Byzantine Churches in Constantinople: Their History and Architecture

by Alexander Van Millingen; Walter S. George; Arthur E. Henderson; Ramsay Traquair

S. Saviour in the Chora. Bracket in the Inner Narthex Interior, looking east.	S. Theodore. Sculptured Marble Slab Built into the Minaret of the Mosque
S. Mary Diaconissa. Heads of Windows in South Arm Interior, looking east.	S. Mary Diaconissa. Sculptured Slab on the West Wall.

To face page 28.

The stone ogee, cavetto, or cavetto and bead cornice is common, but seems in every case to be Turkish work and is very common in Turkish buildings. Internal cornices and string-courses are in marble, and are all of the same type, a splay and fillet. The splayed face is decorated with upright leaves or with a guilloche band, either carved (in the Pantepoptes) or painted (in the Chora), the carving as in classic work, serving only to emphasise the colour. The splay is sometimes slightly hollowed, sometimes, as in the Chora, worked to an ogee.

Doors.—Doors often have elaborately moulded architraves and cornice. In S. John of the Studion ([p. 61]), the oldest example, the jamb-moulding has a large half-round on the face, with small ogees and fillets, all on a somewhat massive scale. The doors of S. Sophia are very similar. The later mouldings are lighter but the half-round on the face remains a prominent feature. It is now undercut and reduced in size, and resembles the Gothic moulding known as the bowtell. This is combined with series of fillets, small ogees, and cavettos into jamb-moulds of considerable richness. The cornices are often simply splayed or are formed of a series of ogees, fillets, and cavettos. The jamb-mouldings are cut partly on a square and partly on a steep splayed line. In some, the portion forming the ingo seems to have been regarded as a separated piece though cut from the solid. If in the doors of the Pantokrator or the Pantepoptes the line of the inner jamb be continued through the rebate, it will correspond on the outside with the bowtell moulding, as though the inner and outer architrave had been cut from one square-edged block, placing the bowtell at the angle and adding the rebate. This formation is not followed in S. John of the Studion.

Carving.—Carving is slight, and is confined to capitals, string-courses, and the slabs which filled in the lower parts of screens and windows. Fragments of such slabs are found everywhere. They are carved with geometrical interlacing and floral patterns, often encircling a cross or sacred monogram, or with simply a large cross. Such slabs may be seen still in position in S. Sophia and in the narthex of S. Theodore. In the latter they are of verd antique, and are finely carved on both sides. In later times the embargo on figure sculpture was considerably relaxed. Little figures are introduced in the cornices of the eikon frames in the Diaconissa (p. [186]), and both in the parecclesion and the outer narthex of the Chora are found many small busts of angels, saints, and warriors carved with great delicacy. The carving in the Chora is the finest work of the kind excepting that in S. Sophia.

Capitals.—The development of the capital from the Roman form, which was suitable only for the lintel, to the impost capital shaped to receive an arch has been well explained by Lethaby and Swainson. According to these authors Byzantine capitals exhibit seven types.

I. The Impost capital.—It is found in SS. Sergius and Bacchus, the outer narthex of the Chora, the inner narthex of S. Andrew and elsewhere. A modification of this type is used in windows. It was employed throughout the style but especially in early times up to the sixth century, and again in the twelfth, thirteenth, and fourteenth centuries.

II. The Melon type.—This is seen on the columns of the lower order in SS. Sergius and Bacchus and on the columns of the narthex of S. Theodore, where they have been taken from an older building. The melon capital was probably not in use after the sixth century.

III. The Bowl capital.—This type is used in the great order of S. Sophia at Constantinople. It has been thought peculiar to this church, but the capitals from S. Stephen at Triglia in Bithynia resemble those of S. Sophia closely. Only the peculiar volutes of the S. Sophia capitals are absent.[34]

IV. The Byzantine or 'Pseudo-Ionic.'—This is found in the upper order of SS. Sergius and Bacchus, and in the narthex of S. Andrew. It is an early type, not used after the sixth century, and its occurrence in S. Andrew favours the early date assigned to that church.