; Hebrews 8:5,9:1-12., 2.3-4.

4 On relevance of the Christian Topography to the debate over images, see Brubaker 2.006.

5 On thistopos, see Mango 1980: 151-3.6 The following diacuaion is based on the fundamental observations of Maguire 1997a.7 Magdalino 1993: 415.8 Magdalino 1993: 437.9 de Lagarde and Bollig 1882.: 2.8-31.

10 On the Ioros in imperial images and texts see Parani 2.003: 18-2.4; and Maguire in this volume.1 1 De cerimoniis ll.40, ed. Reislte 182.9-30: 637-8. My translation.12. Tronzo 1997: 107-9.13 Anthony Cutler dates the pair of leaves to the sole reign of Constantine VI] (945-59): Cutler 1994:

2.2.0-1.

14 Cutler 1994: 2.00-1; Maguire in Evans and Wnxom 1997: 2.01-2.; Biihl and jehle 2.002.: 2.89-306.15 Amulf1990: 82.-3.16 Corrigan 1978: 413; Amulf 1990: 82.; and Featherstone in this volume.17 Maguire 1997b: 2.49-5o.18 Maguire 1997b: 2.49.

19 For similar observations on the non-imperial character of Christ's costume in early Christian art:Mathews 1993: 101, 178-9.

2.0 Maguire 1997b: 2.47-51.2.1 Paris, Bibliotheque nationale, ms. Coislin 79, fol. 2.v.

2.2. Spatharalris 1976: 1 1 1-12..2. 3 Dumitrescu 1987: 40-2.; Maguire 1997b: 2.49. Spatharaltis echoes Bordier’s identication of the

prostrate gure as the painter, although the mention of the scribe in the inscription at the top of theleaf makes him the more logical identication. Spatharaltis 1976: 1 12..

2.4 Verpeaux 1966: 152..

2.5 Maguire 1997b: 2.52.-5.

2.6 Verpeaux 1966: 195-2.04.2.7 Oration 34 of Leo VI is explicit in describing the half-length image (tg nrizttn Béouug

tvhv peptiw élletxg) of Christ in the dome of the church of Stylianus Zaoutus, interpreting it as a

symbol of Christ's sublimity. Akakios 1868: 2.75.

2.8 On the iconography of the deesis: Walter 1980; Cutler 1987.2.9 On the Byzantine alterations to the images and their as well as the modem alterations to

the foliation: Spatharakis 1976: 107-1 5.

30 Spatharaltis 1976: 110.3 1 But compare the lost image of Manuel I Komnenos in the midst of the virtues: Magdalino and Nelson

1982.: 142.-6.32. Carr 1997: 84-5.3 3 Maguire in Evans and Wixom 1997: 2.09.

34 Cormack and Hawkins 1977: 2.1 2.-3 1, 2.3 5-44, pls 2.6-47; Grabar 1984: 193-4.35 Maguire 1997b: 2.47-8; Maguire 1997c: 188; Weasel 1967: 11 1-15.36 Angelidi 1983b.37 See Revelation 2.1:15-2.1.38 Miiller-Wiener 1977: 2.2.9, 2.36. See also Featherstone in this volume.39 §ev€enlto 1994: 2.73-5.

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— CHAPTER 2.3: Hierarchies in the art of the Byzantine Chard; —

40 §evc':enko 1994: 2.74-5; Belting 1970: 35-7, 72..

41 Ignatius, Letter to the Smymeeens, VIIL1, ed. Camelot 1958: 162..

42. M. Mango 1986: 6-8, 2.0-34.43 M. Mango 1986: 165-70, 171-2..44 M. Mango 1986: 159, 165; Schulz 1986: 103-4. Compare the depiction of the Communion of the

Apostles in the late sixth-century Rossano Gospels, fols 3v-41. Cavallo 1992.: 2.4, pl; 6-7,45 M. Mango 1986: no. 32., 1 50-4. Cf. Ezekiel 1:4-2.1. On the iconography of cheruhim and seraphim:

van der Meet 1938: 2.55-9; Peers 2.001: 46-9.46 Exodus 2.5:17-2.2., 37:7—9; cf. Hebrews 9:5.47 Apostolic Constitutions VIll.1 2.. 3-4, cited in M. Mango 1986: 1 51.

48 Pseudo-Chrysostom, In perebolem de lio prodigo, PG 59: 52.0; Germanos, Historie ecclesiestice, PG98: 393C; Pseudo-Sophronios, Commenterius liturgieus, PG 87: 3988D; Philotheos, Ordo seeri min-isterii, PG 154: 753A, 756B-D; Trempelas 1912.: 6, 83.

49 Tanner 1990: 133-8.50 Papas 1965: 75 5; Ralles and Potles 1852.-9: ll, 2.60. The slightly later canonist Theodore Balsamon

attempts to restrict the polysteurion to patriarchs exclusively. Braun 1907: 2.37; Papas 1965: 75 5;

Theodore Balsamon, Response ed Marcurn, PG 138: 989A; idem, Meditate, PG 1 38: 102.0C, 102.5D,102.88.

51 Papas 1965: 12.5. On the imperial sekkos, see Parani 2.003: 2.3-4; Hendy 1999: 157.52. Michael Keroularios, Epistolee, PG 12.0: 800C; Theodore Balsamon, Response ed interrogetiones

Merci, PG 138: 988D; Trempelas 1912.: 1a. On the privileged use of the epigonetion by priests ofrank, see Symeon of Thessalonika, De secre liturgie, PG 1 5 5: 2.61 D-2.64A.

53 Schulz 1986; Bomert 1966.54 Mayasova 1991: 44-50.5 5 On the theme of the oelestial liturgy: Walter 1982.: 2.17-2.1 .

56 Walter 1982.: 2.16.

57 lazarev 1960: pls 33, 34; Hamann-Macbean and Hallensleben 1963: ll, 2.2.4-5, pl. Vl.‘ 58 Dufrenne 1970: 14, g. 62..

59 Tait 1975: 2.06-7; Trempelas 1912.: 9.

60 See Symeon of Thessalonika, Contra heereses, PG 1 5 5: 340.61 Millet 1939-47: 76-8, pl. CLIX.62. On the curtain in the sanctuary entrance: Taft 1975: 41 1-16.

, 63 Verpeaux 1966: 2.2.8-9.

64 Tronzo 1994: 61-2..65 Nikopoulos 1981-2.: 461.66 Symeon of Thessalonika, Expositio de divino templo, PG 1 5 5: 709A.67 Maguire 1997b: 2. 56-7.68 Atasoy etel. 2.001: 176-81, 2.41, 2.44.

69 Lowry 2.003: 41>-2., 63-4.

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Celestial Hierarchies and Earthly Hiearchies in the Art of the Byzantine Church

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