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Ivan Drpić

University of Pennsylvania, History of Art, Faculty Member

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Nevsehir Haci Bektas Veli University

Catherine Jolivet-Levy

EPHE

Eberhard Karls Universität Tübingen

Istanbul University

Elena Ene Draghici-Vasilescu (see also Elena Ene D-Vasilescu)

University of Oxford

Hacettepe University

Catherine Jolivet-Lévy

Ecole Pratique des Hautes Etudes

Mersin University

Mersin University

Arkhaia Anatolika

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Papers by Ivan Drpić

Two Cappadocian Pseudo-Mosaics

Valonia: A Journal of Anatolian Pasts 1, 2024

Attempts to simulate mosaic in paint are exceptionally rare in the monumental art of Byzantium an... more Attempts to simulate mosaic in paint are exceptionally rare in the monumental art of Byzantium and the countries within its cultural orbit. Two isolated examples, both produced by covering the wall surface with dots of paint, survive from medieval Cappadocia, one in the Sarnıç Kilise near Göreme (first half of the eleventh century) and the other in the Bezirana Kilisesi in the Ihlara Valley (late thirteenth century). In the Sarnıç Kilise, feigned tessellation is applied to the Deēsis in the sanctuary apse, while in the Bezirana Kilisesi, it graces the dedicatory inscription above the entrance. The present article seeks to recover the logic behind the creation of these two pseudo-mosaics and to reconstruct how they may have been perceived by medieval audiences. Far from being little more than feeble imitations, cheap substitutes for real mosaics, the pseudo-mosaics of the Sarnıç Kilise and the Bezirana Kilisesi bear witness to a profound confidence in the power of the paintbrush. The rupestrian environment of Cappadocia, with its hyperbolic, simulacral architecture carved from the living rock, encouraged illusionism, overt artificiality, and visual wit. It gave free rein to painters to exploit the full potential of their medium and transform the church space into a spectacle of fictive materials and art forms.

The Burdened Body: Byzantine Enkolpia and the Weight of the Sacred

Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte 86, no. 3, 2023

Few products of human artistry seem as insistently concerned with self-representation as jewelry.... more Few products of human artistry seem as insistently concerned with self-representation as jewelry. In Georg Simmel's classic formulation, articles of personal adornment work to enhance an individual's social persona by magnifying their Ausstrahlung. While medieval Christian devotional jewels were well-equipped to operate in this manner, their true significance lay elsewhere. Objects such as pectoral crosses, reliquary rings, rosaries, and prayer nuts were designed not so much to mediate between self and society, but rather to stage and facilitate an encounter of the self with itself. Focusing on Byzantine devotional neck pendants, or enkolpia, this essay considers how religiously significant wearables participated in introspective spiritual practices aimed at forming and reforming the Christian subject. The essay, more specifically, attends to the enkolpion as an instrument of self-imposed discipline and explores how the corporeal experience of carrying this object and feeling its weight, however minimal, on the body contributed to the wearer's cultivation of inner vigilance.

The Fictive Mosaics of Medieval Serbia

Gesta 61, no. 2 , 2022

The most important royal churches in thirteenth-and early fourteenth-century Serbia were adorned ... more The most important royal churches in thirteenth-and early fourteenth-century Serbia were adorned with what may be described as "fictive" mosaics. The backgrounds of the frescoes gracing these shrines were originally covered with gold leaf and patterned in imitation of mosaic tesserae-an expensive and fragile form of decoration of which only traces now survive. Best construed as products of an attempt to remediate mosaic by means of gilding, these extraordinary mural ensembles bear witness to a moment of heightened metapictorial reflection, unique in the history of Byzantine monumental art. The fiction enacted in the gold-clad frescoes enabled painting to define and assert itself in relation to the more exalted medium of mosaic and, in the process, to establish a sense of its own history.

Eloquent Hands: Epigrams Featuring Named Artists and the Eulalios Dossier (Twelfth to Fourteenth Century)

Sources for Byzantine Art History, vol. 3, The Visual Culture of Later Byzantium (c.1081–c.1350), ed. Foteini Spingou , 2022

Given the paucity of literary and documentary sources about Byzantine artists, the epi grams and ... more Given the paucity of literary and documentary sources about Byzantine artists, the epi grams and other texts assembled in the present contribution constitute a critical body of evidence on the subject. Aside from illuminating various aspects of the role and status of the artist in Byzantine culture, the contribution also addresses the larger question of how the Byzantines conceptualized the relationship between the verbal and visual media.

The Oxford Handbook of Byzantine Literature, ed. Stratis Papaioannou , 2021

This chapter explores the overlap and synergy of visual art and text in Byzantine culture, with f... more This chapter explores the overlap and synergy of visual art and text in Byzantine culture, with focus upon inscriptions, in particular those with literary aspirations. Bringing together insights drawn from the disciplines of epigraphy and art history, the chapter introduces the reader to current approaches to the study of inscribed texts as an integral aspect of Byzantium’s literary and material cultures. Among the topics addressed are the interplay between the linguistic and extra-linguistic dimensions of the written word; the use of inscriptions to mark, enhance, and comment on artifacts and visual representations; and the agency of inscribed objects as vehicles of memory and self-representation. The discussion combines analyses of specific examples across a range of contexts and artistic media with reflections on methodology and proposals for future research.

(co-authored with Aleksa Jelikić) On Large-Scale Gilding and Mosaic Simulation in Medieval Serbian Wall Painting

Archaeometry, 2021

This article explores the materials and techniques of gilding in the Serbian wall painting of the... more This article explores the materials and techniques of gilding in the Serbian wall painting of the 13th and early 14th centuries. The investigation focuses on the pictorial decoration of the churches at Studenica, Mileševa, Sopoćani, Gradac and Banjska, all founded by members of the Serbian royalty. The murals of these churches originally featured backgrounds covered with gold leaf and patterned to mimic mosaic cubes-an expensive and fragile form of decoration of which only traces now survive. Research was conducted through a combination of in situ examination, sampling and laboratory microanalyses, with the aim to identify the composition of the materials used and to reconstruct the painters' working methods. The results reveal a highly unusual, even experimental, system of gilding. In all but one instance, the painters employed leaves of what is known as 'part gold'-a laminate produced by beating two sheets of gold and silver together, which was seldom applied to images on the wall and never on such a massive scale. The article's goal is twofold: first, to present new data on an important and innovative, yet poorly understood, form of decoration; and second, to lay the foundation for a comprehensive art-historical study of the Serbian gilded murals with simulated tessellation and their significance for understanding the changing dynamic between painting and mosaic in the later Middle Ages.

Short Texts on Small Objects: The Poetics of the Byzantine Enkolpion

Inscribing Texts in Byzantium: Continuities and Transformations, ed. Marc Lauxtermann and Ida Toth, 2020

(co-authored with Andreas Rhoby) Byzantine Verses as Inscriptions: The Interaction of Text, Object, and Beholder

Manuel I Komnenos and the Stone of Unction

This article explores the fate of the Stone of Unctionthe marble slab upon which, according to tr... more This article explores the fate of the Stone of Unctionthe marble slab upon which, according to tradition, the dead body of Christ had been anointed for burialin twelfth-century Byzantium. Focusing upon the Stone's association with Manuel I Komnenos, the article examines the imperial handling of this Passion relic in relation to broader trends in the devotional culture of the contemporary Byzantine élite. The special bond between the emperor and the relic, it is argued, should be seen as a manifestation of the pervasive desire, much in evidence during the Komnenian era, to personalise and even privatise the sacred.

The Enkolpion: Object, Agency, Self

Gesta, 2018

The term enkolpion encompasses a broad category of objects — crosses, medallions adorned with Chr... more The term enkolpion encompasses a broad category of objects — crosses, medallions adorned with Christian imagery, and miniature reliquaries, among others — worn around the neck. Protecting the wearer and providing a constant focus for prayer, enkolpia were arguably the most personal and intimate of all devotional artifacts in Byzantium. They were embraced at confession and appealed to in circumstances of danger and anxiety, intensely scrutinized, caressed, and kissed. Yet the agency of these diminutive objects was not limited to their basic religious function. Enkolpia actively participated in various forms of social interaction. They could serve as gifts, collaterals, and safe-conducts and, most important, operate as physical extensions of their owners. This article explores how the Byzantines used and related to devotional pectorals. It has two objectives: first, to recover the significance of enkolpia as a distinct category of objects; and second, to shed new light on the material culture of personal piety as a critical setting for the formation of subjec-tivity in Byzantium.

Chrysepes Stichourgia: The Byzantine Epigram as Aesthetic Object

Jefimija the Nun: A Reappraisal

The Patron's "I": Art, Selfhood, and the Later Byzantine Dedicatory Epigram

Western medievalists have long questioned the notion that in the Middle Ages, as Jacob Burckhardt... more Western medievalists have long questioned the notion that in the Middle Ages, as Jacob Burckhardt famously asserted in Die Kultur der Renaissance in Italien (1860), “[m]an was conscious of himself only as a member of a race, people, party, family, or corporation—only through some general category.” The sweeping teleological narrative of the rebirth of the autonomous self-conscious individual in the Renaissance, after its protracted medieval slumber, has been challenged by more nuanced accounts of the various ways in which personal identity and selfhood were constituted and expressed during the Middle Ages. In recent years, following Alexander Kazhdan's seminal, if contested, work on what he saw as a new sense of the individual in the Byzantine culture of the eleventh and twelfth centuries, Byzantinists have joined the debate and begun to explore the issues of identity, subjectivity, and individuality. Thus Byzantine selves and their formations and representations have been examined in several contexts, including autobiography, rhetoric and letter writing, and the liturgy. This essay seeks to contribute to this project by looking at the largely neglected evidence of Byzantine dedicatory epigrams and the devotional artifacts they accompany.

Painter as Scribe: Artistic Identity and the Arts of Graphē in Late Byzantium

The Serres Icon of Saints Theodores

In the later Middle Ages, the Old Metropolis of Serres in Eastern Macedonia was home to a highly ... more In the later Middle Ages, the Old Metropolis of Serres in Eastern Macedonia was home to a highly venerated icon of Saints Theodore Teron and Theodore Stratelates. This article uncovers the history of this lost image, explores aspects of its cult, and reconstructs its artistic form and the manner in which it was displayed by bringing together the available textual and visual evidence. The article draws primarily upon three sources: the ekphrasis of the Metropolis and the collection of miracles of Saints Theodores composed by a local scholar, Theodore Pediasimos (fl. early 14th century), and a previously neglected epigram on the icon penned by the South Italian writer and diplomat Nicholas-Nektarios of Otranto (ca. 1155Otranto (ca. /1160Otranto (ca. -1235. In tracing the "social life" and transformations of the Serres icon, this study also addresses larger topics such as the formation of image cults and their relation to the cults of saints, the practice of offering precious-metal icon revetments as votive gifts, and the practice of composing liturgical hymns dedicated to icons.

Notes on Byzantine Panagiaria

The article offers some new insights into the signifi cance and function of Byzantine panagiaria,... more The article offers some new insights into the signifi cance and function of Byzantine panagiaria, small-scale containers for the bread sanctifi ed in honor of the Virgin in a rite known as the Elevation of the Panagia. This rite, it is argued, was not limited to monastic and courtly contexts or to routine liturgical observance, as is often assumed, but could be performed by the laity as well. Proposing that the use of panagiaria as personal devotional instruments was fairly common in Byzantium, the article explores the interplay between the design, materiality, epigraphic enhancement, and ritual and devotional use of these objects.

Art, Hesychasm, and Visual Exegesis: Parisinus Graecus 1242 Revisited

The Dumbarton Oaks Papers were founded in 1941 for the publication of articles relating to late a... more The Dumbarton Oaks Papers were founded in 1941 for the publication of articles relating to late antique, early medieval, and Byzantine civilization in the fields of art and architecture, history, archaeology, literature, theology, law, and the auxiliary disciplines. Articles should be submitted normally in English or French. Preference is given to articles of substantial length, but shorter notes will be considered if they relate to objects in the Dumbarton Oaks collections. Articles for submission should be prepared according to the submission guide, style guide, and list of abbreviations posted on the Dumbarton Oaks website, www.doaks.org/publications. Dumbarton Oaks Papers is published annually. Current and previous issues may be ordered online at http://www.hup.harvard.edu/. Standing orders may be placed by contacting customer service at 800-405-1619 or [email protected]. Volumes 1-59 of Dumbarton Oaks Papers are available in digital form through JSTOR; volumes 53-57 are also available at no charge through the Dumbarton Oaks website at

Books by Ivan Drpić

Materials for the Study of Late Antique and Medieval Greek and Latin Inscriptions in Istanbul. A Revised and Expanded Booklet. Edited by Ida Toth and Andreas Rhoby: https://austriaca.at/8370-9

The volume 'Materials for the Study of Late Antique and Medieval Greek and Latin Inscriptions in ... more The volume 'Materials for the Study of Late Antique and Medieval Greek and Latin Inscriptions in Istanbul' is a revised and updated edition of the booklet originally produced for the Summer Programme in Byzantine Epigraphy. This collection of 37 essays has been prepared by Ida Toth and Andreas Rhoby to provide a broad coverage of Constantinople's (Istanbul's) inscriptional material dating back to the period between the 4th and the 15th centuries. It is intended as a comprehensive teaching tool and also as a dependable vademecum to the extant traces of Istanbul’s rich late antique and medieval epigraphic legacy: https://austriaca.at/8370-9

Epigram, Art, and Devotion in Later Byzantium

This book explores the nexus of art, personal piety, and self-representation in the last centurie... more This book explores the nexus of art, personal piety, and self-representation in the last centuries of Byzantium. Spanning the period from around 1100 to around 1450, it focuses upon the evidence of verse inscriptions, or epigrams, on works of art. Epigrammatic poetry, Professor Drpić argues, constitutes a critical – if largely neglected – source for reconstructing aesthetic and socio-cultural discourses that informed the making, use, and perception of art in the Byzantine world. Bringing together art-historical and literary modes of analysis, the book examines epigrams and other related texts alongside an array of objects, including icons, reliquaries, ecclesiastical textiles, mosaics, and entire church buildings. By attending to such diverse topics as devotional self-fashioning, the aesthetics of adornment, sacred giving, and the erotics of the icon, this study offers a penetrating and highly original account of Byzantine art and its place in Byzantine society and religious life.

A Companion to Byzantine Poetry, W. Hörandner – A. Rhoby – N. Zagklas (eds.)/(Brill’s Companions to the Byzantine World, vol. 4). Leiden – Boston 2019.

by Nikos Zagklas, Foteini Spingou, Martin Hinterberger, Floris Bernard, Ivan Drpić, Emilie M. van Opstall, Maria Tomadaki, and Gianfranco Agosti

Two Cappadocian Pseudo-Mosaics

Valonia: A Journal of Anatolian Pasts 1, 2024

Attempts to simulate mosaic in paint are exceptionally rare in the monumental art of Byzantium an... more Attempts to simulate mosaic in paint are exceptionally rare in the monumental art of Byzantium and the countries within its cultural orbit. Two isolated examples, both produced by covering the wall surface with dots of paint, survive from medieval Cappadocia, one in the Sarnıç Kilise near Göreme (first half of the eleventh century) and the other in the Bezirana Kilisesi in the Ihlara Valley (late thirteenth century). In the Sarnıç Kilise, feigned tessellation is applied to the Deēsis in the sanctuary apse, while in the Bezirana Kilisesi, it graces the dedicatory inscription above the entrance. The present article seeks to recover the logic behind the creation of these two pseudo-mosaics and to reconstruct how they may have been perceived by medieval audiences. Far from being little more than feeble imitations, cheap substitutes for real mosaics, the pseudo-mosaics of the Sarnıç Kilise and the Bezirana Kilisesi bear witness to a profound confidence in the power of the paintbrush. The rupestrian environment of Cappadocia, with its hyperbolic, simulacral architecture carved from the living rock, encouraged illusionism, overt artificiality, and visual wit. It gave free rein to painters to exploit the full potential of their medium and transform the church space into a spectacle of fictive materials and art forms.

The Burdened Body: Byzantine Enkolpia and the Weight of the Sacred

Zeitschrift für Kunstgeschichte 86, no. 3, 2023

Few products of human artistry seem as insistently concerned with self-representation as jewelry.... more Few products of human artistry seem as insistently concerned with self-representation as jewelry. In Georg Simmel's classic formulation, articles of personal adornment work to enhance an individual's social persona by magnifying their Ausstrahlung. While medieval Christian devotional jewels were well-equipped to operate in this manner, their true significance lay elsewhere. Objects such as pectoral crosses, reliquary rings, rosaries, and prayer nuts were designed not so much to mediate between self and society, but rather to stage and facilitate an encounter of the self with itself. Focusing on Byzantine devotional neck pendants, or enkolpia, this essay considers how religiously significant wearables participated in introspective spiritual practices aimed at forming and reforming the Christian subject. The essay, more specifically, attends to the enkolpion as an instrument of self-imposed discipline and explores how the corporeal experience of carrying this object and feeling its weight, however minimal, on the body contributed to the wearer's cultivation of inner vigilance.

The Fictive Mosaics of Medieval Serbia

Gesta 61, no. 2 , 2022

The most important royal churches in thirteenth-and early fourteenth-century Serbia were adorned ... more The most important royal churches in thirteenth-and early fourteenth-century Serbia were adorned with what may be described as "fictive" mosaics. The backgrounds of the frescoes gracing these shrines were originally covered with gold leaf and patterned in imitation of mosaic tesserae-an expensive and fragile form of decoration of which only traces now survive. Best construed as products of an attempt to remediate mosaic by means of gilding, these extraordinary mural ensembles bear witness to a moment of heightened metapictorial reflection, unique in the history of Byzantine monumental art. The fiction enacted in the gold-clad frescoes enabled painting to define and assert itself in relation to the more exalted medium of mosaic and, in the process, to establish a sense of its own history.

Eloquent Hands: Epigrams Featuring Named Artists and the Eulalios Dossier (Twelfth to Fourteenth Century)

Sources for Byzantine Art History, vol. 3, The Visual Culture of Later Byzantium (c.1081–c.1350), ed. Foteini Spingou , 2022

Given the paucity of literary and documentary sources about Byzantine artists, the epi grams and ... more Given the paucity of literary and documentary sources about Byzantine artists, the epi grams and other texts assembled in the present contribution constitute a critical body of evidence on the subject. Aside from illuminating various aspects of the role and status of the artist in Byzantine culture, the contribution also addresses the larger question of how the Byzantines conceptualized the relationship between the verbal and visual media.

The Oxford Handbook of Byzantine Literature, ed. Stratis Papaioannou , 2021

This chapter explores the overlap and synergy of visual art and text in Byzantine culture, with f... more This chapter explores the overlap and synergy of visual art and text in Byzantine culture, with focus upon inscriptions, in particular those with literary aspirations. Bringing together insights drawn from the disciplines of epigraphy and art history, the chapter introduces the reader to current approaches to the study of inscribed texts as an integral aspect of Byzantium’s literary and material cultures. Among the topics addressed are the interplay between the linguistic and extra-linguistic dimensions of the written word; the use of inscriptions to mark, enhance, and comment on artifacts and visual representations; and the agency of inscribed objects as vehicles of memory and self-representation. The discussion combines analyses of specific examples across a range of contexts and artistic media with reflections on methodology and proposals for future research.

(co-authored with Aleksa Jelikić) On Large-Scale Gilding and Mosaic Simulation in Medieval Serbian Wall Painting

Archaeometry, 2021

This article explores the materials and techniques of gilding in the Serbian wall painting of the... more This article explores the materials and techniques of gilding in the Serbian wall painting of the 13th and early 14th centuries. The investigation focuses on the pictorial decoration of the churches at Studenica, Mileševa, Sopoćani, Gradac and Banjska, all founded by members of the Serbian royalty. The murals of these churches originally featured backgrounds covered with gold leaf and patterned to mimic mosaic cubes-an expensive and fragile form of decoration of which only traces now survive. Research was conducted through a combination of in situ examination, sampling and laboratory microanalyses, with the aim to identify the composition of the materials used and to reconstruct the painters' working methods. The results reveal a highly unusual, even experimental, system of gilding. In all but one instance, the painters employed leaves of what is known as 'part gold'-a laminate produced by beating two sheets of gold and silver together, which was seldom applied to images on the wall and never on such a massive scale. The article's goal is twofold: first, to present new data on an important and innovative, yet poorly understood, form of decoration; and second, to lay the foundation for a comprehensive art-historical study of the Serbian gilded murals with simulated tessellation and their significance for understanding the changing dynamic between painting and mosaic in the later Middle Ages.

Short Texts on Small Objects: The Poetics of the Byzantine Enkolpion

Inscribing Texts in Byzantium: Continuities and Transformations, ed. Marc Lauxtermann and Ida Toth, 2020

(co-authored with Andreas Rhoby) Byzantine Verses as Inscriptions: The Interaction of Text, Object, and Beholder

Manuel I Komnenos and the Stone of Unction

This article explores the fate of the Stone of Unctionthe marble slab upon which, according to tr... more This article explores the fate of the Stone of Unctionthe marble slab upon which, according to tradition, the dead body of Christ had been anointed for burialin twelfth-century Byzantium. Focusing upon the Stone's association with Manuel I Komnenos, the article examines the imperial handling of this Passion relic in relation to broader trends in the devotional culture of the contemporary Byzantine élite. The special bond between the emperor and the relic, it is argued, should be seen as a manifestation of the pervasive desire, much in evidence during the Komnenian era, to personalise and even privatise the sacred.

The Enkolpion: Object, Agency, Self

Gesta, 2018

The term enkolpion encompasses a broad category of objects — crosses, medallions adorned with Chr... more The term enkolpion encompasses a broad category of objects — crosses, medallions adorned with Christian imagery, and miniature reliquaries, among others — worn around the neck. Protecting the wearer and providing a constant focus for prayer, enkolpia were arguably the most personal and intimate of all devotional artifacts in Byzantium. They were embraced at confession and appealed to in circumstances of danger and anxiety, intensely scrutinized, caressed, and kissed. Yet the agency of these diminutive objects was not limited to their basic religious function. Enkolpia actively participated in various forms of social interaction. They could serve as gifts, collaterals, and safe-conducts and, most important, operate as physical extensions of their owners. This article explores how the Byzantines used and related to devotional pectorals. It has two objectives: first, to recover the significance of enkolpia as a distinct category of objects; and second, to shed new light on the material culture of personal piety as a critical setting for the formation of subjec-tivity in Byzantium.

Chrysepes Stichourgia: The Byzantine Epigram as Aesthetic Object

Jefimija the Nun: A Reappraisal

The Patron's "I": Art, Selfhood, and the Later Byzantine Dedicatory Epigram

Western medievalists have long questioned the notion that in the Middle Ages, as Jacob Burckhardt... more Western medievalists have long questioned the notion that in the Middle Ages, as Jacob Burckhardt famously asserted in Die Kultur der Renaissance in Italien (1860), “[m]an was conscious of himself only as a member of a race, people, party, family, or corporation—only through some general category.” The sweeping teleological narrative of the rebirth of the autonomous self-conscious individual in the Renaissance, after its protracted medieval slumber, has been challenged by more nuanced accounts of the various ways in which personal identity and selfhood were constituted and expressed during the Middle Ages. In recent years, following Alexander Kazhdan's seminal, if contested, work on what he saw as a new sense of the individual in the Byzantine culture of the eleventh and twelfth centuries, Byzantinists have joined the debate and begun to explore the issues of identity, subjectivity, and individuality. Thus Byzantine selves and their formations and representations have been examined in several contexts, including autobiography, rhetoric and letter writing, and the liturgy. This essay seeks to contribute to this project by looking at the largely neglected evidence of Byzantine dedicatory epigrams and the devotional artifacts they accompany.

Painter as Scribe: Artistic Identity and the Arts of Graphē in Late Byzantium

The Serres Icon of Saints Theodores

In the later Middle Ages, the Old Metropolis of Serres in Eastern Macedonia was home to a highly ... more In the later Middle Ages, the Old Metropolis of Serres in Eastern Macedonia was home to a highly venerated icon of Saints Theodore Teron and Theodore Stratelates. This article uncovers the history of this lost image, explores aspects of its cult, and reconstructs its artistic form and the manner in which it was displayed by bringing together the available textual and visual evidence. The article draws primarily upon three sources: the ekphrasis of the Metropolis and the collection of miracles of Saints Theodores composed by a local scholar, Theodore Pediasimos (fl. early 14th century), and a previously neglected epigram on the icon penned by the South Italian writer and diplomat Nicholas-Nektarios of Otranto (ca. 1155Otranto (ca. /1160Otranto (ca. -1235. In tracing the "social life" and transformations of the Serres icon, this study also addresses larger topics such as the formation of image cults and their relation to the cults of saints, the practice of offering precious-metal icon revetments as votive gifts, and the practice of composing liturgical hymns dedicated to icons.

Notes on Byzantine Panagiaria

The article offers some new insights into the signifi cance and function of Byzantine panagiaria,... more The article offers some new insights into the signifi cance and function of Byzantine panagiaria, small-scale containers for the bread sanctifi ed in honor of the Virgin in a rite known as the Elevation of the Panagia. This rite, it is argued, was not limited to monastic and courtly contexts or to routine liturgical observance, as is often assumed, but could be performed by the laity as well. Proposing that the use of panagiaria as personal devotional instruments was fairly common in Byzantium, the article explores the interplay between the design, materiality, epigraphic enhancement, and ritual and devotional use of these objects.

Art, Hesychasm, and Visual Exegesis: Parisinus Graecus 1242 Revisited

The Dumbarton Oaks Papers were founded in 1941 for the publication of articles relating to late a... more The Dumbarton Oaks Papers were founded in 1941 for the publication of articles relating to late antique, early medieval, and Byzantine civilization in the fields of art and architecture, history, archaeology, literature, theology, law, and the auxiliary disciplines. Articles should be submitted normally in English or French. Preference is given to articles of substantial length, but shorter notes will be considered if they relate to objects in the Dumbarton Oaks collections. Articles for submission should be prepared according to the submission guide, style guide, and list of abbreviations posted on the Dumbarton Oaks website, www.doaks.org/publications. Dumbarton Oaks Papers is published annually. Current and previous issues may be ordered online at http://www.hup.harvard.edu/. Standing orders may be placed by contacting customer service at 800-405-1619 or [email protected]. Volumes 1-59 of Dumbarton Oaks Papers are available in digital form through JSTOR; volumes 53-57 are also available at no charge through the Dumbarton Oaks website at

Materials for the Study of Late Antique and Medieval Greek and Latin Inscriptions in Istanbul. A Revised and Expanded Booklet. Edited by Ida Toth and Andreas Rhoby: https://austriaca.at/8370-9

The volume 'Materials for the Study of Late Antique and Medieval Greek and Latin Inscriptions in ... more The volume 'Materials for the Study of Late Antique and Medieval Greek and Latin Inscriptions in Istanbul' is a revised and updated edition of the booklet originally produced for the Summer Programme in Byzantine Epigraphy. This collection of 37 essays has been prepared by Ida Toth and Andreas Rhoby to provide a broad coverage of Constantinople's (Istanbul's) inscriptional material dating back to the period between the 4th and the 15th centuries. It is intended as a comprehensive teaching tool and also as a dependable vademecum to the extant traces of Istanbul’s rich late antique and medieval epigraphic legacy: https://austriaca.at/8370-9

Epigram, Art, and Devotion in Later Byzantium

This book explores the nexus of art, personal piety, and self-representation in the last centurie... more This book explores the nexus of art, personal piety, and self-representation in the last centuries of Byzantium. Spanning the period from around 1100 to around 1450, it focuses upon the evidence of verse inscriptions, or epigrams, on works of art. Epigrammatic poetry, Professor Drpić argues, constitutes a critical – if largely neglected – source for reconstructing aesthetic and socio-cultural discourses that informed the making, use, and perception of art in the Byzantine world. Bringing together art-historical and literary modes of analysis, the book examines epigrams and other related texts alongside an array of objects, including icons, reliquaries, ecclesiastical textiles, mosaics, and entire church buildings. By attending to such diverse topics as devotional self-fashioning, the aesthetics of adornment, sacred giving, and the erotics of the icon, this study offers a penetrating and highly original account of Byzantine art and its place in Byzantine society and religious life.

A Companion to Byzantine Poetry, W. Hörandner – A. Rhoby – N. Zagklas (eds.)/(Brill’s Companions to the Byzantine World, vol. 4). Leiden – Boston 2019.

by Nikos Zagklas, Foteini Spingou, Martin Hinterberger, Floris Bernard, Ivan Drpić, Emilie M. van Opstall, Maria Tomadaki, and Gianfranco Agosti

The Visual Culture of Later Byzantium (c.1081–c.1350), parts 1 & 2.

ISBN: 9781108483056 Series: Sources for Byzantine Art History 3 In this book the beauty and m... more ISBN: 9781108483056
Series: Sources for Byzantine Art History 3

In this book the beauty and meaning of Byzantine art and its aesthetics are for the first time made accessible through the original sources. More than 150 medieval texts are translated from nine medieval languages into English, with commentaries from over seventy leading scholars. These include theories of art, discussions of patronage and understandings of iconography, practical recipes for artistic supplies, expressions of devotion, and descriptions of cities. The volume reveals the cultural plurality and the interconnectivity of medieval Europe and the Mediterranean from the late eleventh to the early fourteenth centuries. The first part uncovers salient aspects of Byzantine artistic production and its aesthetic reception, while the second puts a spotlight on particular ways of expressing admiration and of interpreting of the visual.

Review of Maria Alessia Rossi and Alice Isabella Sullivan, eds., Byzantium in Eastern European Visual Culture in the Late Middle Ages (Leiden, 2020), in Speculum 98, no. 1 (2023)

Review of M. Aimone, The Wyvern Collection: Byzantine and Sasanian Silver, Enamels and Works of Art (London, 2020), in The Burlington Magazine 163 (2021)

Review of R. Franses, Donor Portraits in Byzantine Art: The Vicissitudes of Contact between Human and Divine (New York, 2018), in Church History 88.3 (2019)

Review of A. Rhoby, Byzantinische Epigramme in inschriftlicher Überlieferung, vol. 4: Ausgewählte byzantinische Epigramme in illuminierten Handschriften (Vienna, 2018), in Byzantinische Zeitschrift 112.3 (2019)

Review of I. Sinkević, The Church of St. Panteleimon at Nerezi: Architecture, Programme, Patronage (Wiesbaden, 2000), in Zograf 29 (2002–3)

Neourgia: The Restoration of Icons in the Premodern World

Webinar series "The Byzantine Dialogues from the Gennadius Library," American School of Classical... more

by Benjamin Engels, Fabian Stroth, Ivan Drpić, Wolfgang Thomas Filser, Benjamin Fourlas, David W J Gill, Adrian Kröger-Hielscher, Carl Knappett, and Flavia Vanni

"Skeuomorphs. Transmaterial Design in the Ancient and Medieval Mediterranean" International Confe... more

Rethinking the Wearable in the Middle Ages

by Ittai Weinryb, Ivan Drpić, Antje Bosselmann-Ruickbie, and Cynthia Hahn

Covering, protecting, and adorning the body count among the most fundamental of human concerns, a... more Covering, protecting, and adorning the body count among the most fundamental of human concerns, at once conveying aspects of an individual's persona while also situating a person within a given social context. Wearable adornment encompasses materials fashioned by human hands (like fabric, metalwork, or even animal bones) and modifications to the body itself (such as tattoos, cosmetics, or hairstyles), which beautify the body while simultaneously conveying social, political, and protective functions and meanings. The wearable is thus the most representational and at the same time most intimate product of material culture. This conference seeks to expand our current understanding of the wearable in the Middle Ages. Current scholarship on the topic in Byzantine, western medieval, Eurasian art, as well as Islamic traditions tends to encompass clothing and jewelry, and is frequently medium-specific, with minimal regard to the interrelatedness of different aspects of appearance. On the one hand, work on medieval textiles has tended to approach questions of identity, consumption, and appearance by comparing textual sources and visual depictions with surviving textiles. The study of medieval jewelry, on the other hand, largely focuses on the classification and attribution of precious metal pieces from excavations and museum collections, as scholars make sense of pieces long removed from the bodies they once adorned. Tattoos, prosthetics, cosmetics and headgear are almost entirely absent in our understandings of medieval dress practices. This separation was not always so, however, and indeed nineteenth-century art historians such as Gottfried Semper integrated all aspects of bodily adornment in their considerations of the nature of ornamentation and surface decoration.