Medieval Fortifications in Cilicia

Medieval Fortifications in Cilicia
Author: Dweezil Vandekerckhove
Publisher: BRILL
Total Pages: 282
Release: 2019-11-26
Genre: History
ISBN: 9004417419

In Medieval Fortifications in Cilicia Dweezil Vandekerckhove offers an account of the fortifications in the Armenian Kingdom (1198-1375). Through the examination of known and newly identified castles, this work increases the number of sites associated with the Armenians.

The Armenian Church of Famagusta and the Complexity of Cypriot Heritage

The Armenian Church of Famagusta and the Complexity of Cypriot Heritage
Author: Michael J.K. Walsh
Publisher: Springer
Total Pages: 375
Release: 2017-04-27
Genre: History
ISBN: 3319485024

This book explores seven centuries of change in Cyprus and the Eastern Mediterranean world through the rise and fall of Famagusta’s medieval Armenian Church. An examination of the complex and its art escorts the reader from the era of the Crusades in Lusignan Cyprus, through the rise and fall of the Venetian, Ottoman and British Empires, to the political stasis of the present day. The Armenian church was a home for displaced villagers during the post-independence era, became a military storage facility post-1974 and eventually fell into abandonment once again. This study represents a pioneering history of the Armenian community in Famagusta and a probing analysis of the art and architecture it left behind. It is also a permanent record of the long-term engagement and commitment of Nanyang Technological University Singapore, the World Monuments Fund, and the Famagusta Municipality to protect this precious site, under extremely challenging circumstances.

Approaches to Byzantine Architecture and its Decoration

Approaches to Byzantine Architecture and its Decoration
Author: Mark J. Johnson
Publisher: Routledge
Total Pages: 287
Release: 2016-12-05
Genre: Architecture
ISBN: 1351957643

The fourteen essays in this collection demonstrate a wide variety of approaches to the study of Byzantine architecture and its decoration, a reflection of both newer trends and traditional scholarship in the field. The variety is also a reflection of Professor Curcic’s wide interests, which he shares with his students. These include the analysis of recent archaeological discoveries; recovery of lost monuments through archival research and onsite examination of material remains; reconsidering traditional typological approaches often ignored in current scholarship; fresh interpretations of architectural features and designs; contextualization of monuments within the landscape; tracing historiographic trends; and mining neglected written sources for motives of patronage. The papers also range broadly in terms of chronology and geography, from the Early Christian through the post-Byzantine period and from Italy to Armenia. Three papers examine Early Christian monuments, and of these two expand the inquiry into their architectural afterlives. Others discuss later monuments in Byzantine territory and monuments in territories related to Byzantium such as Serbia, Armenia, and Norman Italy. No Orthodox church being complete without interior decoration, two papers discuss issues connected to frescoes in late medieval Balkan churches. Finally, one study investigates the continued influence of Byzantine palace architecture long after the fall of Constantinople.

The Art of Armenia

The Art of Armenia
Author: Christina Maranci
Publisher:
Total Pages: 273
Release: 2018
Genre: Art
ISBN: 0190269006

The Art of Armenia offers a sweeping survey of the arts of Armenia from antiquity to the eighteenth century C.E., addressing a range of media including architecture, sculpture, works in metal, wood, and ivory, manuscript illumination, and ceramic arts.

The Oxford Handbook of Byzantine Art and Architecture

The Oxford Handbook of Byzantine Art and Architecture
Author: Ellen C. Schwartz
Publisher: Oxford University Press
Total Pages: 665
Release: 2021-11-19
Genre: History
ISBN: 0197572200

Byzantine art has been an underappreciated field, often treated as an adjunct to the arts of the medieval West, if considered at all. In illustrating the richness and diversity of art in the Byzantine world, this handbook will help establish the subject as a distinct field worthy of serious inquiry. Essays consider Byzantine art as art made in the eastern Mediterranean world, including the Balkans, Russia, the Near East and north Africa, between the years 330 and 1453. Much of this art was made for religious purposes, created to enhance and beautify the Orthodox liturgy and worship space, as well as to serve in a royal or domestic context. Discussions in this volume will consider both aspects of this artistic creation, across a wide swath of geography and a long span of time. The volume marries older, object-based considerations of themes and monuments which form the backbone of art history, to considerations drawing on many different methodologies-sociology, semiotics, anthropology, archaeology, reception theory, deconstruction theory, and so on-in an up-to-date synthesis of scholarship on Byzantine art and architecture. The Oxford Handbook of Byzantine Art and Architecture is a comprehensive overview of a particularly rich field of study, offering a window into the world of this fascinating and beautiful period of art.

Medieval Armenian Architecture

Medieval Armenian Architecture
Author: Christina Maranci
Publisher:
Total Pages: 306
Release: 2001
Genre: Architecture
ISBN:

The monuments of medieval Armenia have been interpreted variously over the centuries as Gothic, Byzantine, Iranian, and "Saracen". However, few scholars have offered satisfactory answers regarding their origins and relations to other architectural traditions. This study examines the scholarship on the subject in East and West and offers a persuasive explanation for the current scholarly impasse. Maranci highlights Josef Strzygowski (1865-1941), a prominent figure in the Vienna School of art history, who was closely allied to the pan-German movements of the early twentieth century. Using unpublished archival materials as well as Strzygowski's numerous publications, the author shows how the ideology of race and nation pervaded Strzygowski's theories of art, and how his ideas and persona have informed - and inhibited - subsequent generations of scholars. The concluding chapter outlines a revised study of Armenian architecture, moving from issues of architectural style to contextual inquiries of patronage and crosscultural exchange. As a detailed survey of medieval monuments and as a historiographical case study, the work addresses a broad audience: not just art historians but all readers interested in how ideology shapes our critical faculties. Christina Maranci received her Ph.D. from the department of Art and Archaeology at Princeton University for a dissertation on Armenian architecture. Recipient of Gulbenkian and Mellow Fellowships, she has taught Armenian and Byzantine art at the University of Chicago, the University of Michigan at Ann Arbor, and Boston University. She is currently a professor of medieval art at the University of Wisconsin, Milwaukee.

Armenian Cilicia

Armenian Cilicia
Author: Richard G. Hovannisian
Publisher:
Total Pages: 668
Release: 2008
Genre: History
ISBN:

"Armenian Cilicia experienced a brilliant cultural era known as the Silver Age, with major advances in science and medicine, theology and philosophy, astronomy and musicology, art and architecture. Despite its successes, however, the Armenian kingdom, caught in the geopolitical contests among the major powers of the time, finally fell to the invading Mamluk armies in 1375. In the sixteenth century, Cilicia and most of the historic homelands to the east were incorporated into the Ottoman Empire, where Armenian life continued for four centuries until the calamitous events of the late nineteenth and early twentieth century violently eliminated the Armenian presence there."--BOOK JACKET.

Armenia

Armenia
Author: Helen C. Evans
Publisher: Metropolitan Museum of Art
Total Pages: 360
Release: 2018-09-22
Genre: Art
ISBN: 1588396606

At the foot of Mount Ararat on the crossroads of the eastern and western worlds, medieval Armenians dominated international trading routes that reached from Europe to China and India to Russia. As the first people to convert officially to Christianity, they commissioned and produced some of the most extraordinary religious objects of the Middle Ages. These objects—from sumptuous illuminated manuscripts to handsome carvings, liturgical furnishings, gilded reliquaries, exquisite textiles, and printed books—show the strong persistence of their own cultural identity, as well as the multicultural influences of Armenia’s interactions with Romans, Byzantines, Persians, Muslims, Mongols, Ottomans, and Europeans. This unprecedented volume, written by a team of international scholars and members of the Armenian religious community, contextualizes and celebrates the compelling works of art that define Armenian medieval culture. It features breathtaking photographs of archaeological sites and stunning churches and monasteries that help fill out this unique history. With groundbreaking essays and exquisite illustrations, Armenia illuminates the singular achievements of a great medieval civilization. p.p1 {margin: 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px 0.0px; font: 14.0px Verdana}