Ancient Christian Iconography

ANCIENT CHRISTIAN ICONOGRAPHY. - Within the group of historical-philosophical sciences that concern themselves with the scientific reconstruction of the "orbis christianus antiquus," paleochristian iconography has the task of tracing in the products of ancient Christian art all the information that can shed light on the Christian culture of the earliest times. Its activity therefore proceeds on the basis of those monuments and monumental remains that offer figured representations, studied not as artistic creations corresponding to aesthetic ends (a point of view reserved to art history), but in their content.

Considered at first as a rather analytical and descriptive science (iconography), limited to the search for the true meaning of iconographic themes and motifs and for the scientific method of discovering it, iconography, increasingly intent on historical ends and aided by a progressive clarification of its own laws, has in recent times been transforming itself into a more "penetrative" and synthetic science, to which the name iconology would better suit.

Indeed, it no longer limits its efforts to the identification of the subject, to the description of figures or scenes and of the successive graphic evolutions through which the figured expression passed, to the constitution of more or less well classified groups. The work of art, considered as a manifestation of a thought and in the service of higher purposes, after having determined its figurative genre (symbolic, typological, allegorical, cyclic or narrative), is not only situated in the general chain of the genetic developments of Christian art traceable both in space and in time, but is also studied in all its constituent elements, even the most hidden ones, so as to reach, through the various ideological interferences contributing to its elaboration, the entire inspiring concept to which it owes its existence. The "image" created to serve as a vehicle of ideas and feelings between the conceiver and the one who contemplates it becomes, conversely, for the iconologist a sign, a symbol, a mirror, a document rich in information about the beliefs, states of mind, ways of seeing, customs, and aims of a particular religion or civilization.

Between iconography and art history there is a certain difference, but difference does not mean, or should not mean, antagonism, since the one is a support and completion of the other. Even if in certain cases it becomes difficult to establish where the task of the iconographer ends and that of the art historian begins, or vice versa, in principle it can be said that for the former the formal element, as such, has no direct interest (even a representation devoid of beauty remains for him a precious testimony), whereas for the latter, even if he intends to reach through the artistic creation the inner world of the creator, aesthetic, stylistic and technical quality and its vicissitudes are of primary importance. The two sciences cannot, however, be entirely separated; they should rather orient themselves toward close collaboration. The genetic study of iconographic themes is altogether impossible without clear geographical delimitations and secure chronological datings, obtained indeed often solely by way of stylistic analysis, while the analysis of schemata and the evaluation of iconographic groups or complexes can safeguard stylistic research against deviations and errors in its own conclusions. If both sciences, in short, have as their material object figured creations, what is an end for the one becomes almost always a means for the other.

An auxiliary science of the history of Christian art, iconography is also such in certain cases for theology, to the extent that it succeeds in illustrating the various and successive aspects of the faith and of popular beliefs reflected in works of art.

Vast is the material over which iconographic research extends. Excluding purely decorative motifs, taken into consideration only insofar as they may offer criteria of dating or provenance, the iconographic repertory comprises the representations of God and of the Persons of the Most Holy Trinity, of good and evil angels, of the Blessed Virgin and the saints, of the events of the Old and New Testaments, of the Church and its mission, of eschatological events, of liturgical rites, and all symbolic signs or all allegorical compositions of a dogmatic or moral character, or that are in some manner an expression of faith, devotion or cult.

It falls to the iconologist (and it is one of his most difficult tasks) to distinguish merely ornamental motifs from those which, even if they apparently seem to serve only decorative purposes, are not entirely devoid of symbolic meaning because they are still laden with the last reflections of past symbolisms or of symbolisms in the process of being abandoned. The various techniques employed by the figurative arts interest iconography only to the extent that the requirements of the materials used may have influenced the schema or the details of iconographic compositions, and even the choice and frequency of the themes themselves.

The method that iconography employs to reach scientific results is still in the process of being perfected and cannot yet be clearly formulated. For the collection of iconographic materials and their criticism it follows more or less the norms of the historical or archaeological sciences in general. In the final iconographic presentation or synthesis it aims to elaborate a faithful and complete image, to give in words the equivalent (no more and no less) of what the artists intended to express with their works, regarding them, it is understood, not only as more or less worthy decorators, but also as witnesses of the culture in which they live and moved by determinate motives in the choice and elaboration of their subjects. As for the exegesis properly so called of works of art, which is desired ever more objective and solidly grounded, Christian iconography now has at its disposal not a few means and principles that have already permitted notable results to be achieved.

The starting point of this work is a precise chronology (relative and absolute) of the products of Christian art, no longer considered in isolation, but possibly in continuous comparison with profane art and in the light of the history of civilization and of religion. Once the coexistence of two traditions has been established, the one literary and the other figurative, often, but not always, in agreement with each other, one has recourse, as is logical, to the latter as the most direct source, and to the former as a support where there is concordance of aims.

Precedence is given to the figurative tradition and to the iconographic fact because every art of argumentation or edification, in which content or meaning therefore predominates, can and must be considered as a language "sui generis," which has at its disposal a vocabulary and a grammar of its own, capable of being formulated, codified and further used as means of understanding. Christian iconography therefore has recourse in the first place to the careful analysis of the depictions themselves down to the last details, interrogating the compositional schemes, the distribution and number of figures, their attitudes and gestures, their characteristics and their attributes, their garments and the setting in which they move, the play of correspondences and contrasts, the destination of the representation and its relations with the object it adorns. For greater clarity and certainty, the work examined is compared with other works of art, first of all with those of the same family and preferably with those immediately preceding it in time or contemporary with it, secondly with those belonging to other groups, even non-Christian ones, that offer elements of resemblance. What in one work is perhaps not too clear becomes so through a comparison with another. The eye sensitive to interferences and discrepancies discovers meanings, nuances of thought, modifications and evolutions, evaluates, divides and groups, acquires panoramic views over complexes and ramifications, and ends by discerning laws, intentions and informing concepts.

In the second place, without thereby falling into a petitio principii, Christian i.[conography] utilizes other sources not belonging to the domain of art, which for convenience are called literary. The inscriptions that sometimes accompany the iconographic representations themselves, epigraphic material, Sacred Scripture and the apocrypha, patristic literature, liturgical texts, hagiographic and mystical sources, mythological, cosmographic, symbolographic traditions, etc., used with judgment, especially where they reveal conceptions or beliefs generally widespread in a given period, lend Christian iconography the support of their confirmation or indeed the means to understand what the examination of art alone could not clarify.

Since Christian i.[conography] has existed, it has been agreed to divide treatises and, consequently, also iconographic research according to subjects, arranged in the order of their dogmatic or religious importance. A division convenient both for authors and for those seeking information of an objective kind. The future will reveal whether it would not be better to replace such a system, or at least to adopt alongside it a truly organic history of iconographic themes that would allow one to follow, period by period, the reflections of Christian thought in figurative art. Certainly the "historical" method, precisely because it brings out the numerous intersections of the various themes in a given period and opens a broader view onto what might be called iconographic complexes, not only better guarantees their exact evaluation, but also leads to a more coherent vision of the life of Christian thought over the course of the centuries.

Two particular questions are of a certain importance for early Christian i.[conography]; one concerning the intimate nature of paleochristian art, the other concerning the first origins of this art.

All are agreed in recognizing that ancient Christian art, as indeed also medieval art, has as its prevailing orientation the communication of Christian thought. To put it with an ugly word, it is to a large extent a content-driven art. It therefore lends to the forms it employs a certain value of signs, of symbols. But that in its intimate nature it goes beyond this apparent symbolism, communicating to the viewer ideas or feelings not directly expressed by these same signs, has not always been accepted by all. Setting aside the representations in which the form itself acquires a symbolic or allegorical character (IXØYC = Christ; Last Judgment with the faithful represented by lambs), the question is above all to know whether Christian art, beyond the purpose of simply portraying a biblical, ritual or other event (Noah in the ark, a banquet, etc.), intends furthermore to suggest, by way of typological, symbolic, allegorical means, a more hidden spiritual concept, intelligible only to those initiated into the faith or into the Christian mysteries (salvation, the Eucharist, etc.). Furthermore, it is asked whether this symbolism is of a funerary or eschatological character (in cemetery decorations) or instead follows a more general, dogmatic-moral orientation.

After the exaggerations of the first iconographic schools, which pushed symbolic-dogmatic interpretation to the point of arriving at some ten different interpretations of the same subject, a strong reaction manifested itself (Hasenclever, Styger) which, driven by the desire to find a unitary principle of exegesis, refused to paleochristian art virtually all symbolic value, attributing to it a merely illustrative function. From one exaggeration it fell into the other. Today the symbolic character of this art is generally admitted; opinions differ only in specifying which, within this symbolism, is the fundamental concept capable of conferring on it a certain unity of orientation. It is probable that, with the progress of particular research and the perfecting of method, the definitive solution will impose itself of its own accord.

With regard to the first origins of paleochristian art, a question that interests above all the history of art, it cannot be denied that the solution of certain iconographic problems would be easier if this question were more fully clarified, although its importance should not be exaggerated. It has not yet been possible to determine a center that elaborated and diffused the first works of Christian art. While for a long time this privilege was recognized as belonging to Rome, the reaction later came here too, on the part of the "Orientalists." The name of Strzygowski is by now famous, who at first gave precedence to the important Hellenistic centers of the East (Alexandria, Asia Minor, Antioch), then to the more remote East (Edessa, Mesopotamia, Iran), to end by giving great importance to North Asian and North European influences that came through India toward the Near East. He was followed in varying degrees and with a variety of preferences by Wulff, Baumstark, Diehl, Dalton, Kaufmann, Toesca, Morey and others. The so-called "Romanists," on the other hand (Wilpert, von Sybel, Schultze, Sauer, Rodenwaldt, etc.), consider paleochristian art as a ramification of Roman Hellenistic art. It is not always easy to distinguish whether the argumentation of individual authors refers specifically to the beginnings of ancient Christian art, or instead to the origins of post-Constantinian art (because there also exists a "Byzantine question").

In all probability Christian art was devised almost simultaneously in the various important Christian centers, making use of universally diffused art forms marked by local influences. The question of exchanges is of a "secondary" order. But numerous discoveries and careful particular studies on the characteristics of each region and on mutual influences will still be needed, on the basis of chronologically well-dated monuments, before it is possible to define matters better and pass from hypothesis to established facts.

In the literary history of Christian i.[conography] four salient phases can be distinguished.

The first notable attempt to restore importance to Christian iconographic monuments was made by Molanus (Jan Vermeulen), in De picturis et imaginibus sacris (1570), a work entirely pervaded by the spirit of the Counter-Reformation.

After the discovery of the catacombs in 1578, a great deal is owed to Bosio (Roma sotterranea, posthumous, 1632), around whom Macario (Jean L'Heureux), Ciacconio and Van Winghe are grouped. There follow Reiske, De imaginibus Jesu Christi (1685), Ciampini, Vetera monumenta (1690), Arnold, Wahre Abbildungen der ersten Christen im Glauben u. Leben (1700).

While no importance is to be attributed to the period of the philosophers, the French Romantics, on the other hand, under the influence of Chateaubriand, lay the first foundations of an iconographic science, while in the following generation the first comprehensive works appear.

The names: Seroux d'Agincourt, Histoire de l'art par les monuments (6 vols., 1811-23); R. Raoul Rochette, Discours sur les types imitatifs (1834); A. Didron, Iconographie chrétienne: Histoire de Dieu (1843); id., Annales archéologiques (1844-67); Ch. Cahier and A. Martin, Mélanges d'archéologie et d'histoire (1847-56) and Nouveaux mélanges (1874-77); A. Crosnier, Iconographie chrétienne (1848-76). In Germany there follow: v. Wessenberg, Die christlichen Bilder (1827); Müller, Die bildlichen Darstellungen im Sanctuarium (1835); J. v. Radowitz, Iconographie (1834); Helmsdörfer, Christl. Kunstsymbolik u. Iconographie (1839); F. Piper, Mythologie u. Symbolik der christl. Kunst (1847); W. Menzel, Christl. Symbolik (1854); A. Springer, Iconographische Studien (1860); Quellen der Kunstdarstellungen im Mittelalter (1879), in which a notable scientific exactness is already evident.

The true historical method, directed at setting the nature of Early Christian art in its proper light, is owed to G. B. De Rossi (d. 1894). His immense scientific activity opens a period in which, alongside the monumental collections of materials, the encyclopedias, the manuals, the periodicals, the general chapters in the great histories of art, specialized studies (monographs) multiply in every direction; the value to be attributed to the various literary sources and to the history of religion is ever more precisely defined; the comparison between Christianity and other ancient cultures is exploited more effectively; the chronology of the monuments is progressively clarified; research is extended to Oriental monuments. Among the numerous scholars let us simply recall: in Rome: R. Garrucci, M. Armellini, O. Marucchi, A. De Waal, Hartmann Grisar, G. Wilpert, A. Venturi, G. P. Kirsch, P. Toesca, G. de Jerphanion, F. Grossi Gondi; in France: E. Le Blant, Ch. Bayet, E. Müntz, J. Martigny, C. Rohault de Fleury, H. Barbier de Montault, G. Millet, Ch. Diehl, L. Bréhier, H. Leclercq; in Germany: H. Detzel, F. X. Kraus, V. Schultze, J. Ficker, G. Stuhlfauth, L. v. Sybel, O. Wulff, J. Sauer, W. Neuss, K. Künste, F. J. Dölger; in England: A. Jameson, O. Dalton, W. E. Crum; finally to be remembered: J. Strzygowski, N. Kondakov, D. V. Ainalov, P. Styger.

The Pontifical Institute of Christian Archaeology, founded by Pius XI in 1925, directed at gathering the results already obtained and at coordinating further research, equipped with rich collections and a specialized library, through its courses of study and its publications has already brought a notable contribution also to Early Christian iconography.

Principal collections of materials: G. B. De Rossi, Musaici cristiani e saggi dei pavimenti delle chiese di Roma anteriori al sec. XV, Rome 1872-99; E. Le Blant, Etude sur les sarcophages chrétiens de la ville d'Arles, Paris 1878; id., Les sarcophages chrétiens de la Gaule, ibid. 1886; G. Wilpert, Le pitture delle catacombe romane, Rome 1903; id., Die römischen Mosaikens. Malereien der kirchlichen Bauten, 4 vols., Freiburg im Br. 1916; id., I sarcofagi cristiani antichi, Rome 1929-36; H. Achelis, Die Katahomben von Neapel, Leipzig 1936; besides numerous special collections of objects of minor art. On questions of method: J. Wilpert, Prinzipienfragen der christlichen Archäologie, Freiburg im Br. 1889; P. Styger, Der heutige Stand und die künftige Aufgabe der christl. Archäologie, in Schweizer Rundschau, 1923; id., Die altchristl. Kunst. Grundlegende Erörterungen über die Methode der Datierung u. Auslegung, in Zeitschr. f. kath. Theologie, 53 (1929), pp. 245 ff. Intimate character of ancient Christian art: M. Dvořák, Kunstgeschichte als Geistesgeschichte, 2nd ed., Munich 1924; J. Sauer, Wesen u. Wallen der christlichen Kunst, Freiburg im Br. 1926; P. Styger, Die altchristl. Grabeskunst, Munich 1927; G. P. Kirsch, Sull'origine dei motivi iconografici nella pittura cimiteriale di Roma, in Rivista di archeologia crist., 4 (1927), p. 259 ff.; id., Der Ideengelt der ältesten sepulchralen Darstellungen in den römischen Katahomben, in Römische Quartalschrift, 36 (1928), p. 1 ff.; J. Herwegen, Christliche Kunst und Mysterium, Münster in W. 1929; H. Lother, Realismus u. Symbolismus in der altchristl. Kunst, Tübingen 1931; B. Knippen, Symbol en allegorie in de beeldende Kunst, Nijmegen-Utrecht 1941; R. Gillis, Le symbolisme de l'art religieux, Paris 1942. Origins of Christian art: A. Riegl, Stiftragen. Grundlegungen zu einer Geschichte der Ornamentik, Berlin 1893; D. Ainalov, I fondamenti ellentistici dell'arte bizantina (in Russian), St. Petersburg 1900; A. Riegl, Die spätromische Kunstindustrie, 2 vols., Vienna 1901-33; 2nd ed. ibid. 1927; J. Strzygowski, Orient oder Rom, Leipzig 1901; Ch. Diehl, Manuel de l'art byzantin, Paris 1910; 3rd ed. ibid. 1925; O. M. Dalton, Byzantine art and archaeology, Oxford 1911; F. Wickhoff, Römische Kunst, Berlin 1912; O. Wulff, Altchristl. und byzantinische Kunst, Berlin 1914; 2nd ed. 1936; E. Baldwin Smith, op. cit.; J. Strzygowski, Ursprung der christlichen Kirchenkunst, Leipzig 1920; J. Wilpert, Die altchristl. Kunst. Rom und des Orients, in Zeitschr. f. kath. Theologie, 45 (1921), pp. 337-69; id., Roma fondatrice dell'arte monumentale paleocristiana e medievale, in Atti del X Congresso internaz. di storia dell'arte, Rome 1922, pp. 63-71; M. Dvořák, Die Entstehung der christl. Kunst, in Wiener Jahrbuch für Kunstgeschichte, 2, 14 (1923), pp. 1-13; E. Weigand, Die Orientoder Romfrage in der fröhchristl. Kunst, in Zeitschr. f. neutest. Wissenschaft, 1923, p. 233 ff.; O. M. Dalton, East christian art, Oxford 1925; Kömstedt, Vormittelalterliche Malereien, Augsburg 1929; H. Peirce and R. Tyler, L'art byzantin, 2 vols., Paris 1932. For further references v. C. Cecchelli, Il problema dell'Oriente a Roma - alla luce delle scoperte ecc., in Atti del I Congresso naz. di studi romani, I, Rome 1929, p. 669 ff.; G. Galassi, Roma a Bisanzio, ibid. 1930.

Luciano De Bruyne