After the Byzantine Empire
For worship with textiles
Text, Photo/Metropolitan Museum of Art Translation/Ding Jiewen
These prayers are made of textiles,
Conveys a message:
After the fall of the Byzantine Empire,
The prestige of the Orthodox Church and its clergy continues.
The past and present lives of the Orthodox worship service
These rare ceremonial garments form a hidden historical thread that binds the continuing influence of the Orthodox Church to the pastoral and clergy of the priests and clergy in the centuries following the Ottoman occupation of Byzantium in the 15th century. From a rigorous doctrinal point of view, the sacrificial garment is an indispensable part of the Christian worship ritual. Scholars who study liturgy agree that in the first centuries of its existence in Constantinople, the byzantine capital, her clergy and clergy wore the "street clothes" common in the Roman world when presiding over religious ceremonies, only gradually, because these costumes were worn only on worship occasions, they had a special meaning.
The everyday dress of the classical world, around 50 BC, from left to right: an Egyptian couple, a Greek man in a short cloak, a Greek woman in a double-fold women's dress, a Greek woman in a wide robe; a Roman senator in a robe, a Roman servant carrying a stick on his shoulders, a Roman lady in a tunic with a head, and a Roman villager in Penura.
By the late Classical period, this corset was in fact accepted by everyone regardless of age, rank, or gender, and formed a red and white robe, as well as a cloak with an outer layer like a poncho (in Rome at that time, a kind of rainproof and cold jacket made of thick-bottomed wool fabric or leather that was originally worn by the common people for extremely practical purposes such as cold protection, nearly semicircular). Later, in Western Rome, it evolved into a sacrificial garment with the main body, and in the Greek-speaking Eastern Rome evolved into phelonion (Greek, equivalent to the Western Roman sacrificial garment with the sacrificial cloak as the main body). In the 4th century, not only were the sacred belts for religious ceremonies added to the holy garments of the priests, but also the sacred belts of the priests were also worn by bishops, and in the centuries that followed, textile costumes appeared.
Tunic decorated with Dionysian motifs, 5th century, Egyptian ancient city of Ahmim, linen, wool; jersey, tapestry weaving. At the weekly market in the ancient city, cotton and linen textiles are sold.
Faith becomes the link that binds different peoples
For the Byzantine Empire, it is well known that in 1453 the Ottoman Turks attacked Constantinople and the Byzantine Empire collapsed. But did the Byzantine Empire end there? A growing number of historical archives and archaeology confirm that the Byzantine Empire "perished", but not "ended".
Cross embroidery on the holy belt, late 17th or early 18th century, Ottoman Turkey, silk and metal thread embroidery on a silk satin base, linen jersey at the bottom. This cross embroidery in the shape of a jetted floral ornament comes from the bishop's holy belt and reflects the spread of the Baroque art style through Venice to the east. The motif depicts the crucifixion of Christ and the Day of Pentecost, surrounded by four Gospel writers.
What constituted this dilemma was the long-standing, competing, and mutually influential factors of the Byzantine Empire: Greek culture, Roman tradition, and the Christian church. The Christian faith has largely become a link to a common people, creating the only super-empire in history that has ruled for more than 1,000 years, and the capital, Constantinople, has indeed become a holy place for the preservation of the achievements and heritage of human civilization.
Cross folds, 17th century, were probably Russian, embroidered with silk and metal thread and decorated with metal. The tulips and leaf-like interlaced embroidery patterns on this textile are all imitations of Ottoman Turkish silk embroidery. This fragment should have been located at the neckline and bracket of the cross and worn by a priest or bishop. It was most likely embroidered in the Russian territory, as the upper part of the dress was made of a very different silk fabric (now lost), most likely imported from Italy or the Turkish Empire.
This can be seen in six respects: first, Constantinople preserved a large number of classical documents, which not only received continuous attention and study, but also became the cultural source of the Western European Renaissance; second, the codification of early Roman law by justinian's code was a salvation of the classical judicial system, and the benefits that Europe received from this rescue work were immeasurable; third, in terms of historical writing and compilation, due to the influence of Christianity, all chronicles began with God's creation of man. Including historical clues to the empires that have passed, even the work of humble chroniclers has its significance, because "according to Christian principles, any history must be the whole world", and historical writing cannot set any particularly important center, whether in Greece or Rome, which describes the rise and fall of all civilizations and peoples. Thus, the Eastern Romans not only conveyed to future generations a chronicle of the great exploits of the empire, but also recorded the activities of the surrounding peoples, who had not previously had any idea of writing their own history. In this regard, the Slavs greatly benefited from the Eastern Roman Empire; fourth, the Orthodox Church's emphasis on ecclesiastical traditions led to its tireless efforts to spread the gospel among the Slavic peoples, defining the boundaries formed according to their Christianity and native literature; and fifth, both hermit and monastic life developed from the Empire's eastern province of Egypt. It was also through the Latin translation of the Biography of St. Attanatheus, written by the first monk St. Anthony, that the monastic life system was introduced to the West, and its influence on European history is still incalculable; sixth, the Byzantine Empire contributed to the world a religious art, and today Western Europe is learning to appreciate it with a greater compassion and a deeper understanding.
Glory of St. Charles, 1615, Italy. Charles wears a bishop's sacrificial garment, a crown of law on his head, and a cross over his shoulders.
Classical tradition and oriental inspiration
At the beginning of the 4th century AD, when Christianity became the state religion according to Constantine's will, a far-reaching artistic movement developed to varying degrees during the reign of the Byzantine Empire, and spread to the entire East, including Egypt, Syria, Mesopotamia, Asia Minor, Armenia, and other places, and took forms with local characteristics in different places; there was a Christian art that was unique to Egypt, and one was unique to Mesopotamia. The other is peculiar to Asia Minor... each art has its own characteristics. But a closer look at this diversity reveals two characteristics they share, namely classical tradition and Oriental inspiration.
Devout woman, a panel oil painting in a church on the Greek island of Crete during the Byzantine Empire.
Classical tradition refers to the classical traditions of Greek culture that still existed and flourished in some of the large cities of the time such as Alexander, Antiochus, and Ephesus, and the Oriental inspiration refers to the revival of those eastern traditions of ancient Iran or Semits related to Sassanid Persia, spread throughout Egypt, Syria, Mesopotamia, and Armenia, and eliminated the long-dominant Greek influence. In this context, Christianity insists on a distinction from paganism in terms of truth and doctrine, but has a neutral attitude toward these methods of local art that are suddenly awakened from slumber, that is, that the method of art is a vessel, and the specific wine is different from person to person. Thus, these two seemingly opposing influences achieved a strange inclusion in Byzantine art; indeed, it was the combination of these two influences that gave Byzantine art its uniqueness.
Funerals, mid-to-late 17th century, Russian, Moscow or suburban, silk and metal thread embroidered on linen jersey. The central scene of the mourning of Christ is surrounded by a circle of saints, with a special focus on the saints of the Moscow region, including Sergius and Cyril, the leaders of the four major cities of Moscow and important monasteries.
Byzantine heritage in Southeastern Europe and Russia
There is a popular view in Western Europe that underestimates the influence of the Byzantine Empire on the countries of southeastern Europe, with Yugoslav, Bulgarian and Albania as examples emphasizing their history of being ruled by Turkey, while in romanian history, much attention is paid to Trajan and his "Roman" legions and ignoring the history of the Byzantine Empire and the Fanar princes, and the situation is similar in the case of Greece. But examining the history of the Balkans from the standpoint of Eastern Europe, the Byzantine Empire acquired a completely different meaning.
Holy Branch Sunday Procession, Moscow, 1498. At the center of the picture are Sofia Paleorrog (formerly: Zoe Paleornogina) and her daughter. Sophia was the niece of Constantine XI, the last Emperor of the Byzantine Empire, and after the fall of the Byzantine Empire in 1453, she became the second wife of Grand Duke Ivan III (Ivan the Terrible's grandfather) in Moscow, and Sophia not only brought the two-headed eagle coat of arms symbolizing the glory of the Byzantine Empire, but also under her influence Moscow became the "Third Rome" after the Byzantine Empire.
In Athens, for example, the birthplace of oratory, no speech could appeal to the audience more than choosing Byzantine history, literature, social life, music, or art as themes. For the modern Greeks know that if they were the descendants of the ancient Greeks, they were also the sons and heirs of the Byzantines. Not only that, the Two Greek Cities of Cyprus and Crete have preserved the Byzantine tradition, and the "Holy Mount" of the independent theocratic republic of Athos in Greece is the best example of the existing Byzantine monastic system, which has declined in other parts of Greece.
Textiles used during the Communion, Thessaloniki. It was in Thessaloniki that the traditional forms of Byzantine art that were considered sacred showed a tendency to gradually settle.
In contrast to south-eastern Europe, Byzantium gave Russia its greatest and most permanent gift, namely, byzantine liturgy in the Slavic language—in the early centuries of the Common Era, there was only Latin, the common language, and the Church naturally adopted this language in its ceremonies, a habit that gradually reinforced the theory that it was unconventional to worship in its own language—and to understand this, one could understand the great and permanent meaning of the gift.
Virgin and Child, 15th century, Russia. After Russia inherited Orthodoxy from Byzantium, the theological characteristics of "father and son" were interpreted as "mother and son", and the Russian soul, after any harm, was attached to the warmth of "mother and son", like the lamp of a hunter on a winter night.
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This article is excerpted from the May 2016 issue of Civilization
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